Let the Games Begin

For the second time now, we boarded our loyal metal stallion and headed towards rocky kingdom of Armenia. Anything different from my mundane life is good, hence the first part of our trip, when we passed by haunting, monster-like rocks, scary, unlit tunnels, abandoned houses and post-apocalyptic factories is way more interesting than watching this f***in rain muddying Tbilisi.  So we galloped to Dilijan, a cute pine-covered town, to compete with Armenian and several Georgian teams for the title of the most intellectual group of six nerds that have nothing better to do in their lives, but sit through two days of non-stop questions, surrounded with obsessed people. The Dilijan tournament of “What When Where”, sprinkled with Jeopardy and other quiz games was as fun as two days filled with non-stop questions and obsessed people can be.

My morally corrupt teammates bought the whole duty free shop at the border (by the way, we found Armenian border transported into the modern times. My guess is that Tardis was involved). Inevitably, we trashed a very nice hotel room. Thank goodness I had my own room with my own morally corrupt husband. At least I could sleep before the game. Or so I thought.

As I was desperately trying to ignore the snoring, desensitized pile of human tissue that used to be my husband, the voices from the lobby haunted my troubled sleep. I heard piano. I heard swearing. I heard arguing. I finally stormed the lobby in my PJs, ready to tear the enemy apart, only to discover three of my teammates producing all kinds of noises. That night, my honest drunk friends told the Armenians that 1. That Baku was better than Erevan 2. That people who destroyed the gay bar in Erevan sucked (turned out, those were present in the lobby). 3. That Ataturk was a great politician and role model. Unbelievably, nobody beat the crap out of my teammates. I guess our hosts abstained from annihilating Georgian guests and causing an international scandal. Imagine the headlines: GROUP OF GEORGIAN INTELLECTUALS MURDERED BY ARMENIAN “WHAT WHEN WHERE” TEAMS DUE TO THE POLITICAL DISPUTE. CORPSES FOUND IN THE LOCAL RIVER.

Sleepless (me), sick (our captain) and hung over (the rest of the team), we managed to answer some questions the next day. In the end, we placed 4th and even received a complementary trophy. It feels weird to take an undeserved prize, received mainly for showing up (though we did better than some), but hey, it looks cool on my FB. Also, it’s our first trophy, complimentary or not. Ask and ye shall receive.

In the same spirit of wasting our lives, this weekend we went to Bakuriani for a Georgian tournament. Man, Bakuriani looks so depressing with no snow. Trash everywhere and a post-apocalyptic setting of rusty swings and horses with clinical depression. Lately, everywhere I go, it feels like I am visiting remnants of the atomic winter that have been recently rebuilt. That’s the soviet heritage for you.

The level of alcohol went down this time, due to several reasons I am not at liberty to reveal here, we just had this one annoying drunk person with us, who kept bugging people and fell asleep at inappropriate places…my hubby. He managed to piss off other players, make me mad, binge on our food and at the same time, take some amazing pics of night sky. This person can’t walk around straight sometimes, but he can take high-quality pics. Human brain is still a mystery to me.

As for the game, we played really well the first day, I think on the verge of our capacity, yes we could play better, but not much better. We felt like a team and everyone contributed. Second day....nah. No idea what place we have, I believe it’s 15th out of 50, but hey. If that’s what we’re worth, than that’s what we’re worth. We did well. We guessed pretty hard stuff. I am sick of elaborating why can’t we climb higher.

As it always happens, I feel blue next Monday and wish I was away from the raining Tbilisi. All by myself, I don’t wanna be, all by myself…

P.S. The trophy from Armenia. Received for drinking.