I left Uherske Hradiste by train to Prague. It was quite a pleasant train ride. The snowy scenery was nice but I struggled to get any decent photos. I arrived in Prague 4 hours later and it was miserable. Very cold, mainly due to the wind, and foggy. My plan was to go see some sights around Prague but instead I got straight on the bus to the airport.
My first flight was to Warsaw. I didn't realise I had 2 flights. If I did, I probably could've just got the train from UH to Warsaw. It was only an hour flight. The second flight was almost 4 hours and it was horrendous. There were a lot of teenagers on the flight. I don't really know why, and they had a habit of constantly moving up and down the aisles. There was also a shapely (spherical) lady standing in the aisle chatting to her friend the entire flight. Whenever the service cart would come past she'd waddle her way back to her seat, then waddle back on over. The entire plane seemed to be chatting, the entire way. Keeping in mind this flight went through the night, departing at 11 and arriving at 6. The worst thing though, was that the temperature was set to uncomfortable heat. I was on the verge of sitting there in my undies, it was that hot. I don't actually know if that isn't allowed.
It will still dark in Tbilisi when I arrived. I got a bus to my hotel. I paid on my phone for the bus, but no ticket was forthcoming. On the journey some ladies came around to check tickets. They scan people's travel cards which makes a bird noise if they have paid. They came to me and I couldn't figure out how scanning my phone was going to produce a bird noise, so I said "I don't know what I'm supposed to do" and they left me alone.
The hotel is a 4 star one that I was looking forward to staying at. In fact, it is actually shit. The mattress is very firm (which I don't mind that much). The housekeeping is constantly in the hall having conversations with each other and tapping on doors. The minibar fridge isn't actually there. There is a space for it, and a power cord, but no fridge. The shower takes ages to heat up. There is an impressive list of movies available on the TV, but when you go to watch them they are all "coming soon". The wifi is slow. The window in the room is fake. The breakfast is terrible. I don't know why anyone would ever think 5 different types of cheese, some chopped up tomato and capsicum, quinoa, devon and stale bread would make for a good breakfast. The coffee machine had a big sign on it that says "NOT FREE". When the lady went to make my coffee I asked for the machine coffee, rather than the pot coffee. I'm fairly sure she poured me the pot coffee when I wasn't looking, because it definitely wasn't a cappuccino.
Anyway, I got to the hotel and checked in early, then went to sleep. I woke up around 2 or 3pm and headed out for a little look around. As average as the hotel is, it is in as good an area as it could be. Right on Pushkin Square. I walked down hill past endless souvenir shops to the river and the apparently iconic Bridge of Peace. There were a few tourists and some kids break dancing, which wasn't very peaceful at all. A lot of people asked me for money. What can I say, I just look too affluent. I offered to pay them with card but they sadly don't have eftpos facilities.
The city is quite nice, but fairly run down and grimy. Today I went to the history museum, and it had outstanding scale models from the late 1800s of some buildings. The models were of the buildings looking run-down and grimy too. So I think they might be run-down and grimy either by design, or have been maintained I that state for a long time.
I went to a burger place for dinner, which was actually fantastic. It wasn't that cheap though. I paid 33 lari for a burger, chips and drink. A Lari is worth 58 Australian cents, so it was $20 for a meal that probably would've been 30 in Australia (it was an exceptionally good burger). On the way back to the hotel I stopped in at the supermarket, and that's when I saw how cheap stuff is. A 600 ml bottle of coke cost me around 80 cents.
Today, after my terrible breakfast, I spent some time trying to find some self guided audio tours on the internet. I gave up though when they cost too much or didn't exist. Instead, I typed "attractions" into google. One attraction, that was listed as not too far away, was "Brown Dog Bacho." He was described as "the newest wonder of the world" and has many, many, many reviews. I thought it might be a statue of a dog that did something amazing, but it is literally a brown dog that is noted for its laziness. So I headed in that direction and not long later there was Brown Dog Bacho, right where he was supposed to be!
After my number one goal for the day was achieved, I made my way to the history museum. I was looking forward to learning about the history of Georgia and Tbilisi. Unfortunately, I left knowing nothing more about Georgia than when I entered. It was a collection of old stuff, and rightly so, but with no real reason for it. For example, there was a collection of headscarves that very well could've come from the op shop that day. There was also some old furniture and the aforementioned scale models, which were actually impressive for their accurate grime.
Probably the most interesting thing about the museum was the woman sitting at the front reading when I walked in. She followed me, pacing back and forwards, through the first few rooms. The floors were really squeaky, so I could constantly here her pacing. At one point I thought she'd left because I couldn't hear the pacing, only to turn around and have her right behind me. I started to think she was a ghost, and like a ghost she disappeared. When I got to the end, I saw her back at her station where she started. I snapped a photo of her, then decided to go take a closer one through the window as she was my second favourite exhibit, but she caught me.
After being quite disappointed, I moved on to the upstairs area where my favourite exhibit was. It was of blokes gutting an upstairs area of a museum and it was very accurate. They were so lifelike and interactive in the way they gestured I go away.
After the museum I crossed some bridge and went to a cable car up a big hill. I didn't really know what was up there, except some big statue of a lady, but it was like a dollar to get up there. There was a bloke with a huge eagle up there. I asked how much for a photo and it was 20 lari so I declined. There is also the remains of a castle up there, which I later learned was from 400ad-ish when the city was first founded. It was closed for restoration though, and jusging by how little was left restoration means completely rebuilding to operate as a tourist trap. The big lady statue had a QR code on it. When I scanned it it took me to a website, but appeared like I was receiving a phone call. When I answered, it was the big lady calling to tell me some stuff about herself. I thought that was quite cool. I can't quite remember what she said though. I do know she has a sword to hit her enemies and a bowl of wine for her friends and she finds them both quite heavy. I dunno, I guess I thought it was a real phone call, because I usually tune out when I'm on them too.
I went back down and walked to the park pictured in the photo with those 2 cannon looking buildings. There I met Ronald Reagan!
He didn't know what those cannon building were, nor did Google, and I couldn't be arsed finding out.
The building up behind them is the State Palace of Ceremonies.
I kept walking along the river and kinda got trapped by a road. I had to get across so I could get up to a bridge in order to cross the river. I had heard the traffic here is bad, but it really isn't. It flows really well, but it is relentless. There are just no breaks in traffic. I ended up walking past 2 bridges, probably around 1.5 to 2km, before I found some lights where I could cross. It did take me past this mushroom building though:
It is the house of justice/public service building.
When I eventually got across the river, I made my way to the Georgian National Museum. All around Tbilisi there are these ramps cut into the stairs for people in wheelchairs (and I think more realistically, prams). It is actually fairly progressive to have gone to so much effort in the name of accessibility. I would argue that unless you are going to do in properly, you might actually be better off not doing it at all. This is my favourite wheelchair ramp so far.
Narrow, steep and with sewerage grate in the middle!
The national museum was OK. It had a section on archaeology that I found interesting, including a series of skulls of humans and our prehistoric relatives. Looking at each skull I came to the conclusion that I bear more similarity to the Neanderthal than the humans. That isn't a joke either.
There was a series of skulls of bears that I also found interesting. They had been found in a cave, placed on a natural shelf, like trophies. The interesting thing is that they were not placed there by humans, but by Neanderthals, who were quite possibly my direct ancestors.
The rest of that floor was made up of taxidermied animals. I think they managed to get every animal in Georgia, plus there was one of a tiger that had accidentally wandered into Georgia in 1922 (apparently this accidental migration of a tiger has happened twice in Georgia's history, and they killed both of them). They were really well done, but I'm really not that interested in dead animals that are made to look alive.
I then had a look at the national treasury, which was a bunch of jewellery and coins that had been found over the years. It wasn't that interesting. Then I saw the soviet occupation section. I was mildly interesting. Apparently the soviets occupied Georgia from 1922 until 1991, committing various acts of oppression. They systematically killed off the aristocracy and smart people as well as the wealthy peasants. I remember now that the giant statue on the hill told me that one of the churches was turned into a prison by the soviets, and it has now been returned to a church. I think it was this one:
One interesting thing was that it was two 14 year old boys that started and led one of the resistance movements. There was a section upstairs that had a whole heap of letters. I google translated one and it was some blokes griping about the soviets taking their church, so I didn't bother translating any others.
The final part of the museum was some art. I am sure it was wonderful, but on my way over the bridge earlier, I had accidentally wandered into an outdoor art market and they were, in my opinion, much better than the museum art.
I'm now back at the hotel resting. I might venture out tonight now I'm more familiar with the city. My fake window just went dark so it might be night time now. There are police everywhere here, especially around the square outside and the government buildings. Last night as I was walking back, groups of men with masks on were starting to appear around the square. It didn't feel much different to any big city where people congregate in groups around the squares on a Friday or Saturday night, except that it was Monday and masks were banned a few days ago.
I'm just going to dump any other photos here.
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