Our long weekend in Macedonia - The weekend before Christmas we spent 3 days in Skopje, Macedonia, the capital city of the small landlocked country just south of Kosovo.  Macedonia was part of the former Yugoslavia, from which it declared independence in 1991.  The country has a population of about 2 million and Skopje is home to about half a million of them.  From Prizren it was an easy 3 hour bus ride that cost only 15 euros for a round trip.

We stayed at a cute little hotel on the edge of downtown Skopje, and being a bit hungry after the bus ride we took a short walk and discovered the first McDonalds we've seen since leaving the US.  So lunch consisted of Big Macs, fries and cokes, all of which cost about 800 denars.  Luckily, a Macedonian denar is worth just a little more than 2 cents American, but our $16.00 burger meal made us start to miss the 1.5 euro burgers in Kosovo.

This is the McDonalds we discovered in Skopje, and note the big Coke billboard with Santa.  Macedonia is predominantly Orthodox Christian, with only about 25% Muslim, so Christmas is a big event there, but the main celebration takes place on January 6th, not Dec. 25th.  After a bit of wandering we made our way back to Hotel Kapistec, cleaned up and headed into downtown to find the Opera House, since we had noticed on the internet that the Macedonian Opera was performing Bizet's Carmen that evening.  So we enjoyed a good evening at the Opera followed by a nightcap at one of the many coffee shops on the big Alexander the Great plaza, shown in the photo below.

Saturday morning started with a great breakfast at the hotel and a brisk walk to the new City Mall a few kilometers away.  It looked like any fancy shopping mall in the US and the prices were out of my range, but didn't deter Annette from dropping most of our denar stash on what must be some very good lipstick.  As with any shopping mall at Christmas time, Santa was in the building.

After the mall a quick cab ride took us to the Mother Theresa Memorial in downtown Skopje.  Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu was born in Skopje in a house that was destroyed by a major earthquake in 1963.  Her parents were ethnic Albanians and Catholic, and her father was originally from Prizren.  A memorial chapel and museum was built to celebrate the life of Mother Theresa, and we were lucky to have a long conversation with Zhaklina, the curator of the memorial.  Annette was happy to discover that Mother Theresa's original middle name, Gonxha, means "rosebud" in Albanian and that she had a life-long devotion to St. Therese of Lisieux.  We also discovered that the Bishop of Skopje had a strong influence on her when she was growing up, and that he was originally from Novo Mesto, Slovenia, where Annette's grandmother was born.

 Statue of Mother Theresa and the memorial chapel and museum.

The rest of the day was spent roaming around Skopje.  It is an interesting place, going back to the Thracian people of antiquity, followed by one conqueror after another as has been the case in most of the Balkans.  Alexander the Great was born in nearby Greek Macedonia and ruled his empire around 350 BC.  The big plaza area of downtown Skopje has a HUGE statue of Alexander, as well as statues of nearly every other important figure in Macedonian history.  Many new government buildings are being built around the plaza, with massive columns and classic architecture, which combined with all the statues gives the downtown area sort of a Vegas vibe.  It reminded us of being in Caesar's Palace but on a grander scale and with a big river running through it.  But, all in all we had a fun little trip and were glad we went.  It was a little strange with all the signs using a cyrillic alphabet.  Our last night there we were walking back to the hotel and decided that a pizza would make a good late night meal on a cold and blustery night, but we realized we had no idea what a pizza joint's sign would look like.  In fact, the whole time we were there we hardly could tell what was a restaurant based solely on the signs.  But, with a little help from locals we did get a pizza, although the only thing on the sign that gave it away was a cartoon of a little guy making a pizza (and of course the nice aroma coming from the door).  I had to laugh at myself when we got back into Kosovo on the bus Sunday night, because I was thinking "I'm so glad to be back where I can actually read the signs again."  Of course, all the signs here are in Albanian, which I still can't read, but at least I know the letters, unlike the cyrillic Macedonian signage.  I'm just going to post a few more photos below to give everyone a feel for "Vegas on the Vardar".

The Alexander the Great statue in the plaza.

Zoomed in view of the Kale, the 6th century Byzantine fortress in Skopje.

The 15th century Ottoman "Old Stone Bridge" across the Vardar River, with the under-construction Supreme Court Building in the background

A new bridge with a whole flock of statues, and a new government building across the river with even more statues on top.

Lots of Christmas lights and decorations in the plaza.