Eat, Drink & Rebel : Soviet Georgia Has Good Food, Good Wine and Warm Weather. All It Wants Is Cold Cash and Freedom.

EVERY AEROFLOT DEPARTURE BEGINS with the flight crew’s official parade to the cockpit--a time-honored ritual designed to intimidate passengers and reinforce respect for Soviet authority, which lately could use all the help it can get. But when the crew for my trip strutted down the aisle, it made me wonder if this bunch came to fly the plane or steal it. All of them were carrying guns big enough to qualify as excess baggage--a precaution against hijacking, the Russian next to me said, adding, in an ominous whisper, “This plane is going to Georgia.”

Consistently rated as one of the world’s worst airlines, Aeroflot wasted no time living up to its reputation. As is the case almost everywhere in the Soviet Union, nothing worked, including my seat belt, half of which was missing. As two attendants handed out the in-flight meal of greasy bread and plastic cups of water, word began to filter through the cabin that neither of the bathrooms was operational. Soviets reserve their worst planes for domestic use, and judging by the noise this one was making, the country’s spare-parts problem had reached the crisis stage. The two-hour flight to Tbilisi may be business as usual, but as my Russian traveling companion warned me, what the Georgians would be up to when we landed “was anybody’s guess.”

They were up to rebellion, for one thing. In Tbilisi, Georgia’s Mediterranean-style capital, a newly elected legislature declared independence from Moscow in April after an overwhelming majority of Georgians voted for independence; in May, they elected their own president--the first Soviet republic to do so in direct balloting. Democrats now dominate the government, replacing the local Communist Party, which is so unpopular that the remaining members are thinking of changing its name.

With democratic sentiment running high throughout the Soviet Union, it’s an even bet whether Georgia or Lithuania will be the first of the 15 Soviet republics to secede. Although the Baltic states were among the first to press the case for independence, they ran into violent opposition from Moscow. Outside attention has focused on how Boris Yeltsin, the newly elected Russian president, is angling to secure more independence for the nation’s biggest republic, but restiveness, in the form of a small-scale guerrilla war, has also broken out in Armenia and Azerbaijan. And the Soviet parliament has even moved to change the nation’s name to the Union of Soviet Sovereign Republics. Just the same, Western governments have been reluctant to recognize the sovereignty of the republics, a disappointment that leaves places like Georgia hanging in a political twilight zone. While the rest of the Soviet Union inches toward a free-market economy, Georgians have developed a black market efficient enough to provide consumers with fresh food, clothes that fit and shoes that match--rarities in other parts of the Soviet Union. At the same time, Georgia, located on the Soviet Union’s border with Turkey, has preserved its language and culture in spite of Soviet efforts to Russian-ize both.

But few Georgians think freedom will come without more bloodshed. On April 9, 1989, Red Army troops, using shovels and, according to one group of international medical observers, poison gas, killed 19 peaceful demonstrators outside Tbilisi’s parliament building. The event sparked continued outbreaks of violence and a growing fear that the region might be turning into another Lebanon--not exactly the kind of image that brings tourist dollars, which Georgian politicians see as a vital ingredient in their economic development.

To the north, 125 miles away in the autonomous region of Southern Ossetia, rebellious Ossetians who want to remain under Soviet rule--and who are armed by Moscow, Tbilisi claims--are clashing with the Georgian militia: rebels fighting rebels, with atrocities on both sides. Meanwhile, in nearby Gori, the birthplace of Josef Stalin, thousands of Soviet soldiers are waiting for orders to move in. If that weren’t enough, the area around Ossetia was recently rocked by a 7.0 earthquake, killing at least 30 people.

In big cities and small villages, Soviet embargoes--punishment for Georgia’s dissident politics--have resulted in milk shortages and fuel cutbacks and predictions of civil war. Since Georgians embarrassed the Kremlin by tearing down a four-story statue of Lenin in the center of Tbilisi, life here has become a paramilitary melodrama, complete with protest rallies, private armies and a public increasingly accustomed to the sight of men going about their business with briefcases and AK-47s.

Still, the Georgians on the Aeroflot commuter plane all seemed glad to be returning home to the warm weather, red wine and spicy dishes of their native land. With everyone taking food out of suitcases and telling stories, the flight was like an airborne family reunion. A Georgian jewelry dealer, now a citizen of Israel, introduced himself and informed me he was going to Tbilisi to visit his relatives, all of whom, he assured me, were devoted capitalists. In fact, the jewelry dealer was soon busy telling how he bought his plane ticket for rubles despite a law that requires foreigners to pay hard currency, such as dollars, deutsche marks or pounds.

“All it took was a little bribe,” he said with a smile. The payoff, also in rubles, which no Soviet in his right mind thinks of as real money, saved the dealer $110. That news set off an immediate round of high fives, and afterward, the two of us agreed to meet at his cousin’s black market store to exchange travel tips.

Below, the snow-covered Caucasus Mountains gave way to rolling green farmland and highways lined with palm trees. As the plane descended, the smog over the city made it seem like we were landing in a scaled-down version of LAX. After the crew straggled out of the cockpit, looking somewhat worse than they did going in, every passenger made a mad dash for the exit.

When I finally got outside, it was easy to understand why people were in such a hurry to leave the plane. Following the near-freezing temperatures in Moscow, the bright Georgia sunshine and sweet smell of spring flowers were instant therapy. Politically, the feeling in the air was so pro-Western, there was even an American flag flapping above the main terminal. “It’s for President Nixon,” said a Georgian college student, helping a friend with his bags.

He wasn’t kidding. Richard Nixon was in town on an unofficial fact-finding mission, and Georgians appeared happy to have him. On the way to my hotel, traffic was stopped twice for Nixon’s motorcade. As the shiny black Volga carrying the former president drove by, I caught a quick glimpse of his unmistakable pear-shaped head.

“Look, Nixon !” said my driver, sounding as if he was pointing out a local tourist attraction. When I mentioned that many Americans call him “Tricky Dick,” the man seemed slightly offended. In Georgia, he replied, every guest is considered a gift from God.

It was three days before the March 31 republic-wide referendum on independence, and Georgians were understandably eager to talk politics. Most expected the measure to pass by a landslide. Outside the parliament building, where people gathered by the hundreds to denounce the latest Soviet ultimatums, there was a strange sense of excitement and confusion, as if something everyone wanted, but no one quite understood, was about to happen.

GEORGIAN HISTORY IS FULL OF RICH CULTURAL achievements--poetry, church architecture and music--as well as long and bloody wars, wars that often left the small but strategically situated nation in the hands of world-class tyrants: Genghis Khan, Tamarlane and, more recently, Georgia’s own native son, Iosif V. Dzhugasvili, better known as Josef Stalin.

Oddly enough, despite the push for democracy, many older Georgians still hold dear the memory of Uncle Joe, and it’s not unusual to see pictures of him in restaurants and private homes, particularly in the countryside, where he’s remembered less as a ruthless dictator than as a sort of good old boy who loved to eat meat dumplings and drink Georgian wine.

In Gori, there’s a statue of Stalin in the city square, a Stalin museum (permanently closed for repairs) and a park that houses his boyhood home. Most Georgians, I discovered, don’t like to talk about Stalin; maybe it’s because they think a few of his more sinister traits are still in the gene pool. “Why do people want to know about him?” a man in the mountain city of Telavi asked me. “The guy was crazy.”

When I pointed out that there are a lot of Americans who feel the same way about Nixon, he shook my hand. It was nice to learn that Georgia and the United States had so much in common, he said.

Geography is destiny, and Georgia’s location, in the middle of the ancient Silk Road, for centuries made it the perfect rest stop. As a result, Georgians are among the world’s most unrelenting hosts, wining and dining visitors at elaborate feasts that can last for hours. Unlike Russians, who are often suspicious of foreigners, Georgians won’t let them stop eating. And if they want to talk business between meals, the Georgians are all ears. “Georgia is a little country, and little countries survive by making friends,” says film critic Paatta Iakashvili.

Of course, it’s easy to like people who are constantly telling you how great you are. Georgians invented toasting, and meals are always accompanied by speeches in praise of everyone present. Despite food shortages in other parts of the Soviet Union, farms in Georgia seem to be working overtime. Sitting down to a typical dinner of spiced chicken, fried eggplant, grilled sturgeon, bread, caviar, fruit, nuts, wine, vodka and cognac is a treat in itself. But an accomplished toastmaster, known as a tamada, can turn it into an Academy Awards ceremony.

With a history that antedates the Christian era and a unique alphabet and literature that go back to the 4th Century, Georgians long ago mastered the art of schmoozing. The point isn’t dishing out gratuitous compliments; the real aim is laying down a friendly basis for closing business deals, and when it comes to that, the people of Georgia, whose ancestors did lunch with Marco Polo, are unsurpassed anywhere in the Soviet Union. Once they begin applying those same skills in a free market, the whole republic could become one gigantic sales banquet.

The times, it appears, are perfectly suited to the hot-tempered, warm-hearted Georgians’ sense of drama. Sidewalks along Rustaveli Avenue, Tbilisi’s tree-lined main street, seem to be constantly full of pedestrians, many dressed in the latest Western fashions and almost all talking politics. Men in black-leather jackets walk arm in arm, incredibly beautiful women with raven hair do the same, and kids run everywhere waving little Georgian flags.

In the days leading up to the referendum, downtown streets were often closed for demonstrations. Dozens of political parties have formed, each laying claim to its own special section of Tbilisi curb front. There’s the Helsinki Union, the Greens, the Republican Federal Party and the St. Ilia the Righteous Society. At last count there were more than 25 parties in Tbilisi alone. The atmosphere is a little like Berkeley in the late ‘60s, except that nobody runs around naked.

One of the most boisterous groups is made up of followers of Djaba Ioseliani. The founder of Georgia’s best-equipped private militia, Ioseliani, a former bank robber, was recently arrested for possessing a gun, conduct that hardly seems criminal in a place where firearms have become virtual fashion accessories.

Georgia’s President Zviad Gamsakhurdia, head of the powerful Round Table coalition in the state legislature, put Ioseliani in jail, he said, to ensure public safety. Ioseliani’s army, still more or less intact, has allied itself with the National Congress Party, whose sworn aim is to unseat Gamsakhurdia one way or another, so public safety could be a relative term. Some of Gamsakhurdia’s opponents have accused him of being a dictator; others say he’s in the KGB. He denies both charges but admits that occasional breakdowns in law and order require him to get tough.

All crime, politically inspired and otherwise, is said to have risen sharply throughout the Soviet Union. In Georgia, murders have reportedly climbed to three per day; robberies are also on the increase. After four peaceful trips to Tbilisi in the past year, I finally became a statistic myself, when my passport, visa, plane tickets and $200 in highly desirable 10s and 20s were cunningly removed from my person in the central telegraph office.

But police work on the case was impressive. Television bulletins alerting the public to my misfortune were broadcast, and the stolen items--minus the money--were returned by the pickpocket squad in less than 48 hours.

MOSCOW IN THE EARLY SPRING, when the melting snow turns the streets into rivers of mud and garbage, looks and smells like a plumbing problem. Tbilisi, which is on the same latitude as Rome, is clean and green. Brightly colored houses with flower baskets in the windows and ornate hand-carved balconies give the Georgian capital the open feeling of New Orleans or Santa Fe. Despite their reputation among Russians for being hot-headed and uncontrollably spontaneous, Georgians, at least the several dozen I’ve met, are generous, friendly and unfailingly polite. Even a man carrying a rifle in the airport snack bar had the courtesy to wrap the weapon in his trench coat when a mother and her children walked in.

“Communism tried to impose the Russian psychology on the republics,” says one Georgian who recently dropped out of the Communist Party. “But it didn’t work in Georgia. We kept our language, our culture, our Christian religion. That’s what helped us to survive. No one can stop Georgians from being Georgians.”

Not being Georgian, however, has led some residents of the republic to complain that they are being treated like second- and third-class citizens. Non-Georgians say they are denied the right to vote, the right to use their own languages and are otherwise made to feel unwanted. Native Georgians make up almost 70% of their republic’s 5.5-million population, but their culture dominates the region. Georgians claim to get along with all of the nearly 100 other nationalities living in their republic. It’s the Kremlin, not them, they say, that’s stirring up ethnic unrest to use as an excuse to send in more troops. And should the current showdown with the central government turn into a full-fledged war, “the Georgians,” outgoing U.S. ambassador to Moscow Jack F. Matlock Jr. once told me, “are just crazy enough to fight.”

For centuries, Georgians have been fighting battles with their neighbors--and usually losing. In 1801, Georgia, for its own protection, signed a treaty with Russia that incorporated it into the empire of the czar. Like citizens of many small countries, Georgians have had to depend on the kindness of strangers who haven’t always been that kind. In 1922, after a three-year post-revolutionary period of democracy, the Red Army invaded Tbilisi, and the Georgian Republic became part of the Soviet Union. Bitter memories of the forced collectivization and political executions that came later are part of every family history in Georgia. Nationalistic feelings understandably run high. But the real motivation behind the current independence movement and the Kremlin’s reaction to it is economic.

Moscow’s use of force against the breakaway republics has been widely seen as a return to Cold War repression. But Givi Taktakishvili, chairman of the Georgia legislature’s committee for economic reform, says the main goal of Kremlin leaders is to prevent the new governments from getting Western hard currency.

“Whenever money comes into the Soviet Union--private investments, foreign aid, anything--it goes through Moscow, and the Communists take all they like,” says Taktakishvili. “Now tell me, do you honestly think they want that to end?” Taktakishvili likes to compare the Communist Party to the American Mafia. Instead of trickle-down economics, he says, everything in the Soviet Union is trickle-up.

Last October, when voters elected a democratic legislature headed by the popular Gamsakhurdia, the Kremlin retaliated by reducing deliveries of gasoline, electricity, meat and milk. Georgia, whose farms produce a large part of the Soviet Union’s citrus and wine and most of its bottled mineral water, responded by curtailing shipments of those products. The food fight continues, but it’s been overshadowed recently by other hostilities.

The day after the March 31 referendum, Gamsakhurdia, 52, held a special press conference to announce the results of the voting. A former college professor who spent two years in jail for anti-Communist activities, Gamsakhurdia’s hobby is translating Shakespeare into Georgian. Apparently for the benefit of Western reporters, he decided to hold the press conference in English, which many Georgians speak and which most prefer to the official Russian language.

After all the figures were read--more than 99% of the 3 million Georgians who turned out voted for independence--Gamsakhurdia, looking like he needed a good night’s sleep, launched into an attack on Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev. Gorbachev had called for the Georgian government to stop the fighting in Southern Ossetia, threatening that if Georgia couldn’t handle the problem, Soviet forces would.

But it’s the Soviets who are arming Ossetian rebels, Gamsakhurdia thundered, pounding the table for emphasis. And to prove it, he produced a group of Georgian villagers who had been waiting in the hall. The TV cameras turned toward five men, all carrying pieces of a Soviet Army rocket that, they said, had landed on their town the night before. Each began telling stories about Ossetian terrorism and Soviet military activity. One described how Soviet soldiers from the Central Asian republics were kidnaping Georgian children and selling them back to their parents in exchange for food. Another told about a nighttime helicopter raid that left several Georgians dead. The Ossetians complained in Russian newspapers that they are being subjected to the same kind of brutality by Georgians. The Georgians say that’s Kremlin disinformation.

Gamsakhurdia, by now, was spreading rocket parts all over a conference table and inviting reporters to visit the state Interior Ministry to see more captured Soviet weapons.

But Gamsakhurdia and others have a long way to go before they can prove to the world that Georgians are rational enough to govern themselves--and keep the peace. In May, the acting president of Adzharia, another of Georgia’s several rebellious regions, was shot by the acting vice president, who was then shot by the acting president’s bodyguards. New elections are expected.

IF GEORGIA IS STILL LEARNING TO BE A DEMOCRAcy, few of its citizens need instruction on how to be capitalists. The Soviet embargoes have hurt the Georgians but have also made them more resourceful than they normally are.

With the Red Army breathing down their necks, Georgians, long recognized for their black market talents, are fast developing the most aggressive economic policy of any republic. In April, the legislature passed a law guaranteeing foreign investments and extending tax breaks to new businesses. Austrian firms, getting in on the ground floor, have built ski resorts in the Caucasus Mountains and more recently a four-star hotel, the Metechi Palace, in Tbilisi.

The Metechi deal is a classic example of start-up capitalism. The Tbilisi city government supplied the land, building materials and construction workers, while the Austrian developers provided $77 million in outside financing. When the Austrians earn back their investment, a special agreement calls for the city to take over the property in 15 years and sell it to private owners.

“The Communists’ main function in life is to give people permission to do things,” Gamsakhurdia says. “That’s why they’re so afraid of a free-market economy. Once people are on their own, they don’t need anybody’s permission to make money. At that point, the Communists are out of work.”

WHEN I ARRIVED back at my hotel, I got a call from the jewelry dealer I’d met on the plane. He invited me to stop by his cousin’s store the next morning. A new shipment of leather jackets had just arrived, and friends of the family got an automatic discount.

The store looked like an indoor yard sale. There were packs of Marlboros on display, a bottle of Opium perfume, a tea set with ballerinas on the cups and half a dozen black-leather jackets.

In Moscow, the black market often operates in vacant lots, parks and other open spaces. That way, the KGB, which takes a customary 20% protection fee, can keep an eye on things. “They’re better accountants than I am,” says one merchant. “I always know when I’m having a good month: The KGB wants more money.”

In Georgia, where the authorities are somewhat less watchful, the market works behind closed doors. Just the same, it’s no less consumer-oriented than Kmart. Everything is for sale, assuming you’re willing to pay big rubles--or hard currency, in some cases--and aren’t that particular about breaking the law, which nobody seems to be.

The Soviets, who can’t transport a potato from Point A to Point B without losing it (or having it rot en route), could learn a few things about distribution from the Georgians. In Tbilisi, the typical black market store works like an international carry-out. The customer places an order, puts down a deposit, and the system does the rest. If an item isn’t available locally, the store sends someone to Turkey to buy it, often on the black market there. It’s a little like having your own personal shopping service. From purchase to delivery, the process is a model of economic efficiency.

What makes the Georgian black market work so well is that it is made up of dozens of family businesses, all competing with one another. When squabbles get out of hand, they’re supposedly settled by negotiations, not by murder, a common problem-solver in other republics. Stores might be destroyed and family names cursed--as former foreign minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze’s was when, as local party boss, he tried to break up the trade mafia and ordered winemakers to dilute their product to increase sales--yet nobody in the black market ever gets killed over money. At least, that’s what Georgians claim.

When the free-market economy arrives, whatever it can’t supply, the black market undoubtedly will. Some people weren’t designed to sit behind cash registers.

“Tell me what you want,” my friend’s cousin says. “You can pick it up when you come back.”

In the end, Georgians don’t seem to worry that the world’s second-largest superpower is mad at them. Or that a few miles outside of Tbilisi, there’s enough firepower to level their motherland. They’ve got other things to do, and making money is one of them. In a way, it’s inspiring.

Two days later, the Tbilisi airport was closed for repairs, and Aeroflot was using a nearby Soviet military base as a temporary depot. MIGs were taking off, heading north toward Southern Ossetia--part of the Kremlin’s standard package of flyover harassments, and the roar they sent across the runway was deafening. “That’s a pretty frightening sight,” I said to the man next to me as we boarded our flight to Moscow.

“Not really,” he said, giving the jets a disdainful sneer. “I’m a Georgian.”