Living in Georgia

This is a guest post by Mrs. Fatima Ali, reader of this blog, who contacted me about possible migration from UAE to Georgia. As lately I've been receiving several such questions and mostly from UAE, after giving some basic advice, I asked Fatima Ali, could she come up with a short article in a free flow on topic - Why Georgia? See: Can You Buy a Good Life in Tbilisi With $500 as a Foreign Expat? With the permission of Mrs. Fatima Ali and little re-editing I publish her honest answer bellow…

This article was originally written as a guest post by Ms. Irina Nikolaeva (written back in 2017) Last 10 years I was living in big cities. At that time I moved from a small town in Belarus thinking that I need to live in a city with more people and more opportunities. I started from St. Petersburg. After 5 years in the cultural capital of Russia, I decided that 5 million people is not enough for me and moved to Moscow. But last year everything changed. I came to Batumi for the holidays,…

A time ago I did an experiment - counted our (two persons and two cats) daily expenses for a month to find out that our monthly expenses have been at about USD 1,800 for that month. You can see my findings with detailed positions in this article: Cost of Living in Tbilisi (Republic of Georgia). I have counted for a few more times - and very often the amount we spend per month in Georgia is more or less the same. From my side I should add we travel a lot across the country and spend many…

Average salary in the Republic of Georgia at the end of the second quarter (Q2) of 2016 was GEL 1035.98 equaling about USD 389. For the simplicity of further written and calculated, here is the exchange rates I used from Bank of Georgia website on December 14, 2016. USD to GEL: 2.6599 EUR to GEL: 2.8222 If measuring in actual increase that is a huge increase by more than GEL 200 from GEL 773 in 2013. If converted to US dollars that is a drop from $442 in 2013. The truth, as I believe, is…

This is already the third time I have opened a bank account in Georgia as an individual. This time at the Bank of Georgia. Let me explain -  I'm already using two local banks - Procredit bank and Bank Republic. If you need consultancy or help with opening a bank account in Georgia, visit the Terramatris website: Opening Bank Account in Georgia Unfortunately, my default bank for check operations, Bank Republic, has been sold to another large Georgian bank - TBC bank. I opened an account at…

For the second time, I felt like a real tourist in Georgia. Let me explain - I have been living in Georgia for more than 5 years, thus for the past two years I'm spending the Summer months in Latvia. This year we were absent from Georgia for about 6 months, and when returned - we had no choice but to travel a lot across the country, as the friends of my partner joined us during our journey back home to Tbilisi.  We booked our flight back to Georgia (Tbilisi) already at the start of August (…

The other day I was reading an article in which the head of the World Tourism Organization Claimed - Georgia is the most beautiful country in the world. Well, I can ONLY agree with the words from the head of WTO, Mr. Taleb Rifai, and to add my 50 cents  I have listed 32 places you should visit to make the most from your trip to Georgia.  Georgian nature, culture and people make this country the most beautiful in the world, said UN Secretary-General, Taleb Rifai, the World Tourism…

I have observed this wall for the last three years (with short interruptions, when on longer travels) from our Tbilisi balcony. Probably, right at this wallI started to improve my photographer skills when about two years ago I reported first time lapse - Brick Wall turning green. Looking on this wall I have spent countless hours by zooming, experimenting with f stops, changing lenses and so on, making many photographs for my 365 days photo challenge project. The following picture is how I will…

After almost five years spent as an ex-pat and passive investor (savings accounts only) in Republic of Georgia, time after time I'm looking for some other liquid investment opportunities in Georgia. Mostly I end up with stock exchange, but for now Georgian Stock Exchange market doesn't seems transparent enough and easy accessible. By saying - not enough transparent I mean - I haven't find yet a broker offering real-time stats.  Time after time I end up in official Invest in Georgia website…

There is a very convenient way of getting around in Tbilisi by taxi using mobile application Taxify. I probably first heard of this company at the end of 2014 by visiting Georgian Startup challenge organized by GITA.  For my travels around Tbilisi I mostly use taxi either by calling to the central or just by catching taxi on the street (I prefer second over first still). Taxis are cheap in Tbilisi, but you never know about cars technical condition, the cabin cleanliness and so on. There have…