It happened, finally. Now it seems like a blink, but during the festival it seemed that the day would never finish. I hardly manage to visit some of the workshops/discussions (too much organization stuff to do), which made it almost impossible for me to evaluate the fest.

3 days of festing, discussing, learning, gathering, having fun. Started on 22nd and finished on 24th of april (well, we had an extra spontaneous workshop the following day). It gathered people, feminists, anarchists or just interested, from Serbia, Croatia, Greece, Bulgaria, Austria, France, Macedonia, Holland.
Not having a place of our own, made the festival very mobile, so every day we had to move in a different location, which it might had some advantages (diversion), but it also made many things difficult. But, more or less, it did appear that each of those places satisfied the specific needs of that day.

The first day had more discussion kind of atmosphere. Issues like diy media, pornography, domestic violence, masturbation provoked, here and there, some interesting questions. At the end of the day the room became almost crowded, but still more of the people that were arriving from abroad, and just few local. There were doomsday graphics and shaved woman collages to soften a little bit this monotonous into-discussion day and put some beauty in the space. The night was great. Lots of people, meeting each other, having first chats and cheers. A nice mix of punk/hardcore band This home is prepared and soft acoustic guitars of Drvene Marije were real indication of the diversity of this fest and people participating: women, men, anarchists, feminists, lesbians, punks, radicals, queers…

We put all our hopes on the sun. Oh yes. It was there. There were workshops and performances that were impossible to take place in the small scout’s barrack that we had it for free the second day. But the nice parking place just near and the small frontyard gave quite relaxed atmosphere. Morning feminist theatre workshop came really refreshing and moving. The film Lilja 4ever was followed by a discussion on trafficking, not really impressive, since it gave mostly mainstream approach to the problem. Two diy workshops on making jewelry from plastic glass and making your own pad turned a bit the direction of the fest on to the end of the day, which still had a lot to offer. A 20-minutes dance performance on anti-trafficking, which doesn’t really changed the gained (or not) feeling from the previous discussion. But then, a boom. The next performance was a queer bomb. The Capitalist whore fantasy took everybody’s attention. The room was so crowded, that unfortunately many didn’t have a chance to see it. Different reactions, but people were really expressive. It was really great to see it in Skopje. The night finished with two more performances with juggling and iron sculpturing, and one more, our favorite one, police evicting us. Not much to say about it.

Sunday. Some people already left. More Feminist theater workshop, women’s writing discussion, women and media presentation, batik-diy painting technique, transkitchen rhythmic therapy performance, how to use condom workshop and party. That’s what was happening the last day of the fest. And maybe because it was the last one, I felt much more relaxed. Women’s writing raised some issues that are very discussed in the feminist, especially literature, movement, such is there a writing that can be recognized as women’s one, or feminine, can we recognize the gender of the writer and similar. We have a nice memory banner of the batik workshop, full of different wax colors creations. Women and media was really informative and interesting, through many examples presenting the very evident media exploitation of the woman, as an integral part of the patriarchal capitalist society. An impressive performance of lori and zoe, playing with themselves and the fucking beauty market standards made people laugh and enjoy that very last night. Not in the program, but spontaneously organized, which I personally like very much, there was this workshop on how to use women’s and other types of condoms and dildos. The same group of women made a self-defense workshop the following day after the fest, which was interesting, relaxing, realistic experience in the park. And partyyyyyyy. Music performance and dj beast 666, electro,/ punk, 80’s new wave. Wow, we had fun. And then, the blue angels again, of course. There is no end till the police says so.

During the fest there were few anarcha-feminist distros and publications. We manage to make few translations also. Food was provided, sometimes late, but great, from food not bombs collective.
Ok, there was a lot. It was imagined to be a time and a place for making first contacts, meeting people, talking, discussing, enjoying each other and having fun, and I hope it was. But what I’m really glad about is hearing new girls that want to involve more in anarcha-feminist actions. And guess what, this week we have a meeting. Ok, I’m finishing, just to say that the fest was a joint effort of many, many women and men around, their solidarity, benefits and participation. I’m up on my broom now.