Meet the Fleanstones

Every other Friday all 34 trainees gather in Kumanavo for day-long, whole-group Hub Day training. This year one of the Hub day trainings happened to fall on Halloween. So Thursday Kacey and I found material at a shop in Kumanavo. We brought it home and Hava (our host mother) was going to help us sew our costumes. It also happened to be Agim’s (our host father) birthday. While we were eating desert to celebrate, the power went out. We waited and waited to be able to use the sewing machine. The power didn’t come back on however, so we colored my outfit by candlelight. We went to bed with the understanding Hava would wake Kacey up if the Power came back on or would wake-up early to sew.

Well, at a quarter to six Hava was knocking on our door to show Kacey that the power was still out. She then pantomimed that she was going to sew by hand. Kacey went up stairs with her and a minute later an aunt who lives next door walked in just out of bed; Hava had gone and woken the aunt to help her sew. Thus Hava and her sister-in-law sewed our costumes at six in the morning by hand! When all was said and done, an hour and half later, Kacey and I had incredible Flintstone costumes! Our family got the biggest kick out of the fact I was wearing a dress.

Along with Anna, who made a mask, and Amanda who made bat wings, we visited the local elementary school where Amanda’s host father works. The kids all sat staring, jaws dropped – they don’t celebrate Halloween here, and few, if any, kids or adults for that matter, know what Halloween, or the Flintstones are.

Most trainees, and a number of PC staff were in costume for Hub day. The other dual language group went as the breakfast club. One group all had Devo hats and performed a song and dance number. Two groups made matching tee-shirts. Jordan, the only African-American in our group went as Mike Tyson. The other married couple came in matching Macedonian jogging outfits they bought. The title of the scariest costume was easily awarded to the current volunteer and trainer who came dressed as Sarah Palin.

After training almost everyone went to the Irish Pub in Kumanavo. Most of the training groups had to leave at 8:00 to return to their sights, but since we are so close we were able to stay. A ton of current Volunteers from around the country also congregated at the Irish Pub in costume. At midnight the pub had a costume contest. We were called downstairs through the packed house to calls from the band, “Fred eend Vilma!” Voting was done by cheering, and in the end we elicited the loudest cheer, along with chants of Fleanstones, Fleanstones, Fleanstones – and we won the prize for best costumes! The prize money covered the cost of our costumes, dinner at the pub, all of our drinks for the night, plus a little extra – so it was a great night, and probably the greatest costumes we’ll ever have.

Language

During orientation week we were presented with the opportunity to apply for the dual language program here in Macedonia. Whereas most volunteers in MK learn Macedonian, some volunteers learn both Macedonian and Albanian and subsequently live in mixed or predominately Albanian communities within Macedonia. Kacey was chomping at the bit to apply while I was a bit more hesitant. After talking to Colin and Jackie (current volunteers) I was convinced, we applied, and we were accepted. As a result Kacey and I are two of nine trainees learning both Macedonian and Albanian.

For these 11 weeks of training we are living with a Muslim family in a small Albanian village, Cherkeze, outside of Kumanavo. There are seven communities around Macedonia hosting groups for training. Five groups are learning strictly Macedonian while two groups are learning both. We are lucky that every group but ours has five people while we only have four. We are here in Cherkeze with two other Trainees, Amanda and Anna.

Mondays and Tuesdays we attend Macedonian class and Wednesdays, Thursdays, and every other Friday we learn Albanian. Classes are four to four and half hours long and always seem to fly by. It’s a little bit insane trying to learn two completely different languages simultaneously. Complicating things further is the fact that languages are highly localized in Macedonia. Therefore the Albanian we learn in class is different from the dialect we speak with our homestay family, and both are different from the dialect we’ll speak in Tetovo. The same pattern holds true for Macedonian. In Kumanavo the Macedonian is mixed with Serbian and is a different dialect than Macedonian spoken elsewhere.

Macedonian is a Slavic language and it uses the Cyrillic alphabet, which was actually developed here in Macedonia. It is similar to Serbian, Serbo-Croatian, and Bulgarian and is highly phonetic. Albanian is also pretty phonetic, but has more sounds we don’t have in English. Albanian uses a derivative of the Latin alphabet but has 36 characters. Albanian is far more grammatical than Macedonian and is much harder. There are almost no similarities between the two languages and every town and village is called one thing in Macedonian and another in Albanian. Most Albanians can speak at least some Macedonian, but very few Macedonians speak any Albanian.

The most difficult part of the dual language program is trying to compartmentalize the two and keep them straight. Switching back and forth, especially for class is difficult. Our teachers are incredible, especially for not being full-time PC employees. The are only hired on four and a half month contracts. Lidija is our Macedonian teacher and she is the head teacher; she helps coordinate and instruct the other teachers. This is her sixth year working with the Peace Corps and she just celebrated her 36^th birthday. Vahide is 25 and is our Albanian teacher. This is her 3^rd year working for the Peace Corps. She is the only Albanian teacher, so she works with the other dual language group Monday and Tuesday and with us the rest of the week.

Regardless of the challenge and the insanity it is still a blast and a ton of fun!