Every morning, he rides his old Soviet bike through broken streets,
balancing giant musical instruments on the handlebars –
tools collected by generations of his family.
After the war between Abkhazia and Georgia (1992 – 1993),
most buildings are destroyed.
No solid ceilings.
Including his little school.
When it rains, water drips straight onto the children’s hands
as they play scales under umbrellas
a scene so surreal and poetic that Lynch and Tarkovsky
would fight to film it.
And yet…
look at the happiness of this teacher.
He holds a kind of childlike certainty
in the importance of his mission.
He earns nothing.
and still believes he is doing massive work
carrying a new generation into the light
on the frame of his bike.
A magician holding a broken world together with music
Every day, he walks into the same cracked building
looks at the dripping ceiling,
and starts class with full fire
as if it’s the last day of his life.