From Blue Sky Days to Blackbird Fields: Thanksgiving Kosovo-Style...

Early on, I had thought that with Thanksgiving being on a school day, we probably would not have an opportunity to celebrate it, but I was wrong. Thursday was a Kosovo National Holiday, as they celebrate Albanian Independence Day which is November 28th. Therefore this year, American Thanksgiving Day was a day off from school. Kaçanik decorated for Albanian Independence Day (Flag Day) early in the week with Albanian flags all over the place and black and red clothing and decorations in store windows. On Tuesday, I saw a group of young kids dressed in traditional costumes walking along the main street sidewalk with some adults trailing behind. Traditional dress is a white dress for girls and a white shirt and cream-colored pants for boys These are trimmed in black, red, and sometimes gold braid and lace. Often the costume includes a red vest (see below). The kids wore red crowns with the Albanian eagle or traditional white felt hats.

Kids in traditional dress

Albanian flags decorate the bridge into Kaçanik

Flags line the road in a village we walked by on Sunday

Monday and Tuesday were normal uneventful days with enough time on Tuesday to bake some Cowboy Cookies and get some much-needed cleaning done. Wednesday the fun began. Between the afternoon and morning school sessions, students at my school performed traditional dance, instrumentals, and vocals. It was fun to see students perform. School performances are a big thing for Flag Day as the other schools in the community posted photos of school performances as well.

Cowboy cookies -- oatmeal, chocolate chips, dried cranberries, coconut, walnuts!!!

Students ready to perform

Traditional dancers with red scarves

Meriton playing the guitar

Watching the performance with the other teachers and students

Photos afterward

Wednesday also included a Peace Corps site visit with my project manager, Hyzri. Site visits are a chance for the project manager to check in and see how classes are going. The visit went well. In the evening, staff from the school met up at a restaurant for dinner to celebrate Flag Day and that was a fun evening. We went to Moni and I found out that one of the owners of the restaurant, used to live in Wisconsin and he owns the car with the Wisconsin plates.

Thursday, we celebrated Thanksgiving with Thom's counterparts at Camp Bondsteel in Ferizaj. This was a traditional Thanksgiving meal with all the trimmings and then some. It requires a special invite and Valon (who works at Bondsteel) invited us to join him as his guests (with Sami and his wife). The "Chow Hall" as it is called was decorated for Thanksgiving and there were lots of civilian people along with the military personnel enjoying traditional American food. We saw four members of Peace Corps staff in the Chow hall. Bondsteel was a little piece of the USA located in Kosovo.

Access badge to Bondsteel Thanksgiving

Decorations in the Chow Hall

The seating area in the mess hall

More holiday decorations

Subway and Burger King at Bondsteel

The outdoor stage

The recreational area

And a real US postal box next to the PX on base

"Black Friday" is a thing in Kosovo as well and Friday after I got done with classes, I headed to Ferizaj for language lessons. After that, we headed on to Prishtina for the night. On Saturday, our country director was having another Thanksgiving dinner for us at her home in Prishtina.

Believe it or not, it is beginning to look a lot like Christmas. Although the majority of the population does not celebrate Christmas, they do celebrate New Year's with lots of glitzy, gold holiday lights, New Year's trees (Christmas trees), and a holiday market. We stayed close to the city center and they were setting up the small wooden booths for the holiday market. The decorations included a really large Santa Claus and other holiday decorations. It also turned cold on Friday and it snowed a bit as well.

Mother Teresa Cathedral back right, booths and lights

Super-sized Santa

City center

Flags for Flag Day and holiday decorations

On Saturday morning, we took a long walk before check-out time at our hostel and then we headed to the Newborn Cafe. This a volunteer hang-out and we enjoyed listening to their Christmas music playlist while sitting beside a nicely decorated live Christmas tree. So it is beginning to look a lot like Christmas. A group of volunteers joined us at the Newborn for a bit, before we headed to Carolyne (our country director) for an afternoon of eating. Carolyne lives in a home that Peace Corps country directors with her husband, Ben, and her daughter. She will be leaving us in January to become the country director in Vietnam.

Newborn Cafe and the Christmas tree

Carolyne asked us all to send her a wish list of foods and she had a chef that prepared the food. For me, she did a rice-stuffed pumpkin and the pumpkin came from Ben's garden. There was an amazing cabbage slaw, salad, vegetables, and cranberry sauce for me. There was turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, sweet potatoes, green bean casserole, cornbread, and plenty of Kosovo wines. It was a wonderful and relaxing afternoon spent with our Peace Corps family around a super-long Thanksgiving table.