It can only come down

Today's the fifth or sixth consecutive day in which Skopje is generously awarded with yet another thunderstorm. These storms never last long and always take place between 6 and 8 pm. They are far from the Amazonian stuff and never really seem to upset daily routine. However, on one occasion it managed to attack with some succes. A couple of blocks, in one of which I reside, light was dealt with by means of candles - no electricity. Adds to the Merry Christmas feeling. The storms are also fierce enough to obscure the whole Vodno mountain by clouds. Seems that all these storms start at the mountain and then come rolling down. It's an interesting spectacle.

[Edit] Yesterday's storm that rushed down from Vodno took a bit of dirt, stones and little rocks with it. Some streets in eastern Skopje were lesser accessible afterwards.[/edit]

How to add colours to a picture?

There's a part in Skopje that needs further explanation. It's in the north. It houses a prison for those who dealt with the law not too seriously - the national hotel for those serving time having comitted minor offences. There are construction works in progress for a mosque the size that would rival the current order of the real biggies in the Guinnes Book of Records. It has the most colourfull market in the country. And, as a gypsy, you're not a minority for a change. Name: Шутка or Šutka.

Dressed in shorts, t-shirt and havaianas (have a look and see what I mean) I took off with a friend. Urban transport got us there. The further north the bus got, the more the weather changed. Arriving at the scene we realized that we were both not really appropriately dressed. If we would have stayed in the streets, we would have been soaking wet in no time. Instead of the initiated walk around town, we "Plan-B-ed" by hiding out in shops. Shoe shops. There is at least a square kilometer filled with them around the bus stop. Insteresting side step - there are bus stops and everybody local seems to know where they are. However, when in need of one they all seem to have vanished. No matter how carefull you look around for one, there are no sign posts visible for eyes that are used to order, rest and regularity. A gathering of people next to the street also proofs helpful in these situations. Except, not on a Saturday market day in Шутка. There are people clustered everywhere. Upon inquiry at these clusters, people looked bewildered and sent us up and down the street constantly. Flagging down a bus like it were a taxi was the only option left. It worked.

So far for the side step. We had just arrived and were hopping from one shoe shop to another. Weather also changed for the better and it was time to go out in the streets. Here's where the fun really started as people stopped and watched us as we passed them by. I came to understand that the appearance of somebody with a head full of dreads is, indeed, a bit of a rarity in downtown Шuтка. Most of the people watched and prodded their neighbours. Some didn't bother and a few came and asked wether it was okay to touch. That's when it got really intersting. This is a euphemism, really, but I won't go deeper into detail than that.

About being caught up by interesting sights. As much of an attraction as we both seemed to be, Шутка offered also quite a few for us. Gypsy weddings. I believe there were two of them going on today. Heard a great deal about them, but never witnessed the elaborate dressed women. All of them could be the bride and all were a feast for the eyes. Next: the music. It's loud and once your ears are accustomed to this, it's really great. I started to wonder what a gyspy heavy metal band would sound like and imagined they'd blow away 80% of the long-established likes of Metallica, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest and perhaps even Slayer.

Dropping a more serious note: For some, life at Шутка has been generous in granting them prosperity, big cars of German make and huge fenced houses. The indifference of these who fare well is rather unpleasant. One example: At one stage a big car passed us with the speed of light, not bothering to slow down because of the water and mud filled pot-holes. And, of course, like in a scene of a slapstick movie, the spurting mud landed right all over us. To the majority however, getting through the day appears like a pretty tough fight. Every day again. The smiles on these people's faces, their sense of humour and their interest after they find out you speak a few words Macedonian makes them the people you feel more comfortable being around with. At least I did.

So far for Шутка. It's a great place and probably the most colourfull in the country. I look forward to come back to one day.

Meet Џими

Have been getting some respons about Џими, one of the 4 million (?!) stray dogs in Macedonia. Bumped into him again today and his condition seemed to have changed a little. Partly for good (his jaws seemed to have gotten a little more mobility) and some for worse (his left eye socket). Anyway, he insisted on introducing himself as he appreciated the attention he got.

Џими's photo

Jimmy or Џими as he becomes known in Macedonia. Don't let his facial expression scare you away. Џими is a friendly dog and as far as I can see completely harmless to people.

The sad metamorphosis of Џими

A dog's life in Macedonia is not about roses, moonlight, romance and being cuddled to death. It's a real dog's life. Let's pick the story of one dog as an example. It's about Jimmy. Nobody really knows what the dog's name is. In fact, nobody really seems to know whether the dog has a name at all, but giving him a name like Jimmy, or "Џими" in Macedonian, raises the likelyhood that Disney will pick the story up some day. You'd better get napkins at hand.

Џими has his own territory where he is known by people for being friendly and where he usually is left alone. At a restaurant in his area, people accept him and every now and then he's able to pick up a few crumbs of food. He's provided by water in bowls, rather than drinking it from the gutter in the street. So far, it may look like Џими lives a better than average dog life. However, as it goes in a dog's life, Џими has to stand up and fight for rights or territory every now and then. Unfortunately for Џими, he's a little of the small kind. His legs are only 20 centimeters and the nose to tail-tip count doesn't get much further than 75 cm. And... Џими has a long tail. On one of Џими's last fights, his position as an underdog didn't grant him victory. Nor did the fight result in a draw. Џими lost. And he lost bad. The last time I saw him, Џими looked onto the world with only his right eye. The left one had disappeared. Џими nowadays also walks around with something on his face that resembles a genuine faul smirk that would fit perfectly on any of the Corleone's in the Godfather movies. Џими grins. And it appears that Џими grins painfully. When today he tried to pick up a piece of bread, the grin was explained. He wasn't able to pick up the bread with his jaws like he used to do. He wasn't able to open his mouth. His mouth wasn't able to move at all. Џими had to force the bread through the teeth and then suck on it untill he was able to swallow it. At a closer look, it looks like Џими didn't put up a fight with another dog or a cat. No, it looks like Џими lost his fight from a truck.

Pastrmalija killed the fresh air

Krushevo! The city with the cleanest of fresh air. Its freshness comes over you like a shock after having been in Skopje for a longer time. Walking around in this beautiful little town, that seems to have fallen straight from heaven on the top of a mountain, one gets the impression that living in such a place allows you to live at least 10 years longer. However, there seem to be two downsides to this:

1. Hay fever does not seem to work well in smoggy, foggy and dirty places like Skopje. There's not a lot of sneezing involved in the capitol. At least not from pollen and other stuff produced by greens. Once you sneeze in Skopje, you immediately know it's from the exhausts, the blowing dust and just... well, Skopje. Walking around in the fresh mountain air, where pollen have green light to fly around and get reproduced, is a disaster for the eyes and nose if you have hay fever. It feels like the allergy is playing 'catching up' after having been put on hold for so long. Giving in to the allergy's victory seemed like a wise thing to do after 3 hours of resistance. Having to do that (giving in rather than resist) is a not-done thing in Krushevo where the uprise against the Ottoman Empire in 1903 was done with reasonable amount of success. As a result of that uprise the Republic of Krushevo enjoyed a full 10 days excistence. The motto "Freedom or Death" became something to live by after the re-occupation of the Ottomans. But at the end of the day, all there was to worry about was just a hay fever attack on eyes and nose. Atchoo!
   
2. When coming from Skopje, whatever you do in Krusheve, one moment or the other you have to leave the place and get back to Skopje. The fresh air makes you hungry. Half way back home you come across a town called Veles, famed for its 'pastrmalija' (the Macedonian pizza). You order one thinking that you can deal with it. The smallest seem appropriate. You get about a half square meter of pizza on your plate. And pastrmalija Veles style is lardy. Super tasty, but lardy. Finishing half of that makes you worry about your health. Food that tasty and that heavy cannot make you very old. The worrying part grows when you realize that because of the heavy industry based in Veles, the town is also known as the most polluted place in Macedonia.
   

All the benefits you so gloriously built one when you're in Krushevo become obsolete. At least they did for me.

Today's photos

	A bit further up the road, near the Krushevo Lake, some serious lumbering result in horses carrying heavy burdens.
	The heroes of the national uprise on the day of St. Illija (Illija Den -> Illinden -> Ilija's Day) in 1903 received a monument high on the mountain in Krushevo. All name tags have the shape of old fashioned cherry wood canons.
	Arguably THE most well known monument in Macedonia - Monument of the Illinden Uprising. More about the uprise: in 1903 the freedom fighters in Krushevo succeeded in over-powering the Ottomans, resulting in the declaration of the Republic of Krushevo. Ten days after this declaration the Ottomans crushed the dreams of this young republic and took over again.
	Inside the monument. Detail: the door has the shape of an 'M', standing for, indeed, Macedonia.
	Enjoying the great views over the mountains and the lake.
	Collecting herbs (thyme) on 1.300 metres high. The thyme is used for making tea. Using it as a seasoning for meats is not yet wide spread.

Racked and stacked! Piles of 'em.

Another touristis day out. The usual way of living up to such a day begins three days in advance with the 'planning'. As many of the original plans are still awaiting realization, so went the plan for today. Wednesday I figured it was about time to set eyes on neighboring countries. Bulgaria it would have been, with Sofia as base camp. By mid-Thursday it was Bosnian Sarajevo that kept crawling through my mind as Plan B. Sofia as this weekend's occupation was already a departed idea. Getting to Sarajevo involves some major tracking through Kosovo: some inquiry about the latests over there seemed quite appropriate. And, as it appeared that I would be on my own, I didn't bother to go through all the hassle of approximate 9 hours driving and ... well... to arrive there and find out that in 3 hours time I need to get back already. So, Sarajevo is postponed to another date. Krushevo was mentioned by colleagues. Macodonians keep raving on about this little village high up in the mountains of Central Macedonia. Seems worthy enough to pay a visit. Plan C was born. Sashka, my partner in crime for this ride, had to cancel for today which got Krushevo postponed by one day. And with that, I was not yet having any clue where to head for. Time for Plan D. It wasn't up until 9:55 am that I had a reasonable idea of where to go. At 10:00 am I got in the car and drove in the direction: East of Kumanov - the same route as last Sunday. So far for the touristic re-planning surprises. As the day progressed the plans were moulded and re-shaped. I couldn't find the right turns. Roads weren't on the map or roads on the map appeared to have disappeared in the real world. And three hours of driving on mountainous dirt-tracks in a non 4WD is a lot when you are able to find a village called Konjuh, where there is supposed to be a rock formation where in ancient times people would have lived. It is a context is which you become quite competent in what I call a "Plan-B situation". After Staro Nagorichane and Taticev Kamen it was Zebrnjak that I visited last today. It was a strange climax. High on a hill a monument is raised to memorate some battle I forgot. This monument is more or less a miniature 5 store high version of Minas Tirith - you circle around upwards. With in the centre a pink and white santuary of some sort. On the roof, the views are spectacular and peaceful, though standing up appeared a tricky business because of the firm winds that knocks you off your feet if you're not carefull (and it's a long fall down from 5 stores). Inside the atmosphere is strange at the least. The two pink rooms, one with a fresco of Sveti Wossname, were not the interiors that I imagined to see in there from looking at the monument from the outside. The three or four white rooms looked more in place. Then I found a stair down. Unlit. The camera's flashlight helped me to get down the stairs. The wind outside kept slamming the iron door shut repeatedly. As the hinges were ruined, the door re-opened again always. The constant loud noise added a delicate sound effect to the whole scene. Walking down the stairs I started to realize what the whole monument was there for. It held something. It kept items in store. In a small circular room with a diameter not more than 3 meter. Nicely packed in racks, 4 or 5 shelves high. It was impossible to make out at first. I had to take photos with the flashlight to make sure what it was that was held there. The iron door upstairs was still slamming fiercely. The first photos showed something blurred. I adjusted the camera and made some more photos. To find out that... Well, look for yourself.

Today's photos

	A close up of Zebrnjak, what looks from at a further distance like a ruined castle. The closest place that most people would see this from is the E871, which curls around the hill about 3 km north of it.
	The pink entry hall.
	Sveti Wossname as seen from one of the 4 white inner rooms.
	Someone forgot something.
	Racked bones.

It's much later now. got the 'hyldeblomstsyrop' in the brewing process. A fine smell of fermenting flowers comes from the kitchen. I'm glad there are no bones involved in the making.

Soaring hot day, but I'm registered

Oomph! It's hot today. People appear to get ready for summer (as 30 degrees+ is 'nothing but an omen for what has yet to come'). Half is enjoying it. The other half is complaining. The ignorant few percent like me who doesn't know what to think, happily stays in the middle and more or less just sit it out.

And... yes, the odd registration procedure is finished. What seemed like a defcon 4 situation yesterday is nothing short of a false alarm. You don't carry your own name in your passport, but that of your landlord. You think it's odd? Well, I also thought so, but the officials double checked and... well... The basic thought is that I'm in. But what will happen next week? I don't know if I have to go through all this again. There's a quick flip-flopping of border crossing involved in my schedule. If that happens, will I loose my registration card? Will I have to get a new one (I know the one to this question - YES). It ought to be somewhat more of a routine then. We'll see.

Coming up tomorrow: "How to make a lawn, Skopje Style!"

Registration day!!!

Thinking of getting registered at the police, I'd say that last Friday was a mess because many things happened, a lot of effort was put in getting things organized and in the end nothing was realized. In that respect, I'd say now that today is more interesting: just nothing seems to have happened and therefore, again, nothing is still realized.

To be continued, I guess...

19:30 hrs: Time to edit! I was a little rash with today's entry to my place. When I got home, my landlord was waiting for me. He gave me the registration card. I gave him his rent.

20:45 hrs: Again, time to edit! The registration card is probably not filled out right. It's all in cyrillic. And that, I didn't read well. It has its reason: "Hand written cyrillic makes me nervous!" So now... what? Back to Plan B? I guess so.

The perfect place for alternative tourism

Kratovo. Ever heard of this little city? It's not too far off the Bulgarian border and it could be a real beauty. With that I mean that it could be a REAL beauty. But now, it's just interesting. Some hard Macedonian habits are nowhere so obvious as in Kratovo. Garbage! Disorder! Friendliness! Mucked up sheer beauty! It's all there. And nobody seems to enhance the good parts and put some effort in trying to get rid of the sad side. But that, I know, is hard for someone used to over-organized Dutch society with a multi-layered set of regulations. When I left Kratovo today, the thought of what to do with a winning lotery ticket came back to mind. If there is 35 Million Euro or more to spend / invest, than for my part, Kratovo is a place to do it. To start to get the real beauty more to the surface. As, if you look at the city very close, it simply beats Ohrid.
About investments: there is already a highway being made (European Agency of Reconstruction perhaps?) in the direction of Kratovo. The city has only to connect to that and then, I hope, it can finally do rid of the label it stuck to its own town: the perfect place for alternative tourism.

Photos from the East

	The only photo here featuring Kratovo. This is one of the three old bridges that I counted. All in the same style with big arches and cobbled stones. Also to be seen are the storage anex defence towers, a river anex garbage dump and the most beautiful nature surrounding it.
	Just a little further west from the Valley of the Stone Dolls this one cross (old?) is intriging. A little further away there is also a heap of other interestingly order stones, making up for some old... Well, for some old something stoney. It's completely covered by bushes, flowers and some trees.
	One of the stones kept up in the air.
	Shed next to the Valley of the Stone Dolls.
	My favorite of today. Bugs, lizards and snakes do have a great view when they look up.

Friday the 13th

Whatever you plan, don't plan it on a date like today. I had my fair share of 'abandonned luck' this morning while I was supposed to get registered at the police station. This registration is obligatory and needs to be carried out asap after arrival in the country. It is only up untill very recent that I found out about this but, as many issues in Macedonia are solved, I found out that this would be "Nema problem". That was untill Friday the 13th came around.
The registration procedure is fairly simple and could be over with in 10 minutes. That is, if all goes well. In short it's like this: I hand over my passport. The owner of the appartment that I rent, needs to hand over his ID. We fill out a form. Hand it in at a police station. Wait a little, and all's well from there. That's the theory. Here comes the practice.
Of course, as my landlord is way too important to do the registration himself, it is his driver with his boss' ID who is accompanying me to the police station Skopje Centar today. There, I handed over my passport. We both need to fill out a form. All was collected by the police officer behind the office window. The sliding window closed and we saw our documents and paperwork disappear into the black box of bureaucracy of Skopje Centar Police Station. There's nothing else to do but wait. Wait a little in the smoke filled waiting room.
After a good 10 minutes it was a shaken head from the police officer and the driver's seemingly rough way of negotiation that was starting to get me reaching for my 'Plan B' section for such situations. Only to find out that for this, I didn't really know what to do next. What was the matter? I was explained that the date in my passport of the last entry of the country does not match the date I wrote down on the form. I checked in my passport and yes, it's not the 6th of MAY that is visible on the stamp that I got when I returned from Greece last week. Instead it showed "6 IV 2005". In my mind I thanked the officials at the border to have overlooked the change of month on their stamps. After that, I went into the first phase of despair. My landlord's driver on the other hand was still a lot more hopefull, even though his "Ne e dobro!" as a reaction to my "What's up?" question, didn't add much good to the whole situation. He grabbed for the power of connections - Nokia! Did a little calling. Then, we waited. Two minutes later, he was called back after which we returned to the office window. The window slid away and the driver spoke. The word "Kommandante", the name of my landlord and my name were uttered in one sentenced. It sounded like "Open sesame!" as our papers were brought back into the black-box's circulation. The officer disappeared again. And we waited some more. I figured that as my name doesn't mean anything in this country, it must be that the chief of the station and my landlord are acquinted at the least. A little 'hand-and-feet' Macedonian with the driver revealed that, indeed, they were good friends. There had obviously been some chat going on between them and I was pleased to know that this chat took not too long. I was running late and needed to get to work. This was supposed to take only 10 minutes and I was already clocking close to one hour with this registration.
The waiting took a little longer than the first session. When the police officer returned with our papers, he still wasn't able to bring sunshine to our faces. The ID's were collected and the officer went back into his office window. The driver walked back to his car. He signalled me to follow, though I still had no idea what was up now. He revealed it in the car. My stamp was not the problem anymore. Now it's my landlord who has to show that the appartment on Bulevard Partizanski Odredi that I live in is really his. Too be continued!

...sigh...

It was time to get to work and tell my colleagues that coming Monday I might have to need a few hours off again for finishing this registration procedure.

Taxi drivers: Going to the movies?

This evening I was, again, a little late for an appointment in the centre of the city. Luckily the taxi fares in Skopje are very reasonable - for 50 MKD (a little less than 1 Euro) you'll be brought to virtually any place in the city which is within reasonable distance. My second luck was that not too far from my home at Universalna Sala (Universal Theatre), there is a taxi stand. I decided to buy some time and take a taxi. I picked the odd looking Lada among the big Audi's, BMW's and some Japanese make which is quite popular in town. I could have picked a taxi with a lot less memories. It was not the car, but the driver that, to put it mildly, is not the ideal chauffeur for the faint hearted. He was apparently in his moods and gave me a few stories that made me curious at least.
After the usual 'where are you from?' and 'what do you do in Macedonia?', he decided it was time to reveal his real self - that in fact I was not being brought to the city centre by a professional taxi driver but by what he called one from the 'cleaning service'. His introduction went more or less like this:
"You know, these people from up there?" He pointed to the north, in the direction of the Vardar river, "the Russian [somethings - I didn't understand him well]?"
"Eeerrr, no I don't know them. But please, tell me"
"Well, these people sometimes need the city to be more cleaner. You know what I mean!"
I didn't want to disappoint him by telling the truth and saying that I had not yet a clue what he was talking about, so I just hummed some nodded agreement and hoped that he would elaborate on his matters. He did.
"When the first cleaning service don't do their job well, I will be the one who will be consulted. I'll just have to finish the job off."
"So, how can you do the job better than your colleagues?" I was getting a faint hint at what he was getting at.
"I work with chemicals. Works much better!"
"Ahaaaa, but isn't that the usual idea of cleaning?"
"No, some people use more old fashioned methods."
"I guess they stick to tradition, don't they?", I said, not yet knowing what his cleaning would look like. I wasn't even sure if I wanted to know. It was, however, too late to draw back. The taxi driver was coming to the essential part of his story.
"Yes. But, do you know that you can kill someone with just one blow?" During asking me that question, he pointed to a spot on his throat. He added "I can."
"..."
"There is also another spot", now he pointed at his nose, "but you have to use much more force for that."
"Is that so?"
"You didn't know?" he asked me.
"Well, no. I never had to try."
"Trust me" he said, "but chemicals are more usefull. Much more usefull!" He then offerede me a sigaret, which in a way, was quite funny.
To my following question if it paid well and why he would still drive a taxi, I got some incomprehensible answer about "only once a month", "not trusting the people" and "better times during the war". I was glad the ride was about to come to an end. After he stopped the car and I got out of the car, he trusted me that Macedonia is not a safe place and that Skopje is not an ideal city. It would be better for me to get back home soon. I lied by saying that I would and wondered what car I would take the next time I am running late.

There are no photos today, but the ones from yesterday (wild domesticized geese at the city park) will be up soon. The Heraklea photos are published - look at the 8 May entry.

Skopje's Wild Geese

Just south of the Vardar river, in the City Park next to the football stadium live the most spoilt creatures of Skopje: the Wild Tamed Geese. These lot terrorize the whole neighborhood and people seem to be scared of them. The nasty buggers approach you with their frightful teeth, flapping of wings, head up high and their loud synthesis of a snorting blow. To please these creatures, people are sacrificing food to the already huge animals. And these are not just the left-overs of breakfast or lunch. Nooooo! And they get a lot too. The variety of their daily intake of calories consist of anything from bread ('gjevrek' or just normal 'leb') to crisps. I wouldn't be surprised to know that even bottles of coke are sacrificed to these birds.
Most interesting to this all would probably be this - The restaurant in the centre of the Geese Territories serves a speciality: Geese!

Photos of today - The No-Geese-Show

	One of the many emergency stores in town. Whatever time it is, there always seems to be one open in case you run out of 'pivo' (beer), 'vino' (wine), 'rakija' (white or yellow) or 'semki' (pumpkin seeds).
	Trifun (spelling?!@#$) is the new kid on the block in Skopje. He won the last mayor elections. The new man is enormously popular. Graffity's all over town proclaiming his premiership. This one at Franklin Roosevel Street (it's really there on the green road sign - in cyrillic) is one of the most catchy ones.
	A walk from the football stadium to the city centre along the Vardar is quite popular.
	One of the busiest bridges over the Varder is the one of Bulevar Goce Delchiev. More about Goce: He lead the uprise against the Turks a little more than 100 years ago. Not long after that, he lost his head. 10 years later, the Turks left and an end came to 500 years of Ottoman occupation. Rumour has it that till this day Goce's head has not yet been found.

Near Bitola lies this wonderfull excavation project that one can visit. Today we (Sashka and me) went to see the mosaics that got Mobimak - one of the two main mobile operators in Macedonia and also a sponsor of archeological sites - such wonderfull advertising material from. On the Makedonija Square in Skopje, you can find one of these big posters. That one is actually taken from mosaics from Stobi, a place I've visited in December last year.
A good thing about this Heraklea site is that excavation work is still in progress. So, I guess if you would come here again in 2 years, it might look completely different.

Here are some of the photos that I was allowed to take.

	The most attractive mosiacs to be seen today. You have to walk on the wall to see them. Most of the others were still covered with the protective winter layers of gravel. Hope to see them soon.
	Hand up!
	Fish.
	Little bird.
	Amphi theatre.

Spoilt expectations

What do you do when you're feeling like preparing *that* one exotic meal you had in mind for the coming night's diner? Exactly, as a dutchman you'll go to the National Grocerer and simply buy the vegetables and other ingredients you need. No worries about whether it's the season or not - all the stuff is available all year round, whether it's red paprikas or strawberries.
Saying the least, it is a little odd to see that this availability is something of a different matter at Bunjakovec Pazar - the market not too far from where I live here on Bulevar Partizanski Odredi. By now, all the red paprikas have left the stage to make space for, indeed, the strawberries. Most interesting, and this is what makes roaming the markets really worth it: the greens you get on the Pazars is fresh and has 100% more taste than the testosteron boosters from the green houses of Westland. But hey, now I've got to learn again what's available when. The where-question is already answered: Pazar. I've also figured out that tomatoes are the coming stars.

So far for food - again. Here's what I shot today. Lazy as I was, all's been photographed from my appartment.

	My back-garden with view over the Vodno mountain and the Milennium Cross on top of it.
	View over Bulevar Partizanksi Odredi.
	Back-garden view again with subtle hints of a building site.
	Same back-garden, only from a slightly different angle.
	Another building site, this time again at the front site of the house. In case you want to know: all the new appartments will be carried out in pastel colours: yellow, pink, orange and green have so far seen the light of day.

More to see here - Victim of changes

Oh ooh! A lot on these pages seem to have changed overnight. I know, and I'm sorry for that. I realize that a more sophisticated introduction would have been more appropriate. Anyhow, I decided to just throw it all on your plate at once. On the other hand, this little stir spices up things for a lot better. But, let's stop nagging on about this and have a closer look to what exactly looks different:

• clickable thumbs to bigger photos – if your screen will not show the big image completely, I'd suggest you press F11 (works with Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox). Voila;
• 3 or 4 new entries – so much for the idea of a weblog with regular updates;
• updates of some older entries - so if you're really interested, you've got to re-read this all over again;
• one link to the old Juulsplace at MSN was added (see right) and one to the new photobook is in the make.

That's all. Not too much I suppose as it's not the end of the world.

Now, as that end is raised as a topic, I could might say that the last few days have been a bugger. My Internet connection at home vapourized before my eyes due to an array of self inflickted mistakes . Yes, I really did all this myself. There was no one else present to blame. Like the process of re-learning how to read, it took a while before I was able to re-materialized it. It was during these days of re-construction that I've worked on this newer set up of these pages. So far, so good. Enjoy it and, as a reminder of an older invitation,

Try to use the 'comments' link.

Hvala. Fala. Dank je. Obrigado. Tak. Dienguye. Merci. Kosunum. Thanks.

Toughies at the Greek border

During a trip to Thessaloniki where my sister had to catch a plane home, the border guys at the Greek border appeared to be rather strange to deal with. Here's why.

What does a custom's officer exactly want when he asks for an ID? Being at a border, I bet that 9 out of 10 times you would say "passport". I figure that it's not such a bad reaction. It was exactly mine this morning. The situation gets more interesting, as one variable in this story has not yet been revealed to you. This same custom's officer already had my passport in his hand. So, what did he really mean? Now, I bet that 9 out of 10 times you're as flabbergasted as I was. I first gave him the green card of my car (you're asked for this at all Serbian and Macedonian borders, no matter if you're going in or out of the country). This card was not what Mister Toughy had in mind, so I put it back with the rest of my car's papers. But what should I do now? Starting to explain that the only ID I have is already in his hand? I tried, but he was not convinced. So, I urged that the passport he was holding was really all I have. Mr. T., already not liking me at all, started to become completely unamuzed. So I gave him my driver's license and hoped that this little pink paper would calm him down. It did. He filled out some forms on his computer, growled a few times during the process and returned all the documents with a look on his face that showed that he'd been working out a lot his Freddy-Krueger-meets-Jason look. He shot me his attempt. I took the paperwork and left.
So far for today's adventures. Now it's time to work. But, I hope to be able to see some new places in Macedonia this weekend. Heraklea near Bitola would be nice. Hope the weather changes though, as it's horrible.

Photos of a Greek little church on a lone Macedonian hill.

	Somewhere on the Old National Road, between Thessaloniki and Gevgelija, this little church comes into view.
	The whole road between Thessaloniki and Gevgelija (and beyond) you'll find many wild flowers. It's a pretty sight, even when it's cloudy and rainy like today.
	Little path upwards to the church.
	And down again.
	Looking back.

Just a few photos this time

Work on 5th of May - a national holiday in the Netherlands (Bevrijdingsdag) as well as a day off for everybody anyway (Hemelvaart). Been out hiking after work at Matka. Visited Sveti Nikola. It was actually a little too dark to be out in the mountains (some photos are not that lively), but the views from up at the monestary were worth it. That's all for today. Here are some photos.

	What starts off with a steep climb, becomes a fairly easy hike steadily upwards. After a little less than an hour, this 'road sign' tells you that you're almost there.
	The monestary is really visible on this one.
	That's him. Sveti Nikola (St. Nikola). One of the million very small chapels to be found on monestary compounds in Macedonia.
	Walk this way and you'll see...
	...THIS! This view is actually being sold as a postcard. Please notice the little other Sveti next to the restaurant annex mountaineering centre.

Police jokes - another national sport

Found out a while ago that the police are in Macedonia what the Scots are for the English or the Belgians are for the Dutch: not the brightest amongst us living creatures. None of those jokes comes to mind right now (my brain cells seem to forget to register the jokes, so I only laugh at them when I hear them, unable to remember them). I'll post one or two on these pages soon.

And now, on to the photos from yesterday.

	View over the southern part of Skopje, from Kale. Yesterday, many families got up on the castle hill to sit under trees and... share a meal or some snacks. There were many kids in the park. That explains this en the next two photos.
	No description needed.
	Finding out about sitting down the hard way.
	Overlooking the South East part of Skopje.

What do Macedonians do on second Easter Day?

Back home. Glad to be home. Glad that I made it. Those who are usually known as friendly and helpful people, transform into descendants from hell once they're behind a steering wheel. When in a car, Macedonians are able to show the more obscured parts of their nature. Today was special. They'd gone mad beyond recognition. In a way this is good fun to observe.
It was National Picknick Day today. The day after 1st May or 2nd Easter Day? I don't know what exactly triggers everybody to go out, but all in Skopje appeared to have left their homes for a good sesh of food and drinks in the nature. Matka is a popular spot, but also Vodno and... Ohrid. Our destination for today. The enormous chaos on the road heading for the first two pay toll gateways is nothing compared to what was about to come on the road to Gostivar and onwards in the mountains to Kicevo and Ohrid. A short list of memorable moments:

• Ficos are fully packed with one whole family, food for a day, a grill and a complete set of garden furniture (the latter conveniently stacked high on top of the car). As it comes with Ficos, the furniture is as big as the car itself. Pretty sight.
  
• National Picknick Day means FOOD! A lot of food. Food keeps one alive. A lot of food keeps Macedonians on their feet. Please notice that it's about a lot of great food. The foot is distributed in anything that moves. Today's most noticable one was the Volkswagen Golf. It was crammed full with lettuce. Not just in the boot. Not also on the back seats. No, also the passenger seat in the front, the place where this passenger usually puts it's feet and... the right hand side dashboard is window and roof high packed with the healthy greens.
  
• Overtaking cars on two lane mountain roads = national sport and/or russian roulette. I'm not sure which label is most suitable. I'll go for the russion roulette, but as the activity appeared so popular today, I'd rather put my money on the first option - national sport.
  
• Go out picknicking means serious food preparation and not just for 2 hours. We've seen families on picknick places in the morning with grills functionaing on full throttle who wes saw on our way back at night as well. Still grilling.
  
• Product of a moment of "Logistical Euphoria": chairs in the car boot. table on top of the open boot lid. Ropes have to do their best to keep all together.
• This lost table in the middle of an extremely busy Tetovo – Gostivar 4 lanes road, waiting to be picked up. The combination with the car driving madness described above makes this quite a tricky rescue operation. Avoiding the slaloming cars around the table is a especially nasty business. Please keep in mind that there is ample space to position one single bike left and right of the two narrow lanes. The ditch (right) and the concrete wall (left) sufficiently limit the space of freedom.
  
• Queueing up for usually quiet pay-toll portals – second one from Skopje, 15 km before Tetovo. Overtaking the queue is allowed.
• Getting back from Ohrid to Skopje on the mountain roads for half the trip is record racing. My personal best is 1 hour 53 minutes (or so). All time best is probably around a little more than 1 hour and 10 minutes. I don't think I'll ever take that as a challenge.

Fotos from Ohrid

	Sveti 'Cliff Side' (this will probably be corrected in the course of next week, when locals have had their eyes feasted on this one), the lake and some trees seen from the Samuel's Castle.
	Another Samuel's Castle view down.
	What is known as typical Ohridski architecture can be found throughout the whole of the old city.
	Ohrid Lake.
	Small Sveti at lake with own holy and healing well. Take a sip...