Tbilisi's new pedestrian bridges

Pedestrian Bridge standing on the crossing of Vaja pshavela and Gamsaxurdia Avenue on Saburtalo.Bridge is metal and contains 40 step leader up and and 40 step leader down. It was constructed in he end of 2009.

Two young school pupils with well packed knapsacks on their little backs ran across the iron bridge over Gamsakhurdia Avenue recently, and followed the steps down laughing in loud voices.

“Happy kids, they don’t know how strict life is yet, I wish I were a little girl too,” mumbled an old woman watching as the little girls swept by merrily.
She looked up to the bridge and whispered something. Then she moved on the road slowly to the red sign of stoplight. Resting upon the crutch with her right hand and holding a little bag with some medicines in it on the other hand, old women slowly pulled herself up the metal stairs and crossed the street at last.
Crossing the busy, chaotic streets of Tbilisi is no easy challenge, as nearly 4,500 people were injured and 667 died while crossing street during the last three years. Recent surveys show that only 55 percent of 1,500 respondents say that they follow road rules. The other 45 percent just ignore them, according to research conducted by the Association of Safe Driving in 2010 January.
To reduce the number of traffic-pedestrian accidents, Tbilisi City Hall built 20 bridges in different regions of the city in 2009, and plans to build another 20 by the end of 2010. Each pedestrian bridge costs 100 000- 150 000 lari and the light signals will be removed. Starting in 2011, government transportation officials say they are going to install lifts to bring elderly and disabled people up the stairs more easily, but they don’t have a concrete budget yet, or a construction start date.
“We see this problem is one of the most painful issues for Tbilisi inhabitants. That’s the reason why did we start building these bridges. Each of them is done in order to ensure the safe transportation of the people on the streets,” says Akaki Joxadze, the head of the Transport Municipal Department.

The bridges have met with mixed results residents, according to an informal poll conducted in February. On a recent day in front of the bridge standing on the crossing of Vaja Pshavela and Gamsaxurdia Avenue in Saburtalo, 120 respondents were asked if they liked the new bridges. The majority, 50%, said that they liked the bridges, 30% said they disliked them and 20% answered they didn’t care.

Same bridge with another view. There is iron veneer in the end of 10 metre long pedestrian bridge, which covers the window of the flat, where people live.

Those who like the bridges say that this is the best way for safe crossing the streets and they appreciate it.

In general and not surprisingly, the vast number of people who did like the bridges were under the age of 30.
“I use bridges frequently and I guess it is very nice job done for people,”-says Bella Beradze, a 26-year-old medical student.
But the older respondents got, the more they were likely to complain about the bridges – probably because it’s difficult for them to climb up and down the metal steps, such as the Gamsakhudia Bridge, which has 40 steps up and 40 steps down.
Middle aged respondents were less likely to care, but more likely to question whether building bridges was the most important spending priority for the city government.
“Bridges can’t fill in my empty stomach. Authority should think about our vital interests, rather than wasting money in unnecessary things,” says Manana Dumbadze, a 56-year-old woman. She thinks that government should spent money on making new job places, rather than building pedestrian bridges.
Some opposition members claim the bridges are simply visual public relations for the upcoming direct mayor’s election on May 30, and don’t address the real problems.
“Main obligation of Tbilisi City hall is to provide researches about the most vivid issue for the citizens. They must have discussions with NGO-s, experts and after all assert the project, these rules are just ignored -“says Petre Mamradze, president of the Just for Georgia political party.
One of the oppositional political parties, which entered the parliament after the parliamentary elections,-Christian Democrats contends that though the rate of car accidents was high, making so many bridges was “just absurd.”
“I see some of bridges stand on strategic places and I appreciate it, but most of them are constructed in a wrong way, where there aren’t needed,” says Giorgi Axvlediani- member of the political party. “Ninety nine percent of this project is simply P.R. They want us to look like the European Countries, but forget to solve the real problem- unemployment,” Axvlediani says.
Governmental side doesn’t agree with oppositional parties, contending the bridges have saved lives.
According to the Tbilisi Police statistics conducted in 2010, the number of car accidents has decreased by 30% during 2009 in comparison with the last three years, says police officer Guja Gviniashvili.
“We made big changes in a little time. I’m certain, that people will get used to and be satisfied with the bridges,” he says

My profile by Katie tutberidze

When Tako was a little girl, she longed to be a professional journalist. She was fascinated with this job for the colored and lovely microphone the journalist held in her hand. But when she grew older and guessed that journalism isn’t only the big and lovely microphone, covered with a yellow or orange pattern, she was disappointed a little bit. Still, she has chosen this job and is enrolled at the GIPA journalism school.


She remembers two problems from her childhood. The first is that she couldn’t pronounce the letter “R” till thirteen. She did some exercises to improve her speech speaking rhymes and sayings until she could pronounce the symbols.

She also remembers her piano classes as the other problem of her childhood. For seven years her parents forced her, to play piano, but Tako didn’t like it. Maybe , this is the reason she doesn’t like classical music and always prefers to listen to alternative rock, like Coldplay, but sometimes she plays piano, when she’s alone.
Tako is keen on Japanese culture and her dream is to travel around this amazing country, wondering from small town to town, from Nagasaki to Tokyo.
“I’m fascinated with Japanese architecture, amazing bridges and Pagodas. And I’m definitely sure I’ll travel around this country someday“, – says Tako.

The biggest discovery in Georgia

The biggest discovery in Georgia. Ioseb Alaverdely grave has been found in Kakheti. 
After fifteen century from his death, Georgian archeologists has found Ioseb Alaverdeli grave in Alaverdi church.
Thirteen Assyrian holy fathers came in Georgia in VI century. They built churches in different parts of Georgia. They prayed for Christianity and for Georgians there. Ioseb Alaverdeli, One of the thirteen Assyrian holy fathers, prayed in Alaverdi chuch.
Georgian orthodox church is happy for founding Alaverdeli grave.

Swine Flue

According to the official data, approximately 400 people are ill with the swine flu in Georgia. Experts say that the disease will reach its peak in January. People are in Panic.
40 years old Manana Dumbadze has flu and high temperature for more that one week. She has heavy heath condition, though Dumbadze doesn’t visit the doctor, because she is afraid that doctors will diagnose her Swine Flu. 
National Centre for Disease Control and Public Heaths reports that every heavy flu is identified as Swine Flue and needs accurate treatment.
 ,, according to the official facts, about 400 people are ill with Swine Flu, but we expect three times more ill people, who has not registered in our system’’-says Shota Caava- Main assistant of the National Centre for Disease Control and Public Health.
Georgian Ministry of Health reports , that they have enough vaccines and are ready to cure this disease.
Situation is too much alarming in Gali. People has no vaccines and are in a big trouble. 
Georgian Health Ministry is going to solute this problem. They are going to send the vaccines to Gali soon.
Swine flu is the second pandemic disease after Chicken flue, which was spread all over the world last year. Nowadays the whole world stands in front of this problem. World Health Organization sends vaccines and veils to the countries , which need support. 
Swine flu spread in Ukraine a month ago. thousands of people were ill with this disease and many people were died too.
There are not any accident of the death by Swine Flu in Georgia. Though four patients, ill with this flue, have especially heavy health condition.
Georgian Ministry of Health advice people to wear veil and to visit doctors as soon as they appear to have complicated flu.


    

Europe is more then you think

Neolithic, Chalcolithic, Bronze and Iron Age, individualistic culture, philosophy, humanism and rationalism under Aristotle, Socrates and Plato. History with Herodotus, Poems of Homer and science with Pythagoras, Euclid and Archimedes. Law, language, engineering, architecture and government. Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius- Welcome, this is Europe.
Nowadays Europe is considered to be the most powerful, rich and comely continent with its 27 European Union member states and largest economy on the world. It does correspond, But Europe is much more then they consider. Europe is its history, culture and Religion.
It has very long history of existence with it’s miscarry and triumph, Dark Ages and Classical antiquity periods. Europe has entered a long period of change arising from what historians call the "Age of Migrations.’’ There were numerous invasions and migrations amongst the Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Goths, Vandals, Huns, Franks, Angles, Saxons, and, later still, the Vikings and Normans and this is not all. Middle Ages were full of mortality. There were incursions by nomadic Turkic tribes, by the Mongols, Tatars. The period between 1348 and 1420 witnessed the heaviest loss by the famine. In the mid-14th century Europe was devastated by the Black Death, one of the most deadly pandemics in human history which killed an estimated 25 million people in Europe alone — a third of the European population at the time.
But Europe survived and between the 14th and 16th centuries The Renaissance spread across the continent. This was the time of Raphael, Michelangelo, and Leonardo da Vinci – Age of Discovery. A period of exploration, invention, and scientific development, when Europe has had a major influence in culture, economics and social movements in the world.
In 18th century Industrial Revolution started in Great Britain and spread throughout Europe. The invention and implementation of new technologies resulted in rapid urban growth, mass employment, and the rise of a new working class. Europe’s population doubled during the 18th century and doubled again during the 19th century.
Period of big mortality come back to Europe again in 20th century during two World Wars. Death, Economical and social instability dominated in Europe. After World War II the map of Europe was redrawn at the Yalta Conference and divided into two blocs, the Western countries and the communist Eastern bloc. The United States and Western Europe established the NATO alliance and later the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe established the Warsaw Pact. In 1967 European Economic Community, European Coal and Steel Community and EURATOM formed the European Community, which in 1993 became the European Union. The EU established a parliament, court and central bank and introduced the euro as a unified currency.
Follow to foresaid, Europe has very big history of wars and peace and it is rich with its cultural inheritance, which will never die. Europe is rich with its sculpture, painting, architecture, literature, music, and cinema...


Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, Haydn, and Vivaldi, Luciano Pavarott, Ancient Greece and Roman Architecture. Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, Beaux-Arts , Expressionist architecture, Homer, Dante Alighieri, Miguel de Cervantes, William Shakespeare, Voltaire, Agatha Christie, Anne Frank- This is the Culture of Europe, without what It couldn’t exist.
Religion took important part in the formation of Europe. Christianity shaped up European culture at least last 1700 years. Religion has been always dominant in peoples trust.
 Nowadays Europe is not as unanimous as it had been, but still the most popular religion in Europe is Christianity with its branches: Roman Catholicism, Protestantism and Orthodox Christianity. However, there are Millions of Europeans, who profess no religion or are atheist or agnostic.
XXI century Europe is absolutely formed continent. It has normal situation in demography as well as economically. In 2009 the population of Europe was estimated to be 830.4 million according to the United Nations which was slightly more than 12% of world population. Besides, Europe is home to the highest number of migrants, while 400,000 people emigrated from the UK for a year or more.
Nowadays 27 European Union member states are highly integrated economically and politically. As a continent, the economy of Europe is currently the largest on earth. Most of European countries are rich, though some of the eastern countries economies are still escaping of the ruins of Soviet Union and Yugoslavia.

Alarming Number of Miscarriages in Georgia

According to the official statistics of Georgia number of miscarriages has increased during last three years. There were 2621 miscarriage occasions in 2006. This number increased by one hundred in 2007 and over 300 in 2008.

World Health Organization considers miscarriage, same as spontaneous abortion to be happening before 22 weeks of pregnancy . According to the http://www.uptodate.com/ , accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (cooperated with) about 10 to 20 percent of women in USA , who know they are pregnant, have a miscarriage some time before 20 weeks of pregnancy. 80 percent of these occur in the first 12 weeks. But the actual rate of the miscarriage is even higher. Many women have very early miscarriages without ever realizing that they are pregnant.

22 years old Tinatin Tujishvili had miscarriage when she was 5 weeks pregnant. She was poisoned by gas and that caused her miscarriage. She had high temperature for five days, then she went to the doctor, who said that embryo had died.

,, I remember that small, untidy room, where doctor Dodo Sigua made my spontaneous abortion, I looked for sympathy in the surgeon’s eyes, but they looked at me indifferently, ’’ Tujishvili said. As she reported, she got psychological stress and felt in deep sorrow. It happened two month ago. Tujishvili is taking medical treatment nowadays.
Miscarriage issue is discussed in the book,, Unfinished pregnancy and yearly childbirth-” edited by medicine doctor D. Sigua in 2008. According to this book, miscarriage in Georgia has become one of the biggest problems for obstetrics as well as for population of Georgia during recent years. The percentage of the unfinished pregnancy has considerably increased and by incomplete figures, it is 12-14 percent of all pregnancies.
,, this is the reason of ineffective treatment. There is not throughly studied etiology and pathogenesis of early pregnancy disorder , also there is no simple and effective methods of predicting miscarriage,’’ says the book.
Chachava Inatitute (Scientific Research Center of Prenatal Medicine and Obstetrics Gynecology) gynecological sector instructor- Paliko Kintraia talks about the reasons of miscarriage. He explains, that there are three main reasons of miscarriage in Georgia: social factors: stress, earthquake, revolution, economical problems, unemployment; Chemical and radiation environment; various diseases.
,, Most of XXI century Georgian women are too much stressed. This reflects on their fetus and it causes the miscarriage. Food is another problem, even vegetables are full of chemicals,” Kintraia says. He agrees that ineffective treatment is the most important issue nowadays. ,, But this is not the problem of Georgia only, it is the problem of the whole world, changes must be invented in order to get fast and qualitative treatment,’’- Kintaria says.
The World Health Report of 2008 also states: ,,Globalization is putting the social cohesion of many countries under stress, and health systems are clearly not performing as well as they could and as they should. People are increasingly impatient with the inability of health services. Few would disagree that health systems need to respond better – and faster – to the challenges of a changing world.’’
Increased miscarriages reflect on the demographic index. According to the official statistics made by Health Care in Georgia compared with the European countries in 2005, Georgia stands after Andorra according to the live births per 1,000 population.




Way out of of this problem is in the economical development in Georgia by Tamaz Kordzakhia , expert of the Ministry of Healthcare and director of the maternity home “Hera”. Kordzaxia talks about the miscarriages to the Human Rights Center in 2009.14th January. He thinks, that economical problems reflects on the women reproductive health condition and while this problem exists , miscarriage problem will be alarming in Georgia.
As it is written in the book ,, Unfinished pregnancy and yearly childbirth’’ solution of the miscarriages must be found in reorganizing treatment methods, which will ensure accessible, gradational, expertly helping of the pregnant women.

Statistics of spontaneous abortion
Year Total number of abortion Spontaneous abortion
2006 21204 2621
2007 20642 2767
2008 22062 2958

Graduate Record Examinations

National Examination Centre will publish the list of students, who obtained finance in Master’s degree in a week. The results had to be published earlier, but it didn’t. Students are waiting and confused.

Tbilisi State University administration official, Zviad Muradashvili said, that university started studying students in Master’s degree, Though they don’t know the results of financing. One of the student Natia beridze also reported: ,,I am confused, I have already started my study, but if it comes up, that I am not financed, I’ll have to call off my study. I wish the results published soon.”


Tbilisi Technical Institute also started studying students in Master’s Degree. But they demanded students to pay the tax beforehead. So, after the results publishes, the administration of the Institute will refund money to the students who will get finance.

Merab Topuria, the superior of logistic group on National Examination centre reported, that publishing results delayed because of some unexpected problems appeared in the system.
,, Main cause of this problem is that specialization exams conducted delayed in some institutes, So they send us the facts later, also there are 122 students, who has registered in different Institutes and we need to know Where do they want to enter the Master’s degree program. 85 of them came and chose the institute, we are waiting other 37 student. If they don’t inform their decision until the end of this day, we are going to exclude them from the list,’’ Topuria said.

Government has decided financing students in Master’s Degree in 2009. They have emitted two million GEL for the program this year. Five thousand people have taken part in the competition. They took exams in General Skills and in Specialization exams. Students will get place in Master’s Degree defend on their score in specialization exams. They get finance according competitive score in General Skills. Financing has three steps gradation.
First: the rating. 10 percent of 2 million GEL (200 000 GEL) will finance students whose rating in the list are the highest. Second: 11 Directions of Specialty. 40percent of 2 million GEL goes on them. Third: Priorities. 50 percent of total amount will send on them. There are 11 directions, but only 9 are priorites: Humanitarian, Juridical, Natural sciences, pedagogical, Engineering .. Jurispodence and Business will not be take this additional finance.
,,We have too much professionals in Jurispondence and Business, that’s why we financed other directions to bring more students there,“ Topuria said.