MustardSeedKosovo

May Newsletter

2011-05-09T17:08:00.002+02:00

We sent out our May newsletter via email. If you did not receive it and would like to, please send Landon or Lacey an email asking for the newsletter. Sorry if we missed you!

Our best,
Landon & Lacey

Part II: Two More Videos for our "Video-Stream"

2011-02-09T07:05:00.001+01:00

Lacey's "Inspiration-Stream" from Landon Yoder on Vimeo.

Life at Sweet Bean Coffeehouse from Lacey Yoder on Vimeo.

February Update

2011-02-08T20:46:00.004+01:00

We are sending this month's update in Newsletter form again, directly to your email inbox. Please let us know if you did not receive the letter.

We will use our blog to share a few videos and photos from the past month.

Landon's Shave from Riki from Lacey Yoder on Vimeo.

Photos and Videos to Accompany January 2011 Newsletter: Part III

2011-01-08T13:49:00.003+01:00

And finally, the video of us caroling on "Main Street" on Christmas Eve:

Photos and Videos to Accompany January 2011 Newsletter: Part II

2011-01-08T10:49:00.012+01:00

A few photos since September 2010:

Lacey chatting with Monica

Christmas Eve party at Sweet Bean

Loaf of Artisan Bread from Sweet Bean

A November visit to Camp Bondsteel

Sweet Bean catered for a student Art Show

Sweet Bean's display case

Lumi i Bardhë River in Rugova Gorge

"Death by Chocolate" New Year's Cake

SB employees on local business tour

"Italian Breakfast" with homemade croissants

The beautiful fire in our woodstove

Our first big snow in December

A Canadian family visits Peja and joins us
for brunch at SB on Sunday morning

Photos and Videos to Accompany January 2011 Newsletter: Part I

2011-01-08T08:59:00.009+01:00

In this post we offer you a photo diary (plus two videos) to accompany a newsletter that you should receive by email. If you did not receive the January 2011 newsletter by email and would like to, please email Landon or Lacey.

Because of the size of the videos, we will upload the videos separately, then include all the photos together in a final post.

New Year 2011 at the Pyles':

Back in Kosovo

2010-09-20T14:27:00.005+02:00

It has been about 10 days since we arrived back in Kosovo. Though we miss our friends and family in the States, we are very happy to be back to work in Peja.

The smell of ajvar floats through the air, a crisp wetness settles in, the sound of children walking to school surrounds us each morning, and the leaves begin their colorful retreat to hibernation. The Kosovan Fall is a spectacular sensory experience.

Since our return, we have met with most of our Sweet Bean employees to reconnect after our furlough. We are very proud of how our entire staff solved business challenges while we were away this summer. A few quiet afternoons last week gave us the opportunity to debrief the summer with our three managers and discuss the important role that a manager plays in guiding the entire staff toward our “golden moment,” the moment in time when a customer is standing at the display case to see if any of the baked goods strikes his or her fancy. This moment is the moment on which Sweet Bean’s survival depends—and the manager’s job is to bring all the multi-sensory components of the bakery together to make that moment a success (for us, to make a sale; for the customer, to satisfy). Our managers have grown in their effectiveness even since we’ve returned, and we are looking forward to a fruitful semester with them as our drivers.

Lacey has been back to experimenting with new products, streamlining operations, and pioneering new revenue streams. Since we’ve been back, she has tried out a few recipes from the Tartine bakery cookbook (croissants, lemon bars, apple squares, chocolate squares, gingerbread); Beautiful Breads, Fabulous Fillings by Margaux Sky (goat cheese and ajvar wrapped bread); and her favorite blogs (cinnamon raisin bagels, spiced cider, coconut cake balls). The croissants, apple squares, gingerbread, and wrap bread will likely make it onto our regular menu.

Our work at Qendra Qiriazi is also evolving this month. Our colleague, Joanna, will soon return permanently to the States after 3+ years in Kosovo. We will miss her joyful, enthusiastic spirit and natural ability to connect with high school students in Peja. In her absence, we will continue Qiriazi’s weekly leadership club, which plans and executes a bi-annual community service project. We are also collaborating with another colleague to expand Qiriazi’s work with university students in Prishtina, the capital city. Landon will continue as the Acting Director of Qiriazi. In all, we sense that our work with Qiriazi will be more focused on leadership training in the next season. We look forward to developing original, simulation-based leadership curriculum in the Albanian language and training high school and university students with that curriculum.

On a personal front, we are both exploring potential Master’s programs in the States and in Europe. We would begin a program as early as Fall 2011 and are discerning how that would play into our work in Kosovo.

We wish you all a bountiful and peaceful Fall, wherever you may spend it.

Servant Leadership Camps, July 2010

2010-07-31T18:52:00.022+02:00

First off, HELP! Are you notified whenever we update this blog? Please comment below or email l c y a l i a s @ m a c . c o m (remove the spaces) to let us know what you've though of this blog over the last year. Your feedback will help us blog better.

Servant Leadership Camp If you've been reading our blog long enough, this entry will look familiar: we have completed another pair of leadership camps. Although the format and location were the same as past years', the combination of staff and students makes each camp unique and dynamic. These camps were our last projects before returning to the US for a wedding and some R&R. Landon's Dad, Mom and youngest brother came to visit and to staff the second camp. All three of them contributed majorly to that camp's success, and hit it off great with the students.
A bonus sessions with Darko, HS camp speaker. The students were hungry to learn and attended 4 bonus lectures in their free time.	Darko fields a question. It's a good sign when teenagers are awake - not to mention asking questions - at the end of a lecture!	We use lots of games (some physical!) to make the leadership and life lessons experiential and memorable!
Landon's dad, Tom, was speaker at the second camp, which was for for University students.	In both camps, students belonged to "teams" to discuss lecture themes, applying them personally.	University students are in red and camp staff are in blue, including 4 student-translators.
The Qiriazi Center has held camps at the same mountain-lodge for over 5 years in a row, and their staff really enjoy serving us.	This game of rugby/football on the mountaintop was short but fun because nobody knew the rules.	Tom takes in the view up high, while teams meet below.

Photo Diary - Spring 2010

2010-05-11T10:09:00.062+02:00

Please scroll down to view photos. For some reason, Blogger is putting a large space in the intro.

We hope you enjoy this selection pictures from March-May! Lacey's folks came and visited us in early April. They listened to us a lot, worked a lot, and brought a lot of encouragement. SweetBean is stabilizing and maturing in many small ways as a business. Friendships on the team are also deepening. High School students remain actively involved in the Qiriazi Center for servant leadership development. The pictures below give a glimpse into these three main areas of our life.
Touring the Serbian Orthodox monastery in Peja for the first time, obligatory NATO security pass in-hand	Reviewing a new cake order form during the weekly staff meeting.	Sweet Bean staff picture: employees pose as servers, cooks, and accountants, some of the duties they all perform.
Homemade Strawberry Lemonade	Saturday morning Cinnamon Rolls	Banana Chocolate-Chunk Muffin
Wall around the Serbian Orthodox Monastery: ethnic Albanians on the outside, Serbian nuns on the inside, and Italian troops (notice watch tower) to keep them apart.	Strolling into the famous Rugova Gorge, discussing life.	John and Cee Jaye during a power outage. They got to see a lot of them in one week, and almost stopped noticing them.
Below: This spring the Qiriazi Center servant leadership club organized a basketball tournament as a service project.
Students and a ref prepare the court one morning before game time.	Full of students, especially for the final. Sports are played a lot here, but not formally, so this was a shot at big-time bragging rights.	Qiriazi Center students registered teams, arranged logistics, recruited sponsors, and kept score.

March Update

2010-03-14T15:04:00.018+01:00

Hi again, we're back! Several incredible months have passed since our last entry! You probably know bits about what has been happening (Facebook, Skype, emails, etc.) so this will be a general update.

Sweet Bean | American Coffeehouse is bringing elegance, education and inspiration to Peja

Since Day 2 of business (Jan 5), SB has been financially profitable. Sometime later this year it will probably make-up the start-up investment and be able to expand or fund other projects. Its impact on people has also been great. Employees have opportunities and responsibilities that none of their peers have; members of the community are delighted with the smoke-free alternative to the regular Peja coffee shops! (It's the only one in Kosovo to our knowledge.) People (us too!) are challenged every day to rethink matters of business, integrity, faith, and conformity to society.

Business burst to a start, so we have grown the staff from 6 to 8 half-time workers (with one resignation and one firing in the meantime). In Jan-Mar, we been working 75 hours a week (Mon-Sat) to stay on top of the wave. (We did take one extended weekend in February to relax and get supplies in Thessaloniki, Greece.)

We look forward to closely managing the business for several more months. Once it is stable, we may open the position of "store manager" to someone here who would be ready for it.

We're embedded deeper here than most people expect foreigners to be. Customers, suppliers, the landlord, municipal officials - perhaps most of all, employees and their families - are surprised and curious at the way we've taken a stake in their community. (They reckon Peja is pretty enough to eventually be a tourist destination, it doesn't make sense that we've live here now.) Selling school kids hot chocolate to-go is quite a spectacle, but people like it. And we've made a lot of friends and customers who want something outside the distinct Peja "box".

Meeting practical needs and sharing the work week with locals is an approach we're really enjoying. They've been alongside us during good and bad surprises with the business. They've shared the triumphs of creating something that the market loves. They've seen us discipline and discharge staff members. And they've seen us at the end of our rope when we're off-script and on the verge of tears. In all of this they can no doubt see evidence of a loving God in our lives, and we haven't hesitated introduce them to Him.

In January a local cable TV crew broadcast a 20 min. show about Sweet Bean. Half of the show was an interview with Landon, which allowed us to explain the business/training combination and clarify that the Yoders are not profiting from the business.

Lacey has invented and/or borrowed recipes to make everything from scratch from locally available ingredients. On average per week SB sells about: 180 muffins, 170 cookies, 260 peanut butter fingers (in-house creation), 120 hot chocolates, 80 espresso/macchiatos/cappuccino drinks, among other products.

1. A (foreign) customer enjoys WiFi and apple pie

2-3. The TeleNet crew getting footage for the SweetBean promotional broadcast.

(Thanks Emily Harrison for the last three pictures!)
4-9. Assorted scenes from the cafe. It's less awkward to photograph the kids than adult customers!

Qendra Qiriazi

We have continued to serve with the Qiriazi Center, mostly in the evenings and on two Saturdays a month. Lacey and an American colleague teach a small English class on Tuesdays and they host a girls' night on Wednesdays. Landon and the American colleagues are leading a spring run of the "Leadership Club" which is about helping the students plan and stage a community service project. (They did an anti-smoking campaign for their high school last fall, and this spring This spring they're planning community basketball tournament.)

We are beginning to arrange for the two summer camps (high school and university) that are the high point of the Qiriazi calendar. The location and most of the format will be the same as last year. However, we are inviting new speakers and plan to accept a number of first-time applicants.

Would you be interested in visiting us in June or July to help serve these students? We are looking for several more camp trainers who would befriend and help train the participants. Please let us know if you are interested in this opportunity. We would love to share more detail with you.

Everyday Life

We finally took down our Christmas tree and decorations last week. Somehow we went blind to them until mid-February, and then continued tolerating them for another month. Work has certainly made the time fly.

Electricity was great most of the winter but took a downturn in the last month. Most recently it's been off twice a day for 2 hours. The hard part both for business and personal is the suspense of now knowing when those two two-hour blocks will come. Our emotional state can definitely rise and fall with the light! It does make us better at problem-solving though, because we always need a back-up plan.

Lacey has been mostly able to maintain her jogging throughout the winter, some indoors and some outdoors. Lately, the girls who work at Sweet Bean have met her early on Sunday morning for jog into the mountain pass. They have good heart-to-heart conversations (sometimes in Albanian!), and then talk about their sore muscles the next couple of days at work.

Thank you to all of you who are giving and praying in support of our work here! We miss our friends and family! We do enjoy staying touch with you through some form of social media or another no matter how short the messages may be!

Life just doesn’t hold still!

2009-12-10T07:45:00.020+01:00

So much seems to have happened in the last several weeks! In slow moments we pinch ourselves and wonder how we got to be so involved in a country worlds away from home. Yes, the anticipated 6-month period of culture stress arrived, but we have always remained grateful to be here! (Photo: overnight snowfall)

Our Thanksgiving was great, complete with two turkey feasts and American friends! E. Coli apparently hit us for the next week, though. The long hours in bed put us behind on several plans but also gave us a needed reminder that we are finite and depend on an infinite God.

Landon’s Grandpa Hochstetler passed away on Dec 4. His health was in decline and he was due to start dialysis soon. Thankfully we spent some quality time together this spring before we moved. His passing brought a mix of peace, pride and nostalgia. We're so grateful for Skype!

Kokërr e Ëmbël (Sweet Bean), our bakery, is progressing toward the target opening date of January 4. We have hired 6 students from 25 applicants. A visit to IKEA in Greece earlier this month gave us a huge boost in equipment/supplies/furnishings. Please remember our staff training next week in prayer. Challenging and enabling the employees is the whole point of this shop. We’ve already met disappointments preparing for that, but it’s one “hill” we’re willing to “die on”.

Amidst all the above, our Leadership Club conducted an anti-smoking campaign at the high school this week. This project was selected, planned and executed by club members (with coaching from us). The centerpiece of their effort is a 9-minute documentary that we showed several times every day. A little over 600 students have viewed it so far.

Considering the kind of shortages/challenges in their lives, we're all proud as our students look with satisfaction on project that they ran from conception to execution. The process has brought us lots of “teachable moments” about leadership, character and faith. And non-smoking is a great cause in a country where one in three smoke!

Highlight: after one showing in the high school, the first guy to stand up during Q&A muttered an expletive and lit his pack of Marlboro's on fire so everyone could see he was serious about quitting! Afterward he stayed behind to tell us he appreciated the help meant what he said.
A. B. C.
D. E.
A. Introducing a showing at the Qiriazi Center to students off the street. B. Inviting passers-by to come in to the Qiriazi Center and watch the show. C. Club members on duty between showings at high school. D. The documentary projected on the wall of a classroom. E.The guy who was so persuaded he spontaneously burned his pack of cigarettes.

Landon spends time almost every evening practicing his hobby of fire-tending. The wood stove may be dirty, but it’s sure warm and a great way to unwind me after a long day!

An American Coffeehouse for Entrepreneurship Training

2009-11-04T18:45:00.000+01:00

An American Coffeehouse and Business Training Lab for Peja!

Next month we are launching an American coffeehouse with a built-in leadership training program for youth. Name: "Kokërr e Ëmbël," or "Sweet Bean." While it will be registered and run as a for-profit, it will give employees/trainees a practical understanding of how businesses are started and operated, specifically in Kosovo. The Kokërr e Ëmbël program is intended to demystify the business-creation process for young Kosovars, empowering them to launch (preferably value-creating) ventures of their own.

Banner translation: Coming in January 2010. Sweet Bean: American Coffeehouse for entrepreneurship training

The Specifics
Each semester we will hire new students to staff the coffeehouse part-time. As employees they will have significant responsibility for management, accounting, marketing, and daily operations in the café; as trainees they will also receive about 20 hours of explanation and training in business from the Yoders and others. As each semester ends we’ll hire new staff and start over!

The Strategy
Like Qendra Qiriazi (where we also work), the mission of the coffeehouse is to enable local young people to tackle challenges in their society. Qiriazi has the capacity to train large numbers of students but the coffeehouse aims to deeply influence 5-8 students per semester. The coffeehouse's goal of empowerment focuses narrowly on honest entrepreneurship skills. We are facing near-50% unemployment and corrupt hiring and admissions practices. (College graduates spend an average of 10 years between school and full-time employment.)

If successful, the bakery will grow in the next year into an “entrepreneurship laboratory” that funds itself and possibly even other organizations. Some call this double-bottom-line business or social entrepreneurship. We call it a wild ride!

The planning stage truly ended, and the start-up was born in early October. Since then we have:

Contracted to rent the property (pictured below)
Obtained the services of a lawyer, secured a business license and tax ID number
Coordinated with friends who can contribute a lot with design and product development
Distributed 30 of 60 applications with schools and individuals
Researched and started to formulate a "training-through-work" curriculum for employees
Recruited people from the community to teach some employee training sessions
Shopped (many hours!) for all kinds of supplies; made a host of contacts

Storefront with banners.

We hope to serve you here at Kokërr e Ëmbël in the not-so-distant future.

Home From a Break, Qiriazi in Full Swing

2009-10-20T21:26:00.008+02:00

Back Home from Greece
In the last week of September and early October we took a wonderful getaway to Greece to meet Lacey’s folks. Getting there involved several modes of transportation and travel through countries that are unfriendly with each other. But the company and weather in Greece were more than worth the effort! We made fantastic memories, but were still glad to get home to the people and work in Peja.

Winter rolled into town on Wednesday, sort of rushing fall a bit. There’s snow on the mountains and elsewhere in Kosovo. So far, however, Peja has only had heavy drizzling for a few days straight.

Qiriazi Update: Leadership Club, English, Ladies Night, & Social Events All Ongoing

Students have been attending the Leadership Club consistently and seriously! This past week they choose as their semester project an activity proposal that some students drafted at summer camp: an anti-smoking campaign targeting the Peja general high school. (There are separate high schools here for different career tracks. Qiriazi has and continues to work most with the “general” school that is viewed as the more competitive one.)

We’ve also found a rhythm for English classes. Between 5-10 students come, and we usually teach a stand-alone lesson that doesn’t build on the previous weeks.

These regular activities (plus coffee appointments) bring us together with several specific students multiple times each week. In small ways, they often demonstrate that they’re learning and growing through our activities. That's inspiring! Last weekend we held a Scottish dance evening with help from a Scottish friend here. It was our friend's first exposure to our students (at least in a while) and it was our students' first exposure to Scottish dancing. He took care to teach not only the steps but also the ways of "chivalry." Since then he's been singing the students' praises for their teachability and overall maturity - much different than many of their peers'. Encouragement like that helps us remember what we're working toward.

1 2 3

1. Leadership Club students explore principles of time management by "making it all fit" into a glass jar. 2. Snow over the mountains. 3. Strong attendance even though it gets dark during Club meetings (notice how coats are even worn inside during winter!).

Leadership Club, Prishtaina, & Treasure Hunt

2009-09-23T21:05:00.001+02:00

Leadership Club Kicks Off

At the Qiriazi Center we try to mimic a good science class: plenty of conceptual instruction as well as safe laboratory practice. The Leadership Club is the single biggest "lab" activity on our calendar, and it started last Thursday evening.

Fifteen students (a good crowd) came, and we pitched the club to them as a great opportunity for anyone who is willing to seriously commit for the 12 weeks. Throughout the course we'll have a combination of hands-on lessons (like simulations and games) and sessions for them to lead their own service project. The Qiriazi Center will provide €200 toward the project, but it's up to them to agree upon, plan, research, organize troubleshoot, and seek outside support if it is needed. Last year the Leadership Club organized a soccer tournament for high school students.

Opportunities like this are surprisingly rare for students here. Schools offer no extracurricular activities. There are very few club sports, and nothing like the boy scouts, summer camp, shop class or cooking class. Just this afternoon we explained the vision to a student's dad, and he liked the idea so much that he offered to pitch in €50 to the project budget. We're excited by the possibilities for solid outcomes and growth in the students.

Business Trip to Prishtina

Before dawn on Friday morning, we boarded the train to Prishtina. We hoped and intended to pick up Qiriazi's certificate of registration that our colleagues applied for in May. Unfortunately the individual we dealt with was unwilling to grant it even though we had a very deserving application. Imagine trying to get work done at a DMV where the documentation requirements are not in writing and there is no guarantee that the staff even want you to succeed. Hopefully the end to that process is not far away.

We still had a good productive with an American colleague as well as several Kosovar university students who participated in the summer programs. In recent weeks, Prishtina has seen street protests against the foreign government and military missions that still chaperon Kosovo's government. Those who feel strongly about self determination feel that specific actions by the EU mission have violated Kosovo's sovereignty. This hasn't affected us in the least, but it's another aspect of the country we make a point of watching and understanding.

Train: Kosovo Railways is a much better alternative to the bus!

National Library: walking with a student through the (unmaintained) "park," which is also the the campus of Prishtina University.

Demonstration: a traditional (rural?) man demonstrating for Kosovo's sovereignty. Note how the library's domes were made to resemble the man's traditional wool hat. Photo by: Labinot Ibërdemaj, http://www.flickr.com/photos/labinotiberdemaj/1395038688/

Treasure Hunt for Students

Lastly, here are some pictures of the Saturday Treasure Hunt that was postponed two weeks ago. It was the first one most of them had ever done, and they enjoyed it a lot! It even gave an opportunity for the facilitators (us) to ask the students how tactics and choices they made might translate into leadership practices in "real life."

English, Games, & "Cotton" Anniversary

2009-09-14T10:44:00.010+02:00

ESL Update
The future of our English class that began two weeks ago is still uncertain, after another week of low attendance. We suspect that the Iftar dinner (when devout Muslim break their daily Ramadan fast) makes it difficult for interested students to actually come. Lacey continues to meet with one particularly devoted student for practice at a local cafe. Their meetings usually include conversation, review of written exercises from the prior week, and mentoring toward her academic and career goals. We've conceded that we might need to re-invent the course throughout the semester, and allow students to join based on their availability and proficiency levels. While English is a professional necessity for young Kosovars, it is just one of several leadership capacities that Qendra Qiriazi cultivates, so we are trying to continue ahead on those other areas.

Anniversary
On Wednesday (9/9/09) we celebrated our second ("cotton") wedding anniversary. We are so grateful to have one another as soulmates, companions and colleagues! Thanks to everyone who sent congratulations warm wishes.

Since we're planning a vacation to Greece later this month, we kept our celebration low key. We got dinner reservations at the only restaurant in town with a rotating rooftop cafe, which turned out to be funny because all of the other tables were empty.The waitstaff seemed torn between accommodating us and watching a real-life romantic dinner unfolding before their eyes!

Another interesting anniversary: on 9/9/99 I (Landon) visited Kosovo for the first time with my dad, to begin post-war reconstruction. On that visit we spent about 4 hours in Peja, at a landmine safety training that we still remember because of the colorful Danish official who led it and the disarmed landmines they showed us as cautionary examples. Who knew we would be living here a decade later?

Qiriazi Social Event
On Sat. Qendra Qiriazi (we) hosted an afternoon of games instead of a previously scheduled city-wide treasure. Surprisingly, 20 students came in spite of the rain and had a great time.

We're all looking forward to the treasure hunt next weekend (probably a first for . Besides being fun, it is an opportunity to apply the life skills of teamwork and problem solving and managing self-consciousness while doing something unusual in public!

English Class Rough Takeoff, Mountain Leadership Adventure

2009-09-07T09:28:00.016+02:00

English Class: Rough Takeoff But Flying
After two weeks of advertising around town and on Facebook, we had about 20 RSVP's for our first English class on Tue. evening. Lacey worked for weeks to prepare 14 lessons, rich with content and activities, and as 5:45 approached we printed a dozen handouts and setup the center for class.

Only 3.5 students showed up. (The age bracket was 15-25, which is why we only count 0.5 for the 11-year-old boy. He was only there because his dad asked for an exception for his son who was "fourteen years old".)

In spite of the initial disappointment, we went ahead and taught a stellar lesson to the little class. We met the next day with the guys and gals (separately) over coffee for conversation practice. On the way saw several of the other students who had RSVP'd, and they innocently asked, "You mean class started yesterday? But I can still come, right?" Sigh. Sadly, the whole experience is more the rule than the exception with work here. Despite high ideals, planning, and keeping one's word are rare at every level of business and government here, so we continue to train our students and try to account for that lag as we plan events.
(No pictures of class this week because the scene of two teachers and 4 students was too pitiful. : )

Leadership Camp "Mountain Adventure... before summer disappears!"
On Fri. we took a group of high school and college students up to a camp in the mountains for an overnight getaway and leadership training. To save space, we'll summarize it in bullets:

28 students RSVP'd, still only 18 came (and we even confirmed w/ each one!)
Fee €5 to offset transport, and three meals
Transport: 3 off-road vehicles
2 students sent home early Sat. morning for defying the rules overnight
Lacey woke up at 3:30 am to cook so two devout Muslim guys could one last meal before the Ramadan fast at sunrise.
Chaperons: L&L, Mark (Prishtina based), Jonathan & Clare (from Wales, who happened to be at camp and blended wonderfully into our group!)

On Sat. morning we led an hour-long simulation about leadership, debriefed the students, and elaborated on themes with a short lecture. It was so good and gratifying that it (almost) made us forget the conflict and three hours of sleep the night before.
1. 2.
3. 4.
1. Measuring their success on the 6 puzzles they were assigned in Round 1 of the simulation. 2.Lacey and Kimber in the kitchen. The camp is under construction and has nice balance of comfort and "rustic." 3. Loading the "Chelsea Tractor" (Land Rover) that we rented. 4. Artan receives a chorus similar to "Here Comes the Bride" while serving the other students coffee on a tray (Albanian men often take pride in their lack of domestic skills, which are handled by their mom or "bride").

The theme of the morning was that leading in peacetime can be trickier than leading during conflict. We helped the students recognize that they are the first generation of Kosovars in centuries to be building their society without a hostile occupier who is trying to thwart their efforts. Their parents' stories of organized resistance are heroic, but Kosovars today need new creativity and character to lead a society exhibiting serious symptoms of apathy, corruption, rivalry and passivity.

The simulation seemed to effectively deliver the principle at an intuitive level. The students listened with wide-eyed seriousness when we later explained that it represented the narrative of their history.

Preachin', B&B and Disgruntled Customers

2009-09-01T11:30:00.001+02:00

Preachin'
Landon spoke yesterday - in Albanian - at the local church we attend. This wasn't part of our Qiriazi job description, but it was an opportunity to contribute to a group that we appreciate and wish to succeed. I (Landon) talked for an hour about the role of "doing good" in Christianity. The topic is loaded because many here polarize between rigid religious requirements and "being good" independent of religion. Recently, for example, a friend let me know that Christians, in his view, have an "easier religion than his" because we have loose rules and few rituals to perform. Elsewhere, another acquaintance boasted about his own view that, "this world has only two types of people: good and bad," and religious conviction is not what determines that. On Sunday we started from those two views and looked at Christ's unique teaching that the moral standards are completely out of human reach, yet because of grace we can be in perfect standing with God and thus practice "doing good" out of gratitude and love.

The L&L B&B
Last night two ladies came to stay at our home for about two weeks. They aren't our first overnight guests, but we pushed hard this week to finish some painting and furnishing projects to get ready! One lady is Albanian-American and the other is American. They're moving to Peja to work with an organization that focuses on educating some of the poorer Albanian and Roma population. Lacey has seized the opportunity to test drive her dream of running a guesthouse!
Sunshine-golden paint, framed pictures, and new light fixtures in our hallway.

Real Estate (Disgruntled Customers)
We've also helped for a few hours this week at a real estate office, which is owned by a friend who is currently in the US. The local staff have taught us some good things about customer relations and professionalism in this culture. Unfortunately, one of our go-to tasks (especially Landon's) is to handle hard-to-please, agitated customers. It's certainly not easy, but is a valuable learning opportunity! Overall, we really enjoy being part of their honest productivity in this society where half of the workforce is unemployed and many deal in the black/gray-market.

Krijesa e Re real estate in the bottom-left storefront.

ESL, Count of Montenegro, & Boy Injured in River

2009-08-22T22:21:00.019+02:00

Advertising for Fall English Course
We're just about one week away from the kick-off of Qendra Qiriazi's fall programs. Next Tue. evening our English language (ESL) class for beginners will meet for the first time in the semester. Lacey is spearheading the course, and has put in long hours recently compiling the curriculum and creating marketing material. Practically, ESL is a gateway that brings young folks from all over town into relationship with the Qendra Qiriazi staff and students and into familiarity with servant leadership, the core of our vision. And English also happens to be a vital professional skill, that we happen to know very well! Below are the two posters we made and hung, with help from students, around town.

The Count of Montenegro
On Wed.-Fri. of last week we visited Kosovo's three-year-old neighbor to the West, Montenegro. Our current status in Kosovo is something like "non-resident alien" which means that after 90 consecutive days we need to exit and re-enter the country. Much of the trip was experimental, and we came away wiser, glad to be in Kosovo, but still glad we went!

We took a bus from the Peja station and transferred in Podgorica. Even though the journey was only 70 miles, it took us nearly 7 hours of twisting through the rocky mountainous terrain. Ugh. Thankfully the buses had AC and the roads were reasonably smooth.

In our destination city of Budva, we stayed with a local Montenegrin-Serbian lady that we met at the bus station there. (It's common for locals in Adriatic tourist towns to offer tourists a sort of "bed & breakfast" at cheap prices, and we wanted to try it out!) Lubica was a nice lady who spoke a lot of broken English. For no extra charge at "check in," she read both of our fortunes from our passport numbers... both of us are very lucky. She told us "Saturn is my boss" and we answered that, "God is our boss, and we read his thoughts in the Bible, not in the stars."

Budva is pretty enough to have a calendar made about it, but our trip was nearly ruined by the crush of hedonistic tourists. The highlight of the trip was getting 6 lbs. of fresh figs - Lacey's favorite - and getting her first haircut since moving here! There was also a great beach with rock formations to climb on, sand for laying out and cold, blue-green water for cooling off.

(L) Picture borrowed from: Flickr.com/photos/shrubin . (R) Sunrise over inland Montenegro on the return trip.

Boy in the River with Bleeding Foot
An odd thing happened Sat. afternoon that touched our hearts and seemed to bear spiritual meaning. A small crowd of kids on the bridge (pictured) was pointing and yelling toward the water at a little kid who had cut his foot. As the boy cried and his blood colored the rocks, several adults and kids yelled how he should walk toward the banks so they could help him. Within moments though, most of them would throw up their hands and curse the boy for stupidity because he just kept crying, "It hurts, it hurts!"

The crowd wavered between scorn and pity. I (Landon) stood there facing an ultimatum between the ice cream in my hand and the boy bleeding in the water. Before long, another boy climbed down to help him through the water and over the gravel to the bank, where I lifted him out. I then climbed down to get the the clothes he had left behind, but by the time I was up, the the police had taken him to the hospital. I had to leave them with some homeless Roma guys who seemed to know the boy (possibly a consequence of my lingering too long over the ice cream).

It was a picture of how stuck we can get ourselves in life and of the need for a gracious rescuer. It also reinforced in our minds that the most important event in our day might not be on on our calendars ahead of time!

Last Weeks of Summer, Ramadan On The Way

2009-08-17T11:16:00.010+02:00

Qiriazi Center
Last Tuesday we offered a workshop for students on the basics of applying to American colleges. In a sense the workshop was at their request. A recent U.N. survey found that 44% of young Kosovars (we would have guessed a higher) intend to leave Kosovo to live somewhere else. That outlook on life combined with the troubled higher education system here, explains why many students have asked us for help getting into US schools.

Since we're not experts on US student visa policy, we stuck to the topics we understand quite well from recent personal experience. We tried to help the students brace for the multitude of decisions they'll have to make in system made up of nearly 7,000 colleges that are all trying to find good students and also make a buck. Our aim was to enable the students to use key terms like admissions, tuition, financial aid, merit/need-basis, major, int'l student programs, etc. to navigate college websites so that they can begin making these decisions.

Social Time with Locals & Expatriates
This week we had significant social times with both Kosovars and fellow foreigners. We visited the home of one of our students on Wed. morning and spent nearly 3 hours conversing with his parents and eating various treats they prepared for us. We especially enjoyed discussing his father's stories about leading underground education and social welfare programs in the 1990s when Kosovar Albanians were heavily and violently repressed.

On Thur. evening we had a picnic in the mountains at a camp that some friends are building. We spent the night in tents, and the next morning pitched a few hours with the ambitious construction work that was underway.

Ramadan Begins this Week
Sometime late this week (depending on when the waning moon is sighted) the Islamic month of Ramadan begins. Kosovo's many Muslims will join Muslims worldwide in observing this month with fasting during daylight hours, practicing charity toward the poor, and seeking spiritual purification through prayers and and meditation on the Quran. We anticipate that during this month folks may be less active and less patient during the daily fast, and that there will be an indulgent, celebratory atmosphere in the evenings. We will also probably have a lot of conversations about the tenets of Islam and how these compare with the tenets of Christianity.

Everyday Life
We made two noteworthy purchases this week: last Sun. we got houseplants, four of them, at a nursery outside of town. We're very proud to report that they are all alive and well 7 days later! The second surprising purchase was a pair of great hiking/snow boots for Landon for €5. They were on display in a shop in one of Peja's old Ottomon-feeling neighborhoods, but the shopkeeper told us he actually imported used/overstocked clothes from Germany. As they say, "the world is flat" even over here!

"Promotion," Swimming & Home Improvement

2009-08-08T12:04:00.005+02:00

"Promotion" - On Wednesday Dr. Mark Bryant, professor at a local private college and Qiriazi Center's director for the past year, returned home to the US. The end of his year here came fast, but there's no questioning the big strides forward that his students and the Qiriazi Center took during that time. Our board of directors planned for this day at a meeting in July; as Mark transitions to being a board member, I (Landon) am replacing him as the center's acting director. It is an exciting opportunity to oversee the Center's operations and continue growing its effectiveness in developing servant leaders!

The Uni. servant leadership camp staff, with Mark at bottom left.

Swimming - On Tuesday, Mark's last day, we spent the afternoon with some of our high school students at Peja's newest pool. For a €1.5 entry fee we got gorgeous views in every direction and a huge pool full of clean cold water, perfect for the August heat! The students almost spent the whole four hours we were there trying to dunk or push one another into the pool... but we did also manage to have some deep good conversation about faith/religion (and a bit of politics).

Home Improvement - We've also passed some milestones this week in home decor, and, in my opinion, crossed the threshold of homeyness, even though it's still in progress. We replaced two bare light bulbs in the hall with fixtures to match the golden color paint Lacey put up earlier in the month.

Today we fixed choc. chip cookies and had our landlord's family over for their first visit and so that they could take away their stuff that was filling our second bedroom. In Lacey's words "I just made some chocolate chip cookies using a bag of Nestle chocolate chips that another American left behind :) The butter here is a bit...farm-y and there is no brown sugar--but I think they are going to turn out well. Our landlord and his family are coming over, a bit to visit and a bit to move some of their things our of our second room...finally :), so we'll host them 'Albanian-style' with tons of snacks, sweets, coffee, and juice."

A rainbow at sunrise!

Yesterday (8/7) morning we got a sprinkle of rain at sunrise (around 6:45 - while Lacey was on her jog) and a rainbow! These pictures show the view from our balcony. The white minaret is the closest of several mosques that serenade us 5 times each day with their call to prayer.

Uni Camp Done Too! Post-Camp Excursion Was Today.

2009-08-01T21:14:00.011+02:00

Hi again everyone! We've officially crossed the hump in our summer schedule - both leadership camps now done.

In the last six weeks many visions and plans of work here have been replaced by actual experiences. And incredibly, the realities have almost all been more positive than the anticipations.

We're in a transitional stage now. Several of our coworkers - both temporary volunteers and permanent staff - are returning home to the US and we're both adopting some of their responsibilities. In planning for fall, we're looking to continue some of the Center's standing activities and also to expand its impact with new activities.

We'll leave it somewhat vague for now until we get more time for a detailed update. : )

Enjoy these pictures from our excursion to Mirusha Falls today with students who participated in the University camp!

Lacey jumps from the lowest waterfall (L), while our group watches from their rock perch (R).

Lacey walks the path to the first waterfall.

A group of sweet little troublemakers sidled up to Lacey when she offered them snacks. Later they escorted us back to our vehicles and helped us pick up the blanket of litter beside the path.

This is the rock face on one side of the lake (footpaths are hidden throughout). Large plastic pipes supply a waterwheel (bottom R) that generates power for a boom box and refrigerator at the concession stands down near where we sat.

A student and Landon both enjoying the technical solution. If only Kosovo could harness natural forces to get reliable power for the entire country!

A partial group picture.

High School Leadership Camp Complete!

2009-07-15T14:08:00.007+02:00

We did it! As you all know, leadership training is central to our vision for working in Kosovo, and the summer leadership camps traditionally are the pinnacle of the Leadership Center's calendar.

Last week fellow staff members, volunteers from the US, and a small team of students who completed the program led the 2009 program for High School students. It was hugely gratifying experience and it felt that we were as effective as we could have been in transferring the principles and passion for servant leadership. The students were visibly inspired by the new ideas, facts and skills! We're now working to enable and mentor them as they implement a style of leadership that contradicts the self-serving style of leadership that is pervasive here.

Preparation for the first camp involved a host of details -- lots of "to do" lists. Our colleague, Jo, oversaw most of the logistics and helped us pull off a variety of activities each day that all tied into one another and might have even looked effortless to the student participants. : ) Her experience and stability behind the scenes critical to the successful training!

Landon's role: I was dedicated to delivering presentations at the daily group sessions (Mon-Thur, no session during the half-day on Fri). The work on those sessions began several months ago with reading through various resources and notes on leadership that I've accumulated. Drawing upon observations and a survey of the students, we chose the themes: 1) What is Servant Leadership? 2) Leadership is a Lifestyle, Not a Position, 3) Leaders Practice Integrity and Transparency, and 4) Leaders Enable Others to Act. It was a fantastic feeling to present messages that were burning inside me and to feel that I'd done so effectively! With Lacey's help, I developed a lot of audio/visual elements to make the themes gripping and memorable.

I also provided the four team leaders with activities and journal questions to help them lead the students in taking ownership of the ideas in small groups. And for the final day, we planned a circuit of games/simulations called "The Big Game" for the teams to practice the themes under the stress of a competition.

Lacey's role: My job was to lead five students, the Green Team, in two or three team times each day. We began each morning with a fun team-building activity, followed by discussions and activities to introduce the daily leadership theme. Later after Landon's session, we would further discuss the themes, journal, and run other activities to help us re-teach the themes to whatever extent the students still needed. It was a thrill to personally engage with the students, challenging them and inspiring them to pursue a higher standard than most others in their community. Throughout the week we also developed a written plan for a service project in the city that the students could accomplish within 2 mos. and with a budget of 200 Euros. I had the pleasure of working during the whole week with a "Jr. Trainer" who was selected from among the program graduates and a translator who is currently in college.

Below are some pictures from the camp (click to enlarge).

We're spending this week regrouping because we will run the exact same camp next week for university students. We look forward to seeing what different group dynamics come with with this older participants who have already entered the adult world.

THANK YOU to all of those who are contributing to make our presence here possible! You should definitely share the feeling of accomplishment and excitement for the future of leadership in Kosovo. Please don't hesitate to contact us with any questions, or just to say "hi"!

L&L

Showtime for the Leadership Center

2009-07-03T07:09:00.009+02:00

On Monday the Leadership Center will begin the first of the two annual leadership camps. The one for high school students will happen on the second week of July, and the one for university students will follow in the fourth week of July.

These camps have usually been the biggest activity on the Center's calendar. Board members and several volunteers have come to Peja, which multiplies our capacity to cover the camp-related logistics and to develop student relationships.

Landon will be the speaker for all (4) group sessions at both the high school and university camps, so he has spent much of the last several weeks preparing. The daily themes are, "What is Servant Leadership?" "Leadership is a Lifestyle, Not a Position," "Leaders Practice Integrity and Transparency," and "Leaders Enable Others to Act."

Camp staff (Americans, local students who participated in the past, and translators) will support session lectures with an array of other activities designed to give students opportunities to digest and practice the themes:

Designing a work/service project
Videos
Small group discussion
Journal questions
Simulations
A "Big Game" competition, composed of several games that simulate the leadership themes of the camp

Lacey is helping to cover logistics for camp prep and pre-camp trainings, managing the Center's finances, designing graphics for slide shows and calendars to help the various types of staff members keep their roles straight, and more.

We are so excited to be offering a well-designed, high-quality training on such critical skills!
High School Camp Staff Training 7/2

Board and Staff Meeting (two members not pictured) 6/29

Now We Too Have Firewood

2009-06-22T17:26:00.011+02:00

Home Life

As of today we too now have firewood on our balcony, ready to dry over the summer and burn in the winter.
The plan was to meet our landlord at 9:30 am to go wood shopping together. We had collected a list of criteria and tips to get the best deal at the wood market:

1) get a combination of soft and hard woods (beech and oak)
2) measure to make sure it's actually a cubic meter
3) expect to pay in the mid €30's/cub. meter of wood
4) expect to pay €3/cub. meter to get it chopped and stacked at your house

Our good plans will have to stay in the file for another year though, because our landlord showed up at 8:30 am with both the wood and the mobile sawmill unit.

I (Landon) dashed to the ATM for cash to pay the guys and picked up some nylon sacks for hauling wood upstairs. When I came back, Lacey had just returned from her run and the wood had been chopped into foot-long sections. Another friend came shortly after that (9:30 am) and the four of us spent the next several hours bringing the wood up to our 4th floor balcony.

In the end we were all sweaty tired, but in good spirits. We had some good conversations with our landlord about the war and reconciliation with one's enemies. Halfway through the work he asked if we could make some coffee and take a break and we served him US style drip coffee, which choked down wishing it was turkish coffee.

The cost was quite a bit lower than we anticipated, and the opportunity to share a project with the landlord was great for our friendship.

Preparing for Winter Before Summer Even Starts

2009-06-19T15:05:00.005+02:00

Home Life

What kind of person would buy several cubic yards of firewood a week before summer begins? Just about every homeowner in Peja, Kosovo.

Huge piles of firewood deposited in front of people's homes were one of the first things that caught our eye when we came here. If you're the type of person who doesn't like winter, it's a scary sight. Winters so hard that people are preoccupied with it in late June? On the other hand, the piles of wood are also a thrilling sight, because they represent foresight, discipline, and planning, which are lacking elsewhere in society. It is common, for example, for people to think that they can skirt the consequences of other decisions such as ignoring utility bills, paying bribes, littering, and waiting for foreign investment to help their economy.

Nobody here suffers under the illusion that firewood can be bought at the last minute or with left-over money. Buying firewood after the family vacation could mean getting stuck with green (wet), expensive wood, and having too little money to afford it! The "principles of firewood" are going to be helpful in upcoming lectures and conversations on leadership!

On the advice of some wise friends, we're also filling our freezer with some produce that is in season right now. So far we've prepared several 4.5 pounds of spinach, 4.5 pounds of peaches, and 6.5 pounds of strawberries.

The firewood will be another blog entry sometime after next Tuesday... that's when we plan to take our landlord to the edge of town where the villagers bring their wagons full of wood. We'll bring the deal home with us where the villager will chop the wood and stack it on our balcony.

A Bright Idea

2009-04-24T07:49:00.000+02:00

As we walked down the cobblestone road, we breathed in the smells and sounds of the Korza (core-zuh), the pedestrian-only main road and city center: fresh bread, perhaps burek; techno jamming in the cafés and bars so that we almost feel we’re in Italy; and the beautiful mountains that surround and backdrop the city of about 90,000. In an instant, the music in the cafés disappears and all the lights shut off in the Korza. Burr-umm-hum-hummm…fills the street that was pleasant only moments ago. It is the sound of power generators, a struggling business’ only shot at keeping its light on and attracting customers—if they can stand the overwhelming hum, that is.

Would you rather have stable electricity or live in an independent country?

For many Kosovars in the last 12 years, unstable electric service was a tolerable in-convenience while the much more important drive for independence was underway. However, in the 15 months since the declaration of independence, their patience has worn thin.

Blackouts vary by city and neighborhood, but a common day might include 3 outages of 2 hours each. At a macro level, regular outages affect the people’s ability to plan ahead and walk surely in their plans. For example, while we were in Peja last November, we planned to take a quick shower before meeting some missionaries—just as the power went out, which meant no lights, hot water, or water pressure (read further to find out how electricity affects water supply). We took cold-water bucket showers and lit candles, which made us late and cold. By the next couple outages, we were too cold to continue and surrendered to stink.

Who is at fault and who is responsible to fix it?

Kosovo’s electric infrastructure was built during communist Yugoslavia (beginning after WWII) and is run today by a government-owned utility company. It is not difficult to imagine why Kosovo’s power grid did not receive much-needed maintenance and upgrades while the Yugoslav republics were at war in the 1990s and Kosovo itself was breaking away in 1998-99. The consequences of this neglect today are the unfortunate responsibility of the new newly independent government. By some estimates this government has the daunting challenge of procuring energy for the country that consumes 10 times the amount that it produces, and would consume much more if it were available!

It is an open secret today that many Kosovars cannot pay—or refuse to pay—their electric bills. Some Kosovoars don’t pay because they can’t make ends meet due to unemployment. Some refuse to pay out of dissatisfaction with the interruptions in their service and suspicions that government corruption is behind it. And still others don’t pay because no one else pays.

What does this mean for everyday life?

- Apartments above ground level may rely on a water pump to boost city water supply to their faucets, so when the power stops, so does water! (Some begin their showers by filling a bucket with water to avoid getting stuck with shampoo in their hair!)
- Homes almost never have central heat/air, and, instead, have a combination of other heat sources: propane gas units, electric radiators, and wood burning stoves.
- Hygiene, cooking, cleaning (not to mention leisure activities) are subject to interruption! Some weeks, everyday life can feel strangely hard to “foreigners.”
- Coffee bars and other businesses often run gas-powered electric generators, which can make for noisy walks down the sidewalk.

Talk about an opportunity waiting to be seized by a firm with resources to invest …and many small opportunities for small-time entrepreneurs and servant leaders to meet specific needs. While we don’t have immediate plans to start up an alternative energy campaign, we are, in order to understand more about the region’s opportunities, researching feasible alternative energy sources for Peja—what they’ve tried, what has worked, what hasn’t, and why.