"HAPPY, HAPPY, JOY, JOY"
- Ren & Stimpy
So many people (at least two or three) have asked how we are doing, as a family, so I thought this blog post would be better suited to give a quick update....To help me not chase rabbits, I'll organize the blog by person - oldest to youngest.
OH CAPTAIN, MY CAPTAIN: Zo has been hard at work, securing additional office space, so that he can hire the first 2-3 employees for the Karpa (European branch), a task that has proven to be more time-consuming and difficult than we ever anticipated. He has also been invaluable as "Translator Extraordinaire" for the rest of us. He rescues me when I "bite off more than I can chew" (at stores, doc appointments, phone calls, border crossings, etc), which is a regular occurrence.
He is the strong and steady for our family of 8 (if you count the dog and the cat), who are constantly confused (yes, the dog and cat are confused as well) - whether it be language, culture, new foods, getting lost, or yelling border agents (obviously that was a traumatic event for me, since I'm in the first section and have already mentioned it twice).
THE SQUIRREL: I am working (though not as diligently as I wish) on acquiring the Macedonian language as fast as possible. This is not as easy as I thought it would be - I blame it on my 40th birthday last August. Maybe if I had started when I was 39......Zo is grateful for any language progression I make; however, I think the shop owners are protesting. They seem to prefer my broken Macedonian. It makes for lots of laughs. A perfect example happened a couple of weeks back.
I got a hankerin' for some bar-b-que, and since I had recently acquired a crockpot from an American moving back to the States, I decided Pork Sandwiches would do just the trick. Now, if I were back home, I would've gone to Ingles and grabbed a Boston Butt in the meat department. I wasn't sure how to say "Boston" and I wasn't sure that the pork here would be of the "Boston" variety (I need to Google where that name comes from), so I decided just to ask the butcher at the local supermarket for a "pork butt". Sounds simple enough, right?
I waited until everyone else had finished at the meat counter, so as to minimize my embarrassment. I politely said (in broken Macedonian), "Hello, can I please have a pork butt?" However, unfortunately, the only word I know for "butt" translates as "a$#". He looked at me quizzically and replied, "Excuse me?" Gathering all of the confidence I could muster, I did what I make fun of people for doing to me when I can't understand their language - I said it louder. "CAN I PLEASE HAVE A PORK A#*???????" Ok, at this point, the dude lost it. He got hysterical. Completely, unashamedly (for him) hysterical. And much to my horror, he decided to call the women from the deli counter over, so he could tell them what I wanted. And then he started grabbing various body parts on his own body, asking which kind I wanted (which sounds a little more risque than it actually was). So now I have a couple of deli women standing there, laughing at me, while the butcher does some kind of Justin Timberlake dance number. Good times. I grabbed the first hunk of pork that the guy finally showed me, and made a beeline for the cash register.
I got to the car, related the story to Zo, who was wondering what was taking so long. He seemed to find it just as funny as the butcher did. Apparently, the piece of pork I was looking for is not called a "pork butt" in Macedonia, making my poor, profane translation that much funnier.
Three weeks later, I'm walking through the grocery store, and I hear someone yell in Macedonian, "Hey pork a#*!!!!" I look over, and there is the butcher, waving and smiling. Wow. That was some kind of special! I don't think I've ever been called that before - and I would probably be okay with never being called that again!
Moving on.....I am also trying to figure out how to homeschool in a culture that is more relationship-based than project-oriented. So all "quick trips to someone's house or to the store" end up being 3-4 hour events. That's a new thing and honestly, I haven't figured out how to navigate those waters just yet.
C3PO (inside joke): Nattie is adjusting well to life in Macedonia. She has made friends with a girl named Vesna, and has enjoyed getting to know her better and they've hung out a couple of times.She has also been taking Roxy on walks around the city - since the two of them are having the hardest time adjusting to not being able to "run wild and free". They are both looking forward (Nattie says Roxy specifically told her so) to finding a place out in a village somewhere, to run around.
BLOB FISH: If you ask Aleks what he likes most about Macedonia, his immediate response is: THE FOOD!!!! He loves it. All of it. Fresh onions, grilled mushrooms, bread, cucumbers...the list goes on and on...
He has found the local "American Corner" where he can go a couple of times a month and play board games with local teens, where they can work on their English (and he can pretend he's working on his Macedonian).
We have found him an orthodontist that he says reminds him of 1/2 Dedo (Zo's dad) and 1/2 Professor Snake from Harry Potter. Aleks has had "fun" learning the difference between dentists in America and dentists in Macedonia. (You'll have to ask him, next time you see him - it's quite a hoot to hear him describe it).
JOEJOE BEAN: This is my "city life lovin'" kid!!! He loves EVERYTHING about city life. He enjoys all of the people out on the street, watching the crazy drivers fit through impossibly tight spaces, street dogs, corner fast food places, the late night schedule everyone keeps here, and everything else that makes living in the city what it is. He's doing well in Macedonian class. He has 90% of the alphabet memorized (there are 31 letters in the Macedonian alphabet), and knows all of the greetings and anything related to food or ordering at restaurants.
DRAGAN: Malachi is a name that no one understands over here, so after we try 3 or 4 times unsuccessfully, to tell people what his name is, we usually just say "Dragan" (his middle name) and they are satisfied. Dragan is a Macedonian name, so no one here thinks it's strange - unlike in America.Malachi Dragan is absorbing the language like a sponge, but he only lets it out when we least expect it (and didn't realize he knew the word).
He loves the food, like his brother Aleks, but he reminds us at least 3 times a week that he's "still an American!!!!"
Our "TEAM" UPDATE:
- We are still working on finding a permanent housing arrangement. An explanation of what all that takes could fill 12 blog posts.
- We have begun our first steps toward connecting with the local government orphanage (as a matter of fact, we are planning our second visit on Friday of this week)
- We are digging celebrating two Christmas' (ours and the Orthodox version on January 7), as well as New Year's Eve (when Grandfather Ice "Dedo Mraz" visits) and Kolede (which is today and is when they have bonfires all over the city and the kids go trick-or-treating). So basically, from December 24 to January 8, Santa Claus will be at our house 3 times and we will go trick-or-treating. Sugar overload, anyone?!?!?
- We are still helping at the refugee camp in Gevgelija, though a crazy illness I had (which would be way TMI for me to explain) sidelined us for 3 weeks.
2015 was an absolute whirlwind and there are many mornings when I wake up and think, "Do we really live on the other side of the world?!?!?" It usually takes about 30 seconds for me to hear the Muslim call to prayer from the local mosque or smell burning wood seeping through the windows, for me to get the answer.
Needless to say, we are crazy-excited about 2016 and can't wait to see what God has in store for us! We love you and miss you all!!! Thank you for your encouragement and prayers for our family.
As a fun post-script, I asked the kids to give me three words to describe Macedonia for the blog. These were their (almost exact) responses:
- Nattie: city, mountains, insanedrivers (she told me that "insane drivers" could be one word, as long as I made sure everyone understood she wasn't saying "insaned rivers")
- Aleks: social, peer pressure, enjoyment (apparently the concept of THREE words is difficult for my children)
- Joe: "best place I've ever been in my life", "amazing", "great food" (he asked me several times to explain what I meant by "three words" and then said, "oh, I get it!" and gave me his answers)
- Malachi: gevrek, burek so meso, pizza, "and I know it's number four, but I have to say pileshki prsti, too" (his are all food-related)
MERRY CHRISTMAS and HAPPY NEW YEAR from BITOLA, MACEDONIA!!!!
