This is the journal from my 2000 VIM trip to Kosovo.

Sunday, June 25, 2000   Day 1

The adventure begins. Right after getting off my flight to Dallas I checked to see what gate the Wichita flight was coming in. Five team members were coming from there and one was to meet us here in Dallas (but I can’t remember if it’s Dana or Barbara). The American gate agent checked and said that flight was delayed – no cancelled – and the people in my group would be on a flight arriving 5 minutes before the London flight departs at 3:30 pm! But they were rerouted to London to arrive two hours later at 8:30 am. Plenty of time for us to meet up in London for the scheduled flight to Skopje.  London is a 5-6 hour lay over for my flight!

 When I checked into British Airways in Dallas, they had a message telling me the same thing. But they cannot find Dana’s or Barbara’s name on the London flight!  Nothing to do but go ahead. While waiting at the gate before boarding the London flight, I spotted Barbara in her green T-shirt. We introduced each other. She had not received the message that the others would be on a different flight. She arrived and checked in before the message came. Barbara works for Intel. Every 7 years employees get an 8 week sabbatical.

 Monday, June 26, Day 2

While in the international departure waiting area, I spoke with a guy next to me with another church work team. There are 21 from an Evangelical Church in Lancaster County, Penn. They were going to Romania to work and help at an orphanage their church supports. He was in a wheelchair, but I later saw him “walking” with difficulty.

 Barbara and I saw the Wichita group come through the waiting area door at 9:30 am. I didn’t know anyone and she only knew her Mother, but we recognized the green shirts.

 When boarding the flight to Skopje, the “Wichita 5” had to board last. It appears that when their Dallas-London flight was rescheduled, they were cancelled from this flight. Luckily, seats were available and they made it. Landing here is like landing in Sarajevo: a long, low, serpentine approach. Light rain in Skopje.

 While waiting for Macedonia to process passports (really cool visa stamps!) we realized that only Barbara’s and my luggage arrived. All the other’s luggage was held at London because they were not booked on that Skopje flight. 20/20 hindsight was saying they should have checked the luggage claim in London, but too late and oh well now!  WHAT ELSE CAN GO WRONG!!

 Jimmy and Enver, with two UMCOR vehicles, are waiting for us at the airport. There is a long wait to get through the border into Kosovo. Almost immediately after we are in Kosovo, there is a KFOR checkpoint. It’s a traffic stop to let cars coming south on a one lane road clear before we can go. While we sit there, a 10 year old (?) boy walks beside the car trying to sell a carton of Malboros. A lot of military personnel and equipment from different nationalities is everywhere. While driving along the road, there is a man leading a donkey carrying square bales of hay. The first of many juxtapositions seen during the next week. The border area was mountainous, but once we got in country a ways, it was pretty flat and unremarkable. Reminded me of western Kansas with an occasion large hill jutting up.

 We stayed at an UMCOR/VIM apartment in Pristina that night. This is where Jimmy normally “lives”. Judy was there and will be with us for a couple of days. It turns out she is from Lenexa! She is based out of Armenia where her husband works for UMCOR, too. Dinner is salad, rolls, fruit, and pizza. Got to bed around midnight.

 Tuesday, June 27    Day 3

Awake at 6:30 am.  One bathroom for 10 people. We don’t realize yet how lucky we are!  The house is actually a big residence that the family has “rented” our floor to UMCOR. It’s a challenge for those with only carry-on bags. Some towels were borrowed from the family upstairs for using at Bare. We had a slightly late start because one of the UMCOR cars had a flat tire at the office. Outside of Pristina we passed the oil storage and army barracks bombed by NATO. The oil tanks are now just a mass of twisted, rusting metal.

 I rode with Enver and Judy and both were loads of information. Romas are gypsies. Along the roadside there are occasionally small cemeteries, some with a photo memorial of someone or a KLA flag – a shrine to lost soldiers. A horse drawn cart carries a load of small logs. The main highway (one lane each direction) is “beat up” quite a bit from all the armored traffic. We pass a United Arab Emeritus (KFOR) checkpoint. Most checkpoints wave humanitarian vehicles through.

 We pass the Battle of Kosovo where the Turks defeated Balkan troops over 600 years ago. It was here 11 years ago, in 1989, where Milosevic gave a big patriotic speech to 1 million people. Serbian “history” tells that this was a big Serbian battle, when in fact there were other Balkan troops from Hungaria, Kosovo, Bosnia, etc. The Balkans lost and the leaders from both sides were killed. After this 1989 speech, there began a systematic ratcheting down of Kosovar rights. Only the Serbian language was allowed in Universities, not Albanian. Over several years it extended down into high schools, then grade schools. The result was Albanian schools went underground with home schooling. The teachers were unpaid with an occasion cash gift collected from parents. Then professionals, like doctors, dentists, and lawyers, were told they could no longer ply their trades.  All of this escalated over years where eventually Albanian radicals carried out attacks on Serbs. This was Milosevic’s excuse for military oppression and finally the expulsion of Albanian population (i.e., ethnic cleansing) in 1999 resulting in NATO intervention.

 The Serbian police came to Enver’s apartment and gave him 10 minutes to collect his things and leave with his 2 small kids and pregnant wife. This was at a time when they weren’t letting any more people into Macedonia. They spent 5 days living in the car near the Macedonian border then went back to Pristina. Later, Serbs came again and told him to leave.  Somehow Enver convinced them to give him two days. They agreed, but said if he were still there after two days they would kill him. Fortunately (since he did not leave), they did not come back. Very risky business! Enver had been an Economist in a bank before the war. The bank was destroyed when the Post Office next door was bombed. Only in the last two weeks has mail service started again in Pristina. It has not started for most of Kosovo.

 We skirt Mitrovica and take the road toward the village of Bare. We are only 45 kilometers (28 miles) from Serbia. Mitrovica is a divided city and is still very much in the news. North of the river is a sizable Serbian population and south is Albanian. There have been clashes at “the bridge” and it is now heavily guarded by French KFOR troops. Last week in north Mitrovica, 7 vehicles belonging to humanitarian aid agencies were burned. Most agencies are just pulling out from that side of the river. UMCOR has not yet and they have not had any vehicles burned. We take that as a good sign that they believe UMCOR is doing good things (or it might just be LUCK). But even UMCOR vehicles would be searched going into north Mitrovica.

 French KFOR checkpoint waved us through. It’s a 20 minute drive from Mitrovica to Bare on a very bumpy, windy, hilly road. I was riding in the back of the Land Cruiser and by the time we got to Bare, my head was spinning.  We met the Village leaders at the now unused leather factory, saw the school building that we would call home for the next week, the clinic (where the bathroom and shower were), and the two houses where we would be building roofs. Reg is the “headsman” or Mayor of the village.

 Part of UMCOR’s relief program is “Roofs, Windows, and Doors”. It provides materials for a roof, two doors, and 2 windows. The goal is to rebuild a minimally livable house for those that were damaged. We would hardly call it livable, but it would be as good, if not better, than living in a tent.  Many houses had already been repaired. The villagers selected these two houses for us volunteers to help with. The deal was that there would be an equal number of villagers volunteering and working with us.

 The smaller site (#64 – the houses were numbered for identification) was a modest one story house. The site was cluttered. A partially burned wood floor still remained in one of the rooms. Two sons (I assume adults) from this household were killed during the war. The bigger of the two houses (#130) was owned by an old man and his son. Part of it was two stories tall. They had no money. There were three families living in the adjacent house which was undamaged. Two other partial buildings – damaged – were on the property. One was being used as a barn with a blue tarp for a roof.

 It was late morning by the time we started working on the big house. The old man that owns this house is 72 years old and has arthritic knees. He walks gingerly, bends over and holds his knees, moans and groans. He’ll sit down for 5-10 minutes then have to get up and move. He’s obviously in a lot of pain. He tried to walk up the ramp to the roof and I stopped him. “Yeo, yeo” (No, no) says I (one of the handful of Albanian words we know!). He “told” me, via hand motions (and Albanian that I did not understand), that the house was shelled from one of the nearby hills.

 Time was spent “storming and norming” deciding on what to do, how to do it, reading the blue prints (that were not really used). There is little expertise, but plenty of willing workers. The one son brought a man called a “Master”. These are the skilled building “foremen”, but they actually end up doing most of the work.  The local villagers won’t start work until a Master arrives.

 We started by cleaning off the tops of the barren walls and place 1 x 6 planks on top. Then we place large 5x6 beams on top of those to form the exterior perimeter. None of this is anchored to the wall. The weight of the roof holds it on the house!  A ramp is made with 3 beams nailed together and placed from  the back side hill to the top of the wall. This is a great help for getting man and material up on top.

 It seems like the old Master is doing most of the work. I helped him by hammering spikes and sawing cuts with him. He shouldn’t have to do ALL the work. There are only three tools needed to build a roof. A “hatchet” (with a horizontal blade which doubles as a hammer), a bow saw, and a chain saw. And two sizes of nails, 20 cm spike and 10 cm nail.  That’s it!  The saw and hatchet are used to create notches for the cross beams to fit. We got all the cross beams in place during the partial afternoon. Lunch was around 2:30, but we find this is normal. We were getting pretty hungry! Then we had some more orientation with Angela. I remembered her from Sarajevo two years earlier and we chatted about it.

 We had “flia” (pronounced flee – a) for lunch. It takes hours to make and is very good. We saw her making it while we worked. In a very large round pan, a thin layer of “something” is put down. Followed by spooning in strips of a mixture of flour, milk, and oil. A heavy iron lid is heating over an open fire during this time. The lid is placed on top of the pan and it bakes for a while. Put the lid back over the fire and repeat. A layer of stuff, a layer of strips, then baked. It takes hours to end up with a 1.5 inch deep dish. You eat it with your fingers and it tastes great. We have it once again before the week is over.

The “outhouses” at both sites are primitive. They are “well ventilated”, a tile roof, just a hole in the floor (no seat), and it just sits on the ground – no pit.

 Many villagers are hard at work. They are hard workers and not afraid of heights. I help but am nervous walking on the beams two stories up with nothing to hang on to! When we stop for the day, we have 99% of the cross beams done. No one can believe we got so much done. We stopped at 8:00 for dinner. Chicken and rice. TASTE GREAT! A bumpy ride back to the school. This section of road puts a roller coaster ride to shame! Shortly after we get back, the electricity goes out.  No one has showered and the water heater won’t work without power. We drive from the clinic back down to the school for devotions. Later, the electricity comes back on.  Whew – a long and busy day.

 Wednesday, June 28     Day 4

Didn’t sleep great, just OK. The shower was just a DRIBBLE!! Judy told us a story when she and another UMCOR person stayed at the Grand Hotel in Pristina either during the fighting or just after. No water, no electricity, 14^th floor (walking up stairs), at $200 per night. A FOX news crew put them up for the night to interview them. The news crew had a Serbian translator. They had been in Serbia and now they were doing the Kosovar angle. The translator was talking informally to Judy about reports of Serbians raping Albanian women. He said something like “Albanian women have sex with the husbands brothers, fathers. They deserve to be raped.” Pretty blatant talk to an American woman he had just met. (How accurate of a translation do you think he did when interviewing Albanian refugees?) This is the same type of attitude IRAQIs had.  Hundreds of water wells in Kosova had to be decontaminated by pumping all the water out and treating the well. This is because bodies were thrown down the wells. In some cases, women were raped, their heads cut off, then thrown down a well.

 A new master is on site today. Too bad – I liked the other one better.  Today the difficult overhang above the porch and rafters are done. The chain saw work begins. A sculpted edge in placed of the beams that will overhang the front.

 Three of us go with Jimmy into Mitrovica for supplies. There are troops and military equipment everywhere. This is the French sector, but we see troops from other countries like Poland, UAE (United Arab Emerits), Norway. There is much activity. A lot of hustle and bustle of people and cars. There are sand bagged outposts on top of prominent buildings. You can hear the chanting from a nearby mosque. Someone spots us as Americans and says “Madeline Albright is good for Kosova.”

 One of the things we are on a quest for is breakfast cereal. Judy says Russian corn flakes are pretty good. We can’t find the Albanian word for cereal or anything close to it in Jimmy’s dictionary. We look in several stores in the market attempting to communicate what we want, but no luck. We look on the shelves ourselves, but no one has cereal! At one booth worked by several young men, the “conversation” was quite comical. One guy indicated “wait”, ran off, and came back with a big box of candy thinking that is what we wanted.

 Back at the “ranch”, the net result of today’s work was building the rafter support box and cutting the rafters. The team didn’t physically do much of the work today – the villagers did. Work waited until the Master got there. We hardly started until before noon, but worked until 8:30 pm. Lunch, again, was around 2:30. We cooked a meal at the school since it was so late. It wasn’t bad considering the hodge-podge of canned food we had to work with.

 Thursday, June 29       Day 5

We’re waiting for Enver to come back with a Master. Games are played with the kids like hokey-pokey (an international favorite) and a version of Button-Button-Whose-Got-the-Button. We finally get working around noon. It’s overcast, but that’s good. The first day or two I got sun burned. I wear my heavy long-sleeved shirt just to keep the sun off my arms and neck (a lesson learned for Mexico), but it’s not needed with the clouds. No rain, but it’s humid. We’re making very good progress placing the cross beams. Everyone is working today.

 The big house is the priority of the two because they have no money and there are three families with kids living in one house.  Spinach pita roll for a late lunch and tea. It is traditional to have tea, several cups of it, after meals. It is served in a small 2-3 ounce glass on a metal saucer about 3 inch in diameter. And a little tiny spoon. Two kettles are use. Very strong tea is poured from the small one – about a third of the glass. Regular hot water is poured from the large pot to top it off. And a regular spoonful of sugar makes SWEET and HOT and STRONG tea. I normally have two glasses. The villagers normally have at least three. We finish lunch and back to work at 4:00.

 I almost fell off the roof today. I was reaching to slide down a plank and stepped into thin air. That leg went down, but there was other wood around to catch myself. My shin was skinned and my shoulder was jammed up. It was several weeks before my shoulder discomfort totally went away.

 It started sprinkling a little. All the rafters were cut, nailed in placed, and the chain saw used to splice the top of the rafters. Very dangerous work for the Master. He’s standing on the support box for the rafters, about 2 ½ story up, cut through the rafter peaks with a chain saw!!!   It’s too wet and dark to work anymore so we all go inside the house and wait for dinner. Shoes come off before we enter the house.

 Mary is brought a cup of Turkish coffee. We assume more will be coming for the rest of us, but only Mary gets one. It’s a sign of respect for the “old wise one” (age 80!). Dinner is after dark and it’s by candlelight since the electricity is still out. Chicken and rice again – but it’s always very good. The women (as with the entire trip) do the vast majority of the food preparation and serving.  At one point there are 7 villagers in the room smoking. Non-smokers are the exception in this part of the world. 

 We are told that the families who were feeding us struggled with being provided food for them to fix for us. VIM (actually the team is paying for it) provided food. There would be so many people to cook for! At first, we find it hard to understand why they would feel that way. But then someone said “How would you feel if you had a group of people to help you work at your house and they brought you food to cook for them?” We had a great time socializing (by candlelight). Reg (the village Mayor) is very mild mannered and friendly. He would be elected Mayor in a U.S. town. There were more people at the site today. The old man’s wife is here, too. His name a Shahin.

 It is raining lightly when we leave. As always from this site, a roller coaster ride back to the school.

 Friday, June 30     Day 6

Up at 7:30. The shower has better pressure. Still no electricity since yesterday (and no hot water). Local kids are looking in the school window where we are eating breakfast. They have their noses pressed up to the glass with their hands cupped around their eyes. I put on a clown nose and mimic their actions and they get a big kick out of it. We Americans are certainly a curiosity for these kids. As we struggle to learn a handful of Albanian phrases, it’s helpful to have a word association. Wendy’s hint for “falleminderit” (thank you) is “follow my daddy”.  Sort of close, but it does help in remembering the word!

 We go to work at the small house for the first time today and get “lost” on the way there. We see a small car pulling a bundle of rebar behind it to transport it from one place to another!  We get to the site at 10:30. They already have the headers and crossbeams up. Right when we get there they stop work for us to eat! This is really early for lunch. It’s been about 2:30. Later we realized this meal was breakfast!

 It’s very pleasant weather to be working – partly cloudy. This Master understands that we want to do the work and he accommodates better than the others. He’s a character and we nicknamed him Popeye. The owner/son of this property is named Byrum. After lunch, the work slows down for team members while the Master and others do specific work on the “front porch” section of the roof. It some like a Tower of Babel this afternoon for some reason.

 In the meantime, there was a celebration in Bare next to “our” school. It’s a dedication of a KLA (UCK) monument to 34 men from the local area who died in the fighting. Also, in a couple of days (July 3) it is the one year anniversary of the end of the fighting. It’s sort of a 1^st anniversary of their “July 4”. Enver and Jimmy are caught in the traffic and are off site. Skender, Enver’s brother and our alternate translator, and Dana are down in the village. Dana told us later that there were speeches and kids performing music. At the end we could hear guns and automatic weapons being shot in the air. I hope they’re not pointing in our direction! Jimmy said KFOR searched everybody – vehicles and a body search. Even he (i.e., UMCOR) got searched twice. Many former members of the KLA are now members of TMK (Kosovo police).

 There were lots of kids around today: playing games with the team, blowing bubbles we had brought, Dana was a popular one. She’s been the “Pied Piper”.  A neighbor woman, about 70-75 years old, came out and asked Mary if she cared for coffee or tea. Mary graciously declined. Then the woman honored her by bringing out a blanket where they both sat with Barbara and her son who translated. For the rest of the trip we kid Mary about being the old, wise, honored one. The son had been stacking hay onto a hale stack. The hay is stacked around a long pole which keeps it from sliding off. The hay is very sweet smelling. It’s cut with a scythe and raked with a wooden rake. Sometimes it is on the very steep hillsides so raking downhill is easy.

 Today was also the last day of school for 115 students.  There are two school buildings. The team is staying in one that is not currently being used for classes. Both schools were destroyed and mined during the war, but rebuilt over the winter. The floor tiles in our building are in terrible shape. They were laid when it was wet and cold. Most tiles are not properly fastened.

 They showed us their grade cards which had grades for all previous years too. In attempting to communicate and interact with them we pulled out the 2 page “cheat sheet” of English to Albanian translations – common everyday phrases. Some of them eagerly pronounced the English words and did well.  What was surprising was some phonetically pronounced the Albanian words as if they could not easily read them. This seemed odd until I remembered that much of the Albanian education was done in homes, not schools. They may not have had many “Albanish” classes even though they speak it.

 This afternoon we got the porch and trim parts done, and two rafters. We go back to school early, 6:30pm. We eat dinner at school. Still no electricity. The two (or three?) burner camp stove we have runs on propane gas. It does a pretty good job. The ladies have used it to heat water to wash hair in the sink, since the clinic has no hot water. We have a nice time around the table with the candles. As part of Dana’s devotions, we tell the reasons why we came on the trip.

 Saturday, July 1, Day 7

Radio call signs: Jimmy – Papa Alpha Yankee 74. Enver - Papa Alpha Yankee 72.

The small house already has the roof frame done when we get there. There’s a good crew working today. The Master reminds me of Lyle Robards (but more agile walking the roof beams).  He shouted orders, directing work, mostly toothless. He always has that black beret and NIKE sweatshirt. This guy has a personality. The second one at the other house (with a plis(?) – white hat) has no personality, however, he shows up at this house in the afternoon to help. Things go twice as fast! Watermelon break the last two days! The family at the small house is more organized and hospitable.

 The meals here are cooked next to the house in a shed that is the kitchen. It has a dirt floor with a wood burning – one burner stove. Water is drawn from a well with a rope and bucket.

 Even more kids today playing hokey pokey, red rover, bunny hop, hand games. Enver comes with his wife and three kids. Since he’s working on Saturday he can bring them, but normally not.  She is an Albanish teacher. They live in a 1 room apartment. He has another apartment, but it still has no electricity or water. His little 9 month old was born after the war.

 A miracle – we start tiling! I was exhausted lifting hundreds of tile on the roof to stack them in the “attic”. We stop work at 7:00 pm to eat. I’m so tired I don’t feel well and can hardly eat anything.  The villagers keep working, but “Popeye” (the Master) eats with us. Back at the ranch, a cold shower and candles around the table again. It was good when the team was playing with the kids today.

 Sunday, July 2, Day 8

Did not sleep well – too exhausted. Sites and sounds for early morning: wake up to cow bell and roster, Papa Alpha Yankee 74…, “A gaggle of geese going up the hill” (actually the women making a bathroom run to the clinic). Mary did today’s devotion as a form of church service. We sat on a circular concrete bench in the school yard. While looking down, I saw a spent shell casing shot during yesterday’s celebration. So like every other Sunday, I picked up a bullet from under the pew!

 Today is the last day for working so we want to get as much done as possible. At the small house, the furring strips are all up, but no more tiles since yesterday. Crews get handing, passing, stacking, and placing tiles. It’s great and goes fast. We put all the tiles on, but there are not enough. It will need to be finished after we leave. We eat lunch, say “dita amir”, go to school for a short meeting, then to the other house for furring strips and tiles.

 While we were at the School, in the course of conversation Judy shares some information. Some house burnings still occur. When Muslims die they are supposed to be buried by that night, or if it’s late in the day buried the next day. The bodies are cleaned first as part of the rituals. The bodies thrown down wells was a terrible emotional hardship on the families. Not only did they lose a loved one, but they were not buried in a timely manner, and the body cleansing would be terrible. When someone dies, the family places a chair in front of the house with a towel over it. We noticed that we have towels placed over a chair drying out in front of the school. People must wonder which of us died! In Pristina on the last day, I saw a chair with a towel on it near the ACT/UMCOR office. When UMCOR needed Macedonian drivers shortly after the war, they could hardly get them for $100 day. They were afraid they would be killed.  Weddings take 6 days.

 There are 5 Masters at the big house this afternoon!!!!! Unbelievable!!!  A long chain of people helps to move tiles up to the roof for storage and placement. The roof is so big that progress seems slow, but it is actually fast. Even the old man helps pass tiles for a while. He seems very happy to be helping. Later I heard that Wendy had left some pain reliever for him. Maybe he was pain free enough to perform some work. It must also have helped his self esteem to be help those rebuilding his house instead of sitting on the sidelines. I sat on the outside of the roof slats passing tiles to Jimmy. We want to keep working as long as daylight will allow us because this is our last day.

 After the last meal (flia and chicken) at this location there was gift giving. Reg got a Navajo rug. He said it will go on his village office wall. One master got a square, another a swiss knife, and a third a nail apron. The wife who had done so much work gave the women four doilies and gifts were given to her and the children. The cute little girl sang a couple of patriotic songs. We couldn’t understand, but I heard UCK (oo – cha – ka).   We sing “Home on the Range”. When the local men understood we want them to sing, they think it’s very funny. The electricity is now on so we should have hot showers! Got out of the shower at 10:00 pm. A long team meeting then to bed at midnight.

 Monday, July 3,  Day 9

Up at 6:00, pack up, clean up, team pictures, then start our way to the Skopje airport. Still learning things. When the Serbs were in the area, Mothers would take their children into the hills. We go to the Mitrovica market for an hour or so of souvenir shopping. Today is July 3, a new Kosova holiday – the one year anniversary from the fighting.

 Since this is a travel day, we are wearing our bright green “KOSOVO” T-shirts. Unfortunately, we are on the “KOSOVA” side of Mitrovica. We get odd looks from people and Enver is asked by about 5 people what we are doing with “KOSOVO” shirts on. (Kosovo is the Serbian name, Kosova is the Albanian name.) We agree that we are politically incorrect, but internationally recognized.

 Making our way to Pristina we stop at a Muslim shrine of some sort. It marks the spot where the Balkan leader from the Battle of Kosovo died over 600 years ago. A family was there with three boys going through their ritual to manhood. A very large tree, maybe 500-600 years old, was there.

 A short distance from here was the Battle of Kosovo site. There is a modern monument marking the location. There use to be a restaurant and other facilities nearby, but they were all destroyed. Since the monument is now a Serbian symbol it is guarded by KFOR troops from Norway (they speak excellent English). The original battle was fought in 1389 and 40,000 Balkans were defeated by 100,000 Turks. This led to the Muslim influence in the region. The monument was dedicated 1989 on the 600 year anniversary. Milosevic gave a speech to one million people. This is when the oppression of the ethnic Albanians in Kosovo started.

 As we drove into Pristina there are very long lines of cars and people waiting to get vehicle registrations. It might take an entire day to get registered. This is right next to the wrecked oil storage that was bombed by NATO. We eat pizza under large umbrellas at a restaurant  in Pristina and chuckle over the background music – Kenny G playing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”.  I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore! It’s hot – hot – hot. Enver estimates it is 15 degrees hotter since coming down from the mountains. It must be 90 degrees (and no AC).

 During the drive, Enver tells us peoples teeth are bad because Albanian dentists were driven out. He says dentists are worse now because they always want to be paid for their work.

 As we get close to the Macedonia border, commercial trucks are backed up and stopped for probably a mile or two.  KFOR controls the traffic in the other lane so cars can get through (one way at a time). It takes a while to get through the border and we stand on the hot pavement baking.

 The Skopje airport parking lot is a madhouse!! One way traffic and the van in front of us is going the wrong way. He’s a bad driver and has to back up between cars to get out of our way. Jimmy’s vehicle gets blocked in by parked cars with no drivers in sight. To get the luggage quickly, I climbed on top of the vehicle to untie and hand down the heavy suitcases. Inside, two young men stop and ask if we have any extra green T-shirts (we don’t). It’s interesting to note the huge, wall sized advertisements for Marlboro Country (cowboys and horses). We wait and wait. The plane was late coming in, so it will be late going out. Wendy said it looks like they are taking luggage OFF the plane. Not a good sign. It’s HOT in the airport. If there is AC, you can’t tell it.

 I’m out of my personal water and start getting dehydrated by the time we board. At first, the pilot says the plane is heavy and we’ll have to stop in Frankfurt for fuel. They end up topping off in Skopje and we make it to London. The AC on the plane feels GREAT! A hot bath in a real bathroom feels GREAT too. In bed at midnight.

 Addendum:

An email from Jimmy, July 14

“Hi everyone. Enver and I had a meeting with Reg yesterday. Remember him? He is the village leader in Bare. We were there to ask him if the villagers and families were happy with the Wichita team. He instantly went into a little speech on how much he appreciated the team coming to Bare. He wanted to make sure that I relayed to all of you how happy he was that you came. The villagers were rather amazed at you all. Especially Mary! I think they are going to erect a statue!!! He wanted to make sure you all knew how the village as a whole felt. They send you all a big “THANK YOU” – sung by the early morning birds and late night dogs.”

 Several weeks after our return, I saw a news article that KFOR troops had shut down the smeltering factory south of Mitrovica. It was 8 miles from Bare. We had gone past there a couple of times. It was closed because it was putting out 200 times the amount of safe Lead!