Gaumarjos, Zoom Qartulad. Nini Kapanadze is a Tbilisi-based writer covering the intersection of technology, folklore, and fermented grapes.
Desperate, families and friends turned to a corporate video conferencing tool: Zoom. zoom qartulad
Older relatives, seeing their own video for the first time, panic. “Why am I so old? Why is my hair like this?” The result is an explosion of beauty filters. Grannies in the village of Sighnaghi suddenly appear with cartoon butterfly crowns and smoothed skin, toasting Stalin-era wine while looking like anime characters. Gaumarjos, Zoom Qartulad
It started as a necessity. In March 2020, as the world slammed its doors against the pandemic, Georgia—a country of supra feasts, polyphonic singing, and fierce face-to-face negotiation—found itself suddenly, eerily silent. The tamada could no longer clink his glass. The supra table, the gravitational center of Georgian social life, vanished overnight. Older relatives, seeing their own video for the