Building a house is one thing but filling it with furniture is another. Especially when there are no shopping malls with 10 different shops to choose from!

We agreed that we would as much as possible try to shop locally, save for our trip to a well know furniture store in Thessaloniki and importing a espresso machine from the Netherlands (yes we did!) we bought everything in Kocani.

Beds

I was visiting North Macedonia last October when Johan informed me that he had heard of someone who makes beds and we were going to visit his workshop. We drove to a normal looking house, stepped out of the car and walked, as we had been instructed to the back of the house.

To the workshop.

• 

• 

I am not often lost for words. But out of this was going to be made my bed. 

A colleague of Johans had come along to help with the negotiations so I let them discuss what we wanted while I looked around. The smell of sawdust and cigarette smoke took me back to my fathers shed where he sawed and cut and tinkered around making things. Although here the amount of sawdust mixed in with the smoke from the cigarettes made me long for a few EU enforced Health and Safety standards.

The negotiations completed the carpenter told us we could come back in 2 days and he would have an example of what he could make for us.

We duly returned and I would like to say that I was impressed but this time the sawdust was not only mixed with cigarette smoke but also the smell of varnish and I didn’t see much in between coughing my lungs up onto the floor. Health and Safety can’t say anything about lack of ventilation as only saving grace is that everything is outdoors so the air is, in theory, continually being refreshed.

Only the tools are kept securely under lock and key… well there is very low criminality here in Kocani!

Have faith said Johan, it will be fine.

Of course, with beds you need mattresses. So off to the mattress shop.

• 

• 

We had a choice of hard or very hard. We couldn’t lie on the mattresses we just had to feel a small block of mattress and choose from there. We had NO idea what we were buying so chose 2 and thinking maybe the floor would be a better option.

Fast forward to May 2019.

Johan announced that he had contacted the carpenter and the beds, and bedside tables were ready and they would come and assemble them. Johan and I were holding our breath.

Oh ye of little faith.

• 

• 

This is craftsmanship at its very best.

One phone call and the next day the mattresses were being delivered.

The pure simplicity of life astounds me.

P.s Yes, the mattresses are very hard and very very hard. You can’t win them all.