Spring Bouquet

Ok, I'm calling this the spring bouquet entry because it is a wild collection of random happenings from this spring.

Ashley and I visited our friend Ivona who had her first child, a baby girl. By tradition here, there is a mandatory lock down for about 6 weeks after a baby is born where mom and child do not venture out and nobody visits. Then, after that period, there is sort of an "open house" where people are encouraged to come by and meet the baby. Here we are holding baby Ilina.


I went hiking yet again, this time a group hike to an area about 30 minutes outside of town called Mariovo. Jane and David joined me and about 150 locals participated. The low point of the hike was when we saw a guy chuck his granola bar wrapper down the hillside. I told him (in Macedonian), "Don't throw your trash on the ground," to which he responded, "There's no trash can." Well duh, there's also not a prodav (store) selling granola bars but somehow he had one. Anyway, I actually responded, "You have a backpack," and when he just kind of shrugged and I called him a budala (fool). Luckily the hike ended on a higher note with a local specialty, tavche gravche (baked beans), served at a monastery and a nap in the sun before we hiked back to the buses. David and Jane dining at the monastery pictured below; more Mariovo photos here.

That Macedonians are perhaps the kindest people on the planet was proven yet again for me on Friday. I needed to get my stitches removed and rather than trek to the capital, Peace Corps found a doctor in my city to do the procedure. Well, as is typical here where it's all about who you know, Dr. Alekandar is actually a classmate of a doctor that worked temporarily at the Peace Corps office. He lives just down the street from me and he drove me to the hospital, took out my stitches for free, and drove me home--all that for a complete stranger and on a holiday, no less. I didn't think getting stitches removed could be enjoyable but when Dr. Aleksandar told me his first stop when he visits family in Ohio is Papa Johns pizza, we got into a great conversation about America's best fast food. Maybe I should open a Papa Johns in Bitola, since pizza restaurants are very popular already. The hard part would be deciding whether to serve the tomato sauce on the side (as is done here) or serve it American style, right on the crust.

And finally, here are some pretty pics from around town. I am obsessed with the hand door knockers like the one pictured, they are all over town. I have one that I bought in Syria, so I'll always have a reminder of calling this area home.

The Big One

The big one--a major, bold, and innovative project. Most Peace Corps volunteers, at least in my estimation, want a Big One that they can point to as their success story, their volunteer legacy. I do not seem to be immune to this desire and I have to say, it's looking like the Big One will elude me. When I leave Macedonia, there will be no new building or annual event which I can say I created. Maybe I have unrealistic expectations for myself but lately I feel like my efforts have fallen short.

Tomorrow is Earth Day and as the lone environmental volunteer in my group, I feel as though I should have done a huge activity. Instead, I taught two classes with environmental lessons, one to kids and another to an adult English class. With the kids, it was organized chaos as I tried to be heard over about 16 rambunctious children in a small area. If I'm lucky, a few of them got the green messages above the din. Counting the 30 or so people in the adult class along with the kiddos, I reached about 0.05% of the city's population so, go me.

I got turned down to be a trainer for the next group of incoming volunteers, mainly because Peace Corps wants me to spend more time with my new work site after leaving the national park. I feel like I am being punished for being given a bad assignment in the first place and if the intent is to help me land the Big One, I think it will be for naught. Maybe I'm just grumpy because I have stitches on my back (minor thing, don't worry) and I haven't been able to exercise all week.

With the recent coverage of how Greg Mortenson allegedly exaggerated his accomplishments in his bestseller "Three Cups of Tea," maybe it is a good thing that I am keeping it real and saying yeah, I've only done a little bit. Thinking about writing this entry, I came across this Chinese proverb that gives me some reassurance:
It is better to take many small steps in the right direction than to make a great leap forward only to stumble backward.

I think it's the small stuff for me and I'm trying to be okay with that, embracing the forward momentum. Small but significant, for instance, is that I got two guys from my new boys club to volunteer in helping me teach the kids for Earth Day and they did a super job. And hey, if there was any doubt that I'm still a top notch volunteer, I suggest you read this great writeup by my friend Patrice, formerly a volunteer here and now a life coach. It's part of a series she is doing in honor of the 50th anniversary of Peace Corps, so I encourage you to scroll through her blog and read about other volunteers' contributions, big and small.

Go hiking like it's your birthday

Churches and monasteries, hiking and friends--you know, just another birthday celebration in Macedonia. Like last year, I spent my birthday weekend outside enjoying nature and happily the weather was cooperative (mostly--more on that shortly). First, I finally crossed off my to-do list a hike to a monastery called Treskavec with my volunteer friends Jane and David. There is a monk who lives at the monastery and we saw him driving up in his jeep. For the common man though, it's about a 3 hour hike so the monastery has plenty of solitude. We nearly had the monastery to ourselves and it is quite picturesque, so I encourage checking out these pics. The monastery dates back to the 14th century and they just don't build 'em like they used to. On the way back into town, we made a new friend Spiro who gave us his phone number, his wife's phone number, and encouraged us to call him anytime we were back in the area. It just gives me a warm feeling when people here are so welcoming, I will really miss these types of encounters after I leave Macedonia and that time is not so far away anymore, just 7 months from now.

Maybe the monastery visit helped my prayers for good weather and on Sunday morning, I happily met up with about 10 volunteer friends and 6 locals for another hike. My colleagues at YMCA helped organize a hike going between 3 villages bordering the national park. Following a rather un-detailed map provided by the park, we visited churches and monasteries located in the villages (photos up on Picasa).

We began in the village of Trnovo, which had a church with some images that I had never seen in an Orthodox church before like Adam and Eve and Noah's ark. About 20 minutes later, we arrived in the village of Magarevo. This time, we had to ask around the village for the key to the church and monastery. Usually whoever lives closest to the church keeps the key. Up until this point, everything was sunny and easy but...

Despite asking in Trnovo for directions to the next village, Rotino, and asking a cow herder along the way to confirm our path, we got lost. This might not have been so bad had it not led us to be on the side of a mountain hacking our way through scratchy, dense underbrush. To my friends' credit, they maintained good spirits and we distracted ourselves playing a guessing game. Of course, then it started to hail a little. This was more of less the point where I became frustrated with thrashing through the brush and started emphatically calling in English and Macedonian for us to go, "Down! Долу! Down! Долу, долу, долу!" Then I set off and indeed got us off the mountain. The sun came out again and everyone was happier. We decided to press on to Rotino...

Then the dark clouds rolled in and it hailed again, this time pea-sized pieces for about 5 minutes. Also, we still didn't really know where we were going. Some farmers rolled by in the their tractors and we got more directions. Eventually we got to Rotino and a really sweet baba loaned us the monastery key, even giving me a kiss when I asked to take her picture. Luckily Peace Corps volunteers are almost happier when things go awry because they can flex their survival skills and have another good story to tell, so my pals had a great time. I'm less certain about the YMCA members' enjoyment level but they claimed to have fun, although they did say they'd take a path they knew on the next group hike. After hiking, the volunteers came back to my place for a pasta feast and Jane demonstrated making Amaretto sours completely from scratch, assembly-line style, a very nice birthday treat. I'm not sure how my 30s became the decade for pushing myself with demanding hikes on my birthdays but I'm kind of liking it.

Априлили!!!

The title of this blog entry is the name of the holiday celebrated on April 1st in Macedonia. Like April Fools' Day in America, people try to say things that trick their friends and family but Aprilili is even better because there are kids in costumes too. I doubt I will ever see so many Spidermans (Spidermen?) in the same place again. Popular costumes included other non-Spiderman superheroes, princesses, pirates, cowboys, and witches. The photos on this page (plus more here) are mostly from the kids participating in a costume catwalk in Bitola's city center. Personal favorites of mine were the Indians, Harry Potter, Orthodox priest with a broken arm, the tiny Turk, and Uncle Sam.