I had a friend in Abkhazia (breakaway statelet in the ex-USSR) whose dad I got drunk with once, while he told me his own experience of social distancing. It was caused by war rather than epidemic, but I thought I might share it with you. 1/7
He (the dad, not the friend) had lost three fingers as a child when messing around with a detonator from a coal mine, so couldn’t fight on either side when local separatists fought against Georgian forces in 1992-3. Instead he tended his farm, and kept his head down. 2/7
The war was pretty horrible, with lots of looting and atrocities. He had to spend quite a lot of time hiding in the maize from rampaging soldiers, and this was stressful enough without the prospect of losing a year’s worth of income from his main cash crop: mandarins. 3/7
He couldn't sell his mandarins because of the mayhem, but he’s a resourceful guy and decided instead that he should juice the crop, ferment the juice and distil it into brandy. That could be stored (unlike fruit), and sold once the war was over. It was a good plan. 4/7
It was also time-consuming, since this took a lot more work than the usual harvest. All of the mandarins needed to be peeled, and all that white pithy stuff needed taking off, because it made the brandy bitter, before they could be squashed for juice. 5/7
And that was only half of it. He needed to make barrels for fermenting, and the still for the distillation process, and he needed to maintain the right temperature. But it was a success: 800 litres of brandy bottled; a crop that would otherwise have gone to waste was saved. 6/7
“So, did you manage to sell it once the war was over?” I asked (a bit worried he’d maybe been targeted by looters).
“No, didn’t make a penny. With my neighbours we drank the lot. I’ve never been so drunk for so long, it was brilliant. I barely remember the war at all. 7/7
“No, didn’t make a penny. With my neighbours we drank the lot. I’ve never been so drunk for so long, it was brilliant. I barely remember the war at all. 7/7
(p.s. I can't find a photo of either of them, they're on a computer in the attic, but I did remember this tale about another daft Abkhazian adventure. I spent months there trying to get a book together, but it never came to anything. roadsandkingdoms.com/2012/adjika-sa…)
(And thanks to those who drew my attention to this film, which I can't believe I'd never heard of. One for self-isolation watching. imdb.com/title/tt299122…)
