Batumi, Georgia

Batumi is a small Georgian resort town on the Black Sea, less than a hundred thousand inhabitants, but I have most wonderful memories associated with this town. I was there several times (1977-1981), and all these times merged into one in my memory. I liked to stay there in October, even stretching into November, when the holiday season had already ended. And as the local residents said, “we live from season to season”, i.e. while Russian  women come and there is someone to fuck. It was said that in summer tourist boats came to Batumi, and Russian fair-haired whores, thirsty for fucking, did not even go ashore. They were lying in the cabins, windows looking out onto the pier, half-naked or completely naked, and a line of Georgians queed up for them. The men went in in turn and fucked them. With me, when I came in October, this disgrace was gone. I saw only a couple of times how young people, Georgians, apparently, rural types, in jackets, squatted near a woman sunbathing on the beach and "jerk off on her" in their imagination. Most likely, having returned home, they, under the impression of what they saw, jerked off for real.

Once I met a Georgian guy on the Maritime Boulevard. It seems that he was from the neighboring town. We spent the whole evening in a cafe. There was a complete chaos there - you could order wine on tap and whatever you liked, The room was full of thick tobacco smoke,  noise, music. For some reason, it went without saying that if I sit in a cafe with this guy and talk for a long time, drink with him, then this means that later we will sleep together. And lie down together in one bed, we will fuck. And so it happened at that time. True, the landlady kicked me out the next day because we smoked a lot... But it was for the best. They showed me where to go to look for a place to stay. And I found a brilliant place where there was no landlady.

From the Batumi railway station there was a street full of private houses with some buildings and sheds in the yard, often two-story. It all looked like heaped dovecots ... I settled in one such upper "dovecot". Toilet and taps with water in the yard, nearby. So you could wash up and give yourself an enema at any time.

Interestingly, there were two beds in the room. I could control the situation. 1) pay for the second bed so that no one shares the room with me 2) pay for the second one, but invite someone to spend the night in one bed, telling him that the second bed is not mine, not paid for. There was such an option - to sleep together in the same bed, i.e. half price each. One bed for two was rented out, if two people sleep there together! An ideal situation!

Old Batumi railway station:

The meeting place in Batumi was located at the railway station, on the platform. There was a toilet nearby. I remember the inscription on the wall (in Russian), something like this: "Even if you only fuck in the ass you are still a faggot ." That is, it was a reminder to those who believe that if they perform exclusively the active role, then, according to existing concepts, they are one hundred percent straight men.

Over time, I got to know the local visitors to the cruising area. There was only one notorious Georgian “girl”, the rest were family people who came there every evening in search of someone. Once I asked my friends at a gay place what they call “such” people in Georgian. Of course, in the Georgian language there are rude words for them, but among themselves they say this: “he understands” or “he does not understand (these things)”. So I heard all the time from them - “this one understands”, “this one does not”.

There was a buffet at the station. The buffet sold cheap wine on tap. There were stands. And this is where my pick-ups took place. It was enough to stand next to someone with a glass of wine, start a conversation, then continue drinking, and after a while, sometimes very soon, we went to spend the night at my place, because the guy either did not have a place to spend the night in Batumi, or what else.

It was a wonderful time! Rather, a short period of time. No "homosexuality", but just dating and fucking Georgian straight men, occasional  people. One day a soldier was sitting on a bench on the platform. I sat down next to him and we immediately started talking. He turned out to be a Kurd from Ashgabat.

After a short conversation, we went to fuck right next to the platform. There was a big thick tree. Everything was brightly illuminated by lanterns, but there was a black shadow behind the tree. Here we stood in this shadow, I rested my hands on a tree, and he fucked me with might and main with his big dick. “If I had more time,” he said, “we would have another go. But he had to return home for a visit. In general, there were no complexes, no embarrassment, as if it were the norm!

I also remember one guy, a Georgian. He spent some time in prison, but now he was hanging around without money, running around the towns of Georgia, apparently hiding from someone. He lived with me for several days. When I brought him to me, we first lay down in different beds. However, very quickly, under some far-fetched pretext, he moved to my bed.

He fucked me a lot and for a long time. Then he once said that "with my wife I did not get such pleasure as with you." True, this one demanded "then you take it in your mouth." He probably needed it for "prestige". I think I gave him a lick once.

A little about the Georgian "girls", i.e. passive gays. They really often look like "girls", but they were all terribly hairy, wobbly. They behaved in such a way that for seven miles you could see who they were ..

In Batumi, I knew such Georgian provincial "girl". He was a soulful person. He lived in the center of the city, and he also had a brother (not like that), who told him that “if I find out something terribly disgraceful about you from someone, I’ll kill you.” Nevertheless, there, in Georgia, in those days there was still such a manner of behavior. It is probably eastern, archaic. An ouvert "girl", a passive gay, went to the market and arranged a kind of performance there. He began to behave like a whore, let everyone know who he was, grimace, shout out some kind of sexual calls. At this moment, all the sellers from all departments and all the servants of the bazaar - they were all of rural origin - raised a loud hoot, whistled, began to wave their hands, make obscene gestures. It ended with the fact that all or almost all in turn fucked this girl somewhere backstage (in the ass, of course, there was no talk of sucking). Some kind of psychological mechanism worked here, that they could not react differently to an open sexual enticement. 

Here you are walking through a quiet town, you don’t seem to attract anyone’s attention, but one day, hanging about the town like this, I went into a Batumi bathhouse, into public showers. There was something incredible going on! Looks like people didn't come there to bathe. Everyone was constantly running between the rows of showers, looking out for someone, fiddling with their dicks, jerking them off, some walked around with an erection. They retreated to some dark corners. It seemed to me that they already knew each other there. I did not even have time to look closely and figure out what was happening. They were staring at me in the locker room. Then I went outside, I sat and smoked. People came out too. But a strange thing: on the street they immediately put on a mask of indifference. They behaved as if nothing had happened, as if just a minute ago, they were not rushing like mad all over the bathhouse with an erection. On the street, they will no longer get to know someone in order to continue communication or do something. They won't approach you for the purpose of striking up a friendship. Everyone has families, children. The small town…

Despite everything, Batumi left the best memories for me. The complete feeling that there is no division into “homo” and “hetero” and anything else, that there are none of all these stupid labels. We are all together, but there is just a small part of men (stupid, evil?) who “do not understand” the beauty of such fucking.

* * *

It sounds like a joke. In Batumi, they told me that it happened there. One Georgian fucks another in the ass and suddenly takes out a knife and puts it to the throat of the one he is fucking. But the one being fucked cannot see this in the dark, so the top still managed to somehow light a match so that the knife was visible. After that, the one who was fucked asks: “Why are you doing this, what do you want from me?” The other answers: “I wanted to scare you with a knife so that your anus would shrink and be tighter.”

 

A chance meeting in Tbilisi that left an indelible mark

I have been to Tbilisi many times and with varying degrees of success. Something began to change in the late 1970s, and compared to the 60s, there were more people aware of the possibility of sex between men, although this topic was, of course, not mentioned or discussed in the media, as it is now. Men didn't have to make hard choices for themselves - "who am I, after all?"

In the year 1978, I had the opportunity to go to Tbilisi and stay there for twenty days in a hotel. The hotel was called "Sakartvelo" (Georgia). The hotel was close to the center, it was a building of Stalinist architecture. I had a spacious room with a high ceiling and mirrors…

Hotel "Sakartvelo":

 

In Tbilisi, I knew many people and, in addition, there were some phone numbers that my friends gave me. I had a good time there! There were always people in my room, and I had to run to the nearest shop for bottles of wine every now and then. I will not describe everything, it is impossible. I can only say that in Tbilisi on one of the streets there was the only car cruising area in the USSR. There, cars passed slowly with the doors ajar, and sometimes you could join someone inside ...

I was struck by the bisexuality of Georgians. You could start talking a stranger on the street, and often the conversation ended in fucking.

This is exactly what happened with Gia. I loitered at the Railway Square metro station, looked at the people going out into the street. Here is the place:

Suddenly we crossed eyes with a guy of about 28 years old, he was an ordinary Georgian guy, in a jacket, like a mechanic. He immediately stopped, I went up to him, we lit a cigarette. It turned out that he works at the airport in the helicopter maintenance team. Very soon he asked: “Do you have a place to go?” - Yes, - I answered, you can come to me, to the “Sakartvelo” hotel. Non-residents were not allowed into the hotel, and I used to throw my entry pass out of the window, wrapped in a bag along with some heavy object. It seems we did the same with Gia.

We drank a little, and Gia immediately completely undressed. Me too. “No,” he says, “we will not fuck in bed, but in front of a mirror.” In my room there was a floor to ceiling mirror on one of the walls. I stood the doggy style on the carpet in front of the mirror, and he fucked me in different ways for a long time and with great pleasure. I felt good from complete relaxation, from the disappearance of any complexes. Wow! I met someone on the street, brought him to a hotel, and here we are fucking ... Dreams come true, as they say now.

After all this, we went to bed and talked for a long time. I asked Gia:

- Tell me, whom do you like to fuck more - women or guys? He thought about it and replied:

- I do not know for sure. When I fuck a guy, it seems to me that it’s better with a guy, and when I do a woman, it seems that it’s better with a woman.

This is absolute bisexuality! This is exactly what I have been looking for so long.

Gia remained in my memory for the rest of my life.

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In modern times, when all people have been informed about what homosexuality is, when even children know about it in all details, this phenomenon of bisexuality among the peoples of the Caucasus has disappeared. Because clear definitions have emerged - "I'm a fag or I'm with women." Something that didn't exist before. That era is gone.

 

Things that did not happen

In earlier times, in public transport, you could exchange glances with guys and men. You look, he looks, and so on all the way. It's gone now, like so many other nice things. Nowadays if you look at someone a little longer than you should, they may ask: “What are you, a faggot?” Or even worse.

 One day I was returning from the City to my Suburb, and was wxchanging glances with a simple attractive straight man. Suddenly there was a stop, some minor insignificant stop. He gets up and leaves. Then he came up to my window in the carriage and began making signs - well, why are you sitting there, you dumbass, come out with me, let's go together ... But then the doors slammed shut and the train started moving. I stuck to the window. He waved his hand. I never met this man again, although I travelled by train along this route every day. I kept looking out for him. 

In 1967 I was in Georgia visiting my classmate. I was in a village located far from the capital. From there I was returning by train to Tbilisi. I was in a 3^rd class carriage, and every time I went for a smoke in the vestibule, one man stared at me, as if I were a holy icon. One time he followed me, also to smoke. Well, of course, in the vestibule we immediately started talking. It turned out that he was an Armenian from some Georgian village. It was just a normal ordinary man from the Caucasus, he had dark eyes. He never took his eyes off me! As if suddenly he met in me the man of his life. He travelled with his elderly mother, who paid no attention to anything. The station where they had to get off was approaching. The Armenian began to persuade me to get off with him and stay with him - "you will live with me." I refused, of course. Something told me that there would be no “happiness in life” there, and everything else was not worth getting off a long-distance train with God knows who and who knows where. So, I waved goodbye to him when the train started moving, and he slowly trudged somewhere with his elderly mother and luggage. He also gave me some sign of farewell.