Ayurveda and Georgian Gyms - paradoxes in Stalin-land

I guess to start off I am going to need to explain what Ayurveda is. It is a an Indian philosophy which believes that there are 3 different compositions of individuals which determines what medicines, diets, lifestyles, etc work for them. You can be primarily vata, or water, pita: fire, or kapha: earth. There are essential oils, foods among other things which are coordinated for based on what your composition, or dosa is. So, in the republic of Georgia I randomly saw an advertisement for an Ayurvedic massage center in Tbilisi. I have yet to go and check them out but talk about surreal. I was hoping that I wouldn't be viewed as a heretic for yoga and there is something even more esoteric here. You may ask where such a strange ad would be in this Orthodox country, where else but Vake Park, the most elite and luxurious gym in Central Europe, the Caucasus and most other places I have been. There is a 50 meter pool with Olympic 20 meter diving platforms if desired, deluxe spa with sauna, steam room, up-to-date fitness equipment only in English, and these strange vacuum elliptical machines which burn fat in the women's section of the gym. Apparently you are supposed to put cling film/plastic wrap around your legs and you are in this machine that is covered so you only see your head and resembles and elliptical machine. I have yet to try it so I will keep you updated. So this gym has pretty hefty prices and I almost thought they were joking when I first went. They are not joking and there is a waiting list.

It gets more surreal. Men and women have separate price ranges as they are trying to get more women to join. It costs somewhere between $90-160 a month to use the gym depending on whether you would like to come at all hours or be restricted to only daytime weekday use. Everytime I go it is really a social experiment trying to figure out HOW on earth Georgians are able to afford this place. Salaries for most people short of computer programmers are far short of the rates of this gym each month. Yet, the men's section is pretty packed in evenings and apparently it is hard to get a locker. It seems like I am missing something. There is a piece to the puzzle which is constantly not present. The paradoxes of this country baffle me each day. Sometimes each day more than the next. For example, the streets are dusty, muddy, with many holes and thousands of obstacles such as construction workers, water pipe repairers, yet women wear heels, that don't have any mud on them and they don't seem to destroy the shoes. I have resorted to wearing my hiking boots today as all my shoes are muddy and too wet to wear today. There seems to be an art to walking here that I am anxious to learn. Another example, people spend fortunes on their cell phones, at least $200-300 with fancy cameras on the phones, and they never have credit to call anyone as you have to pay per minute for outgoing calls. I was wondering why people were texting like crazy and then I saw how easy it was to use up money by talking.

So Vake Park, like the cell phones, the fancy cars which get beaten up by the roads and pilfered are status symbols. Strange thing, the ego, isn't it. We saw a parking lot of cars in the intersection outside our house during rush hour. In fact, it usually happens almost every day, at 12pm and then at 3pm. You usually know it is happening by the number of honks, and the police on loudspeakers telling cars to hurry up. Tbilisi is definitely an experience.