Over the hills and into the woods

Well Spring is in full swing here.  With a week's worth of warm weather under our belt Strumica truly has emerged from it's winter hibernation, and I've been the busiest since my arrival.

-Over the hills.

I was able to connect with a group of trekkers/hikers/ultra-marathoners (call them what you will) who invited me to join them on one of their training trail runs in the mountains.  I accepted the invite (ego and age can be a hazardous combination), and set off at 4am last Saturday to see if I could keep up.  After catching a bus to Shtip and then catching a ride to Veles, the team got dropped off at the starting point near the village of Kamen Dol.  Only 23 miles and 5,740 feet of elevation change later we made it to our finish, all in one piece.

• The route profile:

• The team:

-Into the woods.

This past Saturday was a little less strenuous physically but no less mentally.  I, with a barrel of assistance from some high school students, hosted a regional spelling bee qualifier for the National Spelling Bee in Skopje.  For 3 hours Saturday we ran students from 5th-8th grade through a spelling bee gauntlet, and mercy was for the weak.  Of the ~45 students that participated, 11 qualified for the National Spelling Bee, that means they went through 10 rounds of getting 1 chance to spell an English word correctly in front of a room of peers, teachers, and 2 Americans.  One mistake and they were eliminated.  Needless to say, I was very impressed - but I also hope to never host another spelling bee for the reason that telling the students that they had misspelled a word and were disqualified was a new, miserable experience.  Teachers, I have a whole new respect for you.