Harvest Time

Today marks two important events in Macedonia.  First, for the Muslim community, today is a holiday called Bajram.  I, however, am in a small town in the East that is predominantly Macedonian (Christian), so we are not partaking in the celebration.  But my fellow volunteers in Romanovce are celebrating with platters of baklava and slaughtering of lambs (to commemorate when Abraham slaughtered a lamb versus his only son). Second, today marks my first full month in Macedonia!  It is already starting to feel like home, so today is a momentous milestone for me.

Luckily, Macedonia has experienced LOVELY weather for the past week.  I assume it is similar to our Injun summer, and the high yesterday topped 80 degrees F.  However, a storm loom is looming and is expected to bring cold weather starting tomorrow evening.  Therefore, I expect cold weather similar to what we experienced over a week ago.  The cold snap that came before basically destroyed many of the crops which were still in the fields.  Very few people in Lozovo have worked in the fields as frequently as before the cold snap hit.  In our garden, many of the peppers and beans were ruined and my family ended up discarding many of the vegetables.  The tobacco is still standing in the fields, but my family hardly works it anymore.  I am not sure if they are waiting for the plants to grow larger leaves, or if they have given up on the tobacco for the rest of the year. 

My family has a house on the main road, and even though we live in a small village, the amount of land devoted to fields behind the house is limited.  However, my family has taken advantage of their land as much as possible.     Besides the tobacco fields, they planted in their garden carrots, many peppers and beans, leeks, cabbage, squash, a few grapes, and they even have a lime and apple tree.  My host mother pickles or cooks with many of these fresh vegetables, and thus her homemade meals are even more delicious and fresh! 

Besides pickling the basic vegetables (peppers, cabbage, cucumbers, carrots), my host family also prepared and jarred their pepper+eggplant pastes.  Depending on the preparation and cooking process, these “condiments” are created to make ajvar or malijon.  Ajvar is prepared over two days, and according to my host family, homemade ajvar is both expensive and time-consuming.  My host mother has waited weeks for the price of peppers to drop, but eventually she swallowed the steep prices and purchased about 30 kilograms of peppers.  First, the peppers and eggplants are roasted over a metal stove.  After the skins are blistered, the family removes the skins by hand and piles them into a bucket.  The peppers and eggplants are then grinded in a machine and stored overnight.  The next day, the grinded concoction is cooked in a large vat and stirred for hours.  Once cooled slightly, the ajvar is then jarred and stored for the year.

Turshiya (pickled food for the winter)

Carrots, peppers, and leeks

My favorite!  Spicy peppers!

Throughout the cooking process of ajvar, the vegetables lose all nutritional value.  Nevertheless (or more likely, therefore) ajvar is absolutely delicious!  I have no way to describe its taste.  It is less sour than ketchup, thicker than tomato sauce, and only slightly sweet.  But I can literally eat ajvar out of a jar and be happy.  It goes well with most foods, but most people eat it on toast with cirenje (feta-like cheese). 

Making ajvar is messy

This past weekend, a large group of older women gathered at our house to help my host mother make banitsa.  Banitsa is a pie-like dish that has a flaky, oily dough and fried vegetables (usually cabbage or leeks) in the middle of the pie.  The women kneaded their dough and rolled them into many thin layers.  The layers of dough were then dried in the sun and stacked and baked with the fried vegetables in an oven. 

The banitsa crew

With the finished product

While the women prepared the banitsa, my host father and I chopped and stored wood for the winter.  Most families in Lozovo (and maybe throughout Macedonia) use wood stoves to heat a room of their house.  Therefore, they must purchase wood, or illegally chop their own from the forest.  My host father already purchased his wood for the summer, but they needed to be chopped from small stumps into manageable pieces.  He did most of the chopping while I piled them in a neat stack near the house.  Let’s say that my Tetris skills were finally put to good use.  My host father let me try chopping wood, which was just as difficult as it seemed.  With some practice, I was able to bifurcate a stump with one swing, but I think I still need some practice to be a master.

Winter is coming

As for the tobacco, my host family already has many kilograms of threaded tobacco hanging and drying throughout the property.  They threaded most of this tobacco by machine, and this seems to be the easiest part of a long and arduous process.  After the tobacco is picked and threaded, the work is far from over.  The tobacco is hung and dried, and then later in the winter it is boxed to be sold in March.  After all of the tobacco is picked, the farmers must till the soil to prepare for the next year’s crop.  Overall, the tobacco is planted, harvest, and sold between May and March.  Lots of work.

My family does not own any domestic animals, but the next door neighbors own pigs and rabbits, which they occasionally eat or sell. Chickens also wander aimlessly near the house.  My family’s vineyard of grapes is very small, but our next door neighbor has a large vineyard which they use to make homemade wine and rakija (brandy).  This Sunday, Goran (the neighbor) has invited us to watch the rakija-making process.  Since each family chooses which crops they plan to harvest, each relies on the other to sell or gift homemade goods, like wine or ajvar.

Finally, this Thursday the volunteers in Lozovo discover where each of us will live for the next two years!  To put it mildly, we are all excited.