I have been in buffer zone

Yesterday, Octover, 14 I visited villages that were in "buffer zone" just a week ago. These are Karaleti, Tkviavi, Tedznisi, Megvrekisi and Ergneti.

In Karaleti, Tkviavi and Tedznisi many houses close to the main road are burnt down and robbed. Locals, who've stayed there during the August events say that these are mostly done by Ossetians. At first Russians just didn't stop them. However, after Russians left Gori, they started preventing looters in buffer zones too.

After we passed Gori, the first place we have visited was Karaleti that was often mentioned in news headlines during the military actions. Burned houses alongside the road... In the center there was an apartment building with few flats burned. Window frames were missing. People from windows were staring at us and the workers on the street fixing the building.

We drove off from Karaleti to the direction of Tkviavi. There, in front of one of the burned houses we saw EU monitoring mission from France . Owner of the house -- an old man was being interviewed by Monitor mission. Neighbors were gathered around and everybody was trying to get attention to their problems - burned or looted houses.

We continued our trip to Ergneti.

Megvrekisi and Ergneti were complitly burnt down. Ergneti has a Georgian block-post in the middle of the village. Just 500 meters aware are russians and ossetians dislocations. There are still mined fields and Georgians are trying to disarm those mines. We even heard the sounds of those operations.

We met few men and one woman there. They are homeless now! However, they don't complain! Woman told us how her husband was killed but she was emotionless. It seems they lost the ability to express feelings. Men were sitting in the street beside their lorry and they were even joking: "we live like Gipsys. Here in the car we have sleeping bags and sleep here."

After we drove to Megvrekisi. People had already returned to this village. Most of the houses were burnt or bombed. We met several people there. They told us story about one old ossetian woman, who was married to a man from this village. Ossetians killed her brutally and her corpse reminded unburied in her yard. Then some neighbors dared to bury her in her own garden. We saw the grave.

People were complaining that they need more attention from the Government and that nobody had yet counted their looses. They are working hard to save the last harvest that survived the military actions. Many of them stay with their neighbors, others - in the ruins of their houses.

We met 103 years old woman. Her house was complitly burnt down. She lost everything except of hope and sense of humor. Her youngest son told us his story. He received education in Tbilisi and then he moved to Tskhinvali.He bought a house there and made a good carier. In 91-92 war he lost everything and went to Tbilisi as refugee. He said that at that time attitude towards refugees in Tbilisi was good. Everyone was trying to help. However, this had changed after Abkhazia War, when 300 000 refugees fleed their homes. After some time he moved back to the village Megvrekisi. Here he managed to build a new house, but now he lost everything again. He talked without emotions as if he was telling not his own but someone else's story. They have suffered too much to have luxury of emotions!

Afterwards, he digged out a bottle of wine from the ruins, gathered some grapes and apologized that can't serve us better -- according to the traditions of hospitality. He had to borrow glass from the neighbors but only one glass was found. We toasted for their health. After We gave them some warm clothes, which we had with us.

It was clear that they had much better living before the war than we had -- their houses were big and nice, this was clear even by looking at ruins. However, now they were grateful to even our modest help.

One young man said that his garden of apples had survived, but he has no boxes to collect the apples. In other villages we saw boxes but apple gardens were bombed there. People try to collect survived potatoes and onion even thou it is very dangerous due to the mines left in fields.. 4 caws had exploded on them already.

During Russian occupation only few people remained in the village. They were hiding in cellars and out in woods. Several people who were suspected for having some relationship with our forces were executed. When Russians entered the place people fleed and they had to walk to a place called Igoeti, which is approximately in 45 km away. Afterwards, they were picked up and moved to refugee camps in Tbilisi or Kakheti. They learned who was alive and who died only when they returned.

We left village Megvrekisi and drove to Tkviavi. This is a large village which was almost deserted during occupation and people had just returned. Many houses had survived, but most were robbed. So people returned to empty houses... but some don't even have home any longer. Here people are complaining more than in Megvrekisi -- it seems they still have a power to complain. Everybody was asking how government is going to help them. Who remained in village during occupation tell the same horrible stories...

Ossetians were behaving like animals and at first russians were not stopping them from doing so. Afterwards, Russians started preventing looters and executing them. But it didn't helped much. Most of the gardens were bombed and only few fields with harvest survived. People are sitting outside of burned and looted houses and discussing who is guilty. Opinions are very different.

We visited house of ex-governor of this region -- Mikhail Kareli. His father still lives there. House is not on the main road and in the neighborhood this is the only burnt house. Kareli started with fighting against smuggling and finished up by becoming the only smuggler. However, in the neighborhood everybody is loyal towards him - it is Kareli's neighborhood, everybody there are relatives.
In the yard I saw many boxes, so needed in Megvrekisi...

We left village on sunset. It was a beautiful sunset in black, burned fields...

When we drove through Karaleti, workers had already finished the repairs. New white metal frames where fixed on black from fire walls.