Ossetia Safari III

The time was 1600 hours. The green Niva was huffing and puffing its way out of Tbilisi, recklessly overtaking black BMW’s and swerving from one side of the highway to the other. The driver was a genial looking man in his early 60s, who chain smoked cigarettes the smell of which reminded me of Carpati. The passenger’s seat was taken up by our cameraman, a lanky guy in his mid 30s holding the camera on his knees while joyously smoking his Winston. Being in the back seat, I was engulfed in a host mix of dust, smog, and cigarette smoke, looked mesmerized at the erratic rattling of the steering wheel. When the Niva reached the highly unlikely speed of 120 km/h, the deafening sounds and the vibrations reached alarming levels, suggesting that the Soviet SUV was on the verge of disintegration.

Instead, it smoothly pulled over in a ditch-like alley, for us to stretch our legs, buy ice cream and, of course, for the driver to smoke. We were about 5 kilometres from Gori, the birth place of Stalin.

As we got closer to the South Ossetian border, the road became almost eerily empty, save for an occasional minibus with tinted windows. David gets a phone call from the Rustavi 2 studio, with the news that Kokoity's press secretary is not picking up the phone. That means that we don’t have the clearance to go to the other side.

The road finally reaches a small river guarded with concertina barbed wire and several soldiers in full combat gear. Their small post flies the Russian flag. We have reached the first checkpoint manned by CIS peace-keepers.

After a short discussion between the driver and the soldiers, we are turned back with the interdiction to film within a 50 meter range of the checkpoint. The cameraman takes some panoramic shots of the area and David walks around nervously, obviously disappointed.

In the meantime, several vehicles – military, OSCE and civilians – pass through the checkpoint, no questions asked. We decide we should also give it a try - this time as 'civilians'. The cameraman tucks the camera in the trunk and we slowly drive toward the checkpoint. The driver negotiates through the barbed wire as the soldiers look at us slightly bored. We are on the other side of the checkpoint, theoretically in no man’s land!

Theory of course doesn’t apply to a conflict such as South Ossetia, where realities are often times more messy and complicated. After a few kilometres of driving through a desolate landscape of destroyed buildings on a potholed road, we reach another roadblock. Large concrete blocks topped with sandbags, and to the left a derelict gas station, now filled with buff soldiers hanging out and smoking cigarettes. “Who are they?” I ask, almost not wanting to hear the answer. “It’s ok, they are Georgian,” David replies reassuringly.

The crew talk to the Georgian troops while we try to peak beyond the roadblock into the breakaway region of South Ossetia. Several minibuses filled with men and women carrying huge suitcases pour into the roadblock. The soldiers, acting as informal customs officers, rummage through the suitcases, pulling out Chinese-made toy keyboards, opening boxes of medicine and shuffling through piles of cheap clothes. I am told these people come from Russia and sell their stuff into Georgia. Suitcase trading is only the tip of an iceberg of illegal smuggling that uses South Ossetia as a trading hub.

The casual exchange of words between the soldiers and the crew turns into high-pitched sounds and angry shoutings when the cameraman focuses his camera on one of them. I see David is starting to get worried and motions at me to get into the vehicle. The cameraman stays behind, hurling insults at the soldiers, and being answered in kind. It is time for us to leave: the driver drags the cameraman into the Niva and slams the gas pedal.

“What was that all about?” I ask. David tells me the military people got irritated when the camera was filming their faces. He gives me a strange look and adds, “you know, they are not regular soldiers.” “What do you mean, like special troops or something?” I ask, not knowing exactly what that means. David nods softly, looking as if he doesn’t want to continue the conversation.

Our first attempt to break into the breakaway region ended in failure. David is not about to give up though. We are now taking a different route, and trying to get to the road building site that was the scene of protests from villagers and, also, of mutual allegations of attacks from both Georgians and Ossetians.