Our Christmas Tree

Here is a photo of the Christmas tree with all the goodies around it! We love that we have such a dramatic space for the tree, and we only wish we had a much bigger, more impressive tree to put in it! Collier has removed the majority of the ornaments that are within his reach, but overall he has been pretty good at leaving it alone. We love to hear him say "ooooohhhh" when we turn on the lights!

First snowfall in Skopje

Last night, a day late, but still pretty, we received our first accumulation of snow here in Skopje. It has snowed earlier in the season, beautifully blanketing the mountains, but this was the first time we could get close to it. Chris, who I think is secretly still a kid, was out the door first thing this morning to start making his snowman. The girls were eager to help, but ended up mostly making lots of snow angels instead. Collier was not too interested in the snow, he particularly hated wearing mittens, but he enjoyed watching the girls pummel each other with snowballs! Yotee, ever the water dog, tried to eat as much snow as she could. Our first measurable snowfall here in Macedonia proved to be a fun event for almost the entire family--Christopher slept right through everything! I hope you all are enjoying a lovely Christmas too.

Mission Holiday Party

Sunday, the Embassy held their annual holiday party for the entire staff and their families. As you can imagine, this is a huge undertaking for the CLO office and it was not without it's obstacles! Even with the absence of the CLO's goodie bag offerings and craft items due to a lost package snafu, the event was a tremendous success!

Preparing an event of this magnitude requires tons of effort and cooperation, not to mention a great big space. Nova (Christopher's school)was kind enough to offer their facility again this year and proved to be an excellent venue with plenty of space to accommodate the crowd. They also provided some teen volunteers (Christopher included) to help monitor the children in the fitness room and to run the coat check rooms. The main lobby was transformed into Santa's den, with the designated "throne" awaiting his arrival. (GSO warehouse reserves a special chair for this specific function, off limits to even the Ambassador!) Face painting tables entertained the little ones, almost 200 of them I'm told, and strategically placed tables offered plenty of sweet treats to nosh on. Craft tables were set up in the nearby classrooms to give the kids a chance to paint, color and create ornaments. The fitness room downstairs was open for the kids to blow off steam by playing ball, ping pong, jump rope, etc. The cafeteria offered a welcome spot to sit and enjoy a soda, coffee, or hot cocoa.

I was pleasantly surprised by how wonderful and smoothly the event played out. Even with the crowds, I never felt uncomfortable or cramped. It was a very enjoyable evening and the children had a wonderful time. They really enjoyed visiting with Santa, kudos to Tom, and were more than satisfied with their treat sacks, kudos to CLO. I am impressed with how they managed to overcome the adversity of losing all their preordered items and still offer a truly fantastic experience for the children of the Embassy! It was a lovely way to kick off our holiday and I thank them for it.

Singing and Dancing

One thing that is taken very seriously here in Macedonia is the musical culture. For such a small, impoverished country, the amount of operas and ballets on offer is mind-blowing. It seems at least once a week, I receive invitations to performances at the Opera House or to foreign cinematic offerings. Just today I received an invitation to La Traviata, last week it was a ballet of Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs, which I'm sorry we missed. During my research on Skopje, I noticed a lot of references to the cultural climate here, but I am truly surprised by it's actual depth.

This phenomenon even extends into the children's schooling. We were very pleased to learn that Arianna would be able to continue her clarinet lessons here(after spending nearly $1000 on her clarinet), and that the school hired on a special instructor just for her, as there are no other clarinet students. Anastasia was recently "selected" for the special Children's Choir, consisting of Macedonian and QSI students, due to her "musical ability". All students are encouraged to participate in instrumental and vocal studies and the school even hosts an "open mike night" once a month. It is a nice twist, but does have it's downfall as well.

Earlier this month, the school hosted it's winter program (please don't refer to it as a holiday program in front of the director!) and it was quite an event. The kids practiced for several weeks, missing many routine classes such as art, gym, library, computers, and music to prepare for the spectacular event. It was a bit frustrating for me to see the kids come home so exhausted, particularly Anastasia who was staying after school for the choir practices. I was sincerely disappointed to learn later that she had not been "selected" to participate in two of the choir's performances after 8 hours of practicing!!! I spoke directly with her organizer and with the school director about this strange need to handle these shows so professionally. (Long, long story!) I have always enjoyed the performances at other schools, wobbly voices, and all. I can't understand why it is necessary to be so particular with the kids and I feel it is a blow to their confidence to exclude them or treat them like little divas.

Anastasia did get to perform with the "special" choir during last Friday's community time, along with the other "excluded" children. It was an absolutely magical performance, even with the kids who were deemed "unprepared and unable to perform at the necessary level". They performed along side a world class tenor (opera singer) and it was amazing. I cried my eyes out! It was so lovely and I can't understand why she had to miss the previous shows. Everyone was extremely proud of their efforts.

A professional opera singer also accompanied the vocal performances at the winter show, and the second portion of the show showcased a modern dance version of the "Rite of Spring" with a professional ballerina leading the children. What other school in the world offers such opportunities to their students?? The event was held in the Macedonian Opera House and Ballet Theater. As impressive as this is, it is also a bit disappointing in the sense that it was a bit too polished, and most of the kids did not enjoy it and saw it merely as work. Not only mine.... many complained that it was not fun, the choreography was too difficult, and they were thrilled that it was over. Although the evening was sincerely fabulous, I think they placed to much emphasis on making it so professional....just let the kids be kids and it will still be amazing to us parents! I honestly think I enjoyed just listening to the German, Spanish, and English carols performed at community time more, as they were fun and relaxed.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for encouraging musical talent in the kids, I just want them to develop a love for these arts, not feel overwhelmed by them. For photos of the event, please visit http://www1.qsi.org/mcn/.

Christmas Cookies

Each year I bake Christmas cookies. It is a tradition I picked up from my Great Aunt Donna many, many years ago. I remember her baking for days and freezing tons of delicious cookies. Her "buckeyes" stand out strongly in my memory! I was pleasantly surprised to see that my new friend Teresa has the recipe and is willing to share.

I love baking and I love creating festive colorful trays of goodies to share. This year it was somewhat more challenging to create colorful cookies due to the lack of food coloring on the local market. I looked everywhere and I confirmed with my friend Bridget, ace cake baker to the Embassy community, that there is none available here in Skopje. Bridget generously offered to share some of hers, but she has already helped me with so much in the last month(Crisco for my pie crust, celery for my stuffing), that I declined her offer. I am clever enough to find another way to make my cookies look nice, right? I had ordered some food coloring gels from NetGrocer, anticipating the need, but they sent me decorating gels instead. Well, the lack of food colors and fancy green and red sprinkles, not to mention the pecans for my tassies, led to some experimental recipes this year. All with delicious results!

I spent two days baking, with Hani keeping an eye on Collier it was much easier. I created chocolate chip (aka the famous American specialty according to the GSO staff guys), peanut butter chocolate chip, peanut butter dipped in chocolate, thumbprints with frosting, chocolate mint blossoms, chocolate almond tassies, and stained glass cookies. Hershey's kisses, local jelly candy, and some hard tack candy helped add color to the plates. I also baked several batches of flour/salt dough ornaments for the kids to decorate at school and at the Embassy Holiday party. Arianna designed holiday greeting tags for each tray. I was absolutely tethered to my kitchen and exhausted at the end of it all. But in the end, seven beautifully presented trays of cookies delighted the QSI teachers, the Marines, the staff at my husband's office,the girls' school bus driver, and Hani's family. It was well worth the effort and I am always proud to share my talents with the people who help make our lives a little richer. Thank you Aunt Donna for inspiring me!

Ironically, after community time at QSI, within a half an hour of delivering the goodies to the school and Embassy, I checked the mail room at the Embassy and found that my food coloring had arrived! Next year I'll be ready!

Rocky Road to Kosovo!

Wednesday, Chris and I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to travel to Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo together. Usually, Chris goes alone, and I stay home with the kids. Now that we have Hani helping out occasionally, we are able to go together and do our shopping.

Because Kosovo is considered a "no-dependants" post, the children are not allowed to cross the border and accompany us to the base. That is unfortunate because they would really enjoy Burger King and Taco Bell....;). There is only one road into Kosovo that we are permitted to take, and we are not allowed to make any stops between the border and the base. We must also have written permission from the RSO office to allow us to go. Chris always gets a kick out of the signage on the way. There are speed limit signs for cars, and speed limit signs for tanks. It is pretty neat and someday we will remember to photograph it.

We set out first thing in the morning, lamenting the heavy rain that was falling and hoping it wouldn't slow us down too much. The trip isn't very long, probably only 40 minutes of driving, but the trip can be seriously delayed by slow moving trucks on the mountainous two-lane road. Also, tie-ups at the border crossing can be aggravatingly long. En route, we noticed quite a few rocks had slid down the mountain, so I drove slowly and carefully. The rain was a constant, steady flow and we were thankful that the temperature was above 50 degrees or would have been one heck of a blizzard! We arrived at the base in decent time and did some shopping, stocking up on must have items like Oscar Meyer bacon, hot dogs, and cheddar cheese. We enjoyed a quiet fast-food lunch, picked up some extra tacos and cinnamon twists for the kids, and headed back toward Macedonia.

The road home was much of the same, rain wise, but the roads became much more dangerous. There were a number of spots where the rock slides were active, with very large(bigger than basketballs) boulders lumbering down the mountain. I should add here that there is no shoulder on either side of the road and avoiding such a slide is nearly impossible!! The mountain walls are on one side and the other is a deep cliff protected only by rather flimsy guard rails. We noticed several snow plows on the road and laughed about how odd it was to see them in such warm weather, but apparently they were clearing the rock slides. It was quite scary in some areas where traffic was stopped to allow for the clearing. We were stuck in very vulnerable spots waiting and watching as rocks tumbled down, just praying we could get going again before some hit us! Fortunately, most of the drivers were considerate and careful that day, which is actually not the norm, and we arrived home safely (after spending nearly an hour crossing the border back into Macedonia!). I have vowed never to make the trip to Kosovo during rainy weather again!!! While it is refreshing to learn that the Kosovar authorities do actually maintain the road and patrol it well, I'm not sure that cheddar cheese is worth risking my life for again!

Thanksgiving

It is always difficult to be away from "home" for the holidays, but I have always firmly believed that home is wherever my family is and for now--that is here in Macedonia. Thanksgiving is a particularly difficult holiday for me, given that my mom passed away the day after Thanksgiving in 2001. It was always her favorite holiday and she really made it special. Now, it is up to me to carry on her traditions and cook really big!! Though Me-ma would have never settled for an 11 pound turkey, it was all that I could get, so I happily prepared it. As is also my mom's tradition, we snapped a photo of the bird, as you can see above.

It seems to be a requirement to have lots of folks around the table for Turkey day! In Doha, we enjoyed sharing our holidays with soldiers on R&R from Iraq, our British neighbors, and other local friends. In Luxembourg, we had quiet meals with just ourselves, which just never felt right. Here in Skopje, I was eager to share our meal with friends, so we invited Anastasia's teacher and our new babysitter's family to join us. Since Miss Virginia is a young single woman living outside the US for the first time, she gladly accepted the opportunity to spend the holiday with the family. Hani, our new babysitter, has worked with Americans before and is familiar with the holiday, so she was excited to join us too, along with her husband and her son.

We had a lovely traditional meal--turkey, homemade stuffing, roasted garlic mashed potatoes, brocoli, candied sweet potatoes, corn, gravy, peas, fresh cornbread, apple pie, chocolate cream pie, etc. Hani brought some delicious Macedonian cheese and spinach pies as well, and it was nice to have something Macedonian for the feast. We spent the day enjoying wonderful food and even better conversation. It was great to have a chance to get to know our new friends and welcome them into our home. It is important to share our traditions and to learn new ones, and I am glad we were able to do so here in Skopje! I am looking forward to many special holidays with our family and friends in Macedonia.