It’s a short walk beyond the 7th century Ateni Sioni Orthodox church in Tana valley, then down a track and through the river ford (or across the wooden footbridge) and up the gorge, the mountains rising up on either side. New signs indicate trails rising to Damchkeri Waterfall straight ahead, or a hiking route all the way up to Danakhvisi viewpoint, a route which will pass a small 10th century chapel dedicated to St. John the Baptist.
Welcoming participants of the mobile academy, they gave an overview of this place and their motivation in developing their Marani and guest house. Nika is an art historian. During the Soviet time, when he was a student, he worked as a teacher in Ateni and felt in love with this locality. From 2004 till 2012 he worked as a Minister of Culture of Georgia, then as a Director of National Agency for Cultural Heritage Preservation of Georgia. Diana is an architect. They both used to work together on projects in the Ministry of Culture and National Agency. Over 10 years ago, they decided to move from the city here to Ateni, to build a house and the wine cellar, constructing these almost entirely from local stone materials, recycled from abandoned structures. Today, they own almost 4 hectares of vineyard and produce local variety of grapes, using mostly Chinuri, Goruli Mtsvane, Budeshuri, Tavkveri and Pino. Their guest house welcomes people from all over the world. As part of this, they express a particular interest in preserving the cultural heritage of the place, to develop educational and environmental programmes. Soon they plan to restore a small old building on the main valley road to act as an information centre.
Krzysztof Czyżewski of Borderland then explained his personal motivation in developing this idea of a mobile academy of dialogue.
Here today will be twenty individuals from seven different countries, and Dilemma is the word he proposes as the working name of this endeavor. For him, the first dilemma was how to conceive a structure for this Mobile Academy of Dialogue itself. He proposed that over the next few days there would be no fixed agenda or format for discussions, simply the opportunity to share ideas and experiences. ‘I want this opportunity for us to speak about utopian dreams,’ he says, ‘not to be derailed by practical details.’ The discussions here, over the next few days, will shape future actions.
He gave the example of a post-second world war literary magazine, ‘Kultura’, published by Jerzy Giedroyc in Paris in the years 1947 -2000. This was a small but highly influential magazine, featuring writers such as Czesław Miłosz, Maria Wisława Szymborska (both later Nobel Prize winners), Witold Gombrowicz and many others from the Polish diaspora and within communist Poland. In particular, Giedroyc advocated for the peaceful Polish recognition of the post-war borders with Ukraine, Belarus, and Lithuania – the idea that by supporting the independence of these states together they could achieve emancipation in the long term. The challenge was to change a mindset which is always trapped in the past, which only focuses on ancient prejudices; that says ‘We are victims of history, we are superior to our neighbours’ rather than ‘We need to think about our own responsibilities in these conflicts, rather than blame someone else.’ The ideas of Giedroyc become highly influential in Poland’s post 1989 foreign policy towards the east.
Krzysztof spoke of the need, in the modern era, to find new solutions, not simply those of the EU or the USA, emphasising the need for empathy, reflection and cooperation. He spoke of what Borderland would like to do – create a small mobile academy to help find the language to communicate, to talk about spiritual and emotional life, ethical values, to support ‘small centres of the world’, to look at ways to share knowledge, learning, mentoring. Why? Because he felt there was an empty space in public discourse and the language of prejudice and nationalists was attempting to fill up this void.
This academy would involve many different people associated with universities, schools and other types of scientific and educational institutions.
Our second session. On the roof, into the evening.
As the sun rises high in the sky, we adjourn to the roof. Here we are invited to introduce ourselves, each participant in the meeting having the opportunity to share their thoughts on what she or he would like to do in such a dream academy, what to research, share and communicate. What position did we find ourself in today?
Lusine Kharatyan spoke of the deteriorating situation in Armenia, of a feeling of increasing isolation and the worry that ‘whatever you do is not enough’. How to emancipate yourself from your fears when there is the constant fear that someone is coming to kill you? She would like to find a space, virtual and physical, where people could safely cross borders, to enable them to reposition themselves from their deadlocked position of geography. The dilemma was: how to relate to your neighbours and the bigger world? One problem was that international institutions are dysfunctional, and narrow interests decide the future in ‘dark cabinets’.
Archil Kikodze emphasised the need to offer different perspectives, to hear more than just one side of the story. He gave the example of a recent Georgian film ‘Liza, Go On’ which examines the Georgian-Abkhazian military conflict of 1992-1993, looking from both sides. It was heavily criticised for suggesting that Georgians were also complicit and not simply the victims, but it did raise the urgent question of a need for discussion, dialogue and agreement here and now. He felt Georgia was witnessing a new form of nationalism and deeply diverging opinions; on the one hand ‘we have nationalists who are pro-conquerors’ and on the other ‘for young people, collectively, Berlin is closer to them than Moscow.’
Armen Ohanyan thought that the main narrative in Armenia was that ‘we have been betrayed by the west since the Treat of Berlin (1878)’ and they needed to finally emancipate themselves from these feelings.
Hanna Yankuta spoke of her experience of seeing the repression of independent theatres, bookshops, and cultural spaces that used Belarusian language. The dilemma was of visibility – to be able to hear stories, not just from Belarus, but from Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, to be able to hear different experiences and gain some understanding and wider perspective.
Dmytro Tuzhanskyi, currently CEO of the Institute for Central European Strategy, a think tank on Central and Eastern Europe in Uzhgorad, Ukraine, reflected on the events in his country since 2014. For him the dilemma today was that misperceptions and misunderstandings in Brussels, Budapest, Warsaw, could turn to resentments. Historical misunderstandings could have a negative impact on thinking today. How to avoid this?
Krzysztof Czyżewski noted that after the Second World War, Poles felt betrayed by agreements made at Yalta and Potsdam, with everything decided outside of Poland by the big powers. It took 50 years to begin to get past this resentment and move forward. With the war in Ukraine, he reflected on the failure of government strategies and international institutions, the burden of dealing with millions of refugees in Poland falling on civic society. People were willing to help, and the government had no choice but to follow. This voluntary engagement is crucial, and he believed a new phenomena.
Krzysztof Meissner, a Professor at the Faculty of Physics at Warsaw University, thought that mixing up nationalism and patriotism was not particularly needed or useful anymore, old ideas such as saying ‘we are better than anyone else’ or saying ‘we are pacifists, we want peace’. There needed to be much clearer thinking on these matters.
Magda Nowakowska, kartvelologist, communication expert and translator, agreed that the idea of patriotism for one’s country as well as many other ideas has been overtaken and occupied by the far right movements while engagement with this notion is mostly missing in the discourse among the liberals. Social media is compromised – ‘propagandised’ – and to challenge this we need to think of new ways of decolonizing and communicating our values.
Przemysław Czapliński, a professor of contemporary literature in Poznań, literary critic and translator, said that dealing with literature was also an important way of dealing with communication. He described experiencing a new situation in a recent class, an encounter with ‘a person who was against the community we want to create, accusing us of underestimating nationalism and patriotism.’ Przemysław believed it was important to welcome such a person, who came from a completely different standpoint, someone who is ‘against, part of our society against globalisation, crossing borders, other people, afraid of losing their position of respect and their identity, gender or religious.’ After 1989, collective identity was dismantled, only the individual celebrated with Margaret Thatcher famously stating ‘There is no such thing as society’. Now we have a recomposition of society, a part of which wants to restore traditional social boundaries, male/female, national/none-national, Catholic/non-Catholic. He referred to ‘Leviathan’ by Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679), which identified three reasons for waging war: for envy (covetousnous), fear (mistrust of one’s neighbour), and a need for respect (glory). We have to reconsider now, he thought, the rules of living in a society with someone who does not want to communicate with you, in a society less able to communicate – he considered at least one third of society to now be in this category. This was his dilemma.
Andriy Lyubka told a story which began with a sausage, a Transcarpathian sausage cooked to a special recipe. He had a friend who went away to join the army; Andriy and his other friends decided to send him and his unit a gift of sausages for Easter celebrations. ‘A nice idea,’ he friend said, ‘Very noble. But we are here in the forest and we have no vehicles. What we do not need is 100 kilos of sausages. Better a jeep.’ So Andriy and his friends decided to find a way to do just this, writing on Facebook ‘we want to buy a jeep for our friends serving in Donbas’ along with his card number. His phone began to vibrate every few seconds as hundreds of donations arrived, and by the next morning he found they had raised enough money to buy two jeeps. And then began the requests from many other people at the front, writing to him for help – he needed to explain he was not a car dealer or the Ministry of Defence. Nevertheless, he decided to try to help and has mow raised enough funds to buy 200 vehicles. ‘Before I just wanted to be a writer, able to be independent, and it happened,’ he said. ‘What has changed is my understanding of patriotism.’ He was part of the post-Soviet generation that did not want anything to do with the state. His dilemma was that he did not want to be a politician or a civic activist, he just wanted to raise grapes and fish, but as a writer you create a society of readers around you and you have a certain duty towards them. (He has some 38,000 followers on Facebook). He recognised he received this support because of my credibility as a writer, and this is why culture matters.
Krzysztof Czyżewski felt that while we understood our freedom as an individual creator, perhaps we are moving now towards a second person paradigm, away from the Cartesian ‘I’ towards a culture of solidarity.
Ondrej Liska, born Czech and currently based in Brussels, is the Director for Europe at Porticus, a philanthropic organisation, said that he believed ‘belonging’ to be the key word in this discussion. Around the world, society was, he proposed, run by a business model of hatred, not simply that on a principle of divide and rule, but a people choosing to invest in hatred and division. It was not a model of economic development based on sympathy and empathy. In the USA, the riches were better off by one trillion dollars, whereas industry workers had a wage of 30% less value than some 50 years ago. Meanwhile, democratic state were no longer delivering to basic needs, and there was a table of endless ‘identities’ where it was no longer possible to hear each other. Education was failing young people. It was not for a lack of information, but a lack of experience. Where was it possible to have a safe space where one could appreciate different points of views, to allow for the possibility of transformation? If you want to change yourself, to transform in some way, you cannot accept the status quo. ‘We need,’ he said, ‘a new policy of belonging, where people can understand their own sense of belonging, not simply defined by language or geography only – and we need to include climate change and peace in that.’ He gave an example of the recent Inner Development Goals Summit in Stockholm, the basis of concern there being about the skills and leadership qualities needed to support a sustainable future; their view being that social change, better education, climate mitigation, these cannot happen without inner change.
Viktoras Bachmetjevas is from Lithuania, a philosopher with an interest in ethics, currently a visiting associate professor at Yale. He commented that you often may not see the return of your work; you teach students and you never see them again, and hope that something useful will come out of their studies. He said, ‘But it’s very difficult to teach someone who isn’t open to learning... they have to be willing to listen.’ He felt student-focused curriculums created a border, students unwilling to expose themselves to something different or foreign. He felt this was a time of deep crisis, but the best ideas may yet come in a time of crisis, when we don’t really know what to do. The dilemma for many was how to move forward, and with goodwill. How might we encourage goodwill?
Krzysztof Meissner gave the example of The Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity, which is the biggest charity event of the year in Poland (raising money for children’s medical care in public hospitals). Founded some 30 years ago, it still had tremendous public support, all kinds of people getting involved, despite the fundraiser being attacked by the conservative PIS government – which suggests people are indeed willing to act for someone else, to share, even if they only have very small amounts of money themselves. Perhaps a question to address to those who hate us, or who are against us, is to say: ‘What can we do together, what can we do for someone else who is in need?’
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In the evening, after dinner, conversations continued in small groups, while later Raphael Rogiński presented some of his guitar compositions.
Text and photos by Brendan Jackson
