We were glad we had come to the park, for this was the national competition of Georgian wrestling, and it was the day of the finals. For three days the competition had gone on, and today the champions of the republic would be chosen.
Inside the circular board fence was an arena-like place with seats on all sides. The wrestling circle itself was about thirty-five feet in diameter, and the surface was of deep sawdust. At one side was the table of judges, and behind them a little lean-to where the contestants took off their clothes.
The people were very hospitable to us; they made a place for us on a bench, and they cleared the pathway so that Capa could take photographs of the competition.
The two flute players and the drummer sat down in the front row, and the contestants were called. They were dressed in an odd costume-short canvas jackets without sleeves, and canvas belts, and short trunks. They were barefooted.
Each pair of contestants came to the judges' table and was formally recognized. Then they took their places, one on either side of the circle. And at that moment the music started playing its savage melody, with the heavy drumbeat underneath it. The contestants approached each other and joined battle.
It is curious wrestling. Its nearest relative is, I suppose, jujitsu. The contestants are not permitted to grasp any part of the body. The only holds permitted are on the jackets and on the belts. Once the holds are established, it is a matter of tripping, of throwing of weight, of forcing your opponent off balance, until you have thrown him to the ground and pinned him down. During the whole attack and defense, the savage music plays, and only when one fighter has lost does the music stop.
The contests were not long, usually one minute was enough for one or the other of the fighters to be thrown. And in the instant that one contest was over, another pair approached the judges' table and was recognized. It is a sport which requires incredible speed, and strength, and technique. Indeed, some of the throws were so violent and fast that a man would go sailing through the air at the end of the attack and land on his back.
The audience grew more and more excited as the competition continued and more and more contestants were eliminated. But we had to go. We were to take an evening train for the Black Sea, and before that we had been invited to the opening of the Tiflis Opera. Furthermore, our jeep had developed saddle sores and was giving trouble, and we had seventy kilometers to go before we could even attempt to go to the opera. It was gasoline-line trouble, and we limped back, stopping every little while to blow out the gasoline line.
We were very tired when we got back to Tiflis, so tired that we refused to go to the opening of the opera. My broken knee had taken a dreadful beating in the mad jeep. I was barely able to walk at all. I wanted an hour in boiling hot water to loosen up the painful kneecap.
The station, when we finally got to it, was hot and crowded. We walked along a very crowded train and came at last to our carriage, a 1912 first-class wagon-lit of happy memory. Its green velvet was as green as we had remembered. Its dark wood polished and oiled, shining metal and musty smell we well remembered. We wondered where it could have been all these years. The Belgians who built these carriages so many years ago built them for the ages. It was the finest railroad carriage in the world forty years ago, and it is still comfortable, and it is still in good shape. The dark wood grows darker year by year, and the green velvet grows greener. It is a hangover from days of grandeur and royalty.
It was very hot in the train, and we opened the window in our compartment. Immediately a guard came and closed it, scowling at us. As soon as he was gone, we opened the window again, but he seemed to sense that we would rebel. He was back instantly, closing the window and lecturing us in Russian, and shaking his finger in our faces. He was so fierce about this window that we did not dare open it again, although we were smothering in the hot train. His message translated was that on the trip that night we would be going through many tunnels. If the window were open the smoke of the engine would come into the car and get the green upholstery dirty. We begged him to let us open the window, saying we would even help to clean the upholstery, but he only shook his finger more sternly at us and lectured us again. When a Russian rule is es-tablished, there are no deviations.
That reminded us of a story that was told us by an American military man in Moscow. He said that during the war when the American plane on which he was traveling landed at Moscow, a sentry was sent with orders to let no one on the plane. And when the time came for the party to board the plane, the sentry let no one on. Our man said that he was nearly shot for trying to, in spite of his orders, and his passes, and his identifications. Finally the sentry was changed, not the orders. The commanding officer explained that orders were fixed and that it was much easier to change sentries than to change orders. Sentry number two had orders "Let people on the plane," while sentry number one had orders "Do not let anyone on the plane." Two sets of orders, or changed orders, might confuse a man. It was much simpler to change sentries. And also it was probably much better for discipline. The man who enforces one order can do it much more faithfully than one who has to make a decision between two.
There was not any doubt about it, the guard on our train did not intend to let us get the window open. We could have smothered, and it wouldn't have made any difference at all. We did not know what the penalty would be for traveling with an open window in our car, but we judged by the seriousness of the guard's attitude that it must be about ten years' imprisonment.
Our train started at last, and we settled in our little sweat box for the night. But the train had no sooner started than it stopped. And all night it stopped about every two miles. We finally fell into a sweaty sleep and dreamed of being caught in a coal mine.
We awakened very early in the morning to find ourselves in a new kind of country, a completely changed country. We had come into a tropical area where the forests stretched down to the tracks, and where we could see bananas growing, and where the air was moist. The land around Tiflis, and the air, had been dry.
The little houses beside the track were swaddled in flowers, and the foliage was dense. Hibiscus in bloom climbed up the hills, and there were orange trees everywhere. It was a most rich and beautiful country. In little patches along the track the corn stood as high as it does in Kansas, twice the height of a man in some places, and there were fields of melons. In the early morning the people came to the entrances of their open and airy houses and watched the train go by. And the women were dressed in brilliant clothing, as tropical people always are. Their head-cloths were red and blue and yellow, and their skirts were bright, figured cloth. We went through forests of bamboo and giant ferns, and through fields of tall tobacco. And now the houses were on stilts, with high ladders to get to the first floor. And under the houses children and dogs played in the early morning light.
The hills were densely wooded with great trees, and every visible thing was covered with lush growth.
And then we came to the area of the tea gardens, probably the most beautiful crop in the world. Low hedges of tea spread away for miles and climbed up over the brows of the hills. Even in the early morning lines of women were picking the new leaves from the tops of the tea plants, their fingers fluttering among the bushes like little birds.