(The Former Yugoslav Republic of) Macedonia's Third Lake

Looking out over Lake Dojran in Macedonia you can clearly see the foreign land of.... Macedonia? Greek Macedonia sits right across the water, its green hills and spinning white wind turbines giving the little town of Dojran a dirty look.  It wants to be the only 'Macedonia' on the block.  Our first knowledge of the ongoing (and politically vicious) name dispute between Greece and Macedonia came from an email we received from a Greek blog follower asking us to please change 'Macedonia' to 'FYROM- Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.'  He went on to say that "Macedonia is located in Northern Greece" and has been for thousands of years.  He concluded that "Hellenic people surely get insulted when somebody tries to grab their history for various reasons."  Whoa - struck a nerve.

The historic region of 'Macedonia' is believed to have covered land in modern day Greece, Macedonia, Albania, Bulgaria and Serbia.  The biggest chunks, almost exactly equal parts, were in what is now Greek Macedonia and the Republic of Macedonia.  Still, when Macedonia chose its name after becoming independent of Yugoslavia in 1991, Greece was pissed.  The young country's original flag design was changed to appease their neighbor and NATO accepted them under the provisional name of FYROM for Greece's sake.  

More two decades later, most countries (including the United States, whose State Department list we base our classifications of what is or isn't a European country and what they are named) simply refer to Macedonia as 'Macedonia.'  Greece, however, has succeeded in blocking the struggling country's EU acceptance due to the naming dispute.  Even though the International Court of Justice just ruled that this violated all sorts of agreements between the neighbors, this sort of political road-blocking doesn't look like it will end any time soon.

I wanted to put my passport in a swimming cap and cross the mid-lake border, but Merlin advised against it.  I also didn't have a swimming cap.  It was hard not to think about the dispute looking at the small border lake.  Never have we been so close to the border of a country and felt absolutely none of its influence.  There was no cultural blurring in Dojran.  No signs of stones-throw-away Greece at all.  In fact, Lake Dojran is currently returning to a lot of its cultural roots in an attempt to bolster tourism.  It is a tiny body of water, rich with fish and algae - and Macedonian tradition.

People come here to slather themselves with the lake's seaweed rich mud and swim in the warm water, both believed to cure rheumatism, skin diseases, muscle and bone problems and respiratory diseases.  For over a third of the year, it is a bath-like 80 degrees Fahrenheit.  Fishing is done in the winter, using an ancient method which employs cormorants.  A band is fashioned around the birds' long necks, just tight enough to prohibit them from being able to swallow larger birds.  They fly out, dive down, swim around, catch fish, eat all the ones that slip down easily and deliver the larger ones to the fishermen.  It's a pretty amazing technique, more famous in China and Japan, and is executed from these fishing huts on stilts in the water.

The tradition was dying out until people realized that tourists would love to see this sort of thing.  Now, plans are underway to start a "old-style fishing school" at Dojran and build traditional korabs for joyrides.  While keeping these old ways alive is important, the byproduct of this sort of enterprising (no doubt inspired by Lake Ohrid's tourism boom) is that little Lake Dojran will be cared for and kept alive.  For lakes, this means kept filled.  After years of using the water to irrigate cropland nearby and for other survival methods, Lake Dojran lost about 30% of its water.

Shallower water must have made it even easier to find the fish!  Legend has it that Herodotus proclaimed, in the 5th century AD, that if one set a basket in the water at night, it would be full by morning.  Just teeming with fishies.  Sources claim that Lake Dojran is the most fish rich lake of its size in Europe.  Of the swimming creatures, the carp is the most famous.  In Macedonian, it is krap - which elicited many giggles.  We'd read that it was the best carp we would ever eat - certainly the best krap - unlike any other we've tasted.  You know what, it's true.  

We ate a crazy looking carp in Germany, ordered carp 'cubes' and 'ribs' in the Czech Republic, compared and contrasted carp-heavy Hungarian fish soup and even used carp scraps for a delicious home-cooked meal in Budapest, but none of it holds a candle to the carp of Lake Dojran.  At a lakefront restaurant named Nota, it was served fried with two lemon water hand baths.  We ate it like fried chicken and it was nearly as juicy, with none of the muddy flavor carp often has.  It reminded me a lot of swordfish, a clean, meaty taste and fatty but toothsome flesh.  Delicious.  I wonder what kind of Lake Dojran fishing rights deal Greece and Macedonia have worked out.

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Hıdırellez Bahar Şenlikleri - The Spring Fest

We passed three dead snakes on the narrow country road to Çalıklı.  The drive took us through empty fields and near a dry streambed.  The road signs for the town were spelled in different ways – one read “Çalıklı,” another “Çaleklı.”
It’s not a big village.  There are about twenty houses and a whitewashed mosque.  A big crowd had gathered around a cow pasture.  We parked the car beside a few buses and walked over with our cameras.  Circled by a few hundred onlookers, pairs of men – bare to the waist, slicked with oil and sweat, their chests heaving – wrestled one another while a man wandered between them with a drum.  This was unexpected, but we hadn’t really known what to expect – we’d come to the Hıdırellez Bahar Şenlikleri (Turkish for “Hıdırellez Spring Festival”) knowing only that there would be singing and dancing.

It was a hot day in south-eastern Macedonia, some twenty miles from the Greek border, and most of the people cheering on the wrestlers had gathered in what little shade there was – under a few umbrellas and beneath the new leaves of three sycamores on the pasture’s edge.  There is very little information about this festival online, and we had come feeling as though we were following a rumor.
But there we were, watching this ancient Turkish sport and feeling amazed to be part of it.  A man played a kind of wooden horn loudly, the drum beat a laconic rhythm, judges roamed the ring in baggy şalvar trousers.  The contestants did elaborate dances between matches – ritualized, springing, arm-flailing displays to exhort applause from the crowd.  Winners were carried back to their groups on the shoulders of friends.  The losers lay on the grass panting before slinking to the sidelines.  Before every round, the men poured oil over their shoulders, their heads and the leather pants they wore, making themselves as slick as possible.

In Albania, the culture felt more Greek the closer we got to the border – here, though, it feels as though we’ve skipped over the Hellenic lands and landed somewhere near Anatolia.  There are lots of ethnic Turkish and Roma settlements in the lands around Strumica, and the language is heavily influenced by those cultures. Hıdırellez is a pan-Turkic festival that celebrates the coming of spring and the awakening of life – it has roots going back to ancient Mesopotamia, and various Muslim countries celebrate something similar.  In Macedonia, it’s as much about celebrating Turkish identity as anything, and it means a lot to the people of Strumica and Çalıklı.  Groups of dancers and wrestlers come from all over – from Bulgaria, Romania, Turkey and even Azerbaijan.
Interestingly, the non-Turkish people in the area seemed hardly to know it was going on – or to know, but not want to say anything about it.

That night, in Strumica, we asked around, trying to figure out where a Hıdırellez concert we’d been told about would take place.  A man at the cultural center shook his head and said nothing, looking down at the ground.  A man at our hotel said he wasn’t sure.  A woman at the highschool was very friendly until we asked about Çalıklı and the spring festival – she began abruptly to walk away.
We actually took this to mean that there had been some mistake, and that nothing was happening.  It wasn’t until that night, when we heard drums and horns in the central square, that we realized there certainly was something going on.

A group of young dancers in red costumes danced energetically and strangely to music played by a few kids.  The musicians had a flute-like instrument, a trumpet and a drum – they played lively, fluttering music as loudly and quickly as they could.  The dancers did a jumping, line dance routine, turning their heads stoically from side to side in unison as they flicked the draping of their clothes and the streamers on their hats.  Only about ten people were watching.
It was a magical, powerful revelry and a beautiful sight in the dark.  And then it was over.  The lot of them stopped and filed into the cultural center.  We followed them and found more music.

Inside, a raucous crowd danced and sang along to unfamiliar songs.  The musicians sat in tuxedos, playing well.  The singer was probably famous.  She wore a long sleeved, flowing, red dress and a cascade of blonde-tinted curls.  Teenagers laughed and talked and cheered, running in and out of the auditorium with friends or standing in the aisles to socialize.  Parents and grandparents sat and gossiped.  The hairstyles were sculptural and full of grease, the clothes were tight and skimpy.  It was hot, the music was loud.  We stayed for about half an hour, standing in a crush of young people near the door.
Later that night, at about 1:30 in the morning, we heard the young drummer and trumpet player go noisily by under our window – the street was still lively and a small ruckus rose and followed them as they played.  It woke us up and we would have been more upset if they didn’t seem so earnestly celebratory.

The next afternoon we went back out to Çalıklı but found ourselves a little late.  The young dancers – more of them now, bussed in from different places – were changing out of their costumes and into their best festival clothes.  The oil-wrestling field was empty now except for a few heifers, but there were still hundreds of people.  We followed the crowds up through a lane of country-fair stands – toy guns and headscarves for sale, grilling kofte and beer drinking men under tarps.  The older women dressed in full tradition robes, their best silks.  The younger people preferred tight pants and tanktops.  There was much hello-saying and groups of talking friends. We made our way up past the mosque to a covered stage, where people were sitting in the shade and waiting for a performance to begin.

We waited too and talked with a few people.  We’d received a lot of quizzical looks but never felt uncomfortable.  Even though we didn’t fit in the locals seemed more proud of their festival than protective.
Eventually, the same red-dressed, probably-famous singer emerged from her van and began to sing the same songs as the night before.  The audience here was more staid.  They seemed to be from the countryside instead of Strumica – they watched more attentively, the clothes were more traditional.  Around the stage, tractors were parked and a few cows were tied up.

We left with the woman’s voice still ululating in our ears.  A few amorous youths were lurking out by the line of parked cars and buses on the road.  Popsicle wrappers and soda cans littered the ground.  As we drove away, we could still see smoke from the kofte barbeques rising behind us.  The festival was winding down, and we weren’t the only car driving out along the little road.  A scattering of townspeople sat in chairs along the way, watching the traffic from their front yards.
It was an incredible experience.  Even after three events over two days, we felt as though we’d only caught a bare glimpse of something.  As an older man said to us by the wrestling field, this was “something very special.”  He watched the athletes and seemed caught by emotion.  “We didn’t always have this,” he said, meaning he and his Turkish neighbors.  “For us, this is something special.”  You can imagine how we felt.

The Hıdırellez Bahar Şenlikleri in Çalıklı is celebrated over three days around the fifth of May.

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Prilep and the American Dream

Invitations in Macedonia come like threats.  There's no way to demure, you've been invited.  And so we ended up drinking rakija with a family in the outer limits of Prilep, an ancient tobacco town set down where the Pelagonia plains meet the Rhodope mountains.  We talked with the family about America and Macedonia in their front yard, sitting under a plum tree and waving to neighbors and passers by.
Two brothers talked about their father, who sat with us but spoke little English.  Hristijan, the younger brother, told us how their father had gone to Australia but had come back because he was in love with Hristijan's mother, a decision that seemed unbelievable to him.  "But he likes it here in Macedonia," Hristijan said, as though explaining something blasphemous.  The father nodded.  Later, he said that we should take a young nephew or two home with us in our suitcases.  It was a joke, but a heavy one.  Everyone wants to leave Prilep.
It's too bad, because Prelip is a great town.

Afflicted with very low self esteem, this town of seventy thousand has a lot going for it.  It seems that the population has begun to believe the guidebooks, which dismiss Prelip as an uninteresting, blue-collar town that won't fit easily into an Ohrid to Skopje whirlwind tour.  It's true that it's out of the way, isolated from the main tourist hubs in the western part of the country, and that there's a scant four or five places to stay, but to give it only one page (like Lonely Planet does) in a guide is shameful.

The rakija that we drank with Hristijan, his father, his brother Pancho, his friend Goran and Pancho's wife Valentina was homemade from village plums and a pale green - colored by sprigs of peppermint in the bottle ("good for the stomach").  It was strong enough to burn, but well made enough to be complex and subtle.  As we sat, a few neighbors drove by with a cart full of firewood and two plastic barrels.  Jokes and pleasantries were exchanged.  When the men left, Hristijan told us that they were going to a friend's still, off to make their own rakija.  "Why is it illegal to make alcohol in America?" they asked.  "Here it's tradition, it's what we drink for thousands of years.  This IS Macedonia!"
We'd arrived at their house after a hot hike up to the towers of King Marco, who is a legendary figure in the national folklore but was in fact a minor ruler in the 14th century.  The views out over the tobacco plains and low mountains were spectacular, the kind of open, rock-and-grass walking that makes this region so appealing.

The brothers had learned English watching westerns with their father.  The elder man liked the landscapes of the movies because it reminded him of home; the dust, the crowns of rock, the wide vistas.  In fact, it feels a lot like an American town here - though, in some ways, much more colorful.  Tobacco fields creep right up to the streetlights and sidewalks, people buy their loose smoke in the markets.  There are more cafes here than in provincial America, the town center is full of life, there aren't any empty storefronts.  It feels, a little, like an America of the past.

The town is appealing, with some wide avenues and narrow, medieval lanes.  There are plentiful trees and friendly people, dozens of busy watering holes and a constant burble of conversation.  There are a few nice museums, some handsome old houses, a vibrant market.  It's the kind of undiscovered outpost that travelers crave, where the local customs mix easily with modernity in an unaffected, friendly way.  Tourists are still a rarity, university students are abundant, everyone knows everyone else and nobody's in a hurry.  It's a perfect example of what we call "cafe culture."  In other words, it is much more cosmopolitan than its citizens think it is.

We stopped into this blacksmith's shop one evening.  An old man stood by the furnace and anvil, a couple of friends sat nearby, talking.  When I asked if I could take a picture he pulled an ax head from the coals and began pounding it rhythmically.  After a few clamorous moments, it had achieved a rough shape, and he put it back into the coals and smiled.  "It's made easily," he said (in semi-russian that we only kind of understood) and winked.  His face was lopsided and mischievous, his eyes were bright blue.  We realized that it was the first time we'd ever seen a real, working blacksmith's shop that wasn't part of some museum or skansen.

During a tour of some of the town's outer neighborhoods by Hristijan and Goran, the two friends waved to almost everyone they passed, occasionally stopping the car (yes, this was after we'd finished the bottle of rakija) to have a few words with someone.
Hristijan showed us the ancient Monastery of the Archangel Michael, and Goran showed us his church.  Hristijan sat for a minute with friends at a picnic table and Goran took us to a new amphitheater that he and his neighbors had built.  The sun was getting low and the light was golden.  Children rode their bikes nearby, birds sang their evening songs.  The amphitheater was small and quiet.  Goran told us that it was meant to give the town something like Ohrid or the Greek cities, a place for the community to come together.  It was striking, this closeness of people and the many friendships that they all shared.  When we were being driven back to our hotel, much later, Goran and Hristijan talked reverently about the man who had gone to America, built a fortune and just returned to buy the hotels and set up a factory.  As they dropped us off, they ran into a man they both knew walking with his wife and new baby.  They all exchanged hugs and gave the baby many kisses.

As we sat in that sunny yard, having a last cup of coffee and lemonade, Hristijan told us that his father had built their house by himself and was justifiably proud of it.  When Rebecca told him that my father had also built his own house, Hristijan leaned toward me and struck a wistful tone.  "Merlin," he asked, "do you think we will build houses for our families?"
The question touched on many things - his father's happiness in Prilep, thoughts about America, the hope for a better life.  Hidden there was a different question: where would he build his house?  Many times Hristijan talked about American television and what he had seen, about the movies.  He'd asked about what one could earn in America doing different jobs.  These are common questions, common strains in the conversation of far away places.  It's hard to address them without sounding disingenuous.  Of course living in America is wonderful, but it's not like the television shows.

That night we went out for dinner in the town center.  It was Friday night and the crowded squares were full of laughter.  The warm air smelled like imminent summer rain.  Girls in short skirts linked arms and clipped down the streets in high heels.  Boys in dark sunglasses chased them on motor scooters.  Groups of friends spilled from one pool of light to another, from the music of one cafe to the next.  The city was beautiful, a jangling mix of colors.
We began to talk about what Hristijan wanted, about how it's natural for people to want to move somewhere better.  After all, living in Macedonia isn't easy.  But seeing a place like this - a place that feels so alive and friendly, where everyone is acquainted and strangers are invited in for a drink - it's hard to believe that dusty American towns actually are better.
Don't believe the guidebooks or American television shows - Prilep is a lot nicer than people think.

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Macedonian Home Cooking

We came for the food.  In 2003, a Swiss organization called Pronatura chose Brajčino as the first eco-village in Macedonia, aiding it to create a tourism industry that could help preserve the village's natural beauty and rural lifestyle.  The help included trail markers, information panels, updates to homes that wanted to offer "western quality" accommodation.  The people of Brajčino, three old women to be precise, took it upon themselves to create a small sub-industry.  They developed set menus and prices and began to offer tourists home-cooked Macedonian meals.  Almost a decade later, this has become one of the main tourist draws.  "A lot of Italians go there," someone had remarked in Ohrid.  "I don't know why."  We knew exactly why.  Brajčino has become an unlikely foodie destination.

Upon arrival, we were sadly informed that one old women no longer does it, one had rented out her house for the season and the third had a broken leg.  (When an ancient, whiskered woman lifted her black hemline and tapped her cane against a bandaged, swollen knee later that day, we deduced that she must have been apologetic women #3).  "But you can eat in my home one night and in the restaurant the other," our host Divna said.  It felt like a let-down, but when we saw the wooden table on Divna's front lawn set for a welcome snack, we couldn't imagine a more perfect place to eat.  It ceased to matter what exactly that food experience would be.  Divna's chickens ran around, the bigger of her two roosters was on a fornicatory rampage.

Over the next two days, two breakfasts and two dinners, we experienced truly divine locavore eating.  The potatoes were bright yellow, the egg yolks were flame orange, both so packed with vitamins and nutrients that the color and flavor were exploding with vibrancy.  Homemade sheep cheeses differed in textures and flavors, crushed walnuts replaced roasted peanuts when the mood struck, trout from the river (which was stocked from nearby Lake Prespa) replaced the normally offered beef.  "There used to be eight cows, now there are only four.  Young people don't like raising them," our host had told us.  Though, I'm sure veal would have popped up had I not requested meatless dining.

There was, actually, a little meat in Merlin's first dinner.  We were each given a clay pot with four small stuffed red peppers.  My polneti piperki overflowed with spiced rice and his had some ground beef mixed in.  Macedonian food is almost always verrrry slowly-cooked in clay dishes, which is why restaurant equivalents just don't cut it in most cases.  Rice plays a large role in the cuisine, both because of Turkish influences and the fact that they grow a lot of rice.  In the peppers, and mixed into our vegetable soup starter, the grains were flavorful and toothsome - with the appearance of brown rice, but the taste of black, wild rice.

At our dinner in the restaurant, which had been opened just for us and felt just as cozy as any home, we received a crash course in Macedonian cuisine.  Everything we'd jotted down as something to look out for on our travels, appeared before us: tavče gravče (butter beans slow cooked in an earthenware dish - considered the national dish), Macedonian pie (a savory pastry of leeks, spinach and herbs), ajvar and pindzur (a quintessentially Macedonian red pepper paste and its fresher, less cooked down salsa-like sibling).  Ajvar is something we've been trying wherever and whenever we can.  Every cook has their way of doing it.  It is made in enormous batches during Autumn, cooked for hours and hours in jars and eaten at every meal throughout the year.  "I make too much ajvar!" the restaurant chef, Milka, said laughing.  Her annual batch is made from 100 kilos of red pepper, from her own garden and those of other village women.

Ajvar is one of those things that Macedonians insist you must try homemade.  These sort of declarations are usually frustrating, like "try to get yourself invited to a wedding!"  On it.  It's one of the reasons places like Brajčino and homestays in general are so special.  You actually can eat a homecooked meal in a foreign country, you just have to explore your options.  Here's some ajvar served as part of one of Divna's excellent breakfasts.  Alongside is a dry, cornbread with specks of salty sheep's cheese scattered within in like chocolate chips and a sprinkling of sesame seeds on top.  Before eating, we poured kefir over the cake and dabbed on some blueberry jam as directed.

Yogurt was not the only homemade drink on the menu.  We drank white wine, liker and rakija all made by Divna and her husband.  Rakija is your usual privately distilled liquor, clear, strong.  Liker, as far as we can tell, is the girlier version.  Infused with fruit and with added sugar, it is a more pleasant sip.  Adult juice.  These two spirits are usually served with pride and a personal touch.  Some have mint leaves inside or are yellower in color, from extra wheat added during fermentation.  Divna's rakija was particularly strong and her liker, plum.

We felt at home at Divna's, but there was something freeing about having our experience in Milka's restaurant.  Homestays are now a big part of our traveling experience, we try to set one up in each country if we can.  Still, we worry about crossing the line between paying guests and house invaders.  No one has ever made us feel this way, especially not Divna, but it feels much less intrusive taking up someone's time with questions when you aren't also pulling them away from their own dinner, family and/or favorite television show.  Milka's restaurant was decked out in full traditional kitsch, but her low, neat ponytail, athletic shoes and zip-up vest over a v-neck t-shirt harkened back to her 18 years in Sweden.  Like almost everyone else who grew up in Brajčino, she left during young adulthood.  It was wonderful to talk to her about life before and life now, about her recipes, the sources of her ingredients and her family.

In the morning, we'd hear Divna setting up the breakfast table, beneath the grape arbor.  The vines had recently been pruned, so a drop of sap would drip onto our scalps or into our cups of coffee now and then.  The old women of the town would come and visit her as she ate and would, later, recognize us in town.  One, who rose no higher than Merlin's bellybutton and who we'd seen weeding a large garden the day before, spoke rapidly to us as we waited for the minibus.  Afterward, we decided that she must have been trying to figure out if we were the great grandchildren of one of her friends who'd moved to America.  Milka's daughters are in Sweden and Australia now.  The Aussie one has two boys and is pregnant again.  Milka is hoping for a girl.  That way, she explained, she can pass down all of her secret recipes.

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Brajčino Apples

The first thing we saw in Brajčino was a man dumping crates of rotten apples into a stream.  He waved to us without smiling.  We watched the apples bob and swirl down the current.  This was once the apple capital of Yugoslavia, but the people here are just now learning again how to grow, sell and store them.
Here, a group of farmers and hired boxers sort spoiled fruit from good, boxing up what they can.  So much (too much) was winter softened, barely sellable... but still sweet.  One man handed us two apples as we walked by and we ate them with appreciative sounds.  They really were pretty good.

The orchards of southern Macedonia are in full bloom right now.  This is the beginning of a high plateau that covers much of the country, cut off from the warmth of the south by mountains, still springtime cool.  The leaves are just unfurling on the oaks and sycamores, but the orchards are fully green, with clouds of white flowers and an industrious buzzing of bees.
At one time, the apples that were grown in the Brajčino valley were sent all over the balkans, from Ljubljana to Zagreb.  They were prized for their flavor and their hardiness, and the cider brandy made from the fruit was famous in Macedonia.
"When I was little," a woman we spoke with said, "the trees were huge - bigger than any other apple trees, bigger than these little ones they plant today."  The woman, named Milka, was back in Brajčino after years living in Sweden - she, like almost everyone else in the village, had left as soon as she got a chance.

There are now only about a hundred and thirty people in Brajčino, down from close to a thousand two decades ago.  Communism ruined the apple industry in this part of the country.  The orchard owners, many of whom had grown wealthy, left as Tito came.  Lands were appropriated, fruit trees were left to languish untended for years.  With the old people went the know-how that had sustained the industry for so long, and, even after communism fell, there was little interest in trying to plant new trees.

"We only plant a few trees," Milka said.  "Not like the people down there," she said, gesturing towards the towns further down the valley.  "The young people plant so many. We just have enough for ourselves."
It's not quite accurate - the older residents of Brajčino grow enough fruit to sell and make a living - but her point about the size of the orchards is true enough.  In the high, sloping soil there's not much room for big operations and thousands of trees.  The orchards are small collections of a few hundred apples, following old terraced land down the stream, spilling out around the village and creeping a little ways up the valley towards the snowline.  One of the main problems that the villagers have is preserving their harvest - because there's no large-scale refrigeration infrastructure, they're forced to sell most of their apples in season, at rock-bottom prices.  If they save some fruit, it's liable to go bad, like the crates the man was dumping into the stream.

As we ate breakfast on our last day in the village, a big truck pulled up to the stone building next door.  About a dozen men and women got out - Roma, dressed almost in rags - and unloaded hundreds of packing boxes.  A few farmers showed up, opened the building, and the packing began.  Without refrigeration, the fruit was on the verge of being utterly spoiled - it must have sat inside those stone walls for at least six months.  We asked Divna, the woman we were staying with, where her neighbor would sell the apples.  She didn't know. "When we sold ours it was March," she said.  "They went to Russia."
The workers toasted us as we passed by with our bags.  I stopped for a few quick pictures and one young Roma man laughed and shouted "facebook."  The sun was shining, everyone was in a good mood except the owner of the barn.  He walked from bucket to bucket, looking at the fruit that had been cast aside and grumbling.

We left town with about a dozen small apples, given to us by a man by the bus stop.  He was unloading crates of small cider apples from his tractor cart, stacking them up against an old Volkswagen bus.  Another man came to talk with him and they both stood, smoking, for a while.  They looked at the apples, picked them up and turned them in their hands, then put them back in the crates with heavy expressions.  We talked to each other about how they must remember the trees of their youth, when their fathers and grandfathers had the richest orchards in Macedonia and someone could grow wealthy selling apples.  It seems doubly distant now, those bountiful days wiped away, replaced by cheap fruit and competition from China.  They're trying though.  Springtime Brajčino is still full of apple blossoms.

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Happy Labor Day!

"It's a day to be in nature with family..." explained Stefanija, an aspiring singer who was visiting her cousins for the holiday. So, everyone just sits around drinking and grilling?  "Yes, exactly," she laughed.  Labor Day seems to be the same the world over and we were lucky enough to join in on a real holiday barbecue.  We'd been hiking in the sun for two hours during which we'd met a turtle stuck in some shrubs and a recently road-killed snake.  Don't drink and drive, folks.  Behind every house, we could hear laughing and clinking of glasses.  Meat-tinged smoke made signals in the air that read YOU ARE JEALOUS.  Then, in the village of Ljubojno, this minimart-cum-restaurant appeared like an oasis. We sat for a drink and a moment out of the scorching sun.  What we got was much, much more. 

Two generations of men sat around a table on the porch. The front door of the store was open and they went in and out getting what was needed. Traditional music played on the stereo and plastic plates covered the tables - sliced tomato, whole hot peppers, grilled slabs of sheep cheese, scattered amongst the beer and rakija. The main event was about to begin.  There was a gas grill sitting amongst piles of empty bottles, but attentions were turned to the other, larger one.  "This is the best grill in.... in the world!" proclaimed Lambed, the grillmaster.  He'd welcomed us and taken our drink order when the others had looked a little skeptical.  Soon enough, we were embraced with full Macedonian hospitality.  "We'd like to invite you to join us for some meat."  It's not polite to turn down an invitation.

Nor is it polite to refuse a gift.  Our order of "wine" had arrived in the form of a one liter bottle of Macedonian white.  (That's the equivalent of 1 and 1/3 normal bottles for those who may not know).  When it was around four fifths of the way done, another was sent over.  "From him!" one man said of another.  Our place was cemented.  We received a taste of the first batch of meat off the grill: a veal burger, chicken cutlet and hot dog.  You'd be amazed at how good those three things can taste when wood-fired to perfection.  The whole batch of meat, which also included sausage wrapped in bacon and veal chops, had been marinating all day.  A halved onion was rubbed over the surface of the hot grill before anything went on.  This was an artform. 

Macedonia's Labor Day used to take place over three days - May 1st, 2nd and 3rd.  After the fall of Communism, when the actual completion of labor began to take precedence over the celebration of it, they shortened the holiday to two days.  Now, it is just one.  In small villages like Ljubojno, teenagers go and live with family or friends in neighboring cities in order to attend high school.  So, Labor Day is a rare day back at home during the school year.  We'd seen the bustle in Lake Ohrid, Macedonians who can afford to make a whole weekend of it gave a peek at what the town must be like in the summer high season. 

Some places were sleepier because of the holiday, some were more crowded. The little store in our home village of Brajcino, a (somewhat) sobering hour's walk from Ljubojno, was closed for the afternoon.  That didn't stop men from sitting outside under umbrellas, drinking beer and playing cards.  They left their recyclables lined up by the door and went home for the holiday dinners their wives had prepared.  Cars from Slovenia and Serbia filled the small parking lot in the town center.  We're pretty sure all of the former Yugoslav countries have the same Labor Day holiday. 

You see mini-reunions happening all over on days like this.  Cousins who only see each other once or twice a year fall easily back into familiar roles, dogs bark at visitors they don't recognize, young couples smooch and smoke cigarettes in secret. Like Stefanija and her friends, most people ring up their relative with the most picturesque residential location and pay a visit.  It's hard to compete with the Brajcino area in that respect.  The weather couldn't have been any more perfect and outdoor breakfast tables easily transitioned into lunch tables and then dinner.  You could smell baking almost everywhere.

The plows, shovels and tractors stay put for the day.  Except for this man, out on a joyride.  The kids of the town clearly knew he was coming and hopped on his cart.  Lest we forget the true meaning of Labor Day (drinking and grilling), Tractor Man didn't just brake to pick up new passengers.  He happily used the opportunity to pour himself a drink.  Happy Labor Day from Macedonia!

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Everything Except The Trout at Ohrid

Macedonia’s Lake Ohrid is famous for its trout.  In the chilly, mountain depths of these waters, the ohridska pastrmka (pastrmka means trout) has swum since time immemorial, and has been fished here since Neolithic times. It’s one of the only European fish to have existed since before the last ice age, and the species is probably some million years old.  Reportedly, it’s delicious.  The problem is, it’s almost extinct.  That doesn’t stop restaurants here from serving it.  Neither do the police, though it’s officially illegal to fish for it or sell it.
This is the “Macedonian Riviera,” and the eating here in Ohrid town has been almost uniformly excellent, with lots of cheap, pleasant restaurants dotting the waterfront and the side streets. We’ve been avoiding ohridska, but eating just about every other watery fauna we can get our forks into.  Here’s a look at what’s on offer in Ohrid that’s not endangered.

The first meal we had in Ohrid, we ate squid and shrimp – neither, of course, are native to the lake.  At MoMir restaurant, which juts out over the water, the squid came lightly spiced and perfectly grilled.  As tender as can be, with a bit of char and a smoky scent, they were better than any we’ve had since Croatia.  The shrimp were poppy red and full of ocean brine.
(At a later meal - we won’t mention the place - we were actually served fake shrimp, which were somewhat disgusting – they were like frozen fishcakes molded into the shape of a prawn, breaded and deep-fried.  We’ll spare you a picture.)

Ohrid also has European eels, which are quite plentiful both below the surface and on the town’s menus.  Sadly, the lake's stock is now mostly artificially kept up, as the lake's outlets have been dammed, and the eels aren't able to return to the Sargasso Sea where they spawn (this process is really interesting, actually - the Sargasso Sea is in the middle of the Atlantic ocean).
Arriving piping hot, baked with peppers, onions and tomato in a clay dish, the eel was like molten fish fat.  The taste had none of the muddiness that other eel can have, the meat was falling apart and lusciously, intensely flavorful – a heady mix of bay, basil and (we think) paprika.

At Letna Bavča Kaneo, a restaurant on a tiny, pebbled beach, we ate plasica while kids threw stones in the water and a swan swam haughtily by.  The sardine-like fish arrived in a jumbled pile, breaded and fried crisp - just how the locals love them.  Plasica are also native to the lake, and are the fish's scales are used to make Ohrid "pearls," which are essentially glass beads covered with a fishy paste (you'd be amazed how many gift shops sell them).  The fish were tasty in a snappy, easy-to-eat way, a great snack as the sun set.

It’s hard to sit beside a deep, cold lake and not think about flashing silver scales or the smell of a freshwater fish frying in butter. Fortunately, there are also other kinds of trout here – and they’re very tasty.  Guides suggest the mavrovska, belvica, kaliforniska and rekna varieties as better alternatives to ohridska   Belvica is also found in Ohrid, and is less threatened, but it might be a good idea to avoid it anyway.  This beautiful half of mavrovska was pan cooked, thick-fleshed and juicy.  The pink meat was dense without being dry, the flavor was of mountain water and cold winters.

Another alpine treat, and a bit of a surprise, this “fish broth” was more like a potato and trout soup. Ohrid’s cuisine is wonderful for its mixing of coastal and high-altitude aspects, a phenomenon that this dish perfectly encapsulated. The lightness of the starched broth and slight piquancy recalled the Mediterranean; the savory, rooty potato and herb components called up images of high villages, pines and swift running water.  The fish, of course, is what draws the line between the two. It worried us a little that the species of trout wasn’t specified, but it seemed unlikely that a restaurant would waste rare specimens in a stewpot.

It's a little sad that we couldn't taste the local specialty.  Guidebooks published as recently as five years ago call it one of the culinary highlights of Macedonia, and those who've tried it call it unforgettable.  But we haven't really missed it.  Eating by Lake Ohrid is pleasure enough, whatever is on the table.  The water is so blue, so intricately patterned, so vast that it feels like a world unto itself, a mystery in the mountains.  From afar it can be frighteningly rough or glass-smooth; up close it's so clear that sunlight hardly refracts off the surface.
Also, we can't feel that bad about not trying the trout - locals prefer pork cutlets anyway.

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