Kulalisi

This weekend I hiked to a village near Akhaltsikhe, Kulalisi, with some students from my school. I passed through another village, Sadzeli, on the way there. The village had a WWII memorial; 146 men from the village (most of them) fought in the war, and only 43 returned.

Kulalisi. When I entered the village, everyone left their houses and came to look at the American. I was invited to dozens of peoples houses for tea, and some locals gave me a tour of their town. I ended up eating lunch with a fairly wealthy man who had worked in Yemen and Papua New Guinea on oil pipelines for Exxon Mobile.

What's left of an alleged 9th century castle. I'm pretty sure the history the locals told me was false because their region was controlled by Georgia during that time, but they said this castle was built by Armenians. To be fair, the Bagratid dynasty controlled both Armenia and Georgia during this time; the Bagratuni family controlled Armenia, and the Bagrationi offshoot (but distinct historically) ruled most of Georgia from Kutaisi. And this is only relevant if the castle was indeed built in the 9th century. If anyone knows how to verify this information, or where to find information about the fortresses and history of Samtskhe-Javakheti, please let me know.