We have all been placed with host families for the two months of training. My host family is an older couple named Vesna and Tome. They have two daughters: one lives in Slovenia, and the other lives in England. They have been absolutely lovely and very patient. They only speak a few words of English, and I speak less Macedonian than a toddler. We have been using a ton of charades and google translate to communicate. Some times I use a word in Russian if I don't know it in Macedonian and hope they understand. There is a lot that gets lost in translation. For example, when I first got there on saturday, my host parents kept saying "Cvadba" which means wedding. I looked it up on google translate but I still didn't know if they were going to a wedding or if I was invited too. I finally figured out that I was also invited to the wedding, which was very exciting because that was one of my goals. I was really worried though, because I only brought one dress that was wedding appropriate and it was white. I texted my language teacher in a panic, asking her if it would be okay to wear, and she said people wore white to Macedonian weddings all the time and it was fine.
We left for the wedding that evening. It was in Shtip, which is about a 20 minute drive from the town I live in. The wedding was at a super nice hotel and all the guests were dressed to the nines. I saw a woman in a white pantsuit and I felt much better about my dress. When we walked in, instead of a reception line, there was a place where all the guests could line up to take a picture with the bride and groom. I still don't know how to say "congratulations", so when I walked up to the bride and groom, all I said was "hello". We got our picture taken, and then went to our table. I said hello to everyone and introduced myself, but that's all I could say. I really felt like a toddler.
After we got to our seats, the bride and groom did a ceremony where they crossed arms with each other, and drank champagne. Then they had there first dance and that part was very similar to American weddings. They had a live band and the singers were very talented! Since I couldn't talk, I danced a lot of oros. Oros are a type of Balkan/Turkish dance where everyone holds hands and dances in a circle. They usually only have a few steps, and most are pretty easy to pick up even if you are not the world's most talented dancer. I still managed to mess up a couple of times, but it wasn't a big deal. My host mom did tell me to sit one of them out because she thought it would be to hard for me, and it definitely would have been. Oros can go on forever! It was hours of the same dances, but to different songs. At this wedding, they danced before the food was served. We finally ate at 10 pm!
The waiters danced with a plate of roast meat as they brought it to the bride and groom. The bride groom, and the groom's brother stood up on their table and started dancing as the waiters brought them the food. I did not understand what was going on or the significance of it, but it was a lot of fun to watch. After the bride and groom got their food, the musicians brought out the traditional Macedonian instruments like a wooden horn and a drum, and played traditional wedding music. Something I thought was interesting is that they also did the bouquet toss, but the groom was the one who threw it and a man caught it.
By the time we finally left it was midnight! We had been there for 6 hours. I'm so grateful I was able to be there, and it was a great way to experience Macedonian culture! My next goal is to go to a wedding here where I actually know the bride or groom. I feel so lucky that my host family included me.
It has really been a struggle being in a place where I have a lot of difficulty communicating, and I've been feeling really homesick. Every day gets a little bit better though, and I am learning so much. I've also been hanging out with the other volunteers and that has helped a lot. I also feel really happy about the small victories such as being able to explain to my host family slightly complex things, like that my cat is declawed and that's why she lives inside, and learning tons of different Macedonian words. Overall, this is really challenging, but I'm glad I'm doing it, because I am learning so much already.
We left for the wedding that evening. It was in Shtip, which is about a 20 minute drive from the town I live in. The wedding was at a super nice hotel and all the guests were dressed to the nines. I saw a woman in a white pantsuit and I felt much better about my dress. When we walked in, instead of a reception line, there was a place where all the guests could line up to take a picture with the bride and groom. I still don't know how to say "congratulations", so when I walked up to the bride and groom, all I said was "hello". We got our picture taken, and then went to our table. I said hello to everyone and introduced myself, but that's all I could say. I really felt like a toddler.
After we got to our seats, the bride and groom did a ceremony where they crossed arms with each other, and drank champagne. Then they had there first dance and that part was very similar to American weddings. They had a live band and the singers were very talented! Since I couldn't talk, I danced a lot of oros. Oros are a type of Balkan/Turkish dance where everyone holds hands and dances in a circle. They usually only have a few steps, and most are pretty easy to pick up even if you are not the world's most talented dancer. I still managed to mess up a couple of times, but it wasn't a big deal. My host mom did tell me to sit one of them out because she thought it would be to hard for me, and it definitely would have been. Oros can go on forever! It was hours of the same dances, but to different songs. At this wedding, they danced before the food was served. We finally ate at 10 pm!
The waiters danced with a plate of roast meat as they brought it to the bride and groom. The bride groom, and the groom's brother stood up on their table and started dancing as the waiters brought them the food. I did not understand what was going on or the significance of it, but it was a lot of fun to watch. After the bride and groom got their food, the musicians brought out the traditional Macedonian instruments like a wooden horn and a drum, and played traditional wedding music. Something I thought was interesting is that they also did the bouquet toss, but the groom was the one who threw it and a man caught it.
By the time we finally left it was midnight! We had been there for 6 hours. I'm so grateful I was able to be there, and it was a great way to experience Macedonian culture! My next goal is to go to a wedding here where I actually know the bride or groom. I feel so lucky that my host family included me.
It has really been a struggle being in a place where I have a lot of difficulty communicating, and I've been feeling really homesick. Every day gets a little bit better though, and I am learning so much. I've also been hanging out with the other volunteers and that has helped a lot. I also feel really happy about the small victories such as being able to explain to my host family slightly complex things, like that my cat is declawed and that's why she lives inside, and learning tons of different Macedonian words. Overall, this is really challenging, but I'm glad I'm doing it, because I am learning so much already.
Trying to explain Ester is difficult in English so I’m extremely impressed that you can do it in Macedonian!
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