I woke up early in the morning as usual and had my breakfast with friends at the restaurant of the hotel. Today Merja and I were scheduled for a meeting with the colleagues at the Ministry of Culture from the protection office.
Before our meeting we thought of visiting the museum of City of Skopje and the museum of Macedonia. We passed along the park in the city center and first went to the museum of the City of Skopje. The museum was free of charge, not so big but good to see. Outside the museum, on the wall, it was possible to see the old railway station and the clock which always displays the time of the earthquake happened in 1963.

As we contacted Ms. Nada who arranged us this meeting, we met her around 12:45 in front of the City of Skopje, her working place, in advance so that she could direct us to the ministry.

She accompanied us till the ministry with a car and helped us to visit the colleagues in their offices. Ms. Mirjana Dimovska‐Colovik, head of section for immovable cultural heritage and Ms. Snezana Gerasimova‐Mateska had our questions in their hands since Ms. Nada had already sent them in advance. We communicated with the help of their young colleague, because they did not feel comfortable with their English. They tried to help us by providing us some information on the websites of cultural heritage. They emphasized that of the Law on spatial and urban planning, detailed urban plan, rural urban plan and urban planning for the areas outside populated area in where monumental entities and buildings of cultural significance have to have some detailed constraints on the protection and preservation of immovable cultural heritage according to criteria determined.
It was quite a short meeting than I expected since they told us all the related information to our research questions would be found through the websites that they recommended us to visit.
We thanked them for their sparing some time for us from their busy schedule and headed back to the city center.
We decided to have our lunch at a very oriental place in the Old Bazaar. The place was so small but very nice and full of traditional Macedonian‐Ottoman characteristic features and materials.

After our lunch, we walked through the Old Bazaar and visited the Kursumlu Han. It is a typical caravansary built by Ottoman Empire dating back to 16th century. The rooms inside were used as inn. The structure has a rich decoration on the walls and number of small pyramid shaped domes.

In the area, we came across an Albanian young researcher working on the restoration of the area. We had such an interesting small talk. I will refer to this later on while writing our report about cultural heritage.
After visiting Kursumlu Han, we went into the museum of Macedonia and ethnology museum of Macedonia. They were very well organized, it was easy to follow the structure inside. People working there were very helpful. I truly recommend everyone to visit these museums, really inspiring.
The Mustafa Pasa Mosque is located very near to Kursumlu Han and it was also possible to see it behind the museum of Macedonia. The mosque was built by Mustafa Pasha in XVI century. It’s a monument of the Islamic culture. It was under restoration in cooperation with a Turkish organization called Tika.

It had been a really fruitful day, but I was feeling terribly tired and definitely needed some rest before our meeting with the expert from ICOMOS. We were scheduled to meet him around 19:00 at the Hotel. After having some rest, Merja and I went downstairs just before 19:00 o’clock as we agreed. We waited for 2 hours but no one showed up. We were disappointed because it was really important for us to meet him. Aina and Lotta came in to the hotel while we were still sitting in the lobby. She saw that we were down and wanted to help us. She gave us a name of a person whom she and Lotta met that day. As she said the person was working at the Municipality of Cair and was very interested in the preservation of the cultural heritage situated in the Old Bazaar area.
We contacted him by e‐mail and we were already scheduled for meeting with him for the next day.

The third day of this unique field trip started with a visit to the Institute of Geography at the Ss. Cyril and Methodius University. Two students came from the University to guide us. Together with colleagues, students and our instructors, I took off from the hotel quite early in the morning; around 07:30. During our walk we got to share our impressions about what we had seen and experienced in the city. We were concerned about our possible meetings regarding our research themes.
After a long walk, we got to the University around 8:10 o´ clock. Professor Mihailo Zikov, Head of the Institute for Geography welcomed us. He and his colleagues were dressed very nicely and prepared sharply. Professor Mihailo made a presentation about the historical background of the University and the Institute. He made his presentation in his native language and a young Macedonian researcher helped him with the translation. I really enjoyed listening to him in his own language, Macedonian language sounds very different and very exotic of course.
After his presentation, his colleague, Professor Nikola Panov took the floor and told about the tourism potential of the city of Skopje. He gave some important information about the cultural heritage. Then, another colleague from the Institute of Geography (unfortunately, I could not catch his name) made a presentation about the regions and how they were divided. It seemed quite complicated to me, but at the end, he placed emphasis on the economic potential of the regions and said that division was made according to this criteria.
When we had our break, we went downstairs for having a cup of tea. At the cafeteria, we met a lecturer, young fresh PhD graduate, Mr. Ivica Milevski who told us about the geopolitical importance of Macedonia and also the current situation that the country was in. He said he heard about our visit and was very interested to join the session. He came up to the lecture hall with us and participated in the session.
When Merja and I got to the lecture hall, we noticed that we happened to be the only ones from our group since everyone had to rush out to catch up with their appointments with their contacts for their group task. Merja and I were supposed to meet with Mr. Per Arne quite late in the afternoon, so continued participating in the session.
Prof Gunnel Forsberg, made a presentation about the higher education system in Sweden. Then she received some questions from the professors and from other colleagues. It was such a nice atmosphere, everyone was full of potential and really open to exchange of information and cooperation. I enjoyed it very much.
When presentations were finished, we thanked to the professors, received their contact information via their cards. Mr. Ivica Milevski, gave us his contact information as well, and said that he would be very happy to help us in every possible way. Merja and I thanked him and headed to the city centre.
Merja and I had lunch at the Old Bazaar. Whenever we pass through that area, my emotions got high. It is such a nice place with a strong spirit. Dating back to the Ottoman Empire, one could see the influence of that period everywhere. All those small houses and shops, simply beautiful…Of course everything needed to be renovated according to their original form but it seemed like nothing has been done there in order to have them preserved in a nice way.

After our lunch, we headed to the other side of the city passing through the Stone Bridge. While passing through the bridge, you really feel like another way of living or form of life is taking place on the other side, really interesting.
We walked around the Balkan Square and then went in to the café Delfuf to meet Mr. Per Arne from regarding our research subject. He was having lunch with another colleague, Ms. Leyla Hadzic from the organization CHWB (Cultural Heritage without Borders). She is working as a regional coordinator within the same organization. She was also very interested in our subject and promised us to send some background information. Mr. Per Arne and Ms. Leyla told us that they were not specialized in the cultural heritage but gave us a name from an organization called ICOMOS (International Council of Monuments and Sites). They said that he was an expert on cultural heritage in Macedonia, and would like to be happy to help us. After a nice chat with them, we thanked for their cooperation and left the place. We immediately called the person from ICOMOS as we were overexcited with the fact that soon we would be meeting with an expert on our research theme.

The person from ICOMOS told us that he would be leaving for Paris on 7th of March. But he made an appointment as to meet us on 6th of March to see how he could be of help. We were so happy to reserve him as his contributions to our research would definitely mean a lot to us.

When it was about 09:15, we were already ready after having our breakfast for taking our place at the Hotel Centar’s restaurant waiting for a visit from the Ministry of Environment. Mr. Saso Apostolov, Mr. Dejan Gadzovski and two of their colleagues arrived and apologized for being not able to host us at their office. Since they were moving from their current office to another, it was not possible for them to have us at the ministry.
Mr. Saso and his colleague Mr. Dejan mainly told about how they have been dealing with Spatial and Urban Planning in Macedonia. As they mentioned, spatial planning has a long history in Macedonia, especially after the Second World War, the main legal documents were focused on;
‐Law for Spatial and Urban Planning
‐Law for Implementation of Spatial and Urban Planning.
It was mentioned that responsibility for taking action is at the Ministry for Environment in relation to spatial plans. In 2004, a spatial plan was adopted for the period of 20 years. According to the plan, the spatial plan is to be implemented all for the Republic of Macedonia with two sub plans;

‐Spatial plan of a region
‐Spatial plan of an area of special interest
As for urban plans, there is a general urban plan that could be divided into two other sub plans such as;
‐detailed urban plan
‐urban plan for a village
There is also a plan available for areas outside a settlement (for areas that can be called neither a village nor a city).
Each year governmental meetings take place to discuss the budget. Spatial plan is a strategy for the future development of a certain region. For instance; there is a spatial plan for Ohrid (will be finished in spring), a spatial plan for Skopje Region. All these plans are being developed under the responsibility of the Ministry for Environment as a coordinating unit of activities in connection with the governmental ideas and Spatial Planning Agency.

Spatial Plans have two stages; first stage is the draft plan and second stage is the adoption of the plan. Decisions are taken by experts within the field; they are all involved in the discussions in the panel.
I was just going to ask Mr. Saso as how they were deciding on a certain region and according to which criteria; but he was quick and brought up the definition of a region. As he told, definition of a region was given by the law. On the contrary, he also mentioned that he has a different view of defining a region. According to Mr. Saso; territorial of the local government should be a region. He placed emphasize on the administrative area and stated the fact that it has its own identity.
A question was put forward in regards to ownership of the land. He said that local government does not have any ownership on the land. They are trying to get ownership from the central government.
Mr. Saso again pointed out that urban planning is the responsibility of the local government and obviously it has difficulties with financing the planning. My impression is that they have been working hard on developing the conditions in the city with regards to planning but due to the lack of financial sources, those plans cannot be carried out efficiently. In addition to the problems in financing, the demographic movement has happened to be the most challenging side of planning. As Mr. Saso mentioned immigration rates to Skopje city have been increased, eventually there has been housing problems in the city as well as environmental degradation has taken place. In relation to the environmental problems, legislative actions from the EU are put forward for required actions.

After the presentation, we took off from the hotel to the Municipality of Karpos. Ing‐Gerd, Merja and I walked together along the way and enjoyed the sunshine with the rest of the group during this short trip.
We arrived to the Municipality of Karpos around 11:05. Ms. Maja Lazarevska from the planning department welcomed us to a conference room at the municipality. She made a very clear presentation about the administrative structure of the local self governments which are represented by 84 municipalities with the City of Skopje (which is functioning as a unifying body) in Macedonia.
Ms. Maja continued her presentation by explaining the development strategies and plans. As she stated, in the Republic of Macedonia decentralization process has been running since 2005. Municipalities in this process have great part of competencies that belonged to the central Government before. Municipality of Karpos has the task of following master and detailed plans which are initiated and implemented by the City of Skopje.
By the end of her presentation, we had some refreshments already prepared for us at the municipality. Soon, we were informed that even a bus tour was organized to the outskirts of the Mountain Vodno in order to let us see the Monastery St. Panteleimon. A tour guide told us some general information concerning geopolitical position of Macedonia. When we reached the Monastery, he also told us the historical background of the St. Panteleimon Church which was built in 1164. It was not allowed to take pictures from the inside of the church. It was possible to see the Byzantine designs on the walls.

In the surrounding area of the church, there was a restaurant which had a very nice of the city. Borek and yogurt were served after the coffee which almost tasted like Turkish coffee. It was interesting to have the coffee at first but I did not mind since I realized how much I missed eating” borek”.

We were sitting under the sun and enjoying yummy borek (but Macedonians call it as “burek”) on the Mountain Vodno till 14:30 o’clock. Then we headed back to the city centre for our visit to the City of Skopje.
We met Mr. Vladimir Petrovski and Ms. Nada Peseva at the City of Skopje. The municipalities in the City are parts of the City of Skopje with defined peripheral boundaries clearly in law. According to the law, citizens are assured to participate in the democratic arena and have a say for some local actions. After a short presentation made at the City of Skopje, Merja and I talked to Ms. Nada and told her about our research topic. She was highly interested in our research questions and started thinking about how to help us. She said the most appropriate source of information could be found at the Ministry of Culture and promised us to arrange a meeting with some people from the protection office. We were so happy to hear that. We exchanged our contact information and headed back our hotel .

After resting a bit, we went out with the rest of the group to a Macedonian restaurant to have some local food.

We have started our field programme in Skopje with such a busy schedule. After leaving the hotel around 08:35 for our visit to the Embassy of Sweden, we started walking through the city. Along the way, I was trying to observe and catch up with everything which was just within my range of vision. Being in a different country just makes you keen on learning everything related to the place. You feel like you are automatically motivated to learn more and more. Especially, if you are in a country which was home to your ancestors, it is inevitable not to stay motivated. The excitement of rediscovery of the history… I was curious to hear about Macedonia and know how Swedish Embassy and Sida (Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency) have been dealing with development cooperation with Macedonia.

We were welcomed by Mr. Sven Nylander who is working as a Counselor and Deputy Head of Mission at the Swedish Embassy. He gave a brief introduction about their cooperative form of work and how and in which areas they have been supporting Macedonia in their transition period in order to reduce poverty and help them to be in line with EU requirements (Macedonia has gained its official candidacy status in 2005). The concept of transition has a very strong exposition in representing the time period that Macedonia is facing today. Since the importance of the transition period and the efforts as to be in line with EU standards were also mentioned a couple of times by the staff members of the Swedish Embassy, especially after the crisis in Kosovo in 1999, Macedonia have been receiving Swedish support primarily focused on humanitarian aid via non‐governmental organizations and various projects. As it was told, Macedonia has had difficulties with the refugee movement and they eventually have needed to be supported in several areas; the priority was given to the areas in Sustainable economic development through agriculture, Human rights and social cohesion and Environment pillar of sustainable development. Within the sustainable development which is a big challenge for Macedonia, Mr. Daniel Asplund from Sida during his presentation, stated that there is a limited awareness on the issue and a need for strategic focus. Sida was consulted accordingly. He also pointed out the fact that Balkan countries have suffered from mismanagement. Conflicts that they have faced made the administrative structure even worse. It was referred to that there is 37% of unemployment rate in Macedonia today. Significant improvement in health and education sector was mentioned as the main necessities. Tourism stands as a potential but again needs structured and strategic planning.
In regards to sustainable development Ms. Biljana Dzartova‐ Petrovska talked about Sida´s support to Macedonia and additionally about a strategic environment policy assessment now taken place in Macedonia and pending for comments in order to be implemented. She mentioned that Sida has made an agreement with two cities in the world, one of which is Skopje and the other one is a city in India but she could not remember which city it was. Within this scope, the main aim is to be strategic sustainability review as to identify problem areas for interventions. When we had a break, my team mate Merja and I got a chance to speak a little bit with Ms. Biljana about our research in the role of cultural heritage in planning. However she said that in the sustainability assessment program of Macedonia cultural heritage is not included. She said the right place to visit would be the ministry of Culture. Then we spoke a bit to Mr. Daniel whether he could help us with our task. He gave us a name Mr. Per Arne Ströberg, Secretary General, Cultural Heritage without Borders.
After our visiting to the embassy, we started waiting outside for Mr. Vladimir Petrovski who is working at the Planning Department at the City of Skopje. We met him in front of the embassy and had a walking tour around city, we have been to the Kale and mainly guided in the city centre.

I had a lunch at mother Teresa Restaurant with Aina, Ing‐Gerd and Merja. Weather was quite nice and we were sitting outside. While we were having our lunch, a couple of gypsy kids started to come to our table and beg for food and money. It was of course a very bad feeling to see such small kids begging around with almost bare food and very dirty clothes. You feel like you are not in a position of avoiding them but on the other hand you are not in a position of helping them. What could we do? When waiters see what is happening, they just step in and run them out. At some point, one of them came to our table and tried to give a bread to Merja in order to have her fill the bread with leftovers and she did. Then he started to eat it immediately. A bitter experience for all of us. He was really very hungry. After we left the place, the kids just surrounded Ing‐Gerd, and then we heard a young mother shouting at us saying that one of the kids just took something out from Ing‐Gerd´s purse… She managed to take it back after all…When we walked further; we saw some tents at the central park. Most probably just put by other gypsies in the area. It was strange to see that their position was just accepted as it is. They were gypsies and obviously it was their way of living, and that is it…(soon I learned from a Macedonian friend that those people living in the tents in the park across the Parlament are not gypsies; they are people who got laid off years ago in the big wave of shutting down ex-state companies, so living there is kind of their protest).
After this unpleasant experience we headed to The Ss. Cyril and Methodius University, Faculty of Architecture. The dean of the faculty Mr. Vlatko Korobar welcomed us in a conference room and made an opening speech. Then we headed to a big lecture hall and had our presentations of Swedish system of government and planning system in Sweden. When we all finished with our presentations, Ms. Lidija Trpenoska‐Simonovic, Spatial Planning Agency, took the floor and told us about Spatial and Urban Planning system in Macedonia. Following her presentation, Prof. Korobar told about the two tier government and municipalities which form the city of Skopje.
Again this important status of Macedonia as being a transition country that obviously has a greater influence on the development of the country was emphasized by him. He continued with mentioning the special position of Yugoslavia and lively situation of planning or to put it correctly; how planning situation had became so alive when some special UN fund and other funds were made available after the earth quake for threshold analysis and urban development.

Around 18:30 Mr. U. Sean Vance, architect professor from the North Carolina State University, and director of The Center for Universal Design, had an interesting presentation on Universal design that has its roots in design solutions focused on accessibility issues, such as creating small ramps in sidewalks for wheelchairs authorized by the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Today has been such a day with full of activities but very fruitful in the mean time.

once again

Once again I realized how lucky I am...I am sooo thankful to God for all the things I have been given in this life. No more words are needed to describe my feelings today.

May be it is time to start since I could not sleep this night...

Well...better late than never... hereby I am welcoming myself to this virtual environment.

It have been thinking to write down what I have in mind and basically it took me a while ( almost 2 years ) to make up my mind on the subject of blogging and keep tracks of my precious moments. May be my mnemonic techniques have started to call for more specific memory aids. I just could not resist anyway.

I thought it would be a good idea to model my own place in order to present my views on everyday life.

Well...It is time to stop typing...I should just go and catch come sleep.. natt natt