“Berika! Berika!”

The children scream as masked figures charge towards them with whips, and scatter into the village streets. An elderly man is approached by the same figures, and fights them off as they smear handfuls of mud across his face. Elsewhere, a family is being dragged out of their car, doors open, windscreen smeared in dirt.

These are the scenes at Berikaoba, Georgia’s 8,000 year old pagan festival that welcomes in the start of spring with whips, masks and plenty of mud. The festivities celebrate the awakening of nature at the end of winter, and its performers are said to bring fertility and prosperity for the year ahead.

We rolled up to the church at the centre of Didi Chailuri a little shy of 10am. Aside from a few dented Ford Transits and a car blaring Georgian hiphop cruising up and down, there was no life on the dusty village streets. Didi Chailuri was the kind of village people usually drove past on the busy road out of Tbilisi, but rarely stopped in, with a population of just 1,200 and nothing remarkable about it. But, once a year, this quiet village plays host to one of Georgia’s craziest festivals.

There was no one at the church, the apparent starting point of the festivities, so we wandered up to the top of the village with an increasing number of other confused spectators in tow. Eventually we found a group of costumed men in the back of a Transit van, and one masked boy on a quad bike, who we followed back down to the church. An hour or more had passed, we were hot and tired already from the walking, and nothing had started. Georgia runs on its own timeline, and “starts at 11am” could mean anytime from 10 til 1, or just simply whenever it starts.

There were a few minutes of calm at the church as people gathered and men pulled their masks over their heads and put the final finishing touches to their costumes. They piled inside somebody’s courtyard, pulling the gates closed behind them, and a hush fell over the crowd. Then, like a pack of howling jackals, they burst out of the gates and took off down the street in a hail of whips and wailing screams.

“Whywhywhywhywhywhy! Whymewhymewhyme?!”

Like a confetti canon exploding across the village, chaos rained down in colourful hues as the berikas shrieked, whipped, rolled around on the ground and grabbed handfuls of mud, which they gleefully smeared across anyone’s face and hands who got in their way. Their costumes were handmade with all manner of things; rainbow-coloured rags, sheepskins, pelts, feathers, ribbons and cuddly toys were all common themes, as were pumpkin seed teeth, and even a horse saddle that had been hand-stitched into a mask with holes for eyes. They were terrifyingly brilliant.

The berikas sloshed around in water troughs, chased people down the street lashing their whips, and sat stubbornly in front of passing cars, followed around by a crowd of muddied onlookers. They were causing all manner of chaos across the village, and yet the villagers couldn’t have looked happier.

The berikas went from gate to gate, being offered gifts by the locals ranging from bread to homemade wine to pitchers of beer, eggs and money. The gifts are a long-standing and integral part of the festival, as it was believed that the offerings would increase the chance of a fruitful harvest; in return, the villagers are ‘blessed’ with the berika’s muddy hands, which symbolises a connection to the world of the dead and their ancestors.

Once upon a time families who did not have offerings for the berikas were cursed by them rolling around on the floor, but these days the offerings are optional. The berikas were also prone to stealing chickens, even if it was a family’s last, and although the festival organiser insists that they no longer do this, we did see them walking around clutching a couple of chickens by their legs, which were unceremoniously thrown into the back of their van along with the rest of their haul. All beverages they collected were poured into a jerrycan for later consumption.

Berikaoba was inscribed on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage list of Georgia in 2013, despite almost dying out completely in the previous century. As Georgia moved towards Christianity and away from Paganism, so pagan traditions such as this were gradually forgotten, clinging to life in only a handful of villages across the Kakheti region. It was only thanks to the efforts of one history teacher, Eka Veshapidze,  who moved to Didi Chailuri around 30 years ago that the festival was revived.

Previously the festivities would start in the village before moving on to neighbouring Patara Chailuri to conclude, and it seemed that less and less residents were taking an interest. Fortunately, through Eka’s efforts, Berikaoba has grown into a village-wide folk theatre celebration, and has been updated to a modern take on an ancient living tradition, minus the original curses and wooden ‘fertility symbol’ phalluses.

The procession carried on around the village, and no street was left undisturbed. Everyone was involved in the celebrations whether they wanted to be or not. Nobody could escape from the berika carwash as passing cars had their screens streaked with mud, and sometimes their drivers and passengers were dragged out into the street to receive a caking too.

Children shouted in the street: “Berika! Berika!” then squealed with delight and ran away as the masked figures charged towards them. Occasionally people were picked up by a team of berikas and whirled around in the air- even Ben was picked up and thrown, and both of our faces were so caked in mud that numerous people stopped to take selfies with us.

“Beriberiberika! WeeiiweeeiiweeeiiWEEEII! Maselacoocoo!”

The berikas had invented their own language, a high-pitched medley of jackal-like howls, gibberish sentences, ululations, and gorilla shrieks, with the occasional phrase that sounded a bit like English. They ran about for hours under the hot sun with seemingly boundless energy, stopping only at neighbour’s houses for refreshments, never breaking character except to snaffle a cheeky cigarette. They herded the crowds with whips, marshalled traffic and eventually led everyone down to a large field at the bottom of the village. There were no stewards, no organisers, none of the health-and-safety you’d expect of similar events in the west, just good old mud-slinging fun and merriment, and the occasional whipslap.

A village-wide supra was laid out across wooden tables in the field, an enormous feast prepared and distributed entirely for free- even the glasses of local Georgian wine were donation-only. There were hunks of meat grilling on coals, people making churchkhela, the national sweet treat of walnuts dipped in thickened grape molasses, and endless loaves of shotis puri, Georgian bread cooked in a tandoor-style oven. Kids swung on a hand-built wooden swing and snacked on fistfuls of candy floss.

In the midst of this was an arena lined with hay, where the afternoon’s main event would take place. Chidaoba is an ancient form of wrestling that’s so unique to Georgia that it, like Berikaoba, is inscribed on the UNESCO list of Intangible Cultural Heritage. Young lads take turns to grab each other’s costumes, each trying to gain a better hold over the other, while a hectic blend of instruments soundtracks the matches, adding a suitably comedic element.

The wrestling was about halfway through when the berikas made a reappearance, bursting into the arena and enacting their own wrestling matches while the band tootled over the proceedings. Once they’d settled in to watch with the crowd, the final, and meatiest, wrestler took to the stage. Except nobody wanted to fight him, and the one person who did was instantly put on the floor. The meaty man won by default, and heaved his prize, a fully grown sheep, up and over his head, parading it for a short while before throwing it down undignifiedly to the floor.

By now we were sweaty, exhausted, and the sun had baked the mud onto our faces throughout the course of the day. What we hadn’t expected was just how interactive the festival would be, and we’d assumed we’d be watching a local village festival, not participating in it. The berika’s nonsensical screaming and streaking of mud had, in a weird way, bridged the language barrier and allowed us to fully connect with this bizarre local custom. And it had been the most fun we’d had at any festival before.

While the future of Berikaoba had been thrown into doubt, it was clear to see that this burgeoning folk tradition was once again the life and soul of Didi Chailuri, and would hopefully continue to bring joy and prosperity to the villagers for many millenniums to come.

References:

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/berikaoba-georgia-fertility-festival

https://georgiantravelguide.com/en/articles/berikaoba

https://www.thevagabondimperative.com/guides/berikaoba-a-monstrous-fertility-festival-in-rural-georgia/

Watch the full Berikaoba festival video here!

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