fiddlededee

[fiddlededee]

Day 13, May 25, Friday

Our last day — half day actually. The work at the Electric house was finished yesterday and the family needs only to paint the walls. At the Farmhouse, we finish the ceiling in both the main room and the adjoining hall way. There is cement and glass block where a salvaged old door used to block the wind, the walls are fully prepped for a final finish, and the windows are ready to be rehung. Igor and his family are paying for part of this remodel and will finish things off from here. At Mira’s house they are closing up the inside plumbing and finishing up the drainage. I hear later that after they fill in the French drain with soil covering the stone layer, Mira insists the dirt be removed. To us this seems nonsensical but perhaps she knows better. I think back to the old logs she had us place in the drainage ditch that turned out to save the sides from caving in when the bulldozer came. Perhaps this is how she plans to make sure the drainage, which clogged up in previous days, stays clear. She will only be draining water for her sink and perhaps for a washing machine, which she wants more than a toilet. To each his own!

During our afternoon, we relax, watch ourselves on TV at the local cafe/bar, and just plain rest. Oh, one more thing. Turns out that Friday is prom night in Kostajnica and guess who is staying in not only the only hotel but also the hotel that traditionally hosts the prom which includes dinner in the ballroom and a band that plays until 3 am as we discover!

Tonight we have one final celebratory dinner but this time our families are invited as well. Igor and donated two pigs which were roasted for the feast. Those of us who worked at the farm avoided looking the pigs in the eye the last few days! Our team donates roasted vegetables, bread, olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and a salad with a lovely balsamic-mustard vinaigrette that Barbara prepares. It was fun to see our families in a celebratory setting. Mira did not come and we had not expected her to — she is sort of a loner. Igor, his wife and little Ilaila are there, and the dad, mom and little girl from the Electric house are all there. After speeches, photos and certificates, we head home proud of what we have accomplished.

We leave tomorrow early to start our post-build tour. We will all go to Plivitce Falls, a UNESCO world heritage site and then head off to the Adriatic for a few days in the islands (Rab, Pag, and Vader) before the group disbands. I won’t write about this time but will post pictures. Most are heading home after that but John and I will stay an extra 5 days and travel by bus and ferry to the island of Korcula and then on to Dubrovnik.

[fiddlededee]

Day 12, May 24, Thursday

Today is TV day. We get going early so that all will be ready when HRT 2 arrives (Hrvatska is the way Croatians refer to their own country). The filming starts at the Electric house, where the lights are turned on to the delight of the family there. They have been living in a home (belonging to a relative) with a lovely kitchen but no power to it — an aspirational kitchen shall we say. Now they will be able to use the kitchen and living room.

Next the crew comes to the Farmhouse where the cameraman/interviewer gets some shots and interviews with Marija and Richard in front of the cement mixer and inside the new room where the ceiling is coming together nicely.

Finally, we all go to Mira’s house for the really dramatic moment, turning on the water for the first time in 20+ years. Mira fills her cup and starts to cry as do we all, even the camera man. In her interview, she thanks everyone profusely and urges people around the world to help each other. While the TV man is there, he films our crew working and even gets footage of Mira pitching in by pushing a wheel. She is one strong woman. On the days we have worked at her home, she has insisted on pushing the dirt-filled wheel barrow herself. We have to sneak in loads when she is distracted in the house. Otherwise we get a “ne, ne!” Croatian for “no, no” and Mira commandeers the wheelbarrow.

After lunch, most of us return to Mira’s to help finish up but all the guys but Kit head to the Farmhouse to get that ceiling up. At Mira’s we need small rocks to layer in the “French drain” we have set up for her drainage field. So some shovel and others pick through the pile of dirt and fill around her home for stones. We are truly a primitive work force! Still, with so many hands, we manage to fill a wheel barrow with enough stones to do the job. At 4ish, after a stop from the ice cream truck, we head back to the hotel, shower and wait for the Farmhouse crew to return. And we wait, and we wait. They don’t show up until after 6 but are proud to tell us that almost the entire main room ceiling is done! Hooray....

Tonight, the ladies visit the local women’s club which meets on Tuesdays and Thursday to make crafts and visit in a home that used to belong to a town doctor who didn’t return after the war and lends it to them for free. Then it’s another free night....

[fiddlededee]

Day 11, May 23, Wednesday

Sure enough, John was right about the tension in the air on Tuesday at the Farmhouse. No “Zivjeli” and homemade cheese and sausage this morning! There is definitely a bit of frost in the air. Tomislav lets us know that Igor does not want us working on painting or doing more plastering. It is clear he wants us to work on what he cannot accomplish on his own. Fortunately, we have Kurt with us. Kurt and his wife built their own house in Colorado and he knows what to begin on. He and Walter have a strategy for mounting the ceiling panels, which are quite heavy and represent a real challenge. He and Igor start on that. Igor lets us move the windows out of the way and okays beginning another coat of paint and some wall sounding, as he can see the rest of us are not needed for the ceiling prep work. In short order, the technical work at the electrical house is finished and Walter arrives to manage that at the Farmhouse. Patti, Barbara, Nancy, and Mary — plastering experts by now — remain behind to close up the walls up to the point where the electrical inspection can occur.

By afternoon, everything is cooking at the Farmhouse and Igor and his wife are all smiles again. Phew! With that drama laid to rest, let me tell some stories from other sites. First, at the Electric house, Nancy, our “Dollars for Scholars” lady, shares books. Nancy solicits donations from her extensive network of friends and acquaintances whenever she does an international build trip. She then contacts the host to find out what is needed in the local schools. In Peru, she bought bookshelves for the classroom; in Kostajnica, she supplies books and a financial gift that will fund more supplies for the kindergarten. But for the family at the Electric house she purloined a few books from her collection when she saw that their were no books in the house. The little girls is delighted with this gift but surprisingly the Mom is just as interested. Nancy says the Mom’s eyes light up as she turns each page. Later we find out that the mother has some developmental issues that are fortunately less severe that her daughters. Perhaps these books are a present to both of them.

As to the kindergarten, one morning Deb, Brenda, and Kit have the fun of visiting with the children. Kit comes with a bag full of balloon animals pre-made and makes more on request from the kids. My favorite one is a pregnant fish — a ballon fish with a small ballon baby inside! Kit is truly a man of many skills. Mira has come to love this team and regularly serves them coffee, which they drink happily despite some lingering concerns about where that water came from given Mira’s living conditions.

Tonight we travel to Bosnia-Herzegovina on foot for dinner. On the Croatian side of the border crossing, the customs official asks me about what we are doing. “Did you find out about it on the internet?” she asks. Well, not exactly. I explain to her that Marija, a resident of her town, and our leader Walter met 10 years ago and have been planning our build ever since and now it is finally happening.

Our first stop is to a Bosnian mosque where the imam gives us a tour and a review of his religion and how it fits into the history of this area. In the late 1800’s, Serbian muslims came to this town as refugees and the Turkish ruler of the time built them a mosque, part of Islam’s tradition of taking care of the less fortunate. These Serbian Muslims have lived their ever since though the Serbians destroyed their mosque in the independence wars in an attempt to create the illusion that this area was ethnically and religiously Serbian orthodox. On this side of the river, we get a slightly different take on those tragic times and I resolve to learn more about the break up of Yugoslavia and its aftermath when I get home.

We head from the mosque to dinner and are caught in a thunder and lightning storm with drenching rain. We have to duck into a simple restaurant for shelter and wait there for stragglers caught in other locations to arrived soaked but laughing. Marija arrives draped in a plastic bag — wish I had a photo of the look on her face!

As the rain continues, we decide to eat “in situ.” The menu looks decent but it ends up they really have only a few things, so we have a traditional Bosnian dish of meat in a sautéed flat bread and sliced cabbage salad. It makes for a good dinner and a good laugh.

Marija explains that the TV crews will come tomorrow and that they will start filming at the Electric house, move to the Farmhouse, and finally finish with the whole crew assembled at Mira’s house. She instructs the team there to make sure the water is running but not to let Mira see. This will be the dramatic high point of the film.

[fiddlededee]

Day 10, May 22, Tuesday

Happy Birthday to Susie and Ivanka! There sure are a lot of May birthdays on this build.

Back to work! We realize that we have only three and a half more work days and really need to push to finish up our projects. At Mira’s house (aka the plumbing house) we are awaiting the plumber’s visit, which has been postponed several times. At the electric house (the home where we are providing power to the family with the disabled child) the work of channeling through the walls has proved harder than expected especially since a much-needed power drill to do this work has not arrived despite promises to the contrary. At the farm, it’s just a big and complicated project.

In the morning, many of us go to Mira’s, the plumbing house, because Marija is determined we get this job done and the plumber delays have set us behind schedule. Those of us who have not been there see that Kit, Brenda, and Deb have things well in hand with the inside plumbing and while some continue with that others work on the drainage system. We had hoped to hook into the existing drain system. Marija has arranged for a backhoe to come and dig deep behind the house to uncover it. Then we plan to tap into it and save the extra work of replumbing the outflow.

Before the “big stuff” arrives, we must rearrange Mira’s outside “stuff.” She is a hoarder through and through and piles of old shingles, wood, bricks, etc are everywhere, but in a particular Mira order. Marija communicates to her what must be moved and she designates where things must move to and participates in the moving too. This old woman, about 79 we think, is incredibly strong. I have to remind myself that we are here because she pushes a wheel barrel full of filled plastic water jugs almost a mile up hill several times a week for her water supply.

At one point, Mira directs us to move some rotten looking old logs, probably rafters of some kind, into the drainage ditch by the road in front of the house. We look at each other with a bit of consternation because they will impede the drainage but comply with her wishes. Later when the backhoe arrives, we see the method in her madness — the logs serve as a cushion for the fat tires of the backhoe, keeping it from wrecking the drainage ditch. Mira’s intelligence and physical strength are the reason she has been able to survive so long on her own, even though in some ways her decision making is impaired.

After several hours of digging and drilling through the concrete outer wall it is clear our plan to use the existing drainage from Mira’s house will not work. At lunch, we reallocate our volunteer staff to try our best to utilize our talents and “brawn” wisely. We have only two and half days left to build before we head out.

When the crew arrives at the farmhouse on Tuesday afternoon, we find that Igor has done a beautiful job routing out all the electrical channels with his power tools. The team for the electric house takes a peek before they head on to their site, admire his work, and lament that what he did with his tools they had to do by hand. Marija has tried to concentrate on finishing up the smaller projects today, the electrical and plumbing houses. As a consequence, at the Farmhouse we are short the most highly skilled builders. We manage the best we can with the talent on hand — painting, prepping walls, etc — but these are tasks that Igor and his family could finish on their own. John senses a little tension in the air as we leave.

Marija is playing the role of a building contractor, juggling her talent and supplies between three sites, improvising for unexpected equipment delays, and dealing with clients who all think their project is the most important. Seeing it from this side, I have new sympathy for contractors. We are also a bit short handed on Tuesday afternoon because we are down our three cooks, Patti, Barbara, and Deb who have volunteered to cook the “American Night” dinner.

After coming home from our sites, we head over to the local firehouse where dinner will be to see if we can lend a hand but they have things well in hand. Patti has made the jambalaya, Deb oversaw the roasted vegetables, and Barbara has prepared an apple crumble. The only thing we can do is bring over some refreshments and do the dishes. The dinner is a great success and the Croatians marvel that a main dish that contains both shrimp and meat tastes so good. The huge pot of jambalaya is wiped out. At the end of dinner, Marija and Renata announce that the national PBS station and a newspaper have picked up on the press release they sent out. We will be on national TV and in the papers. We are about to be celebrities!

[fiddlededee]

Days 8 and 9, May 20 and 21, Sunday and Monday.

We are on vacation for two days, so I’ll summarize two day together. Our Croatian hosts know we will be visiting the Dalmatian Coast, familiar to many Americans for its beautiful resort towns on the Adriatic Sea at the end of the build so they are eager to show us another side of their history. Kostajnica is in south central Croatia and the coast is to the west so for our vacation we will head east to the Danube River, the border between Croatia and Serbia.

Our first stop is at the Vucedol Culture Museum on the Danube. Some of the earliest human settlers of the European continent passed through this area beginning in 6000 BC. This new award winning museum focuses on one of those cultures that left clear traces of a sophisticated culture. The Vucedol were a late Stone Age/early Bronze Age people and the museum does a great job of telling their story. We marvel at their understanding of astronomy and their ingenuity in devising early mass production of bronze implements. They are farmers, weavers, traders, and the first to make shoes designed specifically for the right and left foot. An amazing people that remind me that our ancient ancestors are really a lot smarter than we give them credit for.

From the museum we head to our lodgings in Vukovar. In Croatia, this city is honored for its history in their war for independence after the death of Tito. This city was the most heavily damaged in that war. The Croatian defenders held off the Serbians, who had control of the Yugoslavian army for nearly 30 days. We will learn more about that the next day.

We stay in lodgings at the Ilocki Prodrumi winery, quite our nicest accommodations to date. We had been told before coming the latest scoop. This winery, which has a long history with the British royal family, provided some of the wine for Harry and Meghan’s wedding! The winery is famous for it’s white wines and they provided wine (not sure if it was a red or white) that was served at the coronation of Queen Elizabeth. They still have some wine on hand from 1947, the year of the coronation, but since it costs about $8,000 a bottle we decide we will pass.

We also hear about an act of wine heroism from the war. The Serbs did not really appreciate fine wines and drained the huge oak barrels in the cellar using the aging contents to make a kind of grappa. They left the barrels with all the sediment collected in the bottom and when the war was over the 50-year-old oak barrels were ruined. The one bright spot was the ingenuity of a winery employee who managed to save an enormous number to some of the finest wines that were already bottled. In one place, he walled off an alcove where the wines were stored and covered the wall with the black mold that covers the cellars wall to disguise the fact that the wall was new. He hid other bottles behind the barrels and covered them with sand. In the poorly lit cellar they escaped the notice of the Serbian soldiers. This man is a prized employee not only because of what he did in the war but also because he makes their prized brandy. Now he is about to retire and is passing on his “recipe” to a trusted subordinate.

At dinner we get to taste two of the wines sent to England for the wedding. One is an award winning Traminac that is light and fruity with a clear golden color. The other is a dessert wine said to be Meghan’s favorite, that is sweet and somehow light at the same time. These come with a fabulous dinner, of course.

The next day we start our city tour with a cruise on the Danube and a chance to see what a city rebuilding itself look like. Our guide gives a short history of the genesis of the way, which began after the death of Tito. Up until that time, the different ethnic (with sometimes different religions as well) lived together in a sort of confederation. As Tito neared his death, he set things up so that each group had its own president and would have the choice of becoming independent. Among the presidents, each took a turn as presiding officer during Tito’s rule but the Serbian Milosevic was presiding at the time Tito died. He controlled the army and was unwilling to let his other “confederates” declare independence. This is how a brutal war started.

Vukovar was a city of some 50,000 before the war but the population shrunk to 15,000 as people fled. Our guide tells us that as a young girl she lived in a big house near a Yugoslavian military base. Night after night young men would appear in her home, change into new clothes and leave. She was too young to understand that these were soldiers from non-Serbian areas deserting so they would not have to participate in killing of their own people.

Our most somber visit is a memorial to 265 people who were pulled out of a hospital despite so called Red Cross status protection and tortured and murdered by the Serbians. In some cases, the victims were identified for execution by neighbors of Serbian descent whom they had lived side-by-side with for years. Earlier we had heard of “mixed marriages” split apart by the rise of ethnic hatred. We also visit a cemetery on the site of a mass grave where a mine field was created to prevent anyone from uncovering the 900 bodies interred there, with the youngest being a 6-month old and the oldest a person in their eighties.

Photos of the destruction of Vukovar are almost incomprehensible. We see terribly scarred buildings next to newly refurbished ones as the town recovers with the aid of the national government and help from the European Union. We also see a group of young teens emerge from a museum that is closed to us because it is a Monday. Our guide explains that all Croatian students take a field trip to Vukovar at that age to see the destruction that war brings. After a day touring the evidence of devastation, they spend the next day in workshops about resolving conflict without violence and about living in peace with neighbors of all ethnic and religious persuasions. They are trying to revive the multi-ethnic culture that made this place and what are now their surrounding countries so special.

So our hosts have given us a vacation but also we are on a field trip like those young students we saw. Our lesson was to see the ravages of war and the hope that can arise from the ashes if people can face the truths from the past and resolve to learn from them. I am inspired by their courage.

Oh, and happy birthday to my husband, John!

[fiddlededee]

Days 6 and 7, May 18 and 19, Friday and Saturday

We have been so busy that I’ve missed Day 6, Thursday. I know we built and had a welcome quiet evening where we ordered pizza or from the restaurant. And we met at the local cafe/bar that sits right on the river for drinks. It’s called KostaRica, a wordplay on Kostajnica which is pronounced about the same.

On Saturday, most of us are at the farmhouse as we are having a short day. I have a great picture of Nancy holding up the dental pick I had in my backpack that she is going to use to paint the fine touches on the window. Necessity is truly the mother of invention! All the girls of the house are home — no school on Saturday. Adrianna, the oldest, runs the tractor/cement mixer had for us when her father is busy and does some spot on translating. The girls are learning English in school. While we are there we see little Illela take some of her first steps and Mary, John and Kurt get a chance to ride bareback on the family horse. They mount tentatively via a stool and do a gentle clip down the street. Igor puts them to shame by mounting the horse by just swinging himself up and over and the demonstrating a gallop.

I had a chance to go with Igor in a mostly silent ride to the hardware store to pick up a few items. He tells me that his second language is Russian or russki which is the language taught when he went to school in Tito’s Yugoslavia. At the store, I have a creative challenge trying to communicate with sign language that we need turpentine to clean brushes, blue painters tape, and razor blades to scrape stray paint on the windows.

We leave a bit early because tonight we are having a barbecue down by the river at a kayaking/river camp. Our chefs are Jura, Maria’s friend and the local doctor; Tomoslav, who is preparing for his exams, and Renata, again. How often do your chefs include the town’s doctor and the aspiring lawyer?

We are having barbecued chicken, steak, sausage, and vegetables as well as potatoes cooked in the traditional peka style. The peka pot is a cast iron pan with a heavy iron lid. The vegetables (and sometimes meat as well) are layered in the pan, drizzled with oil and seasoning, and covered with the lid. The whole thing is nested in hot coals and covered with coal as well to cook — delicious! All of this is followed by Renata’s creation, a strawberry, cream cake that we have to celebrate our birthday builders, Kurt, John, Susie, and Ivanka.

My kids and grandkids will appreciate what comes next. I ask everyone to share their moment of joy from the trip so far. We have all had a few glasses of wine, except Jake of course, and everyone is game. Some really touching moments ensue. Jake’s moment is finally getting internet in his room — a perfect moment of a 16 year old! Deb recalls Mira, the old woman at the “plumbing house” setting a table for the volunteers and coming down the street with a linen covered tray set with china cups of coffee for all.

Mira has caused many moments of Joy. Brenda recalls how touched she was when Mira said she was going to have a heart attack of happiness when she realized that she was really going to get water directly in her home. No more wheelbarrowing jugs of water up the hill from town. Kurt loved that when they asked Mira if they could take her picture, Mira reached over and grabbed Brenda for a spontaneous hug photo. And Kit reports that Mira kissed his hand when he gifted her with a balloon animal. Kit, a retired child psychologist, has many skills, including juggling, making balloon animals, etc. We are going to see him in action at the town kindergarten next week.

Mary is joyful that she is feeling so welcomed and at home with new friends and happy to be traveling with her son. Nancy is happy to be living her mother’s favorite poem about using what you have to give back to others. Walter who is adept at building is so grateful to find that he and the family he is working with can communicate to each other what needs to be down and how to do it. Barbara, who trained as a chef in France and is doing her first build, felt joy at the way she “iced” a wall with stucco like she iced cakes. It’s such a beautiful wall that I took a picture of it but unfortunately I don’t have a before shot of the rough, pebble encrusted concrete that was there before.

Patti was thrilled to meet Marija for the first time and work with her. Patti has been co-leading this trip with Richard and the two of them came here last fall on a preliminary scouting trip.

Susie smiles when she thinks of how enthusiastic and welcoming the people of Kostajnica have been. The thought of Igor and his wife, holding little Ilela and looking through the window of the new room with smiles of satisfaction and anticipation is my moment of joy. John revels in seeing Igor’s look of relief when he found out that his beautiful glass block window would be held together by epoxy and not ugly cement.

Finally to our organizers — Renata who has worked so hard behind the scenes organizing hotels, dinners, excursions, etc. says she felt real joy on the day she finally had a chance to work on site as part of the team. This is when it all came alive for her. Jura loves that his barbecue was a success. (Tomislav was so busy cooking we never got to ask him for his moment!)

Richard’s moment of joy was walking with the team down from the train station the first day we arrived in Kostajnica. Nearly 10 years after a seed was planted on his first trip with Marija, his dream was finally happening. And that is Marija’s moment of joy as well, seeing it all come together at last.

[fiddlededee]

Day 5, May 17, Thursday

Such busy days and I’m writing this days later — how much can I remember?

More AM Yoga and progress continues at all three sites. We have named them the electric house (the home with the disabled daughter), the farmhouse (the family of six where we are converting a barn room to a room for living), and Mira’s (the older woman for whom we will provide indoor water and a ceiling that will not collapse on her)or the plumbing house.

At the farm, Igor and his wife greet us with home made Rakia (a fruit brandy, in this case, made from plums), and homemade cheese and sausage. The Rakia, taken in small shot glasses, with the toast “Zivjeli!” — a bracing way to start the day. The cheese is delicious but when everyone is busy the cat raids the plate before I can snag a piece of what looks like delicious sausage.

We also see that Igor has worked hard since we left yesterday to level the ceiling beams and fix other things. Even more important, he has rigged up a cement mixer to run off his farm tractor engine. In some builds, we have had to mix the mortar by hand, which is difficult, time-consuming work, so we feel blessed. Today we will begin putting layers of stucco/plaster on the interior wall and the mixer makes this work so much easier. First, we need to fill in holes in a brick wall that is roughly finished — after all this was meant to be a barn room. Then Igor will sand off the walls around the windows so they will open cleanly. Finally, we will begin putting the first of several coats of stucco on the wall and patch other walls. More work on the windows. One of the challenges is that we are doing this project as kind of a blitz and paint and glazing require time to cure or set. Patience, patience...

We make steady progress on the room and if I can manage it with poor internet I will post some photos. Another “Zivjeli” and off to lunch we go, where I confess I feel the need for a nap. Two mini shots of Rakia will do that to you!

We have a slightly shorter work day today as our hosts have made plans for us tonight. We are going on an excursion to a memorial at a Croatian concentration camp and then on to a bird sanctuary and eco-lodge for dinner.

Before and during World War II, the Croatian government allied itself with the Nazi government in Germany and Mussolini’s Italy. Yes, that meant that Croatia had it’s own concentration camps. At the memorial we visit, the only thing left from that era is some old train cars left to remind us that people were treated like animals and bought to this site in cattle cars. The site it self is kind of a sculpture in the earth with mounds and depressions indicating the sites of the prison barracks, work shops, and death house. It is quite moving. Croatian artists have become adept at creating memorials that are both abstract and incredibly moving and evocative. Like the “camera lens” memorial to the journalist shot by a sniper, this memorial, a combination of a still lake, abstract earth works and a huge central sculpture that looks like a crucible reaching up to the sky is very powerful. One of our group has relatives that died in the Holocaust in Germany and this visit is very powerful for her. She is very moved when as we arrive cranes take flight over the mist-covered pond surrounding the central sculpture.

From the memorial, we head further east to a bird sanctuary and outdoor museum of the wooden homes characteristic of another part of Croatian culture. We have dinner at the ecolodge, a traditional fish soup “paprikesh” in a dining room overlooking a field where horses graze. The horse activity is interesting and we are not sure what to make of it. Later we find out that two separate herds of horses arrived there just today. They are separated by a fence but a lot of dominance challenging is going on. I’m not sure who wins but these gorgeous animals off in the distant mist make for stunning photo opportunities. Home late, which is why I’m so behind in blogging!

[fiddlededee]

Day 4, May 17

Day 4, May 17

I love it. Today we practice communal yoga with participants contributing by leading some of their own favorite poses. We are opting for stretch-balance heavy yoga as we are getting plenty of other exercise at our build sites.

For this day’s work, we will not go back to Mira’s house as the jackhammer that is needed to bust passages for the plumbing pipes through the concrete and block walls does not arrive until tomorrow. After all, the Jakehammer is not real jackhammer, just a metaphorical one! Instead, we are divided into those who will return to the tough and tedious work of creating channels for electrical wiring and boxes and a group that will start work on our third and largest project.

By now I’ve heard about and seen photos of the work at the electrical site. The crew there has real challenges. Today at lunch one volunteer reported that it took her an hour to chisel out the space for a single electrical box. They mostly have to work high in the room and are constantly reaching up while standing on countertops and stools. The family they are assisting has a developmentally disabled daughter and letting her watch cartoons is one way her family has learned to calm her when needed. They have run an extension cord across the road to keep her calm during all the chaos. As you can imagine, social services in a remote, poor rural area are hard to come by.

Walter (who survived the jungle with us in Peru and still considers us friends) is the capable leader for this team, which includes Nancy of “Dollars for Scholars” fame (more later) and Mary (the Jakehammer’s mom). This is Mary’s first trip. She learned of the trip from Facebook and yoga friend, Deb. Mary thought of it as a great way to bond with a 16 year old. A wise mom, she has been giving him some space by serving on separate sites. No wonder she won the outstanding soccer coach award for Pennsylvania. She knows how to motivate and work with folks of all ages.

The electric team is rounded out by Barbara who has traveled lots in her work as an advocate for people with rare diseases but is doing her first build trip, and Kurt who has done tons of builds including with the Caravaners, a group that travels the USA doing builds with Habitat. For the afternoon, our team grudgingly gives them Susie as well. Susie became our friend after we met her on our first build in Zambia. She is doing her 18th build, giving even Kurt a “run for his money.” Patti, another experienced builder is on this team. We will be forever indebted to Her. She saved our “butts” in the “Croatian challenge.” Franjo of the Croatian team has challenged us to cook an American meal for a second banquet. Not wanting to serve hot dogs, we were mostly at a loss until Patti came up with the idea of jambalaya, American but with a twist and a song. She has brought along the recipe and the essential Cajun spices. Others volunteer to make cornbread and a pie. We may also add in a salad.

As a last minute addition, I need to add stories and films from the electrical site that emerged post lunch. Susie finally managed to lure the shy little girl out of her room and away from her cartoons with bubbles. The little video is heartwarming and if I can find the bandwidth, I’ll post it. The rest of the team’s hearts were warmed by the initiative of the homeowner, who manages to borrow a high-powered drill that incredibly speeds up the channel drilling process. He works the drill, dust and all, and dismisses the team with an insistent wave of his hand at the end of the day. He will clean up at the end of the day; it is enough. Like Mira, he was initially a skeptic, but now he is convinced of the value of this project. One of his neighbors also convinced has already called social services to get on the list for the next group that comes.

The remainder of the group, including us, are headed to a home where the four daughters and the parents are crammed into a two bedroom house with a single small shared room and one bathroom. They are subsistence farmers who live solely on the proceeds of the crops and animals they keep. We will help them convert a room that adjoins the house into living space. Currently, it is part of the barn but it is walled off from the animal areas, has a solid roof, and glass windows that can be spiffed up. We will add a ceiling, a door and wall that will seal off the outside, and then we will finish walls and windows and reconcrete and level the floor. We expect this to be the most time consuming effort.

When we arrive the cows are being milked, the goats are peering curiously out the barn door and we can hear the pigs squealing. The 18-month-old is at home with Mom; the older three girls, all teenagers, are at school. As soon as Dad returns from his morning chores discussion gets going on how to hang the new ceiling. We Americans would have chosen a rustic look with barn beams exposed but here in a real rural area, the family chooses a more finished look. This presents some engineering challenges but Marco, Richard, and Maria — remember she is an architect — make a plan. Also on hand to consult is the quiet but experienced builder Kit. He and his partner Brenda are also carvaners and experienced global builders. Kit and Brenda will be leading a build in Bolivia next spring where the team will work at 13,000 feet.

We are lucky to have Deb at our site as well. She is a first timer but she and her husband have self-built several additions to their old stone Amish home in Pennsylvania. She needs no on-site training. Of course, we have the Jakehammer and Richard, our fearless leader, who brings both experience and enthusiasm. I love that he keeps telling the young Marija to “dream big” as she launches this project to benefit her country.

At the new site, supplies arrive slowly and there is much consultation about how to do things. Patience is part of the lesson for us as Americans. We are always so sure we know how to do it better and faster but sometimes it is a gift of grace to defer to another culture. Brenda puts it well. She says that she has learned on these trips to say to herself, “Not my circus, not my monkeys.” It’s her way of letting go of the need to control the process and a good lesson for all of us to learn.

By the end of the day, the windows are sanded, mostly caulked, and the ceiling supports are up. Supplies have been delivered and stored efficiently and we know as we leave that tomorrow all will be ready. In the meantime, we have had a chance to work with the beautiful and charming Renata, who works with Marija and has made many of the arrangements for our meals and lodging. She is inspired by Deb’s story of building her own space. This is something Renata would love to do. So many cross cultural moments!

Tonight we are on our own for dinner, although our choices will be paid for by the build budget. Some order pizza and head down to KostaRica, a cafe/bar right on the river. The name is a play on Kostajnica. The rest of us order take away from the nice restaurant of the banquet on our first night here. We want vegetables and more vegetables in this meat heavy cuisine. The restaurant is delivering to the hotel and we debate where to eat. Dining room of the bar next door, cocktail pit? Since we are “celebrities” in town, we find that the hotel dining room has been set with linen table cloths and china for our take away meal.

Another great meal with great company, and the proportion of vegetables to meat is perfect. While waiting for our meal to be delivered, we visited the pizza guys down by the river where pizza was shared and then they join us in the dining room for our leftovers. Jake has what we hear is a prodigious cheeseburger in his room and everyone goes to bed happy. “Onward!” As a colleague of mine used to say at the end of every email.

Upstairs hall/yoga studio after a long day....

[fiddlededee]

Day 3, May 16

Day 3, May 16

Some of us start with morning yoga — a bit of a surprise for a guest not affiliated with our group when he emerges from his room. Last night we moved all the sofas in the large triangular lobby of the second floor to make a cocktail pit. This created ample space for yoga! The hotel was built in 1905 era and has two floors and about 16 rooms. They are simple but clean and we all have private baths. Not bad housing for a build — no bunk beds, no sleeping bags....

We are off by fire department minivan to our building sites. John and I join Deb, Jake, Kit and Brenda at the home of an older woman named Mira. Ivanka, from Kostajnica, was our translator and co-worker. Mira’s home has no running water and she walks downhill to the spring in the center of town with a wheelbarrow and fills jugs of water and then pushes it all back uphill. Her roof leaks and the ceiling in the main room is falling down. We will dig the trenches (ironic, I know) for the water input and tear down and repair the sagging ceiling. Marija tells that Mira is a bit of a hoarder. Their attempt to get her to throw some stuff have been unsuccessful to date but they hear she has made an effort for today. Still, we need to be really careful and respectful around her stuff.

When we arrive Mira looks at us a bit skeptically. John, Deb, Kit, and I are all seniors. Deb is younger, thank goodness, and bringing the median age down significantly, we have Jake who is 16. Mira and our plumber/fighter show is where the entry ditch must go. It needs to be 3 feet deep for the pipe to survive the winter. We get digging with a few shovels and take turns breaking up the soil and heaving out. We have one pick ax, which we eventually turn over to Jake. By the end of the day, we have given him a nickname, “the Jakehammer,” as in “Jake can you break through this really, hard rocky spot with the pick axe, please.” We are so glad to have a young strong guy on our team! By lunch time we have the front ditch done and have gotten a start on the back drainpipe ditch. Mira is impressed!

We are picked up for a nice cooked lunch at a school converted to a community center and then are back again at our assigned sites. Kit and I volunteer to take a whack at the ceiling while the others continue to dig out the exit ditch. Mira has indeed cleared out the room. All that is left is a single table with a few things left on top. Kit does most of the work, using a shovel to bang wholes into the disintegrating ceiling and his hands to rip it down. With each successful pull, he is rewarded by a deluge of dirt, dust, old corn cobs, and, no doubt, mouse turds. Mira and I sweep up the debris and carry it down to her burn pile. We all wear face masks but it is dusty, dusty work.

It didn’t take Mira long to warm up to these strangers invading her home. Kostajnica has had no experience with a Fuller style build and Mira quite rightfully approached this whole venture with some misgivings. By mid morning, she has communicated through Ivanka and with her smiles how thrilled she is.has seen how much is getting done. She tells us she is “having a heart attack” of happiness about what is happening to her home. By the end of the day, she is urging us to rest and shooing me behind her to avoid falling ceiling pieces. We work together in companionable silence. She’s introduced us to her dog and made us feel valued in Avery special way. We exchange our “tomorrows” at the end of the day with heartfelt sincerity on all sides.

Back to our hotel for showers and a short rest before sight seeing and dinner. There is a short debrief over wine and chocolate in the cocktail pit and we are off again. Jura the local doctor, another friend of Marija’s, takes us of a tour that includes a world renowned memorial to a press photographer gunned down by a sniper during the war. This photographer was an artist as well as a newsman and had driven up to a vantage point that afforded a view of the rolling hills and winding Sava river through the farmlands and villages below. As he focused his camera for the shot he was picked off by a sniper from the opposite hill. The first shot went directly through his camera lens, shattering it. More shots followed and he was gravely wounded. He might have made it but the sniper continued his fire preventing the medics from reaching him and providing aid. The whole sequence was captured live on television.

Today’s memorial is unique — a simple, large metal “lens” framing the view as his camera would have done. The glass in the center, the lens of the memorial, is shattered by a single bullet hole. We see the view as he would have seen it all those years ago.

From there we go to visit a medieval fortress in the middle of the Sava, just on the north side of the Bosnian border. We can see the border crossing just below as we walk the ramparts. On their side of the river, the mosque is the most prominent feature. Jura tells us that when we make our visit to the Bosnian side in a couple of days we will see a distinctively different architecture and civilization. The Croatian side of the river spent most of the 500 years before WW1 as part of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire while the Bosnian side was under control of the Ottoman Turks.

Off to dinner, another delightful Croatian meal. Tomorrow I will need to find out more about what is going on at the other site where they are preparing the walls of the family home to get electricity for the first time. This involves chiseling through lots of plaster and I hear some wire is actually in. Rumor has it that a neighbor stopped by to see if it was really true that there were women doing construction work. They say he walked away impressed! We just hope this observation leads to opening minds about women’s capabilities rather than increasing women’s workload!

Kostajnica memorial to the reporter/photographer killed by a sniper.

The Cocktail pit — really the wine/beer pit.

[fiddlededee]

Day 3, May 15

Another morning of touring before we head out by train this afternoon. The highlight is the Museum of Broken Relationships. This funky museum started out as a touring collection of mementos donated with a brief history of a broken relationship. Some relationships memorialized are kinky like the one associated with a single red stiletto. The donor had a childhood love that she lost track of. She grew up to become a prostitute who specialized in S&M. One night a client came in and she recognized him as her childhood sweetheart. He said he liked to be beaten because his father used to beat him terribly. When they parted, she gave him her stiletto. Other relationships described were funny. My favorite was memorialized by an old internet router. The legend simply said, “We were not compatible.”

By afternoon we are on our way to Kostajnica. We do indeed start to see abandoned buildings pockmarked by bullet holes in about an hour. We also see rusted, closed factories and boarded up stores and other signs of a dying region. Marija says the land her is rich and fertile but much of it lies fallow. When the fighting began Serbs fled to their own side or ran away to escape Serbian army units that would treat them as traitors. Many Muslims fled south to what became Bosnia-Herzegovina. People of all ethnicities left The region and moved to other countries in Europe and elsewhere and never came back. Now this southern region is full of aging pensioners but some young people are starting to return.

After a celebratory dinner with our Croatian partners — we have been well fed — we are off to bed. Tomorrow we will meet our first families.

Bullet holes and peonies...

[fiddlededee]

Day 2, May 15

Another morning of touring before we head out by train this afternoon. The highlight is the Museum of Broken Relationships. This funky museum started out as a touring collection of mementos donated with a brief history of a broken relationship. Some relationships memorialized are kinky like the one associated with a single red stiletto. The donor had a childhood love that she lost track of. She grew up to become a prostitute who specialized in S&M. One night a client came in and she recognized him as her childhood sweetheart. He said he liked to be beaten because his father used to beat him terribly. When they parted, she gave him her stiletto. Other relationships described were funny. My favorite was memorialized by an old internet router. The legend simply said, “We were not compatible.”

By afternoon we are on our way to Kostajnica. We do indeed start to see abandoned buildings pockmarked by bullet holes in about an hour. We also see rusted, closed factories and boarded up stores and other signs of a dying region. Marija says the land her is rich and fertile but much of it lies fallow. When the fighting began Serbs fled to their own side or ran away to escape Serbian army units that would treat them as traitors. Many Muslims fled south to what became Bosnia-Herzegovina. People of all ethnicities left The region and moved to other countries in Europe and elsewhere and never came back. Now this southern region is full of aging pensioners but some young people are starting to return.

After a celebratory dinner with our Croatian partners — we have been well fed — we are off to bed. Tomorrow we will meet our first families.

[fiddlededee]

Croatia — Fun and Free Lance Build

Day 1, May 14

John and I haven’t done a build/vacation in a couple of years, so when Richard, one of the trip leaders for our last build in Peru, reached out and asked if we were interested in coming to Croatia, we thought “hmm, that sounds interesting.” What really intrigued us was this build was going to have a REALLY local connection. Richard was partnering with Marija, a young woman from Croatia, who he met on a Habitat build in India. Marija, an architect, proposed a build in her home town of Kostajnica. It’s right on the Croatian-Bosnian border and was still heavily damaged from the horrible civil war that split Yugoslavia into independent states. The Croatian portion of the conflict raged from 1991 to 1995. More than 25 years later, her home town and the surrounding region had still not recovered. We decided we couldn’t pass up a travel/build with that compelling of a local connection.

In the end, Richard recruited 13 others to join him for this project — really impressive considering this would be a truly independent project. Most of us had previously built with the well-known Habitat for Humanity and the lesser known Fuller center but neither of these organizations had an affiliate in Croatia, so Richard and Marija were organizing this venture entirely on their own. Richard has led trips for both Habitat and Fuller and it is a tribute to his organizing abilities that 13 people took a leap of faith to come on this “outside of the box” trip.

We did not know Marija but it was clear from even her emails that she was passionate about bringing us to her home town.

Marija has enlisted the assistance of the mayors of two local towns, the fire department, the youth league, the social services department, and others. She’s arranged for the government to provide building supplies, social services to identify the families in need, the fire department to ferry us around, and a plumber and electrician to donate their expertise. Richard and Marija are hoping that our trip will be successful enough to convince The Fuller Center to establish an affiliate there. Our group will be the pioneer volunteers but Richard and Marija are the true pioneers. They first talked about doing this 10 years ago in India and now it is happening.

Our meeting place was Zagreb, the capitol city, and the last of our teammates arrived today, so we are complete and this is Day 1. Seeing the group assembled in the lobby of our hotel in Zagreb brought tears to my eyes — so many luminous hearts, coming from different parts of the country and world and from different walks of life, different faith traditions or no tradition at all — all assembled to help total strangers , to help “the other.” The world needs more of this.

Counting Richard, we know four of our group from previous builds. By the end of our time together, I know we will have made an intimate connection with the others who just were faceless names on an email list until now and we will have a deeper connection with our old “build” friends. These trips attract interesting, independent people from all walks of life and sometimes from different countries as well. Marija, our Croatian leader, had done her first trip after watching a segment on The Oprah Winfrey show! The team assembled here today are all Americans. They come from eight different states. With Marija, we are15 and tomorrow we will meet our Croatian team members in Kostajnica.

As for today, we spent it in Zagreb touring under the tutelage of Gorin, a friend of Marija’s, who is an architect as well as a certified guide. Zagreb is a beautiful city that is an amalgamation of all the occupying cultures that have dominated it since 229 BC when the Romans first arrived. Gorin and Marija are wonderful, both deeply steeped in Croatian culture and history.

What impresses us most is the passionate views these young people hold about the most recent war, the one that occurred 25 years or so ago when both were just young children. That war ripped this once multicultural adriatic peninsula apart by ethnicity and their families were deeply affected by it. They believe that the only way forward is for Croatians to acknowledge the atrocities, pain, and destruction that occurred here during both World War II, when Croatia was a fascist collaborator state, and during the war for independence of the 90’s. Marija and Gorin are the heirs of the devastation wrecked by a time when people divided by ethnicity and expelled or fought “the other.” They see very clearly the tragedy that ensued and the deep rifts that still exist. The war of independence was mostly waged in the south of Croatia and the effects are not that easy to see in Zagreb in the north but they assure us that an hour into the 2-hour train ride tomorrow we will start to see the damage.

[fiddlededee]

Free at last...

April 25 Headed home. This morning I said "Good morning" to our disgruntled group member and got a shrug. It turned out that this person was very set on not communicating unless necessary with anyone in the group. Not sure what when on yesterday but I'm doubly glad that we were not caught up in it. It's sad to see someone so unhappy but I realize this person is making their own choice and vow to respect that. Still, I repeated my compassion mantra with that soul in mind. Anyone holding that much anger is in a lot of pain and I can sincerely wish that their pain will ease. Our exit from China as a group went without a hitch and it is good to be out, even if via a different route that planned. We arrived in Bangkok and the eight of us who remained friends had a last dinner together. Individuals have different levels of anger withMountain Travel about the delay but we all agree that up until things went badly awry it was a great trip. We are still up in the air regarding how much hassle we will get from Mountain Travel about reimbursement of unplanned expenses. They have paid for the two additional nights at hotels and at least for some meals. For us the big costs are the flight back from Beijing to Chengdu, which I'm confident they will pay, and the cost of two business class tickets home --- almost $10,000! Our original tickets were booked with miles on a Chinese airline and a rebooking, even if possible, would have taken us back into China to Beijing and gotten us home later. Tomorrow, we get on a Air Nippon flight that will take us from Bangkok to Tokyo and from there home to Seattle. And if all goes well, this will be the last post for this trip....

[fiddlededee]

Bureaucracy rules...

April 24 This was to be our last day in China, with the group leaving separately on flights we had arranged for ourselves from Chengdu to our homes, as per Mountain Travel policy. Some were scheduled to head to Bangkok, Tokyo or other cities. John and I had a short domestic flight to Beijing where we would pick up our frequent flyer flight in business class that would take us non-stop to Seattle. This was another very early morning (4:30 am wake up for the second day in a row). Eight of us left on a very early bus for the airport with one remaining behind for a later flight. John and I were the only ones with a strictly domestic flight and were dropped off alone at the domestic terminal; Diana, our guide, went with the other six to help them manage the outgoing immigration process. We all had some concerns around the fact that we were traveling under a group visa but each of us were given a copy of the stamped visa to hand to the immigration authorities. Word was that the visa would not get much attention and that seemed somewhat logical given that we were leaving rather than entering the country. Joan and I agreed to share texts about our progress through security and immigration as we were in separate terminals, on different paths home. John and I got through security smoothly and I texted Joan and put my phone away though I did several cursory checks to see if she had an update. Throughout the trip, both Joan and I have relied on texts sent when we have wifi to communicate. We've turned off "roaming" to avoid cell phone charges. When John and I got settled on the plane, baggage checked and presumably aboard, I went to turn off my phone in preparation for takeoff and saw an ominous missed call from Joan. Call and texts were exchanged -- the group visa was indeed a big problem. The Chinese authorities were insisting that everyone listed had to leave together. Diana and the local company acting for Mountain Travel were trying to work to get us separate visas. One fellow traveler suggested we get off the plane. Since we were hearing such contradictory information, and were already on the plane with the door about to close, we elected to stay on the plane and hope that things would be worked out while we were in flight or in our upcoming long layover in Beijing. John and I shared that we were happy not to be part of the commotion back in Chengdu. Over- tired people looking forward expectantly to sleeping in their own beds and homes after a month of travel are not candidates for resilience in a situation like this. And, Diana, sweet as she was, did not have the experience or savvy to inspire confidence in such an group. We felt we had been spared a lot of angst and, as we later learned, we were. Well, bureaucracy triumphed over my optimism in this case. When we landed, per phone calls, there was still some hope for separate visas. But it took just a few minutes for the final verdict to come in -- the group did indeed need to leave together. This meant that John and I had to claim our luggage, head up to the Air China ticket counter and purchase a ticket back to Chengdu. We just missed the noon flight and had to wait for the 3 pm. Then we worried that this sudden ticket purchase and reversal of our travel would raise eyebrows at security, so we checked in early, thankfully without incident. The closest we came to a problem was when John realized after we had been in the waiting area an hour that he had forgotten his camera bag at security. He rushed off to retrieve it, which took awhile. I was just getting really worried when I saw him walking back, camera bag in hand. Three hours later we were back in Chengdu, where poor Diana looked so relieved when I smiled at her. She had a rough day, I'm sure. And we found out a bit later that our little group's esprit de corps had suffered a severe setback in making the final decision about the group flight out. Most had rebounded from the intense pressure of the day but one member had not and that's sad. So my moments of happiness for the day were seeing John coming back, camera bag in hand, and appreciating that we had missed being in the pressure cooker of the intense feelings around disappointment about not going home as expected and planning a solution that was acceptable to all.

[fiddlededee]

Pandas and flowers

[fiddlededee]

Off to see pandas...

April 23 Today we leave Lhasa and Tibet for our departure city, Chengdu. I have found the visit to this region to be bitter sweet. It is clear to me that, short of a miracle, the Tibetans will never regain autonomy over their own land. The wave of Chinese recruited by the government to settle here is just too large and they are being swamped. They are second class citizens in their own land, disdained for their darker skin, their way of living and their religious beliefs. The Dalai Lama is right -- the only benefit of this sad, sad era is that the word of the Buddha is spreading via their diaspora. From the sublime to the ordinary -- we land in Chengdu on a flight requiring a 4:30 am wake up call. We leave Sanjay behind and a very young and junior guide named Diana meets us. Problems start to surface. One of our group is not on her list, a cause for concern in tightly controlled country like China. So an underlying tension starts to rise in the tired and a bit cranky group. Still we make a group mandated short stop at the hotel (which some are not thrilled about) before heading out to see the Panda park. The pandas are adorable and the park is a beautiful garden in the midst of this huge city. Even with the crowds, we get good photos of these darling animals. Things start to fall apart at lunch. Diana has selected a restaurant near the panda park for us. First, we ask, and rightly so, for a larger table, as we are to be crammed in around a table in the crowded, noisy courtyard. Diana secures another table for us in a private back room but getting to this room requires walking through a room full of empty tables with stained cloths and napkins and food scraps all over the floor. It is a bridge to far for most of the group. Although the back room is nice, the complete chaos of the room we see sparks a rebellion. "Let's just go back to the hotel," some demand. John, Dennis and I who went to check out the back room did not witness it, but I guess some harsh words were said. On the bus, as we pull away, I can see that Diana is almost in tears and is rehearsing some speech to give to her boss. It is a sad sight though I can see why many did not want to stay at that restaurant. It was indeed filthy. Everyone tries to cheer her up and we succeed to some extent. She goes in to "guide mode" again and points out features of Chengdu as we make our way back. Clearly this episode is NOT my MOJ for the day. For dinner, we go our separate ways. Joan, Dennis, John and I venture out of the hotel along a busy boulevard to an Irish, yes Irish, pub that serves lighter fare. A busy freeway passes above the middle of the boulevard and shops and paved areas line the median underneath it. As we walk we heard loud, ompapa type music reverberating from a paved area beneath a freeway ramp. It comes from a concert of traditional music of some sort that features a small band, singers and a dancer. We stop to enjoy the show. As soon as the lead singer sees us, she smiles and acknowledges our presence among a small Chinese crowd of older people and families with children. We see some in the audience sneaking shy glances at the foreigners in their midst. Next thing we know the lead singer gifts Joan with a bunch of artificial flowers she has used in her last song. Then the performers bring us stools to sit on. We are treated as honored guests for the time we are there -- a reminder that Chinese people and the Chinese government are not the same. And that is my MOJ for the day.

[fiddlededee]

Summer Palace