Midnight Train to Georgia 2011: The Long Good Bye Part 2

Sunday 10^th June

It is only since this last week that it feels like we are leaving Georgia. It started with the 1^st years finishing, but that felt more like a little holiday from lessons rather than the beginning of the end. Ren, one of our cohort, got engaged and we were invited to the celebration bash to be held in Batumi last weekend. We have no money but it felt important to be there for this special event and also it would be the last time probably that all of the remaining Group 23 people would get together. So we went cattle class by train, up on the Friday night and back again on the Saturday night to make it as cheap as possible. Batumi is a coastal town on the Black sea and has been subjected to a lot of investment and is quite ‘glamorous’.

A beautiful day on the Black Sea

A new aquisition! A moving statue (we didn't see it move)
But there is a mechanism that rotates the man and the woman . Very interesting!

The Alphabet Tower

We arrived at 7.30 on the Saturday morning after a pretty restless night and found out that many of the celebration party were on the same train and so we gathered together then split into groups again with the plan being to meet up again later. We had a fab breakfast of the khatchapuri (cheese bread) with the egg on top washed down by a couple of pints of beer. Very good and this set us up nicely. We then took a leisurely stroll to the beach and kind of settled down, with us preferring to have a little snooze while the younger elements of the group ran around playing Frisbee. The beach consists of large pebbles and so it is testament to our rough night that we managed to sleep haha.

Sitting at the Pizza restaurant waiting for news about the wedding!

We kind of drifted somewhere else after a while and then Ren arrived and we were told that the engagement might actually be a wedding if her fiancé Miriami could get the registry office booked and so we were not sure what was happening. There was no restaurant actually booked either and so we really didn’t have a clue what was going to happen! Another stroll to a pizza place for lunch and then Miriami and his mates arrived and we were told “No wedding” and that they had booked a Chinese restaurant and to meet there at 6.

Wandering through the town centre of Batumi

Batumi was the first place we visited when we came to Georgia last August and it co-incidentally it was with our group 23 and we had not been back since then. So it was a funny kind of day with the memories of what it was like to be a newbie and also looking at the changes that had taken place since we were last there. It was a good day. Here are some before and after pictures from both of our visits and while the weather makes everything seem a lot lovelier, you can see the changes!

The Lighthouse in the distance with the not yet finished Alphabet Tower (August 2011)

Taken from a different angle but you can see how the surroundings are developing (June 2012)

The Raddison hotel on the left,
unknown building and the Alphabet Tower (August 2011).

The Raddison hotel on the left plus new building,
unknown building and the Alphabet Tower with its roof on (June 2012).

The Ferris wheel all alone in August 2011

Much prettier in June 2012

I like this picture!

The Chinese restaurant was good and in the end there were about 30 of us in the party. Of course this was followed by Georgian dancing ! Emotions were running high. Who would have thought it that one year later 7 of the 8 remaining group 23ers would be here with 2 of the 8 singletons having met their future husbands? Because of course Justina also met Ola!