Alright guys! This is going to be the most controversial video
I've made since Armenia and Azerbaijan.
As you know, we follow the alphabetical English list of countries in the UN.
That being said,
as the UN, EU, European Council, and NATO all give the same title for this country.
This episode is going to go under 'F' for "Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia".
However,
I will refer to this country as the Republic of Macedonia as over 130 countries call it that on their own terms,
and because it's shorter and easier to say.
Okay? Are we good? Cool?
♫ ♫ ♫
♫ It's time to learn geography! ♫ NOW!
Hey everyone, I'm your host Barby.
For those of you who know nothing about this country or why I'm trying to take so many precautions.
Basically all you have to know is that
in almost every aspect, this place is actually pretty plain, simple and chill.
It's just the name that starts all the drama.
You might be wondering why. Well, we will explain in a bit
But first, let's talk about where it is.
So, the Republic of Macedonia--
Am I good? I know you don't like it but can you just at least maybe tolerate it
if I just use this title for the video for abbreviating purposes?
Greece: No problem. Please, just continue your lesson.
Thank you.
So, the Republic of Macedonia is kind of like a country that got mixed up, tossed around
flipped, turned upside down
and I'd like to take a moment just sitting right here to tell you how this country became a place with such an affair.
OH! High five!
First of all, the country is landlocked and located in the Balkan Peninsula of Southeast Europe,
surrounded by Bulgaria, Greece, Albania
and depending on which side of the sovereignty debate you stand on,
Kosovo and Serbia.
Guys, it's the Balkans, Europe's most dysfunctional family.
The country is divided into 9 regions
with the capital Skopje located in the North central part of the country
where a quarter of the entire population lives.
It's also the historical birthplace of Mother Teresa and in the city square it has a statue of Alexander the Great.
Greece: Look, they immortalized Alexander the Great, in their land.
Oh, and they named their airport after him too.
Greece: ...
The country only has two main civilian airports:
Skopje Alexander the Great International
and Ohrid St. Paul the Apostle International, by Lake Ohrid.
Ohrid is a popular tourist and vacation spot,
however, the second and third largest cities are Bitola, Kumanovo in the Northeast of Skopje.
The E-75 highway is the longest and busiest road that traverses the entire country North to South.
Fun little side note!
In the Republic of Macedonia, the sidewalks are actually used for both walking and parking.
To this day, the legacy of the Ottoman times is well preserved in places like
the Gazi Hajdar Kadi Mosque in Bitola.
Tetovo is kinda like the Albanian capital of the country as it has the highest Albanian population in the country,
adorned with geometric and floral motifs all over.
In the west, we reach the strange town/micronation of Vevčani
which declared itself its own republic and even has its own currency called the linčnik.
Now, if there's any structure that just straight-up dominates the landscape though,
it would have to be monasteries, churches, fortresses and mosques.
I did four like this, that's weird.
This is how I made a four.
Ones, like St. John the baptist monastery, which supposedly has the forearm
of St. John the baptist embellished with extremely intricate wood carvings in the interior.
The Kale fortress in Skopje and the Tsar Samuel fortress in Ohrid stick out too.
So, those are some of the most noticeable sites, but you're probably still wondering
"Okay, that's nice but what does any of this have to do with the country's controversial name?"
We'll explain that in just a little bit in the demographics section,
but first let's slowly keep you distracted from the inevitable rage fest
by telling you more about the pretty mountains and rivers and stuff...
All right, let's have one more round of plain objective fact reporting
before the gray zone of doom comes up in the next section.
In the simplest way I can put this, the country is about 80% mountainous and basically split in half
by the longest river, the Vardar that flows North to South and emptying in the Aegean Sea.
On the west of the river you have the Dinaric Alps with the tallest peak Mt. Korab along the border of Albania.
The general South Balkan region that the country lies on sits on the subduction zone between
the European and African plates cut right in the Mediterranean.
Therefore, the Republic of Macedonia is subject to some earthquake activity every so often.
The Republic of Macedonia is famous for two things: tobacco, and opium.
The opium here is the national treasure which has disputably the highest quality in the world,
with about 14 morphine units per specimen.
Rep. of Macedonia: Yeah, sorry Afghanistan. Hang in there though, you're doing good.
The crop is mostly used for pharmaceuticals and is transported all over Europe.
There is also the Peshna cave in Makedonski Brod which is famous for looking like
Helm's deep in Lord of the Rings.
Close by Skopje, you can't miss the Matka valley with the canyons.
Of course, the price trophy of the country would have to be Lake Ohrid.
One of the oldest and deepest lakes in Europe with over 200 different endemic species.
Including the Ohrid trout which is one of the national animals.
Some national dishes include meat pie and Ajvar relish made of crushed bell peppers and garlic.
Sometimes referred as vegetable caviar.
Even though sometimes Serbians will say that they created it.
And that's about it!
Stay tuned. France is coming up next!
Oh yeah... Uh, how did this country get their whole name controversy dispute thing, right ah.
Oh boy, well uh...
Here comes the train wreck. I'll do my best.
Transition?
Oh boy... This is going to be just dandy. No matter what I say in any angle in this section.
Someone is going to disagree and throw sharp objects at me.
But, this is my job... This is the life I chose...
Come on Barby, you can do this!
Hey! Uh... We haven't done a Bob Saget joke in a while.
Duh, I'm Bob Saget. I wear dad pants and I once sat on a pizza.
Okay, first of all. The country has about 2 million people and was the only
former Yugoslav republic to gain independence without any bloodshed.
About 65% of the nation identifies as ethnically Macedonian and a quarter are Albanians
and rest are made up of groups like Turks, Romanis, Serbs and Bosniaks.
The currency is also the Macedonian Denar, they use the 'C', 'E', 'F' type outlets
and they drive on the right side of the road.
Now, let's begin the discussion...
First of all, what exactly are some distinguishing traits of people that identify as "Macedonian"?
Well, for starters, just like we explained in the Bulgaria episode.
They have Slavic roots and speak a Slavic based language that is very similar to Bulgarian.
Most people in both countries can understand each other just fine,
and many have relatives and family that live in each other's countries.
The people of this country have been tossed around over and over again in the past millennia,
and it wasn't until the Balkan wars that things really got cracking.
For those of you who don't know, the Balkan wars basically just went like this:
- Round 1 -
Oh no, we don't like the Ottomans. Let's fight them, yeah...
- Round 2 -
Bulgaria: What the?! We had an agreement, you screwed it all up. You're all dead!
And that's about it.
Essentially the area that takes up the parameters of modern-day Republic of Macedonia were
sort of the product of Yugoslavia after World War II.
First, they were called Vardar Banovina and then it became the Socialist Republic of Macedonia.
To this day, Macedonians claim that they are descendants of Alexander the Great
and the ancient Macedonians that were mixed in with the Slavic tribes that migrated
into the area in the 6th century AD.
Then, in 1991 Yugoslavia broke up and that was when the whole modern mess with Greece really heated up.
I mean, it was already kind of heated before that but this just made things a lot worse.
To this day, Greece deliberately opposes the usage of the title "Macedonia"
as they claim the name is historically inseparable from Greek heritage
and they are the only ones that have the right to use the name, let alone the symbols.
And shortly after they said that, the Republic of Macedonia started to use the... symbols.
Yeah, that didn't really help the conflict.
One thing that both Greeks and Macedonians can agree on is that historically, there was a region
called Macedonia that expanded under Alexander the Great all the way from the Balkans to India.
Where they disagree on is who the Macedonians and Alexander the Great really were,
which... I'm going to try my best, kind of went like this:
Greece: You guys are constructing a narrative and appropriating our heritage and symbols
and it all started with Tito. Macedonia is an inherently Greek title
and you guys are not Greek, let alone Hellenistic in any way.
Rep. of Macedonia: Uh, we never claimed to be Greek and neither was Alexander the Great.
He was ethnically Macedonian which was a separate distinct group apart from the Greeks
with mixed in with our Slavic forefathers after they arrived centuries later.
Greece: Dude, the Macedonians were Greeks. They spoke Greek, they had the same culture,
they worshiped the same gods, they spread the Greek language across the empire,
Alexander the Great was taught by Aristotle. They were Greek!
Rep. of Macedonia: Yeah, he spoke Greek, he also spoke Persian and a ton of other languages,
and if they were Greek, why would they go to war with ton of other Greek cities so often?
He spoke the original Macedonian language first, and then propagated
the Greek culture as it was seen as advantageous.
Greece: That's just a lie your leaders have told you to set up footing for future claims against Greek territory.
Macedonia has been the name of our North region for over 3000 years
with real Greek Macedonians today living in that area.
Rep. of Macedonia: Huh, yeah, that totally explains the actions of Ioannis Metaxas in 1913.
Greece: I knew you would bring that up. Look, I know that was tragic and horrible but it's completely
irrelevant to the actual documented, archaeologically corroborated, historical facts that you can't deny.
Rep. of Macedonia: Huh, then clearly you need a history lesson.
Greece: NO, YOU DO!
Rep. of Macedonia: YOU DO!
Greece: YOU DO!
Bulgaria: So uh guys, the Pirin region...
Rep. of Macedonia: AAAAA!
Disclaimer: this is pretty much just what the governments and radical nationalists say.
Most of the general Greek and Macedonian populations don't really care too much about this issue.
To this day, the UN, EU, European Council have all somewhat cited with Greece agreeing to appoint the title
"Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia"
Many Greek and Macedonian politicians have said that they would maybe be willing to settle on a new
compound country name that deliberately distinguishes the country apart from the word Macedonia.
Some suggestions include: Slavo-Macedonia, Upper-Macedonia or Northern-Macedonia.
But for now, the one that kind of unofficially stands at a somewhat not perfect but
not too rage inciting national title is "The Republic of Macedonia".
So anyway!
Macedonians love wrestling and handball. Wrestler Saban Trstena being considered a national icon as he
won a gold metal in 1984. The men's handball league made four appearances in the World Championships.
Some notable Macedonians throughout history include: poets Blaze Koneski, Kole Nedelkovski,
painter Petar Manzev, pianist Simon Trpčeski, Academy Award nominated director Milčo Mančevski.
- I know, "ski, ski, ski, ski, ski" -
And of course, even though she was ethnically Albanian, Mother Teresa was born in Skopje.
All right, I think it's time to move on. Let's jump into diplomacy.
Well, as you can probably guess. The Republic of Macedonia is kind of surrounded by neighbors
that have some kind of issue with them.
The general stereotype is that Serbia doesn't recognize their church, Bulgarians don't recognize their sovereignty,
Albanians don't recognize the Western border and Greece...
Yeah, you can kind of already guess.
However, it's the 21st century and the millennial generation
really doesn't care too much about their grandparents' drama.
Borders are totally open. People travel back and forth between these countries and trade is consistent
as long as you've got a good bottle of Balkan wine to share.
Serbians are generally close as their split from the republic was the only one without bloodshed.
Even though some political points are disputed, they're still cool. And Bulgaria is like the country
where the Republic of Macedonia kind of sneaks into the EU through a loophole in the passport system.
In which you can totally qualify if you have family in Bulgaria, which many Macedonians do.
Turkey still gets along nicely with them, however it's been favoring Albania
and Kosovo a little bit more these days.
Their best friends however, and out of all the Macedonian geograpeeps I asked,
more or less, most of them agreed that Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina are probably their closest allies.
These *three countries all share a deep history of being former Yugoslav republic states that go way back.
Have you ever had friends that you made while you were all being punished for something at the same time?
Yeah, that's kind of how it is with these guys.
They've seen so much struggle and hardship together and still managed
to smile back at each other the entire time.
Brandon: It's like Breakfast club!
Yeah! It's like Breakfast club.
In conclusion: just saying the word Macedonia incites a lot of opinions
and frustrations with certain groups of people and I'm not going to pretend I have an answer to all of this.
The Balkans will always be indescribably complicated.
It's just interesting how a simple name can cause so much uproar. Names matter.
Let that be a lesson for you today.
Restez à l'écoute. France sera le prochain! [Stay tuned. France is coming up next!]