Macedonian Metaphor

Each apartment building has three stories. The top two have balconies and a long floor to ceiling window down one long side. They’re framed by the cement floor and pillars holding up the ceiling. For reasons that weren’t explained to me, cement risers must be poured at the foot of these openings. It seems like the sort of thing a wrought iron railing might be laid onto. To pour the risers, we build a box out of scrap wood around a row of rebar lattice. It’s just a form to hold the cement in place while it sets, so it doesn’t have to be pretty and it doesn’t have to last forever. But it has to stay put while we knock the cement around and make sure it’s filled the form properly.

Can I draw attention for a moment to how this is a metaphor for all this habituating for humanity I’m doing? These buildings will not stand for centuries. The cinder blocks are a loose foam of concrete; light weight and stackable. Those are cemented together and coated in mesh and glue to bind the walls tight. I think it’s designed to stand up under Macedonia’s frequent earthquakes. Regardless, this development lacks the organic charm of the build family’s current neighborhood. We went over for dinner last night and had to navigate a maze of hillside streets inaccessible by van. Locals strolled through the square and kids played games in the street. The scents and sounds of supper called us in all directions. We piled into their small living room and crowded around a long table that must have been built for the night. Dishes were passed and bottles emptied. Family was everywhere.

So why move on from such a trove of tradition? Why leave your friends and neighbors to build a new community amongst strangers sharing only your ability to navigate non-profit offerings? Why move from streets built over centuries to a fringe complex pieced together by volunteers?

Whatever the neighborhood and whoever the neighbors, this is a step up. This is home ownership (yes, the build family pays 1/3rd the cost of the unit, and works alongside the volunteers). It’s a home that will alleviates economic stress and gives the family the structure and time to set like cement into the middle class.

So while the work here is similar to that in India, here, there’s a force of progress pushing me forward. There we were building brick bunkers that will outlast the shacks and shanties surrounding. We anchored those families into the slum built just for them. But this feels like something of a halfway house for home ownership.

Or I could be completely wrong and this complex will be an oasis of awesome in Veles. Either way, I feel good about the work I’m doing.

The cement pouring took a couple days, but today I returned to digging; just in time to get new blisters over the recently healed. The dry heat pulls sweat from my body as fast as I can guzzle more water. I spend the day soaking wet in the ninety degree shade. But as I find a rhythm to my picking and shoveling, and as I pull lungfuls of hot and clean air into my body, I feel driven by a solar powered motor to keep moving. Two hours into it, I’ve burnt up any meals I’ve recently eaten. By lunch or dinnertime, I’m ravenous. I eat as much as I can of the items within my diet. More cucumbers, more tomatoes, more cheese. Sometimes fish. Sometimes mushrooms and corn. Always Rakia.