The Rocky Road to Bitola

Good news everyone! The curtain has been lifted and Peace Corps has finally informed the current trainees where their sites will be for the next two years. This is extremely relieving for me as I hate being kept in suspense with anything, and am even more irritated when people withhold information from me. Let me start off by saying exactly how nervous I was before our site announcements. Luckily, Macedonia is an absolutely fabulous country, with zero bad site placements. However, some places are much more suited to certain personalities than others. For example, my biggest concern was that I would be placed into a small rural community (~200 people and without a pub... yikes!), working at an NGO that specializes in cat rescue and rehabilitation (I hate cats and am extremely allergic to them), and living with a family that has 20 children (over half of our 36 volunteers this year were placed in home stays). I calculated my odds at dodging all of these potential PC hazards at approximately between 7-8% through a very careful and thorough country map and cross-sectoral analysis. Honestly, I spent way too much time trying to calculate the odds of being absolutely miserable and it nearly drove me insane. Also it is important to note that while these things may not be appealing to myself, there are many people who would actually want all of those things I tried so hard to avoid.

However, now that the news is out, I can breathe a major sigh of relief. By some absolute miracle, that is absolutely a complete shock; I somehow managed to get every single thing I wanted without ever telling anyone in the organization what I actually would prefer. Luck has placed me in the second largest city in the country (beautiful Bitola with approx 80,000 people and presumably several pubs), at a democracy-advocacy NGO that works on an international scale with young adults through various organizations including the local university (no cats for this guy!), and I have been truly blessed to be receiving my own apartment somewhere within the city (no children with sticky fingers!). Everything that could possibly have been in my wish list has been realized. It makes me extremely guilty knowing that some volunteers were extremely upset with their site placements, while I received everything I ever wanted without saying a word but that is exactly how the Peace Corps goes sometimes. Complete luck. I half-expected a sign to pop up, ala Civilization V style, and say ‘your Golden Age has ended.’ The karma bank has run dry, all reserves have been used up.

Please bear with me for a bit as I torture you all with another history lesson, since I love to lecture so very much. In the shadow of Mount Pelister (Baba Mountain), Bitola is built on the ruins of one of the oldest cities in Macedonia (Heraclea Lyncestis), dating back to the time of Philip II, in the 4^th and 5^th Century B.C.E. The town is the site of many historical mosques, Turkish baths, and old bazaars that have been around for centuries. Ruler of the Ottoman Empire, Ataturk, went to university in Bitola, and many other historically relevant things occurred here over the past 2 centuries. If you would like, you can read ALLLL about it on the world’s most trusted academic resource, Wikipedia. I joke of course, but really, the basic history of the city is all there, complete with credible citations from various academic sources.

In a week from now, all the current trainees will get to experience the wild adventure of going to their sites for a 3-day excursion that includes learning how to use Macedonian transportation, meeting our workmates and counterpart, and hopefully seeing where we will be living for the two years at our site. I will be taking over the apartment of a departing volunteer, as also will be Joe, the other volunteer who will be working in Bitola as well. Joe also was placed in a great NGO, which specializes in small business incubation to help entrepreneurs manage their own new enterprises. Living and working in the same city with another volunteer will be a great joy, seeing as how some volunteers are placed far away from anyone they can converse in English with. Please be patient in the coming weeks as I can only update this blog so often with pictures and snippets of information about my new home. I still have a month left of living in wonderful Kratovo, but the excitement of starting a whole new adventure all alone is tantalizing. Hopefully at some point everyone, from all around Macedonia as well as other parts of the world, will be able to visit as well!

Please continue to do some research via the Wiki here, there is a lot of very interesting things to entice you all to come spend a week or two.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitola