Over the river and through the woods to grandmothers house we go :)

June 3, 2009

Today we helped "Grandma" stack firewood, and also helped her store the smaller pieces in her shed, which are used for lighting her stove. We got a tour of where she lived - which is only a couple small rooms in a larger building that was once used as a school.

This is one end of the building where Grandma lives


There is no electricity in her home, and she has to heat everything by woodstove. It's easy to take for granted electricity and stoves in the U.S., but in her case it's something she has to actually work for, or at least the volunteers help do most of the work for her :)

Our stack of firewood with an awesome view of the countryside :)


It was a very hot day, but we enjoyed ourselves (besides when we discovered the daddy long legs all over the wood :-X) It was fun to take the wood and throw it into her shed. After awhile, we had everything down to a science. We all attempted to use the axe to split the wood, but not many of us were sucessful. Watching Pega, Damir, and Ljubisa (other volunteers at the center) split the wood makes it look SO easy, but it was definitely harder than it looked!

Pega splitting some wood while gramma watches. Right after this picture was taken, she walked into the shed, got a bigger axe than Pega's, and started splitting wood, too! She's a lot strong than she looks! Thanks to Marie for the picture


We were asked to guess her age - I would have said 80, but surprisingly, she's only 69 years old.
Thanks, Adelita, for the picture :)


The top of Grandma's shed


Being in Gvozd really took me back in time - or maybe it's not even that. Maybe it's because I have never had to split my own firewood, drive to another town to get supplies I need because my town doesn't have what I need - it was something different for me, and it was good to experience it.

Gvozd is small and self-sufficient, but still, the closest hospital is in Karlovac and the high school everyone goes to is an hour away. When you live in a small town, this is what you live with - you accept it and do the best you can with what you have. The one thing I will always remember about Gvozd is the happiness of the children - although they do not have the best of circumstances, they are happy with what they do have, especially while living in a postwar community.

I can't express how important I feel Suncokret is to this community, and I only can hope that there are more passionate, caring, and determined people like Maja and Pega running centers in other postwar communities. It's so important for those kids to have a safe place to express themselves, interact with other kids. I think it's especially important in a place like Gvozd, being a postwar community, to have somewhere like Suncokret that can help the kids understand and embody acceptance and tolerance, especially between the Serbs and Croats.

And of course, later that night we played some volleyball! Walking from the center to the playground was always a nice walk, too. There was a new church being built, some houses, and lots and lots of gardens!