in transit/conference reflections/thanks

 For the first time in my life, I missed my flight back to Skopje.  

I showed up at the ticket counter, after waiting in the wrong place (either that or the bus was waiting in the wrong place—and I can feel myself slipping into that stupid blaming place, and quickly backing away, it never seems to be a really productive emotion. but there was miscommunication somewhere along the line) for the bus—and then stupidly kept waiting rather than catching a taxi until it was way too late—and got to the ticket counter as the plane was leaving. It’s certainly been a test of my patience—I think I was really ready to be home, to be back rooted in a community. Maybe I’m not destined to be a backpacker because I really miss “home”—and maybe this is in part why I keep finding myself drawn to studying home and place, the meaning we get and ascribe to places, to feelings-in-places, because these feelings have so much meaning in my own life. 

And yet—this trip has also epitomized ‘eating like an ex-pat:’ all the flavors I can’t find in Macedonian food: Indian curry, jalapeños, hummus. But here I am—sitting in a café, wishing that I had a place to call home that I could be writing this in, rather than some oddly public place. I miss silly things, like doing the dishes—or not doing the dishes and then doing them later. Knowing the names of people around me. Not living out of a suitcase. Not living with people who snore. 

But it’s also been really enlivening to be surrounded by other travelers—and see the world in little snippets through their eyes. Last night, there was a girl in whom I caught little glimpses of myself—taking time off before university to “figure things out”—and traveling. And she asked some really interesting questions—jumping into a conversation between some Erasmus students by asking “if there was one thing you could change about your life, what would it be?” which totally turned our somewhat superficial conversation about the nuts and bolts of Erasmus on its head. And writing it down—it looks kind of corny on the written page. But spoken, earnestly, curiously, inquisitively—it gave me pause. And then later on, she asked each of us to write a word that was significant to us on a piece of paper, and she took our pictures with them.

and I think what continues to strike me about these two questions/tasks is that it seems like she was not only trying to figure out “the world” through traveling, seeing new places, things, contexts and realities (who am I in relation to these new places? How do these contexts make me see things differently? Here? home?), but was trying to figure out the kinds of people who inhabit the world. And at the same time—asks us to do some serious introspection.

This morning, heading out of the hostel, I reached my hand into my pocket and found this letter—

Last night, I had asked Luli about what her word would be—and she didn’t answer, or at least immediately. And it’s a really interesting flow of words—consciousness to acceptance to will to change.

Again, it brings me back to Freire (maybe I should re-name my blog?) and how without awareness we are lost, we are powerless. but how courage to change also dissevers its place next to consciousness.

Of course, we can be aware of things which we can’t change, or at least not change immediately, but without seeing them, without being able to articulate these issues, these ideas, these ways/modes of seeing, what do we have?

and then I was just touched that she had taken a minute, in her rush to head off to that next destination, to bring our conversation to a close.

And maybe it’s this articulation which I’m struggling with—especially on reflecting on this conference which I attended this past weekend in Budapest.

Let me preface this by saying that I was kind of expecting this to be like the best Symposium ever—a collection of scholars just talking about the Balkans. What could be better? Dreams do really come true! I was going to have an epiphany. Or maybe two. 

And maybe this was a little unrealistic.

But for a conference called “Balkan Dialogue”—there wasn’t really a lot of dialogue which went on. Very few questions were asked, and so in many ways it felt like a collection of scholars having their fifteen minutes of fame, and then fading back into the quiet oblivion. it was also in a huge lecture hall (so sitting in the back you could see who was checking their facebook on their computers quite easily), and man is it easy to tune out in one of those halls, and intimidating to stand up and speak in front of.

Language was certainly a barrier for some speakers—and I also think impacted how engaged the audience is—I wonder/imagine if Englishes are not all mutually intelligible (how does a non-native speaker of English from Hungary hear a non-native English speaker from Albania?) . And then some presenters, I don’t think, were very professional—there was a husband/wife duo (dangerous) who presented back to back, and the husband kept whispering/prompting his wife (her English was also not her strong suit, so I think she was already feeling self-conscious about it--not to mention Balkan gender dynamics and the macho man phemenon), and finally she just read the text literally from the slides—kind of sounding like the auto mated voice that reads severe weather alerts. she was even talking about something I was hoping would be really interesting--and I didn't absorb hardly anything. And then they—while the next person was presenting—were on their phones, taking pictures of their son who was fidgeting in the front row. talking through smiles. 

maybe I should teach a class on cellphone etiquette. or maybe the cultural norms governing cell phones are just totally different here and I still can't read or understand them.

there were also a bevy of speakers who just didn't show--creating some odd pockets of silence in the conference. 

and then, just to top it off--a Bulgarian guy closed out the conference, speaking about Bulgarian-Macedonian relations, and how things had been going well and then the Macedonians got into their hyper-nationalist groove, and things were now on the rocks. and of course, the Macedonian piped up--and thankfully they agreed to disagree peacefully, but I think it only speaks to how, perhaps the Bulgarian guy was onto something--some things with Macedonia are well, sensitive. (However I don't want to get into the validity of some of his other claims--like Bulgaria and Macedonia are two states, one nation. Yeehaw, what an ugly can of worms to open.) 

The conference also opened with a bunch of diplomats speaking 'diplomat-speak' which I'm realizing I don't do very well. I think especially after being exposed to some really amazing scholars/presenters through the Rosenfield Program (thanks Sarah, Laureen and co!), who a person is, what their title is, doesn't really tell me very much, nor mean very much to me. In particular, the Croatian Ambassador made some comments about how dysfunctional Bosnia is (about as close to the "truth" as I think we can get) (I think he used the term "broken" which I object to) but then kept reiterating how the Bosnian Croats were "the most neglected people in Bosnia" (what about the Roma? a voice in my head pipes up). But what's so frustrating is that, for me, imbedded within these two statements is some huge honking cognitive dissonance--Bosnia, to me, is "broken" if you really want to use that language, because of statements like "X is the most neglected peoples" because it again falls into this miserable ethno-territorial-monochromatic-deadend kind of vision of Bosnia.

I remember one of the things a girl I'll call Selma said when I interviewed her in 2011, was that there still isn't a legal category "Bosnian" that one can identify with (there also hasn't been a census in which to identify yourself as Bosnian--but that's another issue all together). and until people can and have the opportunity to begin reorganizing their identity-wardrobes (and maybe getting rid of some of the pieces that have gone out of fashion?) really, how are things going to change? how is language like "the X are the most victimized by Bosnia's current political/social/economic/whatever systems' how does that help make Bosnia better?

so it was really disheartening for me to have this be the opening shade of the conference.

I think it should also be noted that I was somewhat disappointed with my own presentation (the perennial academic question "did I make any sense?" --and I'm sure that colors my own perspective/experience of the conference.

Plane home leaves soon.

an amendment:
I don't mean to sound totally negative about this conference experience--there were a lot of positives (I learned a lot about Turkey. totally fascinating. Like there's a Muslim sect there which doesn't pray in mosques, but in Cem houses--and because they don't pray in mosques, there's all sorts of tension with the government...) I also got to talk with a guy from N. Cyprus (the Turkish side) who, coincidentally, also studied peace education. I guess us Balkan-lovers are quirky in similar ways.
I'm really glad I went--but also do wish that it could have been better. but that's the way everything goes.

 

Good things come from vending machines?

Ljubljana, you blew my mind.

I guess I was raised in a bit of a hippy-healthfood kind of family--sure there were occasional 'happy meals' but no solid habit formation. and then life went on, and I worked at a local foods restaurant and on an organic vegetable farm. I became a vegetarian because I loved vegetables, and it was just easier to explain "I don't eat meat" then "I'd prefer to just eat vegetables" (that and the meat industry is horrifying). so vending machines are kind of my antithesis (not to mention their troubled relationship with schools and food in schools): purely packaged food, who knows how long it's been in there, or how long it will be? Visits to vending machines are usually pits of desperation or despair.

But I may have to give vending machines a second chance.

In the square, next to the open air market in Ljubljana were two odd boxey machines: the first dispensed raw milk (raw milk!?). you can either bring your own bottle, or buy one from the machine (plastic or glass). for 1 Euro/liter--which I haven't gone back to the supermarket to check prices, but it doesn't seem out of line (the internet tells me a liter usually goes for .92Euro, so). and you can buy it in basically any quantity you want (only have 20 Cents? buy 2 deciliters of milk!). and the second sold filtered and unfiltered apple cider (oh my god so amazing). cheese, jogurt. All from what appeared to be small suppliers, at a local level.

Yes--the only things that were missing were a loaf of fresh bread (which you could buy in the market--so not too big of a deal) and human interaction. the human component is a huge part of the appeal for me of things like farmers markets--and a vending machine will never replace that. but to think that I could satisfy my craving for a glass of raw milk at any time of day is just kind of beautiful.

now if only they had one of these vending machines in the airport. 

The Irony of Fate (or, Enjoy your Tarantula)

For those of you who know me as a bit (or a bit more than a bit) of an arachnaphobe, you'll probably have a few laughs at my expense.

And for those of you who don't know me, let me introduce myself. Hi, my name is Claire and I'm terrified of spiders.

I won't get into the details of how this all started other than to say it involved a big spider climbing on my body, and that even writing these words still gives me the heebie-jeebies.

So yesterday, after boarding the train back to Ljubljana from Budapest--I noticed a guy walk by carrying a big ice-chest, the kind I'd pack to take to a concert or the beach (a bit out of place in the snow in Budapest at the train station). And low and behold, he came and sat in my compartment.  After checking to see that the radiator was warm, he opened up his ice chest and pulled out a chameleon. I kid you not. a chameleon. it was in a plastic container--but a live chameleon. It was two months old, he later told me.

and then he pulled out not one but five (FIVE!) vials with different spiders in them. Four of them were small enough--about the size of a pill bottle (the vials, not the spiders!)--that I couldn't see anything. But the last--in a jar about the size of a large yogurt container--well he had eight hairy legs and I could see them all. Luckily, the jar was opaqueish (and I didn't have my glasses on--a strategic move), so I couldn't see any of the hairy details. and I just focused on not looking physically uncomfortable. As far as I could tell, my two options were
1.  totally offend this guy and look for another compartment on the train or
2. grit my teeth and deal with it. and who knows, maybe this would be my spider breakthrough.

but sharing a train compartment with tarantula, well, it makes for a hell of a long ride. (Tarantulas on a Train anyone? Travels with Tarantulas?)

and I tried not to stare too much--but I think my terrified glances were interpreted as genuine interest, and he kept holding up the vials, checking on the spiders and offering for me to look at them, and I tried to contain myself. and all I could think about the entire time was "what happens if we get in a train wreck, and I'm somehow pinned somewhere and then the spiders get out? do chameleons eat tarantulas? do tarantulas eat chameleons?)
let's just say--any train trip with tarantulas is a train trip that lasts a little too long.

but I survived unscathed, and that's the important part.

back with Buda and Pest

 I think I spent just a little too much time on the train today, because even now--five hours after getting off the train--my body still leans just a little whenever I sit down in anticipation of the train lurching off towards our next destination. being stationary. what a novel concept.
the quiet is a little eerie.

 We boarded the train in Ljubljana before the sun had risen (I guess Slovenia is considerably north of Macedonia) and it was amazing to watch the light change as we sped across all sorts of landscapes. Maybe it's spending four years with a train track literally running through my life, whistling to me, rumbling through town irregardless of weather, exams, mood or deadline, but there's something about seeing the world from a train window which I just love--the perspective on the world, the clattering, the lilting. the old man who wheels up and down the aisle "can I interest you in coffee?" he says, with the most wonderful smile. A week before leaving for Macedonia, I spent an evening with Charlie--kicking around the train station in Burlington before heading up to Radio Bean. "they're all somehow the same," he said. and the same could be said for the countless stations we zoomed by today--same conductor, with his red cap and flags, same people wrestling luggage off the train, same family members

 looking longingly after the train once it has pulled away from the station.
and all of a sudden, it was getting dark again, the softness returned to the light as it slanted across the Hungarian plains. and there--up ahead--was Budapest (actually Pest--which certainly threw my internal-map for a loop). and oddly, coming up from the metro--it felt like a homecoming of sorts.
it's good to be back with Buda and Pest

Aegean Adventures, or (cue Jake) "Is that a musrhoom?"

 

Three times in two days, Jake turned to me and said, with usually a look of wonder in his eyes, “are those mushrooms?”—and with those simple words, Jake quickly got short-listed for my rooster of delightful travel companions. Especially to Greece—where a historian-by-trade comes in handy, and when a fellow mushroom enthusiast is always welcome (which must make living in Macedonia rather trying at times because the majority of mushrooms I see come in a bag—making them look even more out of place than other canned foods). (we also ate ice cream cones in Skopje while it was snowing—which probably is the Macedonian equivalent in terms of oddities—still very much worth it.)

Jake—I guess I should mention—is our resident Byzantine scholar, fellow Fulbrighter, and Floridian-in-denial (he just wrote me an e-mail saying how much he loved Skopje on gray, overcast days…hope it’s ok that that cat’s out of the bag, Jake) and we took a weekend excursion to Thessaloniki a few weekends ago. 

The first thing you see once you cross the boarder into Greece is a sign welcoming you to Macedonia. And from there on out there was some serious Macedonia-pushing (or perhaps more pertinently, claiming). And I don’t mean to offend Macedonian/Greeks/fellow humans, or get bogged down in the debate-that-never-ends-it-just-goes-on-and-on-my-friends…but it feels a little crazy.  Maybe it’s the American in me—and we have six states which are differentiated only (in title) by North-South (Carolina, Dakota) or East-West (Virginia). And that hasn’t lead to the American identity crisis of the century. (we also have states blatantly names after other places—all the “News”). And yet it’s a fight that just won’t seem to die down.

Yes—I understand that the situation in the southern Balkans is somewhat complicated by the fact that they are different countries—and that the historical legacy that they are both laying claim to is a bit more significant (on a domestic and international front) than North Dakota (not to say that North Dakota/North Dakotans don’t have legitimate history of their own). but it felt crazy to me to constantly be mindful even with the guys, (immigrants from East Africa?) who were trying push colorful woven bracelets on us—of “I work in FYROM. I work in FYROM”  even though FYROM as a title means very little to me. Or perhaps—just to be a good academic—I’ve ascribed very little meaning to the acronym FYROM (Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia).  

I think I was a little shocked because Thessaloniki doesn't look like the Greek islands (Greece looks like more than one thing?)--a lot (a lot a lot) of eight or nine story buildings, lots of right angles (windows, balconies, Greek flags), and then thrown into squares between blocks--ancient ruins.  the buildings--which differed mostly in pastely hue--definitely gave the city a strange feel, an odd uniformity. 

Thessaloniki and the White Tower

the neighborhood where we stayed was nestled up between a church/cemetery which took up a wide swath of space, and some sort of cliff, so there was really only one entrance, and even just walking in, it felt like a neighborhood, it felt like a community. the houses were a little shorter, it was quiet.

 One day, Kostas' (our host) grandmother came to visit him and brought the best homemade yogurt I've had--maybe even giving mats'oni a run for its money. and when we arrived, the only thing in Kostas' fridge was olives. 

Being Greece--other than olive oil and feta cheese (and the name issue), much of the recent information I've gotten about Greece was about the debt crisis, although I've heard that Thessaloniki wasn't hit quite as hard as Athens--so other than everything being on sale (one store even advertized "sale" in Georgian...?), lots of anarchist/communist/anti-capitalist graffiti, the only real markers of tension were the gaggles of riot-geared policemen, just (as far as I could tell) hanging out (and that many shops closed early). their presence reminded me of Belgrade during a particularly hot football match, and served as a not-so-subtle reminder of some of the broader political/economic/social tensions at play. which I guess speaks to the ways in which social strife is hidden--both in terms of economics as an issue of the "home"--and then the more general gaze of the tourist.

On Sunday morning, we ambled up to the ruined fortress on the hill above the city, looking down at the arch of Galerius, musing on how the city had changed in the past two milllennia (and how inconceivable this cityscape would be for the people who build the fortress), and then wandered into a crowded, dark church service. It must have been a special saints day--the saint of children or healing?--because parents brought their children to be blessed. churches--unlike in Macedonia--were also divided by gender. but it was so beautiful--the icons, the glinting of the gold (even if it is totally overthetop), the frescoes, faces illuminated by beeswax candles, the music. the chanting was stunning. stunning. stunning. 

Thessaloniki was also a welcome break before the semester kicks off--two days ago--although students are still trickling in. Thusfar, I've gotten a great impression from the students I have met--thoughtful, engaged--even at 8am on a Tuesday--and I'm optimistic (but really--when am I not?). but they left a great impression on me. 

However--I'm actually missing the first day of class for my Geography/Mapping course because I'm en-route to Budapest (stop one Ljubljana) to present a paper (Bosnia, home, space, return--the usual suspects). I think I'm most nervous about the mapping course because I desperately want students to connect with it, and I'm worried that it might be a tinderbox for broader issues of space/control, and that studying home may hit a little too close to home (literally, figuratively). 

Preparing for the mapping course made me feel just like I was back in college--sitting at a cafe with readings spread around me, absentmindedly sipping at coffee, vigorously underlining. every so often staring off into the distance. and the challenge not only becomes--how do I teach these concepts, but how do I teach them in an EFL context. I'm sure I've got a lot to learn.