Thursday, January 19th, was another holiday here in Macedonia called “Vodici”. But my PC friends call it "The Cross Toss”. On this day in every village and town everyone goes to the river or lake where a priest will bless the water. Then he blesses a cross (usually wooden) that can easily be held in your hand. He then throws the cross in the water and a few local men jump in to retrieve it. Whoever gets it first is then blessed for the following year. He also usually wins a prize (like a new TV set) and everyone in town gives him money. I went to see this event at a nearby village (see photo above) where a married PC couple, Sean and Jennifer live. They are the closest PCV’s to me, I call them my neighbors. It was fun to watch the Cross Toss event. The water was so cold there was some ice floating in it. Before the priest throws the cross in the water he sings and chants. The men were really anxious to get going (there were eleven of them) and at one point the priest stopped singing and said, “Get out of the water, it’s too early” and everybody laughed. You could tell it was freezing, some of the men were shivering as they waited for the priest to finish his blessing. This is the last major holiday in Macedonia, for a holiday period of about 5 weeks. This village is incredibly beautiful with nearby snow-topped mountains. I’ve seen photos of it in spring and it is as prettier than a Hallmark greeting card.
(Note: in one of the above photos, you can see a red flag with the yellow 16-pointed star of Alexander, this was the first flag of Macedonia ('92-95), but created so much controversy with Greece that they modified it to the current flag. I'll post a photo of the current flag in another post soon).
Also, classes start up again on Monday the 23rd, wish me luck!
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