Georgia Special. Episode 9

01:13:23:10 – 01:13:24:11

Hey, Gabrielle, I was wondering.

 

01:13:24:12 – 01:13:24:19

Yeah?

 

01:13:24:23 – 01:13:25:29

What are we doing

 

01:13:25:29 – 01:13:28:02

next to a Lenin statue again?

 

01:13:28:06 – 01:13:30:20

You don’t know that guy. No, no, no.

 

01:13:30:29 – 01:13:32:02

And where are we again?

 

01:13:32:06 – 01:13:33:13

Extremely. Good question.

 

01:13:33:14 – 01:13:35:07

Well, if you can see, we in Georgia

 

01:13:35:07 – 01:13:37:06

and the beautiful mountain of Caucasus,

 

01:13:37:10 – 01:13:39:23

and we’re on the exact site of where

 

01:13:39:27 – 01:13:41:10

the One Caucasus Festival

 

01:13:41:10 – 01:13:42:04

will take place.

 

01:13:42:05 – 01:13:43:23

So that’s why we’re here.

 

01:13:51:25 – 01:13:52:09

OK.

 

01:13:52:13 – 01:13:54:26

1. Let’s walk. Let’s see what’s around.

 

01:13:55:00 – 01:13:55:18

So that’s.

 

01:13:55:22 – 01:13:57:16

That’s the old communist school.

 

01:13:57:17 – 01:13:59:15

If I get it right. That’s what I noticed.

 

01:13:59:19 – 01:14:00:00

And that’s

 

01:14:00:00 – 01:14:02:10

basically the headquarters of that.

 

01:14:03:07 – 01:14:04:17

Of that event. Yeah.

 

01:14:04:18 – 01:14:05:28

And if you need any other proof

 

01:14:05:28 – 01:14:07:09

that we’re really in Georgia,

 

01:14:07:13 – 01:14:08:17

here’s the flag.

 

01:14:09:05 – 01:14:12:07

OK, so, so far, location set.

 

01:14:12:25 – 01:14:14:09

Both of us have a podcast.

 

01:14:14:11 – 01:14:16:08

I talk about nonprofit

 

01:14:16:08 – 01:14:17:20

social impact work.

 

01:14:17:24 – 01:14:20:05

And what is your podcast about?

 

01:14:20:09 – 01:14:21:20

And I talk about ethics,

 

01:14:21:20 – 01:14:23:14

usually around technology

 

01:14:23:18 – 01:14:24:18

and the natural setup,

 

01:14:24:19 – 01:14:26:08

what I do is I talk about,

 

01:14:27:11 – 01:14:28:10

let’s say sometimes the right

 

01:14:28:10 – 01:14:29:20

to repair, cybersecurity.

 

01:14:29:20 – 01:14:30:24

And I usually, host

 

01:14:30:24 – 01:14:32:15

someone from university

 

01:14:32:15 – 01:14:33:21

or academic background,

 

01:14:33:25 – 01:14:34:29

someone who’s more on the field.

 

01:14:35:00 – 01:14:35:22

And we make

 

01:14:35:26 – 01:14:37:17

like some conversational clash

 

01:14:37:17 – 01:14:39:18

to kind of make a different point of view

 

01:14:39:22 – 01:14:40:20

on the ethical challenge

 

01:14:40:20 – 01:14:41:17

of some technology.

 

01:14:41:21 – 01:14:43:13

But today, One Caucasus.

 

01:14:43:15 – 01:14:44:05

It’s been a while

 

01:14:44:05 – 01:14:45:11

since I’ve made a webcast.

 

01:14:45:11 – 01:14:45:29

It’s been a while

 

01:14:45:29 – 01:14:46:28

since you’ve made a webcast.

 

01:14:46:28 – 01:14:47:27

A few months. Yeah.

 

01:14:48:01 – 01:14:49:19

So we might as well join forces

 

01:14:49:20 – 01:14:52:03

now that we engage We are engaged.

 

01:14:52:14 – 01:14:54:17

With Joint Ventures. Yes.

 

01:14:54:21 – 01:14:56:11

So vision acquisition.

 

01:14:56:15 – 01:14:57:09

Fantastic.

 

01:14:57:13 – 01:14:59:03

So essentially,

 

01:14:59:07 – 01:15:01:03

let’s talk about One Caucasus.

 

01:15:01:04 – 01:15:01:20

Let’s talk

 

01:15:01:20 – 01:15:03:03

about the reality of

 

01:15:03:07 – 01:15:05:07

educational, uh,

 

01:15:05:11 – 01:15:07:19

educational technologies,

 

01:15:07:23 – 01:15:08:29

ethics and stuff like that

 

01:15:08:29 – 01:15:10:27

in the special context of Georgia. Yeah.

 

01:15:10:27 – 01:15:11:21

And because it’s summer,

 

01:15:11:21 – 01:15:12:24

let’s be concrete about it.

 

01:15:12:25 – 01:15:14:20

It’s not about theory on this episode.

 

01:15:14:20 – 01:15:16:06

So we going to talk about something

 

01:15:16:06 – 01:15:17:02

very concrete.

 

01:15:17:06 – 01:15:18:25

We’re here at One Caucasus.

 

01:15:18:28 – 01:15:20:01

We have Misha

 

01:15:21:02 – 01:15:21:21

Hi, Misha.

 

01:15:21:23 – 01:15:23:15

Hi Misha. Lude.

 

01:15:23:19 – 01:15:24:28

Hello. Hello.

 

01:15:25:04 – 01:15:25:21

Fantastic.

 

01:15:25:24 – 01:15:28:12

So we have you for about 45 minutes.

 

01:15:28:16 – 01:15:29:19

You’re not physically allowed

 

01:15:29:19 – 01:15:30:27

to leave the premises,

 

01:15:30:27 – 01:15:32:16

and we have a bunch of questions for you.

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When there is in

 

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30 kilometers,

 

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there is a war between Armenia

 

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and Azerbaijan.

 

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We see that there is a village

 

00:00:07:06 – 00:00:08:21

of Armenians in Azerbaijan.

 

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So they living together here

 

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and no one speaks about war

 

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and no one mentions the war.

 

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There’s something that stands out for me

 

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when I read about One Caucasus.

 

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This is the

 

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the the words interdisciplinarity,

 

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co-creation comes up frequently

 

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and that strikes me

 

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because I’m a bioethicist.

 

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And those are two terms

 

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that usually come in

 

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the way we do bioethics.

 

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Interdisciplinarity is super important.

 

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Co-creation as well.

 

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So I want to talk about

 

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maybe the organization

 

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context and challenge

 

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regarding those two aspects.

 

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Can you tell us

 

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more about the aspect

 

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of first interdisciplinarity

 

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in One Caucasus?

 

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What’s the importance of it

 

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and how do you make it happen here?

 

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I would

 

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I would say, if I can start,

 

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I would say that

 

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it’s almost geographical.

 

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It means that we are in the region

 

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where we have a different minorities.

 

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And the idea of the festival

 

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was to create

 

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a space where these different

 

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minorities can talk.

 

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And we are in a context

 

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that is really specific

 

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because we are talking about,

 

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as I mentioned,

 

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the minority Armenian minorities

 

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in Georgia.

 

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So we are also at the edge.

 

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So you are

 

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if you go this way, I think

 

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tell me if I’m wrong.

 

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You there is a country over there.

 

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It’s you’re in Armenia there this.

 

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Yes, and here is a region.

 

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Yeah.

 

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So we’re really, really on the edge.

 

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And if we know this is geographic

 

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geopolitical situation,

 

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you know, that we are in

 

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something really sensitive

 

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So that’s why our philosophy, this

 

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shaped our philosophy

 

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to go into something inclusive.

 

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Yes.

 

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To don’t maybe don’t to yeah.

 

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This can happen also because

 

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if this goes. Yes, yes.

 

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Because we have this cow.

 

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Her name is Michael.

 

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Her name is Michael.

 

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Fantastic.

 

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To give context, there’s a moment

 

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where all the cows

 

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are getting in the field

 

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and that was part of the logistics

 

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on when we can actually film.

 

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Because when you have

 

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80 cows, cows with their bells,

 

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but if I understand

 

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right, this is a

 

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historically a fairly hot zone

 

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because it’s close to different

 

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frontiers, borders

 

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that historically have been

 

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had conflicts.

 

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Instead of speaking about peace,

 

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you know, like do this peace thing,

 

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come and hug each other

 

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and we will sing Hakuna Matata and so on.

 

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I don’t know if it’s working.

 

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It would work here.

 

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So that’s why

 

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we try to focus to bring the people, meet

 

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the people.

 

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That’s what we are doing

 

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also at the skill of volunteers.

 

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We go and meet people from different

 

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countries are meeting

 

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at the micro scales.

 

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It’s the same operation,

 

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the same process.

 

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People are meeting,

 

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create, create together

 

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to have the impression to to avoid this

 

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hit and run

 

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Western

 

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colonization.

 

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Yeah, I would say this tradition though,

 

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it’s a tradition

 

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and to give it

 

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really a voice to come here

 

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and do a convo

 

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and let the youth here,

 

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the people who want to be active,

 

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to co-create, to, to express themselves.

 

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Misha, can you tell us

 

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maybe a bit more

 

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on the geopolitical context of Georgia?

 

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Myself, when I came here,

 

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I didn’t know there was Azerbaijani,

 

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and Armenian village within Georgia.

 

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I knew about the border

 

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and there was tension

 

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in between Azerbaijan and Armenia,

 

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but it seems

 

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it’s much more complex than I thought.

 

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So maybe we can give them some context

 

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of what

 

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we’re getting into in One Caucasus.

 

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When we are working

 

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in all those villages

 

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that are either Azerbaijani, Armenian

 

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or Georgian, what’s happening?

 

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Exactly, concretely,

 

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can you give us just a bit of context?

 

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Socially?

 

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Yeah, of course.

 

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First, I would add a bit on the

 

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on the previous question

 

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that the interdisciplinarity that we see

 

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is not only that

 

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we bring this interdisciplinarity,

 

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we learn a lot from locals,

 

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we learn a lot from the industry,

 

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from this reality,

 

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because we see how is possible

 

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when there is in 30 kilometers,

 

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there is a war between Armenia

 

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and Azerbaijan.

 

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We see that there is a village

 

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of Armenians in Azerbaijan,

 

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so they living together here,

 

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and no one speaks about war

 

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and no one mentions the war.

 

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And we learn that it’s possible.

 

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It’s possible to make this peace here.

 

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And answering the question

 

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about the geopolitical stuff,

 

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this area was always under

 

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the question, whose land is this?

 

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Is it Armenians?

 

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Was it Armenian?

 

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Was it Azerbaijan?

 

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Was it Georgian?

 

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You know, like

 

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it was all always under the question.

 

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But we are in Georgia

 

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and we are sure that we are in Georgia.

 

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But there are a lot of Armenians,

 

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a lot of Azerbaijanis,

 

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and they are sure that

 

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they are in their own home.

 

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This is their own home,

 

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and this is Georgia.

 

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No one no one even speaks

 

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and no one makes a questions that:

 

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Where am I?

 

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I am at my home. And it doesn’t matter.

 

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I am Armenian.

 

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I am Azerbaijanian,

 

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I am Greek or I am Georgian.

 

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I am at my home.

 

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So this is the home that we live

 

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and this is our common home.

 

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And we when we were thinking

 

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how to work, how to

 

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how to come to this,

 

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how come to this reality

 

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always we were coming

 

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from these people,

 

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from from the culture of these people,

 

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because this culture,

 

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I think, is one of the main things.

 

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The brilliant that we have here.

 

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And of course,

 

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no one tries

 

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to change something

 

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or to bring something,

 

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I think,

 

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and I’m sure that we can take more

 

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and more from these people,

 

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from this culture, from these traditions,

 

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these common traditions.

 

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Because as a as Armenian, I can say

 

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we have a lot of mixed traditions

 

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with Azerbaijanis and with Georgian.

 

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So what you want to do

 

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is focus on the common ground

 

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you have rather than focusing

 

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on the difference that can divide people.

 

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Of course!

 

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This is the richness that we have.

 

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This is that we don’t ask, never hear

 

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about what is your nationality.

 

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If you are local,

 

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you will never ask about nationality.

 

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You will ask

 

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from which village are you or from

 

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which city or from which which town.

 

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For example,

 

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we never ask about nationality

 

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because it doesn’t matter who are you.

 

00:06:40:03 – 00:06:42:01

So this is the spirit here.

 

00:06:42:01 – 00:06:43:14

Even on this field,

 

00:06:43:14 – 00:06:45:01

on One Caucasus Festival,

 

00:06:45:01 – 00:06:46:14

this is the spirit

 

00:06:46:14 – 00:06:48:28

for the it doesn’t matter

 

00:06:48:28 – 00:06:50:13

color, nationality,

 

00:06:50:13 – 00:06:52:16

religion, like a lot of things

 

00:06:52:16 – 00:06:54:05

that can divide people.

 

00:06:54:05 – 00:06:55:18

So we don’t divide.

 

00:06:55:18 – 00:06:57:28

We will multiple you know, these people.

 

00:04:49:20 – 00:05:11:21

Speaker 1

When you’re trying to do activities here we showed in the introduction the school there’s a reason why this is not a live podcast is because Internet can cut at any moment. So, you know, already Internet is is kind of complicated electricity, things like that. What’s the kind of setup on the on the in terms of infrastructure of an event like that?

 

00:05:11:21 – 00:05:20:03

Speaker 2

And if you want to ground, it a bit more in the actual context. Maybe make a comparison between you came here for the first edition, how it was and how is it now.

 

00:05:28:05 – 00:05:48:15

Speaker 3

We’re we right here. There was no windows, for example, do you know, in the school, like broken windows in the gymnasium? No, no windows, no electricity, no toilets. We had to I think it was smelling so bad that we felt that someone was dead in the toilets there. So it’s a toilet? Yeah. That’s the toilet. Yeah, it’s the whole.

 

00:05:48:15 – 00:06:07:26

Speaker 3

And we have to, we had to clean it and so on. We are how we, when we arrive here, the people are really like they’re happy and it was weird because I don’t know if you can imagine we are really at the very edge of Georgia really far. And when we arrived there is a river down there before we arrive to the to the school, we stop at this river.

 

00:06:08:03 – 00:06:27:12

Speaker 3

So we visit. There was this different people, a guy from New Zealand, different people, different colors. We come as a big, big rainbow and we arrive in this place, this we call it the little Jacuzzi. And they were like, Oh, look, the locals, it was full. It was the meeting of two worlds, you know, like and we stand like this, like I would say, 30 seconds.

 

00:06:28:07 – 00:06:50:25

Speaker 3

No, no one said nothing. Who will shoot first? You don’t know. Okay. So as I really like people and I’m not so afraid of the social relations and so I undress like they were like, hello, let’s go. You know, they took I had my camera and they took my character to discuss how you I didn’t speak nothing. And we are lucky enough to have a girl.

 

00:06:51:13 – 00:06:59:25

Speaker 3

The only girl who knew Georgian really well was a Kenyan girl. My god. Yeah. So for you, it’s. My God. So for them, it’s like, oh, my God.

 

00:06:59:25 – 00:07:10:00

Speaker 4

What are the odds? Why? What kind of choice did you make?

 

00:07:11:20 – 00:07:32:13

Speaker 3

Very abstract. And I give the kids the cameras now look. And stuff too. And I know that in this case, to break the ice, it’s for the kids because if the kids accept you. Oh, the whole community accepts you. So. And then it was okay. They were jumping, so we were just trying to jump with them and so on. And then we arrive here and it was like, Oh my God, there was on the floor.

 

00:07:33:04 – 00:07:56:19

Speaker 3

I think it was the a mattress of dust that we had to clean. But hopefully when we arrived, there were some fun guys like the guys like local guys, we some thing called Cha Cha. And we have been drinking this Cha Cha. And I think that we were so drunk, that the first night was sweet. We slept comfortably on this dust of on on this dust on the floor.

 

00:07:57:03 – 00:08:03:19

Speaker 3

And it it was kind of hardcore and romantic at the same time. This is hardmantic.

 

00:08:04:02 – 00:08:05:11

Speaker 2

Yeah that’s the thing now.

 

00:08:05:12 – 00:08:05:26

Speaker 4

Yes it is.

 

00:08:05:26 – 00:08:06:24

Speaker 1

#hardmantic

 

00:08:06:25 – 00:08:10:22

Speaker 4

 

00:08:10:24 – 00:08:21:22

Speaker 1

So that probably explains why there’s so many activities involving kids. It’s a fantastic way to break the ice with various villages and such. So that was nine years ago.

 

00:08:22:10 – 00:08:30:04

Speaker 3

Nine years ago. And when we arrive in, if I can finish when we arrive in the village to do the the workshops, I remember as a village.

 

00:08:30:20 – 00:08:32:05

Speaker 4

 

00:08:33:04 – 00:08:51:11

Speaker 3

I’m in the village as a Azerbaijani. Sorry. And the noise. Oh they’re happy to have the workshop. And when we arrive, of course they arrive. We were still the rainbow. And like this. And then we start to do the workshop. And then it starts. The noise starts again. So it means that we were accepted.

 

00:08:51:12 – 00:08:52:01

Speaker 2

Noise is good.

 

00:08:52:05 – 00:08:52:16

Speaker 4

Yeah. Noise is good. Sometimes, yes.

 

00:08:54:14 – 00:09:09:20

Speaker 2

So we talked about a lot of the villages around here that you make workshop here. But One Caucasus stays in one village. Can you tell us more about the village we’re in? The name of it and just what kind of impact did One Caucasus had on the village, positive or negative?

 

00:09:09:22 – 00:09:52:19

Speaker 5

So as we already know, all of us were in Tserakvi village and Tserakvi village is one of the, I think, biggest villages, Georgian villages in this in this area as 86% of population in Marneuli are Azerbaijanis and like just 5% of population are Georgians here in this this is a bit different region from all other Georgia. And this is a Georgian village with a big history because in this village was born Mikheil Javakhishvili. One of the brightest…

 

00:09:52:29 – 00:09:53:28

Speaker 3

Can you repeat this?

 

00:09:53:28 – 00:09:55:09

Speaker 2

Absolutely not. You know it.

 

00:09:56:01 – 00:10:30:05

Speaker 5

Mikheil Javakhishvili. Yeah. One of the brightest activists in the period of the starting of Soviet Union and anti Soviet guy I can say. Yeah. And there is a museum of Mikheil Javakhishvili and this village is like more is famous by by these by by by this person and while oh the organ organizators like… were starting to think where to to to make this these this festival happen.

 

00:10:30:16 – 00:10:54:11

Speaker 5

There was thinking about Sadakhlo, which is very close to or to Armenia. It’s on the border of Armenia. It was thinking about different different villages. But this area, I think, was was made for this festival because we have very good school. Now, of course, after after these changes.

 

00:10:54:22 – 00:10:56:20

Speaker 1

There are now windows and electricity and all.

 

00:10:56:26 – 00:11:21:00

Speaker 5

Still see a lot of a lot of a lot of lot of problems. But this is very good place for managements with the volunteers. This is very good place for living. There is very good like air and there is like very good like… how to say it? Climate, climate here. Yeah.

 

00:11:21:05 – 00:11:23:19

Speaker 1

So as you’re testing the sun right now.

 

00:11:23:22 – 00:11:27:27

Speaker 5

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. This is this is a message. This is the message from this sky.

 

00:11:27:27 – 00:11:31:05

Speaker 2

It goes so fast.

 

00:11:31:05 – 00:11:55:09

Speaker 5

Yeah. And as we started to work here, of course, first of all, there was a lot of questions, who are these guys? Why these people came here? What do they bring here? And what are they doing? Like for for example, for this area is very strange when like ladies are working with hammers and very like hard working or digging something. With tattoos.

 

00:11:55:09 – 00:12:52:06

Speaker 5

Yeah. With tattoos of course. And with very short shorts or dress, you know. And it was very strange here something. So it was very strange here. But as we speak about the impact, of course, this is the economical thing, which brings a lot of people who will who would buy something, who would go and rent a flat, who would like economy stuff it comes to comes to like starts to increase somehow another thing is the thing that I like are children, local children and all of them they know English language better than other languages, other villages because they are coming. Lud was working with them from the start and they started to like feel

 

00:12:52:07 – 00:13:12:09

Speaker 5

that we need this language to learn, we need this this to communicate with these people and they are sure that next year these people will come. And I met a lot of children that, for example, last year they didn’t know any word, but this year they start to have this simple communication. So this is the impact.

 

00:13:12:10 – 00:13:24:05

Speaker 2

That’s the way of them to get involved with you. So now they can communicate between participants.