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Sunday afternoon Bakuri and his wife Eka invited Tanya and me to their apartment for tea. They have three children: Dato (8), Gio (5), and Dachi (4). As you can imagine, these three young boys have lots of energy, and they zoomed around the place like mad. The apartment is on the eighth floor, so the views from their balconies are fantastic.
.  You can see the Hippodrome from their balcony.
Dato is taking lessons in Georgian dancing, and he put on some music and showed us his best moves.
I think that Georgia is one of the few places in the world where the history, culture, art, and poetry are continually present in every day life. The most popular shows are of Georgian dancing, the art of Pirosmani is all over, and the national operas are always playing to large audiences. So it's a great thing for a young boy like Dato to be learning the national dance. Georgian dancing is unique: the men are proud, confident, and acrobatic; the women are elegant perfection in their long white dresses, tiaras and veils.
One aspect of Georgian dancing is that the men stand not on the tips of their toes, but on the first joint. I can't imagine how they can stand it, but Dato seemed very comfortable dancing that way. I asked him to pose on his bent toes, and perhaps you can see that he's standing on his toes' "knuckle."  This is a professional on his toes.
Dato's cousins, Tornike and Giorgi, are part of a Georgian Boys' choir named "Bichebi" that is presently in Italy for a competition. They'll come home next Saturday
Eka served us a lovely tea that consisted of raspberry cake, ice cream, figs, pears, peaches, grapes, and chocolates, and we made toasts with some delicious red wine.
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