Blog Archive: September 2020

Rustaveli Borjomi Hotel

29 September, 2020 | Hotel reviews | 7 seen

Set in Borjomi on Rustaveli street this Hotel has a bar, shared lounge, garden, and free WiFi throughout the property.

This 4-star hotel offers a 24-hour front desk and room service. Free private parking is available and the hotel also offers bike hire for guests who want to explore the surrounding area.

We booked this hotel for a one night stay at the end of September 2020 and paid just GEL 88 (USD 26). Now that's definitely a bargain deal. From several hotels we have stayed in Borjomi, this stands out (budget friendly)

6 Best Value Hotels in Borjomi, Georgia

All guest rooms come with air conditioning, a flat-screen TV with cable channels, a fridge, a kettle, a bidet, a hairdryer and a desk. With a private bathroom fitted with a shower and free toiletries, rooms at the hotel also have a river view. At Rustaveli Borjomi Hotel, all rooms include a seating area.

Rustaveli Borjomi hotel

The accommodation offers a terrace.

Rustaveli Borjomi Hotel provides an ironing service, as well as business facilities like fax and photocopying.

Bakuriani is 29 km from the hotel.

Carved Stone Sculptures near Sno - Akhaltsikhe - Juta road

26 September, 2020 | Tourism objects | 11 seen

Driving into the village on the winding Sno-Akhaltsikhe-Juta road, just before the entrance, you pass a collection of massive stone heads, somewhat reminiscent of Easter Island, carved out of granite.

It was in mid-August 2020, we took a day trip to Juta village to fly drone when our guides told - hey look there are these cool carved stones, let's take a stop here. I thought cool, I will google this place later, but for now, will just take some photos with a drone.

And so I did

Carved stone sculptures near Sno village in Georgia

It took me some time and technical knowledge to find more information about this place using metadata  for photos from my DJI Mavic Mini drone (Adobe Lightroom metadata to find GPS coordinates)

Sno village in Georgia from a drone flight

Doing my research on this place it was fun to learn that the village of Sno is famous not only for mineral water but also is known as the birthplace of the current head of the Georgian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Ilia II.

Carved stone sculptures near Sno village

I was able to find that author of these carved stone sculptures is sculptor Merab Piranishvili:

Merab has been carving these statues by hand since 1984. Each statue is of a different prominent figure from Georgian history, some will find sculptures of: Ilya Chavchavadze, Vaja Pshavela, Shota Rustaveli,and Alexandre Kazbegi.

Author of this blog captured in action flying a drone

Used resources: The Man Carving History out of the Caucasus Mountainside

Orio Center Shopping Mall in Bergamo

25 September, 2020 | Shopping Venues | 123 seen

Located next to the Bergamo airport, Orio center is one of the largest shopping centers in Italy.

We visited this shopping mall in mid-November 2019, a day before departing back to Tbilisi from the Bergamo airport.

Arrived here from Hotel 'Castello Visconteo' in Cassano dʼAdda, Italy in the late evening, some 2 hours before the mall was closing. Bought some goodies and ate at KFC

Orio Center in Bergamo

In front of the Orio al Serio international airport you can find one of the largest shopping centers in Italy, the Oriocenter.  With over 200 stores distributed on 2 floors, you can find everything you’re looking for in this mall.  You can spend an entire day window shopping or walking through the numerous food stops like ice-cream parlors, delicatessens, cafes.

In addition to clothes and accessories, you can visit the Apple store to see the latest in technology, or stop at the Lego store and its thousands of small colored bricks. You can see the many events organized in the Mall, with the presence of famous people such as singers, actors and TV celebrities and maybe take a selfie with your favorite star!

Oriocenter will soon also feature a cineplex and a food court to taste all the best food specialties.  Something you cannot miss!

Oriocenter is located in front of the Orio al Serio airport and can be reached thanks to an underpass indicated directly from the airport.

Samsung Galaxy A51 6GB RAM 128GB Review

24 September, 2020 | Gadget Reviews | 46 seen

Samsung Galaxy A51 was first released in December 2019. I bought this phone as a replacement phone for the Samsung Galaxy A50, to whom glass cracked on the tiles at the Champions Academy in Tbilisi after a good workout, at the start of September 2020

My previous Galaxy A50 had served me for about a year and was still a very decent phone, to avoid dealing with repairs I decided to take a new one. I was very happy learning that there is the same version but an upgraded model for my phone. Without much thinking I just took it. 

I'm not the phone photographer/videographer (for that I have a DSLR camera and a drone), but the phone has a very decent camera and plenty of storage (extendable up to 128GB). Taking videos for Facebook is quite good, so do share pictures on Whatsapp. 

I'm using this phone together with my DJI Mavic Mini drone controller, works awesome

Samsung Galaxy A51

It works very well together with my Samsung Galaxy Fit activity tracker

Bought this phone at the AltaOk store in Eastpoint Tbilisi. The price was GEL 999 ($310.25). On Amazon, you can get a brand new unlocked Samsung Galaxy A51 phone for $277. 

• Display: 6.5 inches Super AMOLED capacitive touchscreen w/ Corning Gorilla Glass 3 - Resolution: 1080 x 2400 pixels
• Main Camera (Quad): 48 MP + 12 MP + 5 MP + 5 MP w/ LED flash, panorama, HDR - Selfie Camera: 32 MP w/ HDR
• Platform: OS Android - Chipset: Exynos 9611 - Processor: Octa-core (4x2.3 GHz Cortex-A73 & 4x1.7 GHz Cortex-A53) - Graphics: Mali-G72 MP3
• Sensors: Fingerprint (under display, optical), accelerometer, gyro, proximity, compass
• Wi-Fi: 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, dual-band, Wi-Fi Direct, hotspot - Bluetooth: 5.0, A2DP, LE - GPS: Yes, with A-GPS, GLONASS, GALILEO, BDS

Syncing files and settings between broken and new phone

How To Sync Files Between Samsung Galaxy Phones (Smart Switch)

HDR image with Samsung Galaxy A51

As said, I'm not looking too serious to take high quality pictures with a phone, but I must admit I'm quite surprised how good they are. In above picture an HDR image towards Tbilisi from our balcony

Technical details

And We are Back / DJI Mavic Mini drone

19 September, 2020 | Documentaries | 13 seen

The wait is over - today I picked up my already second DJI Mavic mini drone here in Tbilisi.

See how I crashed the first one at the Jvari: Jvari monastery from a drone flight / DJI Mavic Mini crash

We headed straight to the Tianeti / Khatsiri Forest Park
And we are back - short drone videography from drone 2.0
Khatsiri Forest Park near Tianeti
Music by: Scott Holmes - We made it!
 

Today I bought my first flat on online auction site

18 September, 2020 | Real Estate | 8 seen

On September 18, 2020, I won an online auction for a property in the countryside Latvia.

This was the second time me using E-izsoles platform, and the second time winning an online auction (for the truth I won the first time a plot of land, but that place turned out not good for a house building and I revoked it, back in Summer of 2019)

In total today, I agreed to pay EUR 3,760 for a 53,7 m2 flat in a 3-storer building in rural Latvia. The name of the village is Vilgāle, and it's located some 171 km from Rīga. There is a huge Vilgāle lake located nearby the property. Can't wait to fly a drone nearby

wow what an adrenaline, there was more competition than I thought,with 2 additional 5min overtimes but I won this auction and now we have a flat in Vīlgāle. average buy price EUR 71/per m2. at the start i was looking to get this for EUR 45/m2

Can't wait to visit the place, invest some additional 5k and trade stocks from the Vilgāle

Gudauri View Point from a drone flight

17 September, 2020 | | 330 seen

Gudauri viewpoint is a cool attraction located some 2 km up from the Gudauri to the Kazbegi (Russian border)

Officially named as the Russian -Georgian Friendship monument, this place has been "installed" back in 1983, but seems to have gone under major reconstruction works recently.

We were returning from a weekend trip to Kazbegi when it was agreed to fly my little DJI Mavic mini drone around the monument.

Gudari viewing platform

Located on the Georgian Military Highway between the ski resort town of Gudauri and the Jvari pass, the monument is a large round stone and concrete structure overlooking the Devil's Valley in the Caucasus mountains.

Parking lot near the viewing platform

This monument has been built in 1983 to celebrate the bicentennial of the Treaty of Georgievsk and ongoing friendship between Georgia and Soviet Russia.

Gergeti church from a drone flight

15 September, 2020 | | 10 seen

In today's Piece of Life series - Gergeti Church from a drone flight

The region of Kazbegi is very nice for drone photography and videography.

Gergeti Trinity Church is a must-have destination in Georgia. The church is located at an elevation of 2170 meters, under Mount Kazbegi some 160 km North from the nation's capital Tbilisi.

It was in the middle of August we did a short trip to the Kazbegi region in Georgia and I had a chance to fly my DJI Mavic Mini drone in the area. Thanks Johann Kritzinger Photography for organizing this trip 

Gergeti church from a drone flight

The Gergeti Trinity Church is built in the 14th century, and is the only cross-cupola church in Khevi province. The separate belltower dates from the same period as the church itself. Its isolated location on top of a steep mountain surrounded by the vastness of nature has made it a symbol for Georgia. The 18th century Georgian author Vakhushti Batonishvili wrote that in times of danger, precious relics from Mtskheta, including Saint Nino's Cross were brought here for safekeeping. During the Soviet era, all religious services were prohibited, but the church remained a popular tourist destination. The church is now an active establishment of the Georgian Orthodox and Apostolic Church.

Gergeti Church from a drone flight

Pretty unusual shot and I love it

DJI Mavic Mini drone near Gergeti church

Thanks, Johann Kritzinger for the above picture

List of Georgian laboratories offering to make a test (Paid) to diagnose COVID-19

14 September, 2020 | Living in Georgia | 13 seen

Colin (form a parent's group here in Tbilisi) shared a link to the spreadsheet containing a list of Georgian laboratories offering to make a test to diagnose COVID-19. 

The list was published on the Agenda.ge website and contains the medical facilities name, and address, the original list also contains the e-mail of the facility (to avoid spambots harvesting the e-mail list here, I'm pasting info without e-mails)

I don't have exact info, but for the test, we have to pay (at least in September 2020) - according to different sources some should expect to pay GEL 120 - 200 for a test to Diagnose Covid-19

There are medical facilities in several cities of Georgia, including - Tbilisi, Batumi, Kutaisi, Zugdidi and Ozurgeti

I believe there is a chance to call for a test to be done at home (expect to pay a higher price)

Source: List of Georgian laboratories offering to make a test to diagnose COVID-19

Tbilisi

• The First University Clinic – Tbilisi, 4 Gudamakari Street
• Aversi Clinic – Tbilisi, 27b Vazha Pshavela Ave
• NeoLab – Tbilisi, 47 Tashkenti Street
• New Hospitals – Tbilisi, 12 Krtsanisi Street
• Cito Medical Center – Tbilisi, 40 Paliashvili Street
• Center of Molecular Diagnostics – Tbilisi, 11 Lubliana Street
• Megalab – Tbilisi, 23 Kavtaradze Street 
• Georgian AIDS and Clinical Immunology Research Center – Tbilisi, 16 Al. Kazbegi Ave
• Med Diagnostics – Tbilisi, 78 Beliashvili Street
• National Center for Tuberculosis and Lung Disease – Tbilisi, 8 Adjara Street /50 Maruashvili Street 
• Medical World (laboratory) - Tbilisi, 11 Mirian Mepe Street
• State Laboratory of Agriculture – Tbilisi, 49 V. Godziashvili Street
• National Laboratory of Genetics – Tbilisi, David Agmashenebeli Alley #240

Batumi

• Family Medicine Center of Settlement Tamari – Batumi, 4 Tbeti Street
• Batumi Regional Center of Infectious Pathology, Aids and Tuberculosis – 11 J. Katamadze Street
• Mardaleishvili Medical Centre – Rustavi, 12 Gagarini Street

Kutaisi

• Mixta LTD – Kutaisi, 27 Rustaveli Avenue 
• State Laboratory of Agriculture – Kutaisi,  5 Nikea III Lane

Zugdidi

• Zugdidi Municipal Hospital of Infectious Diseases. Zugdidi, Village Onaria

Ozurgeti

• Biomedica Georgia - Ozurgeti, 22 D. Eristavi Street

See original Google Spreadsheet

Tbilisi Open Air Museum of Ethnography

12 September, 2020 | Museums | 34 seen

The open-air Museum of Tbilisi is one of the coolest attractions in Tbilisi, situated in the footsteps of Turtle lake. Many cultural events are held here.

The museum is located west to Turtle Lake on a hill overlooking the Vake district, Tbilisi. It is essentially a historic village populated by buildings moved there from all main territorial subdivisions of Georgia.

I've been heading here ever since I remember myself in Tbilisi. See: Few shots from Tbilisi Cheese Festival

Open air museum from a drone flight

There is an awesome restaurant located near the park (upper side), offering spectacular views towards the city and of course delicious meals - see: Rachis Ubani Tbilisi Restaurant Review

The Giorgi Chitaia Open Air Museum of Ethnography is an open-air museum in Tbilisi, Georgia, displaying the examples of folk architecture and craftwork from various regions of the country.

Open air museum in Tbilisi

The museum is named after Giorgi Chitaia, a Georgian ethnographer, who founded the museum on April 27, 1966. Since December 30, 2004, it has been administered as part of the Georgian National Museum.

Open air museum in Tbilisi

The museum occupies 52 hectares of land and is arranged in eleven zones, displaying around 70 buildings and more than 8,000 items.

Dwelling houses at Open air museum in Tbilisi

The exhibition features the traditional darbazi-type and fiat-roofed stone houses from eastern Georgia, openwork wooden houses with gable roofs of straw or boards from western Georgia, watchtowers from the mountainous provinces of Khevsureti, Pshavi, and Svaneti, Megrelian and Imeretian wattle maize storages, Kakhetian wineries (marani), and Kartlian water mills as well as a collection of traditional household articles such as distaffs, knitting-frames, chums, clothes, carpets, pottery and furniture.

Open air museum in Tbilisi / views towards city from a drone flight

There are also an early Christian "Sioni" basilica from Tianeti and a 6th-7th century familial burial vault with sarcophagus.

Small open air stage at the museum

Since 2004, the museum has been hosting an annual summertime folk culture festival Art-Gene founded and managed by the Georgian rock musician and folk enthusiast Zaza Korinteli ("Zumba")

Museum park is best reached using private vehicle or taxi. There is an entrance fee of GEL 5 per person (or GEL 1 if coming after 18:00). at least in 2020

Expats in Georgia (Facebook group)

11 September, 2020 | Living in Georgia | 149 seen

I have been living in Georgia since 2011. During my time here I have been exploring the country, as an Indie traveler, crosswise from the pebbled seashore beaches near Batumi to the desert sand in David Gareji, and have gathered a great collection of my travel notes all across Georgia

Also, I have been contacted zillions of times online asking Georgia-related questions, starting with how to get a residence permit and ending - is there snow in July in Georgia? (Yes, there is, somewhere atop mount Kazbek)  

I've decided to launch a separate Facebook group aimed for ex-pats living in Georgia. In this group, we are going to discuss schools and pre-schools, business-related questions, good services, ask for advice, and more

If you are an Expat in Georgia, or just looking to relocate here, feel free to join here: Expats in Georgia (Country)

This group has been launched at the start of September 2020, two years latter group unites already 1,000 members

Dry Bridge & Alexander garden in Tbilisi from a DJI Mavic Mini drone flight

10 September, 2020 | | 3 seen

It was on an overcast Saturday afternoon (at the end of August 2020), we went for a long walk in Tbilisi. 

Equipped with a baby stroller and DJI Mavic mini Drone here is what we found today:

View towards Dry Bridge in Tbilisi

In one of these building, you can see, is located famous 'former hotel London', where some 19th-century writers have stayed

Aerial view of Tbilisi

Many good things can be seen from this place (Alexander garden), like the Public Service house, Sameba church (in the background), Orbeliani square

Tbilisi TV tower and The Biltmore hotel

Almost like the How to get on one photography Tbilisi TV tower, Narikala and Tabor Monastery

Aerial view of Alexander Garden

Ok, this park is bearing another name: Giorgi Leonidze Park

Jvari monastery from a drone flight / DJI Mavic Mini crash

5 September, 2020 | Tourism objects | 10 seen

Jvari Monastery is a popular tourist destination in Georgia, and I believe there are two reasons for that - first it's located close to the nation's capital Tbilisi and second it offers really scenic views to the nearby city of Mtskheta and the delta of Aragvi and Mtkvari rivers. Another reason to mention - the monastery is listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

On September 5, 2020 we headed here to make some casual drone videography, unfortunately I lost my beloved DJI Mavic mini drone while filming here.
Using VW Touareg as a drone pad and crashing drone near a UNESCO World Heritage-listed site? It's possible!
Here is the last footage I was able to recover from my phone (the drone is missing and I don't have actual SD footage). Post-processed in Adobe Lightroom
Music by Scott Holmes: Hotshot
P.S. New drone to be shipped in next 2-3 weeks
 

Narikala fortress from a drone flight

3 September, 2020 | | 10 seen

Narikala fortress is probably one of the most known tourist attractions in Tbilisi. 

It was on an easy Sunday afternoon we decided to take a lazy walk around the old town of Tbilisi equipped with a baby strolled and DJI Mavic mini, here is what we got

Narikala fortress from a drone flight

Narikala  is an ancient fortress overlooking Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, and the Mtkvari River. The fortress consists of two walled sections on a steep hill between the sulfur baths and the botanical gardens of Tbilisi. On the lower court, there is the recently restored St Nicholas church. Newly built in 1996–1997, it replaces the original 13th-century church that was destroyed in a fire.

Flying over St. Nicholas church / Narikala fortress

The new church is of "prescribed cross" type, having doors on three sides. The internal part of the church is decorated with the frescos showing scenes both from the Bible and history of Georgia

View towards Narikala fortress from the Mother of Georgia monument side

The structure was established in the 4th century as a Sasanian citadel called Shuris-tsikhe (i.e., "Invidious Fort"). It was considerably expanded by the Umayyads in the 7th century and by king David the Builder (1089–1125), respectively. The Mongols renamed it the "Narin Qala" (i.e., "Little Fortress"). Most of extant fortifications date from the 16th and 17th centuries. In 1827, parts of the fortress were damaged by an earthquake, and were subsequently demolished.

August 2020 Dividend Income Report - $171.31

2 September, 2020 | Investments | 16 seen

Welcome to the forty (#40) dividend income report, covering earnings I've made from dividend-paying stocks and peer to peer lending in August 2020.

Last August I turned 35, because of the Covid-19 we couldn't travel much and decided to stay in Georgia. At the start of August we headed to the Black sea coastal town Batumi, and then visited the 5-star Paragraph hotel in Shekvetili for a couple of days. August was pretty awesome.

Paragraph Resort & Spa Shekvetili, Autograph Collection Hotel in Georgia

The baby girl attends her pre-school, she is doing great - talking a lot, putting together sentences, mixing languages, figuring out new words. Awesome. Quite fascinating what a two-year-old can do. Development is very rapid. in August she learned to answer on question - What's your name? Daddy's heart is melting.

From the perspective of dividend income -  last July was neither good nor bad, we keep suffering from trimmed dividends, and by the end of the month, we barely took $171.31. Relying on dividends these days is very hard.

Compared to the previous August in 2019, when we almost took $260 in dividend income, our monthly dividend has decreased by -34%  (-$88.27). A year ago we did set a goal to take at least $400 this month, now this didn't happen. 

Luckily, an additional $958.04 was made from options trading.  

As options trading is not a passive form of making money while you are sleeping it wouldn't be fair to include them in dividend income reports.

Check out our options income report here: August 2020 Options Income Report - $958.04

If counted all together (dividends + options) it seems we have made $1,129.35 in total last month.

We were able to generate about 5.63% income yield from our portfolio last August (that's about 67.56% annualized)

One of our monthly goals is to generate at least 2.5% income yield from the portfolio. As longs it's above to it - it's awesome.

Interest income in August 2020

From the stocks and peer to peer lending we got the following income last month:

Ticker

Earnings

FGB

€43.11

BGLF

€36.30

EDI

€13.17

PBCT

€9.79

EDF

€9.16

Mintos

€8.55

T

€7.82

RA

€7.10

NCV

€6.09

ET

€4.88

Total EUR 146.42 / USD 171.31

In total there were 10 companies paying us dividend in August 2020 that is 2 companies less than in August 2019

Monthly income

I've been tracking my journey towards million dollars in a savings account since January 2017. More than three years already. The result, so far, looks quite good. Dividends are growing (even when they are not)

Monthly dividend Income chart as of August 2020

The cumulative earnings for 2020 now are $1,273.04  which is just 35.36% from my goal of 2020 ($3,600). On average, it would ask us to generate $581.74 every month for the next 4 months to reach this goal. Right, now the goal looks unattainable, as for now, I cannot see even a single $200 month for 2020, 

2019 in Review and Financial Goals for 2020

Goals for August 2021

This is my favorite part of these reports - trying to forecast/set goals for the next year. But before setting a goal for 2020, let's see what I forecasted/said a year ago (August 2019)

When setting goals for August 2020 - I will be quite optimistic -  I'm looking to crack $400. I hope to get there with more US monthly and quarterly stocks and also might use dividend capture strategy

Ahh, what a surprise, we didn't get there, not even close. )ur dividend stock portfolio wasn't immune against the market downturn and most of our stocks get trimmed or halted dividend payments. In the case of the recovery, there is hope. I will be optimistic and say we are still looking to crack that $250/mo goal in August 2021