Shot/Seen

If you hear that, while in Thessaloniki, I got drunk and flirted with the bright-eyed and perpetually smiling Christina Koza, don’t believe a word of it.

I will admit to being pleasantly buzzed on five or six beer, a couple of glasses of good red wine, and a couple more of bad, overly-sweet red wine. I had no trouble walking or talking and, at one point, even danced a little in my chair without falling out of it.

As for flirting with Christina, I have no idea where that comes from. Until the end of the evening, this was our sole conversation:

“Hi, I’m Christina.”

“I’m Mark. Sorry, I don’t have any Greek.”

“No problem.”

Christina, with whom I did not flirt, as well as being bright-eyed and perpetually smiling, is a fine singer of Greek songs. She was on the crowded stage when Katarina led us through the doors of Apoikia, a small bar/nightclub in a quiet neighbourhood of Thessaloniki, Greece, and into one of the musical highlights of our Balkan travels.

We were fortunate to catch her: it was Christina’s last night in the city before returning home to Rhodes. She sang with Andreas Karakotas, also a very fine singer of Greek songs, his brother, Vasilis, no slouch behind a microphone either, and players of stand-up bass, bouzouki and keyboards.

It was a neighbourhood evening. The club – more of a restaurant/bar – filled up through the late evening, mostly with couples and groups. They didn’t just listen: some danced, a lot sang along with every song and chatted with the musicians, even as they played. The music was wonderful, tinged with the touch of soul that goes with much Greek music.

So I clapped along, I danced in my chair and I drank, but not to the point of drunkenness. And I did not flirt.

The only other time I spoke with Christina came as we were leaving in the early morning hours. She came off stage to say goodbye, primarily to Katarina, our host. When we shook hands, I did get her e-mail address, but only so that I could send her a web link once I had edited and uploaded that evening’s photos and video.

Those photos are possibly my best defense against the rumour of drunkenness. Autofocus would explain why most of them are not blurry, but the artful composition shows a man still in control of his higher functions.

As for the flirting, you’ll have to take my word for it.

Small businesses in Skopje's old market town.

I want a t-shirt that reads “Skopje – I was there before it got trendy.” You get the feeling trendy will be the result, or is at least the aim, of what’s happening in the Macedonian capital.

Skopje is a nice small city. It’s dissected by the river Vardar, and in the central area it is resolutely Turkish/Armenian market town on one side (the left bank as you look upstream) and European city on the right.

Walk off the stone Kamen Most (most=bridge) onto the right bank and you’re in a huge public square that leads to a broad, car-free boulevard. It stretches long and wide, lined with canopied cafes fronting upscale shops, most of them with the signs and brand names you’d find in any upscale Western mall. To the left – downstream – the high riverbank is covered with broad beer- and soft-drink-sponsored umbrellas and cafe after cafe after cafe, filled mostly with well-dressed young.

Walk off the stone Kamen Most to the right (passing by table after table of passive Roma entrepreneurs and some of the most aggressive young panhandlers anywhere) and, 80 metres on, you’re on flagstones, in narrow streets that bend and twist. This is Carsija, Skopje’s old Turkish bazaar. The storefronts, mostly old, narrow and well-maintained, offer a mixture of goldsmiths, tailors, souvenir sellers, tiny cafes. The streets are mostly car-free, but are not free of large push or pedal-powered handcarts, packed high with everything from clothes to bottled water. On side streets, there are tombs, mosques and bathhouses, some converted to art galleries. Above it all is Tvrdina Kale, the old city fort, the scene of both a major archaelogical dig and major restoration project.

In fact, scattered throughout central Skopje, on both sides of the Vardar, there is construction and restoration. (This applies primarily to the centre, which is surrounded by crumbling and unimaginative apartment blocks.)

The city, it seems, is in the process of becoming a version of itself that exploits both of its parts, a determined effort to grow the new while sprucing up the old. Even now, it’s a pleasant place to stay for day or two. Five years from now, this could be one of those places featured on the must-see lists of tourist promoters and travel agencies.

Outside an old house in Skopje.