Kichevo and Other Adventures

Здраво folks, its been awhile since anything exciting has happened but I will try to give a quick rundown of the latest events taking place thus far in this part of the world. We had our first hub day in Kumanovo this past Friday, which was a nice opportunity to see all those friends we made the first week that we have not been able to see since then. I was particularly excited about this opportunity as it offered a chance to return to the Irish Pub in Kumanovo, which according to all the locals, is 'the place to be seen.' Now let me share some things about this Irish pub, I think it may be the least Irish place I have ever been. They had no Harp, no Guinness drafts, and no crazy Irish paraphernalia hanging on the walls. They did however, have Guinness in bottles, at the OUTRAGEOUS price of 180 den a bottle... for a 12 oz bottle. To put this into perspective, in my town of Kratovo, you can buy a .5 L bottle of Златен Даб или Скопско for around 40 den. I find this insanely offensive that someone would charge that much for a terrible beer. I find it even more perplexing that people actually pay this amount for old Guinness in bottles in downtown Kumanovo. Oh well... Тоа и тоа.

On the other side of events, I was lucky enough to be able to travel with my host sister to Kichevo last weekend to attend a handball game. The drive was a winding, long trek through the mountains that took close to four hours (after stopping in Skopje) to complete.

Handball game! Go Kratovo! But... we lost. (T_T)

So this is the view from the top of the mountain on the way to the Kratovo vs. Kichevo game, its quite nice up here and the air is so much cleaner than downtown Skopje. However, I cannot even imagine how dangerous these roads are in the wintertime. Especially considering the way some of these drivers like to handle corners in their buses as if they were driving Formula 1 cars.

The scenery was very beautiful though, and apparently in the western part of the country they have a few decent (although expensive, I hear) ski resorts so I am hoping I can eventually break into some of my savings and go snowboarding one weekend in January or February.

 So I realize that I completely forgot to inform the world of my living arrangements with Мајка и Тато. This is my room and my very comfortable bed. The down comforter is especially lovely on those evenings where it dips down in the single digits.

Here is the favorite part of my room however, I was allowed to 'decorate' so I used this as an opportunity to be reminded of some of my favorite places. Pictures from Korea, and of course a map and postcards from my Okla-home.