There is an old Georgian drinking custom that catches the flavour of this small Caucasus mountain republic rather nicely. It is part of the tradition of the Georgian table known as Supra. As the glasses are filled, each participant (largely but not always men) must stand and give an extended and flowery toast. Glasses must then be drained. Not only does this lead to the expected drunkenness but also to a larger-than-life sense of this land of poets and pirates.
In the dreariest days of Soviet dictatorship everyone envied the Georgians. It wasn’t just their mild Black Sea climate where you could drive from orange orchards to ski hills in no time. But the Georgians just seemed to enjoy life more – the food was better, the rules were looser, the arts were livelier. It led to a still-lingering resentment and the Moscow stereotype of Georgians as a country of chancers and crooks who just couldn’t be trusted. Joseph Stalin was a Georgian. So was Eduard Shevardnadze, the Soviet foreign minister who helped undo the Stalinist system.
