Press Officer Rick Purnell writes ….

For our last meeting before the summer recess, Probus Mens Club members were intrigued by our speaker and educator Peter Baker’s title of “Jason, George, Nino, Joe & Sali” a QI type conundrum of historical characters for member to resolve to discover the content of his talk and slide show. We all failed.

The clues were ‘Jason of the Argonauts’, ‘St. George’, ‘St, Nino’, ‘Joe Stalin’ and tour guide ‘Sali’.

Peter presented his captivating slide show of his pre-Covid Caucasian Pilgrimage with tour operator, McCabe Pilgrimages to The Republic of Georgia, bounded by the Black Sea, Caucasian Mountains, Russia, Turkey, Armenia & Azerbaijan. A centre of the earliest conversion to Christianity and claims to be the birthplace of wine with evidence of viniculture dating back some 8000 years. The region is still have ‘wines to die for’ but little is exported.

This ancient kingdom of the Iberians and Colchis was immortalised by the Greeks, with the legend of ‘the Golden fleece’. At that time, the local practice for finding gold, a lambs fleece was pegged to the bottom of mountain streams to trap and collect gold freckles hence a golden fleece.

St. George is the nations patron Saint (as is England Ethiopia, Moscow and many other location).

St. Nino was the founding missionary to the region in 320AD. Joe Stalin, an ethnic Georgian, annexed the region to the Russian State in 1921. Sali was his local tour guide born on the day of independence 26th May 1991. She guided the party to little visited, off the beaten track places and provided hospitality by ‘locals’ to enhance the culture of the region. Since independence, English rather than Russian became the nation’s second language.

The visit included Tbilisi, the state capital, holding a third of the county’s population and a new Russian Metro built in 1966. The visit to the Gori Stalin Museum dedicated to the Soviet era was a sobering experience.

Whilst Georgia is presently an independent state, there remains a strong Russian influence with them remaining in occupation of the western province of Acasia.

The vote of thanks was given by member Chris Inch who echoed the speaker’s opinion that Georgia was well worth a visit.