‘I’m proud that I have come so far being who I am and didn’t give in’, Drago says. (Tamuna Chkareuli / OC Media)
Despite widespread homophobic attitudes throughout the Caucasus, there are some queer people who find acceptance for who they are — from their co-workers, their friends, and their families. Below are the stories of three queer people, from Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. [Read more…]
(Illustration: Dato Parulava/OC Media)
The Kodori Valley, populated mainly by Svans, was the only corner of Abkhazia under Georgian Government control before the August 2008 War. According to the Tbilisi-based Government of the Autonomous Republic of Abkhazia, around 2,860 people lived in the valley before the war, all of whom fled their homes. Only 55 families have returned; Raisa Khachvani, 62, is still waiting to do so. [Read more…]
Lika Managadze (Mari Nikuradze/OC Media)
On 16 March, the bodies of 12 people who died during the 1992–1993 conflict in Abkhazia were returned to their families. Lika Managadze, whose father Akaki was among the dead, reflects on her memories of her father and how the war shaped the course of her life. [Read more…]
(Magomed Gadzhidadayev/Daptar)
The women of Kvankhidatli, a village in the mountains of south-west Daghestan, are known as the people who mine salt. The women recall gathering sand by hand to dissolve the salt since the beginning of the 20th century but say the tradition is now dying out. [Read more…]
‘My Soviet childhood was very happy. I thought that my whole life would be like a fairy tale. But the fairy tale ended abruptly.’
(Gayane Mkrtchyan /OC Media)
Thirty years have passed since the day an earthquake devastated northern Armenia, killing 25,000 people. The town of Spitak, close to the epicentre, was utterly destroyed, and for many of the survivors, life remains a struggle 30 years on. [Read more…]
(/Getty images)
Since the 1990s, thousands of Georgians have left home in search of opportunities abroad, pushed out by food poverty, debts, unemployment, or to escape violence in the family. Below are stories from three women who braved landmines, hidden containers, and frozen seas in search for a better future in Greece. [Read more…]
Makhachkala (Dominik K. Cagara /OC Media)
A 35-year-old woman from Makhachkala tells Daptar that becoming a second wife is a dream come true. [Read more…]
‘The cost of conflict is enormous. Everyone paid that cost. I personally paid with my damaged psychology. The most precious part of what I had — the best period of my life — my young age was claimed by this conflict. This is going to haunt me all my life.’
Sopio Jeterishvili (Salome Sagharadze /Women of Georgia)
‘I think that if a person really wants to do something, if it’s in their soul, they can do it. I’ve wanted to be independent since I was a child. I made several attempts at it. I escaped from home a few times. I don’t know why but since very early childhood, when I was so little, I already knew I didn’t want to live in that house, where they don’t love you and you don’t love them.’ [Read more…]
