I know no Georgian. To me, the alphabet looks like a series of abstract designs for crochet hooks and vases, although I understand it is phonetic. I think I might just be able to make out the syllable 'pop' as the local mini-market on Bakhtrioni Street, Tbilisi, where I am staying this week, is called Populis.
So why am I here? How do I come to be sitting eating cake and drinking brandy with a writer called Zurab Lezhava in a little house in an orchard, not far from an area of the city known as Eve's Arsehole? The answers lie in Cornwall where I met my collaborator, Natalia Bukia, who is a native Georgian. Further back, the connections were made in Greece and New Zealand where we met our respective Cornish husbands.
Zurab spent sixteen years in prison for 'hooliganism'. That's where he became a writer and also developed his skills in wood carving and embroidery. Nata and I accept another glass of murky, delicious 'new wine' that he's made himself from his own vines and wonder at the circumstances that brought us together.
