The sun was barely kissing the peaks of the Caucasus when Don Bacho stood outside his stone hut, scratching his chin. He had a problem: a giant, ancient wooden wardrobe that had belonged to his grandmother. It was heavy, smelled of mothballs and history, and needed to go to the village at the bottom of the valley.
Don Bacho and Bedina are legendary, lighthearted figures often featured in rural Georgian folk humor and local anecdotes. Their stories usually revolve around their cleverness, stubbornness, or comical misunderstandings of modern life. In Georgian dialects, (
At that exact moment, Gogi the donkey decided he had had enough of family heirlooms. With a sudden shimmy, the straps snapped. The wardrobe teetered. "Bedina, hold it!" Bacho screamed. DON BACHO & BEDINA daagdo ...
Bedina walked over, wiped purple juice from his lip, and pointed down at the river. "Look on the bright side, Bacho. You wanted it in the valley. It’s in the valley. And we didn’t even have to walk the rest of the way."
Bedina arrived, leaning lazily against his donkey, Gogi. "Bacho, that wardrobe is larger than my house. Why not just burn it and tell people it was stolen by a ghost?" "It’s an heirloom," Bacho insisted. "We carry it." The sun was barely kissing the peaks of
Bedina looked at the tumbling wooden mountain, looked at his blackberries, and then looked at the steep 200-foot drop to the river below. He calmly stepped aside. "Bacho!" Bedina yelled. (Drop it/Let it go!)
"Bedina!" Bacho hollered. "Bring your donkey and your pride. We have work." Don Bacho and Bedina are legendary, lighthearted figures
And so, they walked back up the mountain, leaving the "dropped" history behind, already planning how to tell the village they had fought off a pack of wolves to save the empty air.