Believe it or not, in between the weekend adventures of mountain biking and Adriatic coastal adventures is a day to day, 8 to 6 followed by my usual string of evening activities to recreate somewhat of a normal life. So what does this mean?
Well first off I'm in the process of trying to become a farmer, a Herder, a breeder, a wood smith and a recycling expert all under the guise of marketing and trade linkages. My position at my new job is Team Leader, aka Competitiveness Specialist who is tasked with finding the markets and buyers for many of my organizations clients in these aforementioned areas. As anyone who has ever marketed or sold anything, one must be an expert (or a believer) in the products and clients they are to represent. So, after just a month, I have spent 60% of my time in the field with my staff traveling all over the country (and region) meeting and learning about all these new lines of business. Aside from learning about bull semen samples, proper pasteurizing techniques for sheep's milk or the acidity rate required to properly harvesting apples it's just like you standard 9-5 right.
And surprisingly, this is the easy part of my job. The challenge really begin with some massive barriers we must overcome which include the fact that almost nothing produced in Kosovo is certified to enter Western or EU markets. There are almost no labs, laws or enforcement of any type of quality control in any industry that would make Kosovo products competitive in the region (or even domestically against some of the imported products). Not to mention the temporary government of UNMIK has created laws that levy both a customs and VAT tax on input supply products needed by some of our clients whereas a competitors completed product can easily cross the border (legally or not) with almost no tax what-so-ever. So lets compound this with the fact that this place was until the fall of Yugoslavia a socialist economy more recently repressed by the last Balkan war of 1999 which destroyed most the properties, factories, livestock, crops and families.
But not their spirits. Every client I have met and villager in the streets wants to rebuild their country and they are willing to take a risk. With unemployment officially around 65% and many families living on less than 200 euros/month, they have allot to lose but in the long term much more to gain. I have the pleasure/challenge to have both a Serb and Albanian work for me and fortunately they get on well despite the traditional hatred across these ethnic lines. As safe as Pristina feels there are still cells around the country much closer to strife thus the strong presence still of KFOR, the NATO peace keeping force out here. It has become common day occurrences to see convoys of tanks, personnel carriers and supply trucks traveling all across the country particularly causing traffic jams throughout the city.
Unfortunately, each client meeting involves the boss passing out cigarettes to everyone, a strong Turkish coffee and usually no open ventilation while they chain smoke throughout the entire encounter. I am usually running for the door gasping for some fresh air before the meeting ends. I'm told the clubs and restaurants will be much the same as everyone holes up for the winter:-(
So all and all the job is quite exciting, challenging, frustrating and rewarding all at the same time. After hours, I have decided to give it a go learning the very difficult language of Albanian so I have two class lessons a week and will be hiring a tutor for the weekends I am in town. The word has also spread among internationals that I am teaching yoga at the UN once a week now. Only done one beginner class but sounds like many more will be coming over the winter months. As for cooking, not as much as I used to do. Even though my stuff finally arrived it costs less than $10 to eat a full meal out and a much more social way of spending personal time so I tend to opt for this. I will blog later with more of the subtle cultural submersion I am trying to experience so stay tuned...
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