Marta Prekpalaj

Has, Prizren | Date: June 5, 2013 | Duration: 105 minutes

Where the river Drini is, and across there is Krusha e Vogel, in the morning, we saw houses burning. But we didn’t know what was going on there, what was happening to the village, and sometime around noon, twelve o’clock, we saw a group of people who had started to walk from the village and go towards the Drini there […] and we saw those women, those people, that crowd of women and children and they all had gone there, they had gathered before the Drini. The side of the village burned, we did not know what to do, we couldn’t communicate directly and finally I said to my brother that those women and children had absolutely no place to go, we must go and pick them up. […] I went across with the tractor […] when I saw all those women and children crying, screaming, upset, terrified, they did not know where their husbands were, and it was hard […] they were many, some 300-400 people, women and children, so many […] Later we understood that all those men who were detained, 120 men, were massacred in Krusha e Vogel, they were murdered, and we stayed four nights and five days with those women and children in our homes.

Anita Prapashtica (Interviewer), Nicole Farnsworth (Interviewer), Jung Chao, Donjeta Berisha (Camera)

Marta Prekpalaj was born in Breg Drini, Has on 10 May 1967.  She is a teacher and the first woman to ever serve as a school principal in Has. She was an activist of the Motrat Qiriazi Association, campaigning for women’s literacy and empowerment. In 2011 she established the organization Visionary Woman of the XXI Century. She received the Women’s Creativity in Rural Life Award from the Women’s World Summit Foundation in 2006.

Marta Prekpalaj

Anita Prapashtica: Tell me about your  childhood.

Marta Prekpalaj: Yes, I would first say that I was born on May 10, 1967. I am the second child. The first child was my big brother, Luz. I was the second child, and then I had and I have two other brothers, which means that I have three brothers. I have   been told that when I was born the mentality was such that you should not rejoice for giving birth to girls, but they were very happy about me, especially my father, now deceased, who even then was the one and only person whom I really loved and I was much attached to, the only person in my whole life and I don’t have him.

anymore. We were four children in the village of Breg Drini in Has,[1]  born of course when conditions were not that good, but it was very important that there was warmth in the family. My family was comprised of father, mother, brothers and grandma or “loke”[2]  as I used to   call her. I was very close to loke and I hung out a lot with her, because my mother gave birth to my brother and then another brother after me, and I was attached to her. She  was a fine woman, a very capable woman, who had a very difficult life. Naturally, I grew up with her stories, but also with her teaching, because she was the grandmother, loke, dad’s mother. She was a woman, in those days, who has reared orphans as it was the case after the war, and of course we got a lot from her, especially in   education.

But also the other grandmother from my mother’s side, she too was loke, a very good  woman and I loved her,  and  she  loved  me and taught me good things, important ones such as helping people. My childhood here in the village was good. We lived near the river and the most beautiful moments of my life as a child, the best games we played during      the summer by the river Drini e Bardhe, and of course in those periods we did not have        a worry in the world. In those days we mostly played during the summer and of course   when we began to grow up we also began to help the family. There was work to be done     in  the  village.  We,  for example, remember the time when my mother harvested wheat  with her hands and we went to her with grandmother and brought her fresh water from    the village. Bringing her water and finish the job was sheer happiness, a great   feeling.

Later, gradually, when I turned seven, I began elementary school. That  was  a  little difficult for us because we lived very far from the school. How shall I say, for the first  classes  we  went to another village, Zyme. We had to walk four kilometers each way,   about eight kilometers a day to go across the mountain. However, the desire, the will to    go to school was very great at that time, not only for me, but also for all the boys and    girls  of  my generation. We learned a lot. That was also a beautiful part of my life:  learning. Fate was that I had a teacher in fourth grade  ­ that was a very important  moment that maybe influenced the fact that later I became a teacher ­ who was my idol. In fact this is my profession. My childhood was not bad but not good either, no, but   in general good, but it is important to say that it was [good] because of the love in my family. I had parents  and a grandmother, two grandmothers, and I have spent a lot of  time with them and also with my two younger brothers. There was  love  and  they  watched over me. It was good, my  childhood.

Later in my childhood, there were many good and sad moments. Among such moments there was when the teacher passed away. That was for me a very difficult moment,   I    was in third grade. She died, it was a difficult moment. We had other difficult moments      as children, different problems. We were hurt, and we had problems, but I  don’t  remember that they were very big. Because I was the only girl in the house and I was inclined  to help a lot my mother with her housework, help mother and of course also  father, how shall I say, we were always a little preoccupied with the work to be done in    the village, however, I have always, for the whole time, been very interested and  passionate about books. Luckily there, in the school of Zyme, at that time, there was a library and there I began    to read books and from them were born the love and desire for school. But I must say about school, because later there was a moment after I finished elementary school, when  the  mentality  of  my  rreth,[3]   began  to  pose  obstacles  to  my  going  to   school, because local girls did not go to school. After completing elementary school, I spent two years in the middle school there in Zyme. There were a lot of problems to continue [school], but later the problem was to continue high school. Relatives said that I should  not go to school, that girls had to stay home, be engaged to marry, work on the bride’s trousseau, and so on. I was persistent, but also very important, in this story of my life   that has to do with school, there was my father’s support, my late father, who had left school. It is not that my mother did not want me to go to school, but my mother had a great influence on the relatives and said that one girl should not go alone, also because she did not know what I  did, or what happened in school. From that circle of relatives,  from my generations, only three girls continued their schooling. Because of that it was difficult at the time to persuade my relatives to let me go to school, but thanks to my persistence  and  the  support  of my father, later also of my big brother, even though a    bit later, I managed to continue high  school.

I would tell two short stories from my childhood life, one which I don’t remember but I have been told, it is when my life was at risk. When I was only a three month old baby, and my mother had gone to my father’s paternal uncle for a wedding, they left me wrapped in white clothes in the bride’s room, and what happened, when they brought all the bride’s dowry clothes, they covered me all over, and it was a very difficult moment, because as the bride came in, she saw that something was wrong, she heard something there. At that time a bride did not have the right to talk because the moment is very sensitive, but she saw that there was really something, that that thing was alive and in danger, she spoke up and so they found a baby and they pulled me out of there and I   was almost suffocated and they saved my life, they gave me my life   back.

Also, there is a very important moment in second grade, we were kids and at that time,    dinar was the currency in circulation. The five­dinar bill was big and loke, my late grandmother, told me to get it and buy some stuff at the store there when I went to      school. I was going around the  table  to  take  the money, and just so that my younger brother wouldn’t get it and put it in his mouth, I instead hid it in my mouth. By the time      we stood up from the table after eating, I had forgotten about the coin and it got stuck in my throat and it was a big problem until they brought me to the doctor and he pulled       it away. How shall I say, I have these two moments in mind when my life was in danger,   but here I am…The first time, the bride of the son of my father’s paternal uncle saved      me. The second time, my paternal uncle’s wife saved me from almost guaranteed death. How shall I say, these were difficult moments as a child, but also, a difficult moment was  when  my father’s mother, loke, passed away. She was a person I truly loved and I  was  very  attached  to  her,  very.  That was a difficult moment. This is all I had to   share about moments of my childhood that were  important.

1  Rural, mountainous, and traditionalist region in the northeast of Kosovo, near the border with Albania.

[2]  Endearing term used to address older women.

[3]  This is the social circle, includes not only the family but also the people with whom an individual is in contact. The opinion of the rreth is crucial in defining one’s   reputation.

Anita Prapashtica: Tell us about your professional career.

Marta Prekpalaj: My biggest desire  as  a  child,  I have told you, was to be a teacher, but  once  I  finished  the first two years of high school in Zyme so as to continue in the  city of Prizren, I had difficulties convincing them to enroll me. At that time in our region there was a great need for nurses. In some way I decided, because I also had a friend there, to go to nursing school, as I was an excellent student and I fulfilled the criteria. I finished then the nursing school in Prizren, and from the first year of the school I began helping people, because people here traveled  for  kilometers  just  for  an  injection.  As soon as I finished the practice of the first year, I engaged fully and from there I started     to work with people of my rreth, to help as much as I was able to – to give first aid, injections, or medicines to women or children, as  needed.

How shall I say, from the year 1986 when I started until I finished school, I was helping people little by little. As soon as I finished nursing school, my desire, my dream was to become a teacher…I decided and registered at  the  pedagogical  school  Gjakova  to  become a teacher, with a major in biology­chemistry. During 1988­1989­1990, I finished school, so I graduated as I knew that the Has region had a great need for professionals,    for everything, not only nurses, but also teachers. So I was immediately given  the opportunity  to  get  employed, right after graduation in 1990, as a teacher in the school     of Kushnin in Has. But during the years of 1989­1990 it was the time when in Kosovo the movement  started,  the  demonstrations  to  resist  Milošević  oppression  started.  But  1989 was very important for me, when a branch of the association Motrat Qiriazi[1] for the Eradication of Illiteracy opened in the village of Rumaje in Has. At  that  time,  this  association was organized all over Kosovo and I was graduating when they invited me to represent my village, Breg Drini, in that huge gathering that was held in Rumaje of Has, at  the  time a great number of people came together. This was the first activity and        they appointed me to take care of my village, although the number of girls in it was very low. However, the duties were countless and in that big gathering of the Motrat Qiriazi association, a great number of activists  from  all  over  Kosovo  were  present.  Safete Rogova was there, and later we continued working together, but that was  the  first encounter. Since I faced many difficulties in finishing school and throughout my schooling and  I had noticed that many girls had difficulties too, I had promised to myself that once     I finished school I would help somehow. However, I didn’t know where to start from, but with  the  arrival  of  this  association,  one  of  the  first  established  in Kosovo, and one of the first working on such issues, I felt really good and I was given the opportunity to be involved  first  hand  in  the activities. So at that time, with all of the activists of Has, of     the villages of Has, we started a major campaign for the eradication of illiteracy. How      shall I say, we found and  registered  all those women and girls who didn’t know how to  read and write, although there were not many of them, but, anyways, this was the first activity that we organized, and so I started to get more involved. Meanwhile, as I said, I   was employed as a teacher and I participated in the numerous activities in the region of   Has. Along with Motrat Qiriazi, at that time was operating also the Women’s Forum, with which we organized an activity where we all helped  and  I was part of it. I covered the health and education sector, because at that time, the independent education system in Kosovo was established  and  schools  worked  independently with our own programs, and  so the first organized events in the region of  Has  began  to  happen.  Until  1994  we worked in different activities, including first aid  courses.

By the end of 1994, beside my work as teacher of course, I began to work a lot as an activist because the association Motrat Qiriazi  was reorganized. And   with   this reorganization and also with the return of Igballe Rogova from Albania, we refocused the work in the region of Has. I was connected a little with Safete, with  the organizing committee of the village from the beginning. And we started many activities, one after      the  other.  At  first  with  Motrat Qiriazi we started the first meetings with women.  They were informal. We gathered women and  discussed  issues  with  them  and  always  together we heard women’s needs and requests. The  first  problem  raised  in  the  meetings was the lack of schooling for girls. We began many activities. We didn’t only     work with women, slowly we included men too,  to  convince  them  to  send  their  daughters  to  school. We didn’t work just to send the girls to school, we began also to    work with them. In 1995, we started many courses here in Has. We started with the    sewing course; there were training courses for the people that the association brought together; Igo was one of the activists, always side by side with us, Rachel too. We had English courses with her, when at that time, here in this region and maybe in Kosovo,     there was none. Then  we  established  computer  courses.  Also,  we  supported  and  started initiatives  to  open  high  schools.  The  first  action and project­plan ever made in Has was the opening of the high school in Gjonaj, where we as an association had our  center there, the women’s center Motrat Qiriazi  of  Gjonaj.  We  started  with  the community, with activists working together and succeeded not only in opening the high school through the Ministry of Education, but people collected the funds for the building. Knowing  that  the majority of Hasians work as bakers and they work outside of Kosovo,    we activists all together organized a big campaign to build the school in Gjonaj, which was something impossible during the 1990s, to open a school in that situation. And because     the region is big, we discussed with the activists the opening of a new school in Romajë,  a parallel high school, in  the  field  of  nursing. This was a big project in cooperation with  the  Ministry of Education, the association Motrat Qiriazi and the community. Meanwhile    we worked together again and succeeded  in  realizing  another  project with  the  association Nënë Tereza.[2]  But the technical organization and the means were brought by   us as Motrat Qiriazi, naturally with the help of the people. The initiative was ours. When I say this, it is understood that we were a big group, we were not alone, a group of girls working together in Motrat Qiriazi.

 Meanwhile, it is important that in 1995, along with other activities we were doing, it is an event, an  important moment for me…when for the first time in the region of Has and  maybe the municipality of Prizren, I applied for a significant job position such as school principal, and I  got  it.  The idea and support came from my colleagues and friends from  the  association,  from  Safete. She was persistent, Igballe, everybody, [said] “You can  be a principal.” At first, I thought it to be impossible. I was wondering, “How can I be a principal?” Of course it was a heavy responsibility, but it was a strong message for the community and the rreth, that a woman too could lead a school. I was the only one in      the region, even  in  Prizren  at  the  beginning, but later there were two colleagues. This was a challenge too, it was a difficult time in my life,  because  around  six  hundred  students  and  thirty  workers were under my responsibility, I mean, it was a school with    no financial support, no budget, and the villagers tried to help. We know what education means in Kosovo. During our many activities  with  the  association,  because  of  the  courses and  the  organizations,  the  girls  started  to  go  to  school  in  Gjonaj. In Romajë, the number started raising, and the association cooperated greatly  with  all  the  associations  outside  Kosovo, with the women’s movement of ex­Yugoslavia, Women     In Black,[3]   many  others,  and  the  Center  of  Women  in  Novi  Sad.  Of  course Motrat Qiriazi gained support,  we  did  much  more projects. We also started opening libraries, and it  was an important moment for our community, the initiative of the association when we opened libraries in the region of  Has.

It was not easy, but together we managed to equip some libraries, in Gjonaj, Kushnin, Mazrek  of  Has,  it  is these libraries that we established before the war even in Romajë     of Has, in Lugishte, which later were burned. All of our work was directly concerned with education, teaching and the emancipation in general of this rural region. The first results were obvious right away. Our successes within the community were measurable. The number  one  priority  was  the  development  of  girls’  education,  which  before  had been impossible, unattainable. It was difficult to work here in our region, because Has was at  the border, and from time to time we had problems. I had difficulties with the police, I   was  interrogated  many  times  by  the  inspectorate of that time about our activities.  In 1976,[4]   I  intended  to  represent  Kosovo­Albania.  I  was  part  of  a  conference  of    the Balkans region, on behalf of Motrat Qiriazi, but this also had repercussions, because we were not supposed to go to Albania. Then, I had problems, because I was the school principal and I was questioned about the curriculum. Also, in the framework  of  the  activities  organized by the association, we invited colleagues from abroad, from America,  the United Kingdom, and various  European countries, but even that, the fact that they  would come, was a problem. We had our activities for education. We had nothing to do   with politics, but we faced obstacles. The regime  wanted  to  put  everything  under  control, wanted to direct what was going on. Of course, there was a huge organization       of these activities. We even organized competitions here in Has. We also had  our  newspaper Të Jesh Grua [To be a woman], later, the community had the newspaper Etja [Thirst],  how shall I say, the activists were engaged in all spheres, and because of this      we were considered an obstacle by the regime, “Because  you  are  doing  all  these  activities and reaching all these goals, fulfilling all these tasks!”   (Smiles).

It is very interesting that, during the first activities that we started with women in the   region of Has, we did  not have many difficulties with men. The Hasian men agreed.  Perhaps in the beginning there looked at  our  activity suspiciously, I am not saying that there was not that.  However,  we  have  been constantly on the move and have worked with  the  community,  for example, we held activities more often in schools. We worked  with  school principals, teachers, village leaders. And they welcomed everyone, especially  the  activists.  People  were  excited  and  ready  for  change, for as long as someone took the initiative to get  organized.  I  remember  every  time we had to move from place to place, we walked.  For  every  activity  that  took place, we travelled together as activists with  whatever  we  could:  horse  carriages,  tractors  etc.  I  remember  a  moment when together with Safete we went to the farthest village of Has, Guruzhup, with a tractor,       and she would ask, “Are we there yet?” I would tell her, “Just a  little  bit  more.”  Meanwhile, we had a long drive ahead, but it was a real pleasure when you got there and were welcomed by a huge crowd of  women.

[1] NGO founded by Igballe and Safete Rugova in the 1990s to promote women’s and girls’ education. It was named after the sisters Qiriazi, who founded the first school for girls in Korça (Albania) in 1892

[2] The self­help organization named after Mother Theresa that during the 1990s, at the height of Milošević’s repression, supported the parallel society of Albanians, expelled from all state institutions and services.

[3] Belgrade­based women’s movement that on 9th October 1991 began a public nonviolent protest against the war, the Serbian regime’s policy, nationalism, militarism and all forms of hatred, discrimination and violence.

[4] This happened in 1996.

[5]  In 1990 a mass movement for the forgiveness of blood feuds (pajtimi i gjakut), was launched among the Albanian population of Kosovo. It was initiated by a group of students, former political prisoners,  who approached folklore scholar Anton Çetta and others seniors figures in academia to lead the   process. The movement reconciled thousands of cases, and it became a movement for national unity.

 

Those  moments  were really…we went through different periods, and when people saw us around, because we did not go only to women’s meetings, we went to weddings for example, and other  informal  gatherings,  and  in  any  other  event that took place there. We were always with them. However, when we were with them, we did not go there to tell them, we came here to teach you. No, “We are with you and we have come only to  listen to what you have to say, and we will support you!” Safete and Igballe were highly experienced activists who always knew the way, they found  the  key.  Maybe  other  activists said that in many other places there were problems with men, we did not have   any, we did not have problems going to meetings, or attending courses. Many times we   had so many requests we could not satisfy them all, because the region of Has is large.    Has has many villages, it is a very large  area.

However,  it  is  very important to remember out travel to different places. As activists,     no matter how we travelled, whether by tractor or bus, we worked. If we met a father       or a woman on the bus, we talked with them all the time, we discussed the question of emancipation, and there was a case when we persuaded a father there on the bus. We worked to persuade a father about the importance of school. We had a case in Gjonaj of Has, when together with Safete and Igballe we stayed for days with  this  family  to persuade some brother. He said “Yes” but next day said “No” to sending his sister to   school. I remember  very  well,  our stay there for a few days, our friendship with the  family, also Igo and Safete, the success  after  some  days,  that  also  this  was  a  very specific case. That girl, that sister,  had  seven  brothers.  They  did  not  let  her  go  to school and we  stayed there to discuss, to give other examples, to show that going to  school is good. For example, we were  a  group of activists who had finished school and were an example, and it was a very important moment when at the end, after some days, we managed to convinced them. Even those many whom we  did  not  convince greeted us well, however we had difficulties in our  work.

There have been cases when parents came by themselves with their daughters. They       had  heard that we worked “so that girls go to school.” I remember a case, in Kushin. I    was in school, of course working, when this father comes with his daughter, he says, “Principal, here is my daughter.” The  girl’s name was Barie. “Here is Barie, do what you  wish with her, send her to school, do as you wish. She is yours!” And I froze. It was a moment…(smiles) how did we say before,  he  had  not  agreed  and  then  he  did  after some time, it was really a very emotional moment. The girl continued her schooling and today she works as a nurse. There are numerous cases, many emotions that we have experienced, very emotional cases. It was really  important  that  we  focused  on  something, we kept doing it and in the end we did it. We never quit, say, even quit once.  I’m telling you that there have also been cases when  people  approached  us  by  themselves, they asked [for  support].

I also remember that a very important moment was the first meeting of Motrat Qiriazi  which took place in Romajë. We established the branch, the organization back in 1989. Sometime during the 90s, that was a really touching moment, when a woman forgave  the blood of her husband, because we had the movement of the forgiveness of blood,[5]         and of course we too helped as much as we could. However, when the Committee of Reconciliation visited  that  woman,  she  didn’t  accept  to forgive the blood, but she did  that day in the meeting of Motrat Qiriazi, which was a large meeting. She forgave the   blood, it was a historical moment when she forgave her husband’s blood during a demonstration of women of the association Motrat Qiriazi in Romajë. It is a case…then, along with these activities I mentioned regarding health courses,  the  education  about personal  needs  and  health,  women  doctors  from  all  around  also  came  to  help.   We started helping and teaching women about first  aid,  which  later,  during the war, was  good to know. However, even to learn well how  to  administer  first  aid,  we  needed means, so we improvised and came together  with  the  community, some villages had  small clinics and hid the equipment stored there. Besides the Nënë Tereza clinic here at Breg Drini, we also had some other secret places that helped in some specific cases,        also because  it  was  very  dangerous  because of the regime. It was very dangerous for  us, because when I was interrogated, how shall  I  say,  they  asked  me  about  these things. Why? I was lucky that I was spared because it was risky for me and the   activity.

I  remember  a  lot  of history…there was the opening of two schools. I absolutely need     to go back once again to all those people, the men  and  women of Gjonaj, when we  opened  the  high  school, the Gymnasium. There was the minister Xhevat Ahmeti, who  gave us much help, because it was not easy to open  schools,  and  there  was  the  majority of the people of Has. They had welcomed the event. Later there was also the opening of our center with our activities which was the main center  in  Gjonaj,  the  women’s center of Motrat Qiriazi. There was a room there  where we held meetings, courses, the library. But we didn’t ignore the cultural life, and there was a cultural life      that we offered the community. We were lucky that we had Safete Rogova, the artist. Back then, beside all the other activities she did, she also realized a radio drama for the association. Later we published a book by a writer from Has,  Margit  Markaj.  We  supported  her,  and her book with the story about a girl’s difficulties to go to school,    where she at last did go. Later, Ms.  Safete  and other artists made it as a play and  recorded it in a cassette, we used it in our activities and loaned it to women who used it  with other women. It was motivational for young girls to hear that radio play.They were encouraged to continue school. It was an important project that helped us a lot, it was simple but important, especially because we didn’t have a proper television at that time.    We had a lot of activities with the school. We helped and collaborated with the schools, included the folklore of Has, our traditional clothes, we did special programs on school’s   day, teacher’s day, and all the activities we could develop. We also had sports activities, here  in  Has,  the  most popular sport was and still is volleyball. It is a sport played by  many girls, boys too, but mainly girls. Seeing that there was interest, with a small organization, no tee­shirt, nothing.  We  organized  girls  tournaments  in  the  context  of Has, which was something miraculous. The support of parents who came to see their daughters play volleyballs was very  important.

Along with the numerous activities that we organized as Motrat Qiriazi here in Has, we cooperated with other organizations that  were  being  established  in  other  cities  in  Kosovo. The most important thing is that we,  as  an  organization,  had  a  very  good regional cooperation. Motrat Qiriazi established a good reputation among the organizations in the countries of ex­Yugoslavia, they regularly attended meetings and cooperated. Of course, we  cooperated  on  project­ideas  because  we  saw  the  war  in Bosnia and its consequences,  and  Motrat  Qiriazi  and  we, as activists, spoke up as we  could against  what  was done, what  happened in Bosnia. Then, in 1995, 1996, 1997 until  the eve of the great war here in Kosovo, we were always in touch with  the  women organizations in the ex­Yugoslavian region, in this  case  with  their  headquarters  in  Belgrade. I took part in many conferences held  in  Novi  Sad,  Ternshovac.  There  were various meetings of regional and  international  women,  with  Women  in  Black,  and  different women  from  different  places  in  ex­Yugoslavia,  not  only  from  Serbia,  but  all from ex­Yugoslavia,  such  as  Bosnia,  Croatia,  and  Slovenia.  We  had  a good cooperation and  besides  that, it was a good experience for me, because I had the chance to meet  various activists from all over the world  who  worked  for  women’s  rights,  there  were powerful feminists whom I had the honor and the pleasure to meet, naturally I had the  chance to meet and know them and that was empowering and motivating for my future   work. Whenever I  came  back  from  those  different  meetings  and  conferences,  when  I came back here, I felt the will and desire to work even more, because there were many models of powerful women who had made changes in their countries, just like we could,     and my friends and I  could  bring  forth  change here in Kosovo, concretely here in the  region of Has, because it was not easy to make changes, how shall I say, to make life better, as life was pretty hard here in  Has.

This region, as I said earlier, was reliant mainly on immigration. Men migrated and women stayed home.  Women  took  care  of  the  household  and  were  obliged  to do the work in the fields as well, because  there  was  no  man  in  the  house,  they had to rear children, cook  and  work  in the fields. How shall I say, the life of women was pretty hard here in  Has, besides that, at the time, there were no roads and there was no water. This was      one of the Has women’s problems,  to  get  water  with  a  wooden  bucket.  We  carried water, I did it myself from when I was a child until later. We carried water to live and to clean. They were difficult moments, difficult living conditions, but women managed to survive. There were very beautiful stories, also published in our newspapers Te Jesh Grua and Etja. We were engaged also into writing in the newspaper. It was not easy to be a woman here in Has  in  those  periods,  at that time, however, women here have been  really very strong, very powerful. Such was also my mother, who reared us at that time,    but  also  harvested,  did  the  very hard work in the fields, and beside that, she had to   wear  the beautiful traditional clothes, which were not easy to wear while working, let    alone to wear it all the time.

However, if we compared the life of women now and then, we  would  see  huge differences, there are  very  great  differences.  I  must  say,  we  divide  them  in  periods, how shall I say, the period of ’90­’99 was the period when the changes started, but the   men from Has were abroad. They saw the changes, and  later  they  supported  us  in making changes, they supported the education and so on. Then, another period arrived,   the war period. Has bordered with Albania, and we  know  that  the  movement  of the Kosovo Liberation Army operated here, so it was more difficult to continue our activity.      By the end of 1998, the end of 1998­1999, we had less activities as an organization. As     we saw that women and men  from  other  regions  began  to  mobilize, we focused on a lagje[6]  of  Prizren  called  Arbana,  ex­Dushanova. We started our activities with women who had relocated from other regions, when in 1998 the fightings had begun. It was an important part  of the activities of Motrat Qiriazi in the years ‘98­’99, shortly before the  great  war,  what  we  did in Arbana, this neighborhood of Prizren. And there we stayed  with women, we trained them in first aid courses. We also organized help for women to assist  those displaced families that relocated to less dangerous areas. This was also a   pretty  difficult period, especially for the activists who came, Igballe, Safete, who found       it  hard to come to Has, also many other activists who came to help us, because there    were police checkpoints. The borders were closed and there were many controls. There    was [a checkpoint] later also at the entrance of Prizren, you know how difficult it was to  pass through, especially when bringing books and other materials. It was very difficult.     The most difficult moment was when Motrat Qiriazi found a way to supply the center of Nënë  Tereza  here  in  Breg  Drini,  and  while traveling with the minivan full of supplies,   a contingent held us in Arbana and there were problems, the nurse…and we hardly passed through. Fortunately, that day we did not have medicines which we used to bring for the wounded,  but we had other supplies, this was the hardest time for free movement here    in the region. Our activists also worked in Mitrovica, let’s not forget  that.  It  was  important, our group with  our  activist,  Sanije  Voca,  who  was  there in ’98. She started her  activities  there  with many difficulties, we also visited her from time to time, but    there were  those  times  which  were  very difficult. So, we are close to when the great  war  begins,  just  before  that and all our activities, the connection with people, and those drugs and medicines that we had here in Nënë Tereza,   and  some  small  work in that period was useful.

[6] Lagje in this context means just neighborhood, but more specifically, in the traditional tribal organization of northern rural Albanians, it refers to a group of families sharing a common ancestor. From now on, it will be translated as neighborhood.

Perhaps we continue with that moment, that period, the war situation, it  is  a  very important moment. Significant. The  Has region is a borderland, so a great number of  police forces circulated there, hoping to catch our army as they crossed, so we were in  great danger. The war in Kosovo  started with the NATO bombings, the greatest war  started,  which  was  welcomed  here because we thought it will pass quickly, we    wouldn’t have  problems.  But  unfortunately,  in  the  third  day  of  the bombings the troubles   and various  massacres  began,  and  what  happened  in  Krusha  e Vogel[1]   is a very   important event. It was a Friday morning when we woke up and from here, from this area of the  village, we saw across the Drini there {shows the river}, where the river Drini is, and     across there is Krusha e Vogel, in the morning, we saw houses burning. But we didn’t      know what was going on there, what was happening to the village, and sometime around noon, twelve o’clock, we saw a group of people who had started to walk from the village    and go towards the Drini there {shows the river}. And  we  from  our  position  were observing carefully, there was my brother with binoculars, the device to see closer, and      we saw those women, those people, that crowd of women and children and they all had   gone there {shows the  river},  they  had  gathered  before  the  Drini.  The  side  of  the village burned, we did not know what to do, we couldn’t communicate directly and finally I said  to  my brother that those women and children had absolutely no place to go, we      must go and pick them up.

Since the Drini was very large, and the level had risen, it was   hard  to  cross  it  with  no bridge, so with my brother we decided to get the tractor, we     still  own  it,  it  is  bigger,  taller,  we  started  to  go  towards the Drini and to cross it and see  what  was  going  on  there. It was a very difficult moment when I went across with   the   tractor,  when  I  saw  all   those  women   and  children  crying,   screaming,  upset, terrified, they did not know where  their  husbands were, and it was hard. But in that  moment I felt a strength ­ I don’t know where it came from ­ to help those people, and     this  is  how I loaded the women and children in the trailer of the tractor, my brother  escorted them to the  river  and  the  daughter  of  my  paternal  uncle  with  the  others stayed  on  this  side,  took  them  into  houses and sheltered them. We had to cross the  Drini a few more times with the tractor because they were many, some 300­400 people, women and children, so many. It was a very tough moment for us too, they were yelling    and crying, they didn’t know what had happened to them and what was going on with their people, and within a period of time we managed to bring them all here {shows the house}, into our homes  in  the  village  to  shelter  them.  Later  we  understood  that  all those men who were detained, 120 men, were massacred in Krusha e Vogel, they were murdered, and we stayed four nights and five days with those women and children in our homes. I had to give them medicines to calm them down because they were very traumatized, we had two wounded, who when crossing to the houses of the village had  been hit by some pieces of grenade  thrown  at  them…we  gave  them  sedatives,  we healed those wounds. We practically provided the food  because  there  were  lots  of people, the village took it upon  itself,  others  arrived,  it  was  not  easy,  people  were afraid, and  frankly,  it  was  me who took the initiative because it was risky to bring all  those people here because the army could come here, and we had no defense, but the mountain was close, we couldn’t just leave them there because the police had told them    to go to the Drini, and didn’t allow them to go to Prizren or Gjakova and it was and is a    very heavy situation, and difficult for me personally. Emotionally, it was a very difficult moment, and also for the family, to see all those women weep, those children pleading   their loved ones, it was hard to calm them down, but we succeeded with a good organization, we treated them for the four  nights  and  five  days  they  stayed  in  the village. We sheltered them all and after five days they [Serbian army] gave us the order      to leave the village, to go to Albania. And along with those women and children we took    the road to the border with  Albania.

As a child, I had many childish moments, I remember when we used to wake up early in    the morning to get ready for  school,  and  of  course while we were doing that, mother quickly prepared some food, cooked tiny cakes, they were made from dough, she made  them from bread dough, baked them  fast  and  of  course  she  put  a  piece  of  cheese inside, and so we were ready to go to school. It is very important to mention that the      road leading to school was a mountain road, and we walked together, all the friends, we reviewed our lessons, we walked all that road with great will, we used the time to learn    new  poems  or  we  sang,  or  reviewed  the  lessons, imagine walking four kilometers until we saw the school! Then there are other beautiful moments as children when  we  celebrated the holidays, they were special days to us, we got  new  clothes,  and  had different and better food than usual. The village had  and  still has its own beauty even though the conditions were very hard, there were good moments. As a child, besides attending school, I used to take care of the cattle, I remember guarding the sheep, we owned sheep and it was a special joy to take the sheep and a tiny bag that my mother     had prepared with freshly baked bread and cheese, and go to our beautiful meadows and fields and corral the sheep. We had beautiful moments while we guarded the sheep and played games, we didn’t have dolls or television, and other devices,  so  we  kept  improvising different games and enjoyed a nice  day.

Nicole Farnsworth: Have you ever had any problems when you were little, or did you cause any?

Marta Prekpalaj: No, I didn’t have any quarrels, I wasn’t a problematic child, no, I can’t remember any problem, maybe if we ask my mother, no, I can’t remember. But I would like to remember in particular some good memories about my grandmother  loke, this is how I called my father’s mother, she was a typical woman from Has who had had some rough years, but she was really a  smart  woman, she taught me everything, starting from basic things to checking our homework, even though she wasn’t really good    at  reading  and  writing  because  she  taught  herself, she was an autodidact, she learned to cook, to sew clothes because back then we used to sew them, we couldn’t buy new   ones. She had a special way of sewing and tailoring clothes. Also, she always told stories  they  had experienced, she advised and educated me, but the overall great lesson I had  from her was that she was a great humanitarian, she helped people. When people from     the village needed anything, she  was always the one saying that we should help each  other, so she was a very dear  and  smart  person to me. Even though she didn’t go to school, she had taught herself to write and  read,  she  was  an  autodidact,  and  loved school, and it pains me because she died while I was in elementary school, and if she had been there to see me, it would have been amazing because I know she loved   school.

Leaving  Kosovo  was  something  that  regarded  the  whole  population. And I, together with my  people  from  my  village and the people from Krusha e Vogel and this crowd, as  we were sent  to Albania, we passed a part of Prizren at the border and Vermica, then  Kukes and I spent there, in  Kukes,  one  night.  It  was  a  very  difficult moment there, there  was  a large number of people with tractors, with different things, it was really      very difficult. Even though maybe there we felt a little bit safer, it was difficult because  many people who were there look for their loved ones, had been separated from them,  there were all sorts of scenes. [this passages is repeated   below].

Like the majority of the population of Kosova that was forcibly expelled, we too had to  leave, almost the entire region of Has was emptied in one day. We, together with the women and children of Krusha e Vogel with the tractors with which we arrived, were told   to leave our homes. Naturally those moments too were not easy and we passed a part      of Vermica to Prizren and we arrived in Kukes and there was a scene there, a very     difficult   moment, it was difficult because there were families that had been separated    and people looked for each other, there was a large number of people who did not know what to do.

However, the organization created there [in the refugee camps] began to spread  us everywhere in Albania. We were fortunate to go to Durres, because we had relatives in Croatia  and  maybe it would not have been possible, we didn’t know how long the war  would last, but those people who gave us a lift with their vehicle took us to a very comfortable place as we had lots of kids, because  my  family  at  that  moment,  my  brothers had all small kids and with my paternal uncle we had around ten, ranging from five­six month to six­seven­eight year olds, we also had old people. So it was a problem     but luckily we were sent to a camp near a church in Durres, a place where we were  sheltered.

In  the  beginning,  the  camp  where  I  went  the  first  day  had  a  few  residents      and immediately  there  my  paternal uncle’s daughter and I, both activists, couldn’t stay with  our hands folded and got involved immediately in the center where  they  registered  refugees and where people worked, so we got in touch with some activists of German associations. There was a league of German churches, ASB, which worked there with  Caritas, and I introduced myself as an activist who worked on this and  that.  They  welcomed us and immediately we began to work  with  the  newcomers,  we  took  the people from where they came to  the  cities  where  they  were  sheltered. We began to expand the camp where we worked through Caritas and the church, they brought more  tents and the camp grew, and naturally I saw it necessary to work there directly in the  camp. It was a very difficult moment to work  with  women, I had to run all day up and down, and in the evening they were still waiting for me, every evening we were doing activities, because their trauma was hard to  overcome.

I have to mention one specific case  that  is  a  story  very…a  woman  from  Drenica,  Shkurte Gashi, who had arrived pregnant  with  two children and her husband had been  killed on the road to  Gjakova,  he  had been stopped, and she managed to come to the  camp with the tide of refugees. That woman was not..she didn’t speak for two weeks,   Caritas had arranged many psychologists but none of them managed to make her talk. I   too, though I  don’t  know  the  work  of  psychologists,  visited  her  slowly  slowly  at  least three times a day, I brought her food and talked  to  the  children, and didn’t ask any  question because I saw that she had a way to tell me not to ask question, just stayed       with her.  After  two  weeks,  that  woman  started  talking  to  me,  only  to  me,  and  the other psychologists who worked there said, “What did you do, what  is  your  power?” Naturally,  I  was  devoted  to her and stayed close to her, how I worked with them? I  hugged them, but did not ask questions to avoid provocations. So, it was this feeling, a  power that, how shall I say, connected me with my work with women, and my experience that lasted for years. I succeeded, how shall I say, in activating that woman, in calming      her and rehabilitating her,  because  she  wanted…later  she  had thought of aborting her child, of not living anymore because she couldn’t imagine life without her husband and those small children.

During our two ­month ­stay as refugees, I was active in that camp, helping people and reconnecting  them  to  their  families.  I  went  to  Tirana  once a week, through the press we could find people, I helped as I could. From the moment that the war started here,   when I brought the women and children of Krusha e Vogel, until the moment when I returned I don’t think I’ve had more than four­five hours of sleep per night. How shall I   say, it was a full­time activity, all night and day non­stop, with a will I don’t know where it came  from,  but  I  had  the desire to help as many people as possible, to be close to   them, to those women and children who were  traumatized.

Immediately after we returned from  Albania  as  refugees,  naturally  the  association  of Motrat Qiriazi met the activists who  had  been  scattered  all  over the place. Safete and Igballe had been in Macedonia,  Sanije  a little bit in Montenegro and of course in Albania  and we reunited and naturally  started  working  immediately  and that work was naturally very intense. We had  many  activities  as  an  association  of  that  region  where  we  had been before, Has, but also in all other  parts. I made a request that they approved to continue to work with the women of Krusha e Vogel, because before the war we had         not worked with them, only during the war we did. We expanded our activities even to  Krusha  e  Vogel.  It  was  a  period of emergency, when the association had a lot of work  and a lot of projects. We had planned many projects, in the first place to help these    women. It was not easy,  maybe  not  because  of lack of funds, but because they were many, very sad, very traumatized women. It was difficult for anyone to work, to want to work,  because  they  came from other villages, however it was very difficult. Since I had  been very close to them even  during  the  war,  we  immediately  opened  the  women’s center in Krusha e Vogel and started our activities for the rehabilitation of women, also providing aid through other organizations we collaborated with.  We  even  brought  numerous donors there, I  cannot  even  count  them,  they did not know where to begin from.

Naturally, women’s activities began. Firstly, we  visited  them  at  homes,  because  they didn’t  want  to  go  out,  they couldn’t come to terms with the fact that they had lost     their loved ones. Then, gradually, with the center,  we  began  activities  for  each  age group, for girls and women, but also older women whom we did not want to leave aside.  For instance, we engaged the older women  with hand­made craftworks, which among  other  activities  we managed to sell abroad. This served as a way to forget their sorrow,    to spend time while also earning a little something. We started with the first projects, different for­profit courses, with the women of Krusha, widows who did  not  have  a husband. One group asked for tailoring courses, which all of them completed and they continue to work today and earn something and support their families. We also brought sewing machines and other various  materials.  Sometimes,  we also organized collective work at the center. For example, we sewed pajamas, uniforms  and  curtains  for  the hospital,  together  with  Kinderberg  and  other  associations  with  which  we cooperated. Then, a group of women and young girls requested informatics courses, I mean, they    began with computers, and English courses. We also organized  a  culinary  course  in  Krusha and in some other villages of Has, where women wanted to learn better, and in  detail, how to cook.

But one of the biggest and most important projects for Krusha, that in the beginning    people did not believe we could do it, was the driving course for women, how shall I say,  the right  to  drive  cars.  When  we  first  applied  for  the project, at first donors believed that it was a luxury or something, but we convinced them by proving that those women  here needed to drive both tractors and cars. They need to do this to meet their family needs. So, about fifty women of Krusha e Vogel and Krusha e Madhe[2]  got their driver license. Even today they use them. In Krusha, we had to think  about  implementing projects that were sustainable for women and would last to support their   families. Later, we also provided scholarships for the children of Krusha. Through various donors,

Motrat Qiriazi provided scholarships  so  that children wouldn’t quit school. At the center,  we organized different cultural activities and there we began gradually with children  because  women  sometimes  backed  off.  We  then  organized  different  programs, activities, we brought different  actors.  We  also  organized  different  health­related  courses and had doctors coming, who performed check­ups. For about three­four years Motrat Qiriazi, in cooperation with other local donors, provided women with a doctor once   a week. Women were provided with free checkups, and there was a great number of activities,  we  gave  huge  support  to the women for as long as the association   existed. But, besides  the  work,  the  activities  and  the  projects, in the period immediately after the war we had to face another problem with the women of Krusha  e  Vogel.  We  organized protests, the protests of Krusha  e  Vogel’s  women  about  their  missing  relatives are well­known, from Prizren  to  Pristina.  Even  today,  it is not known where  their remains are. It was not easy to organize these protests, to provide them with transportation buses, to take them to Pristina, to face them in Prizren. But of course,  thanks to the good internal organization  of  the  association  and  the  profound commitment  of Igballe, together, we succeeded to satisfy the women’s request to be    with them even during the protests, and among all the things they needed there was       the  feeling that they were not alone and that someone supported them to go on with     life. We tried with all our means to be as present as possible and give them financial and emotional support. Although nowadays we don’t have activities, I am still in touch with them, so I do all I can not to be disconnected from them. We also organized exchange  visits with other women from all over Kosovo. We visited Prekaz, Drenica, Reçak, so that  the women could talk to each other, cry over their sorrow and their common problems. These activities were very much welcomed by them and were important for them, and although for us it was a bit overwhelming, fatiguing, and engaging, we never felt   tired.

Then there was a project that does not exist anymore, it worked only for three years; it was our  initiative, for women to secure a factory job from the Germans, who came up  with  the  funding. We offered that possibility, but later there were some problems and   it could not continue. It worked just for three years, with our possibilities, then we secure  some farming jobs thanks a cooperation with the  UNHCR  [United  Nations  High  Commission  for  Refugees]. Even  today  there  are  still  different  activities  of  other associations that benefited  many women at that time, many projects in Krusha e   Vogel.

After the war, not just Krusha e Vogel, Has too, remained marginalized. We had cases in Lugishte too, we have women and young orphans there too. In Lugishte, also in many   other villages, we reopened the libraries that were burnt during  the  war.  And  we  reopened them  in  Gjonaj,  Lugishte, Romajë, but most importantly we reopened a center for children together with the association in Lugishte and together  with  ASB  from  Germany. There was a center for children, supplied with all the equipment needed for       the orphans to spend the day there with two instructors who were trained  by  the association Motrat Qiriazi. It was a beautiful period, during which the center continued working with little money, something  like  a  preschool  or kindergarten that was never  there before, and we developed many good activities for children. How shall I say, we     tried to support all age groups, to help  them.

Now, it is more important to mention one activity and one action which were important      for Has. Earlier, when I was talking, I mentioned that all the roads in Has were unpaved, they  were  dusty,  too  difficult  to  pass.  There  were  very  few  means of transport, only one bus in all Has. We went there with tractors, cars, walking,  and  people  were  connected, the residents,  independently  from  the  village,  we  too  were  involved personally, especially in that small organization council to realize the biggest project, to   pave the road to Has. This road that connected Has with the municipalities of Prizren  and  Gjakova,  was something like 36 km, and the Government of Kosovo had no budget,  did not have a budget at all. Of course UNMIK [United Nations Interim Mission in Kosovo] was present too, but we lobbied for some months  the  municipalities  of  Prizren  and Pristina, the Minister  of  Transportation,  together  of  course  with  Pristina,  where  we went and obtained the support of Safete Rogova, who was with us in the delegation,      some  activists  from  Has  and  I,  who  tried  to  find ways to pave the road as soon     as possible, because there was the problem of people who had started to relocate. There    were no living conditions, houses in many villages were burnt, no roads, no water, so we took the initiative together with the villagers, to find resources to start the project. There  was  a possibility through the Ministry of Transport to secure some funding, so     that the road could be asphalted. Thus together with four other activists from Has, we   went together to Croatia. We got organized together with  all  the  people  working  in bakeries and collected 600,000  euro.  It  was  something  impossible.  Even the donors could not believe that there would be such good will, that people could organize such  project and of course collect the funds that we  took  to  the  bank.  These  funds  we donated to the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Transportation and within a very short time they began to pave the road, the road that completely changed today’s life in Has. For its residents, today  this  region  is  totally  different.  We  do  not  have  to  talk about schooling, the problem with education is solved. Women and men go to school normally, to high schools, university, etc. It is  truly  a  big  change,  a distinct pleasure when I see  these  things,  all  the  commitment that we cannot describe. I am together with my friends, I have never been  alone.

A really  important moment was one during 2006, when we were honored with an award  from the Peace Foundation in Geneva, which  awards women who have contributed to  change in  rural  places. I have been lucky to have been among the women from Europe,  only three of  us,  I  was  the third, the other two from Italy and France. For me that  occasion was really important, something that it is difficult to  describe.  It  was  very emotional when I understood that  naturally  the  Network,  the  Women’s  Network, nominated  me, proposed me, as an activist who contributed and brought change. The  award presentation was held in Pristina, on an occasion where people from Has were numerous,  many  from  Pristina  too,  all the representatives, all of my friends, and all of   my colleagues and it was a moment when all my work and my involvement  were  recognized. Although when we worked and during our  work  as  activists,  we  never  thought whether we would be awarded or not, we have done humanitarian work, have volunteered in all fields, helped people. So, to help women, we helped families. In Has      we have brought change in all aspects of our  society.

[1] The massacre of Krusha e Vogel of March 26, 1999 is documented in many news reports but also in the Human Rights Watch report, Under Orders (2001). All the men of the village were killed, many of their bodies never to be found.

[2] More than ninety men were killed in the massacre of Krusha e Madhe on March 27, 1999. This massacre   is documented in the Human Rights Watch report, Under Orders,  2001.

Anita Prapashtica: What is your greatest   achievement?

Marta Prekpalaj: Our greatest achievement has been the increase of the number of  women  in schools. This was [our greater achievement], educating the women of Has, today a considerable number. For me, definitely, this has been  our  biggest  success, because I have lived that reality myself earlier, in difficult times, and I fought to get educated. I cannot recall everyone, of course, but  in  general I consider this to be our biggest success, supporting young women to continue their education, in Has. Girls’  schooling has changed the life in this region considerably, the entire region of Has. There have been young women who finished nursing school and  that  was  very  important.  Today, that generation works and they are all employed in the region’s health centers. It     is the generation that studied in that school we opened with Motrat Qiriazi in Romajë, the nursing school. Women and men studied there, they finished their school there and  today they work and operate there. This is an exceptional achievement for me, for my people,  for Has. Schooling is progress. Everything is going smoothly. Even the project for  the  road,  that  has  been  something big, has changed the development of this region.  Even the support and care of the women of  Krusha,  for  whom  I  am  an  important person. Wherever I meet them, wherever I see them, when I  meet  them,  I  feel particularly good and happy. All these successes for me have been a great honor and pleasure, I  can’t  think  of  whether  it  is  destiny to have worked with these two people, two  great  women, the sisters Safete and Igballe Rogova, who have been my true guides   in all this activity that took place. They have been  the  ones  to  support  me,  have  provided me with their experience, the commitment to work. Even today I continue with    the same goals, because it  is  important  how  you  operate,  but  most  important  with whom you will cooperate.  Our  association  has  successfully realized all its  goals. I can recall   how   effective   and   good   the   organization   we built  was,  and  that  gives  me happiness, that we had this nice team, that we have been an effective association, that maybe has been a little rare. It is known that good organization and good cooperation succeed. Today, we can see the results, concretely, in Has. That’s   all.

Anita Prapashtica: Is this far from your expectation of what you planned? How close    is it to what you thought it would  be?

Marta  Prekpalaj:  When  we  started  our  activity in the 90s, it was not easy at all and  we could not even imagine, we knew that it was not going to be easy to attain the  liberation of Kosovo, though we thought it would happen faster, but it took a long time.      It took  almost  ten  years,  in  the  beginning  it  was  peaceful  resistance, at the end also the armed resistance of the people  of  the  Kosovo  Liberation  Army,  who  have contributed, but of course  we  have  helped those people both directly and indirectly. In  our region we have secured medicines for our army, we sent them drugs and they took them. Despite this, to tell you the truth, we thought it would turn to be different after liberation, to be  better  that things actually are now. For example, when I thought how  long would it be after the liberation to get to the independence and the organization of     the state and the society, it seems a pretty long time.  And  the  establishment  of democratic  ruling in a society takes time. It is not how we thought it would be. I don’t   want to say that it was not   a success, that we did not get there. However, it was not     like we thought of it in the 90s, maybe things have changed not just in Kosovo, but in      the world and maybe not everything depends on us alone. It may depend on international factors, that we have here with different organizations, KFOR [NATO Kosovo Force] and UNMIK, and now EULEX [European Union Rule of Law Mission]. These structures maybe   have not approached the reality  in  Kosovo,  our  society  and  mentality,  as  they  should have. As activists from time to time, we have opposed these structures. When we did not agree with different activities, we said we did not agree and they should not happen. We spoke up in different fields and different directions. We continue even nowadays, but naturally  we must work to empower women and support women’s rights, something     that we are still doing.

Of  course  the  resistance of women’s activists has not stopped and I believe will never  stop, it will only maybe get louder. We  are  witnesses  of  many  activities  and  organizations that the civil society has raised, in our case the creation of the Women’s Network, which includes well organized women’s groups which resist according to circumstances, but of course we are planning long­term programs for women. Kosovo women activists are continuously engaged in practically every social issue, and we react every time we think it is necessary. Women have organized and cooperated, for example  also with women in decision­making. After some time, we began to advocate for the law     on  equal  opportunities,  the  fight  against  domestic  violence, and in general for the rights of women in Kosovo society, and we still have much work to do. But from time to time resistance will continue according  to  circumstances,  moments,  opportunities  for  the rights and empowerment of women. I  believe  we are more in number than any time  before. It is not small, we are  many.  We  are numerous activists now, we are a great number of organizations that will continue a peaceful resistance for rights. When there      has been a need for it, we organized ­ and that has been recognized by public opinion    from time to time, in Pristina and other centers of Kosovo ­, to speak up against injustice, by whomever it has been made,  whoever  is  in  government,  whether internationals or not,  whoever  commits  injustice  against  women.  We  will speak up and will oppose strong  resistance according to the moment and the   times.

After the war, after we started having our own  televisions in Kosovo, how shall I say, because before the war we lacked media, it was a great absence, and fortunately after      the war some televisions started work, whether central or local. It was something very important as the public had the opportunity  to  get  many  and  different  information. Motrat Qiriazi worked continuously and planned various activities. After the war, a new television  was  established  here  in  Prizren; it was a local, regional television, covering half of  Kosovo,  the  owner  was  a man from Has who had returned from abroad to invest    in media, it was called Television of Has and later Tv Opinion. I told the association and we discussed with our group, to do some projects with media, because the media are the strongest weapons to communicate with the  public.  In  this  case  we  were  more interested in family and women, the female gender, but of course this program had an impact on the  entire  family,  it  was not written only for women. And thus we began to  find support for the project, and started airing shows organized by Motrat Qiriazi on different themes, where I was honored to host for the entire   year.

It is very important  that  when  you  are  on television the audience sees you, women in this case, and they were live shows, which is also important. They had the right of expression, of asking, of their opinions and  whatever  they  wanted,  we  selected  the topics. For example, before the war we had to go village to village to organize meetings,  and health services, whatever it was. Now, through media, we had the opportunity to communicate with a larger number of women of the region, we  delivered  live  our  message regarding their  rights,  their  protection, and many other things, but of course  also educational topics with experts advice from different fields, such as doctors and psychologists and so on, all based on the demands of the audience. I believe that we appreciated the media very much, realized projects, but also collaborated and still do of course as  the  Network,  as  the association, since they are irreplaceable for our opinion  and society. Televisions have a large audience, they are still viewed today despite the development of the internet, there is no house or village that doesn’t have one. Yet, television, media, have their  role  because  they communicate directly with the audience  and give them the opportunity of a variety of information according to their   needs.

Earlier  on,  saying feminism or feminist was maybe not understandable or even taboo,     but now I think that our whole society has understood and accepted the meaning of feminism. How shall I say, I  was,  I am and will be [a feminist], there is no questioning  that, there is nothing wrong with fighting for women’s rights. There is nothing negative  about this subject, it is the right of every  individual  to  develop  her  own  ideas, their opinion on any field they want to focus on, but this is something very normal and not something “No, this is  not  ok.”  Maybe,  I said earlier, it may have been misunderstood,  but now I believe that it is understood and I am proud, I don’t deny it and will continue      to be, and work as much as possible of  course  in  the  direction  of  human rights, no matter the gender. But in reality a woman has  more  need,  has  still  more  need  for support to her safety in our society and others. I think that we have developed positive change in Kosovo in this direction, there is a strong movement of feminist women who      do work, we also have men who are feminist, and I don’t think this is an issue anymore,  and  I  believe  that  Kosovo  may be one of the countries that leads in activities directed    to  the  success of feminism. Of course we had the support of our friends outside of   Kosovo;  there are a lot who helped, supported and gave us the experience to empower   and continue this movement.

All the work  done  by  women,  let’s  not  even  talk  about what was done before the 90s until the eve of the war, during and after the war, if we look closely, has not paid off. It     has not paid off because, believe me, women worked very hard, we cannot describe the   work done during wartime when there was a crisis, where women went where men could  not. And now, instead of the government, the society, giving  them  their  deserved  positions, women still have to fight to take them.  I  will  give  some  very  concrete  examples. Women were fighters in the Kosovo Liberation Army, they were heroines who   died in the war and I don’t  know,  but  have  you  seen any monument to commemorate them? And there are very few books written about them, only when women wrote for women. How shall I say, I, as an activist who took part in the war, who never stopped [working], day and night, I am not happy because not much is done as it should, and we   still have to fight and  have  our  initiatives.  The  latest…after  the  election  of  the  President [Atifete Jahjaga], she started to give  awards  but  that  is  not  enough.  As concrete example, many of my fellow activists and I were repeatedly awarded prizes by internationals, we got awards, Igballe and Safete. Just recently Motrat Qiriazi was recognized, because Motrat Qiriazi is not only Marta who worked in Has with activists, but Motrat Qiriazi worked  in  the  entire  Kosovo,  and  it  is  impossible  for  me  to talk about everything we did. There is a great amount of work that has been done. There are a lot     of activists who worked individually without an association, different groups. I know that  this has not yet come to light, that they have not been recognized, it is not known as it should, it has not been acknowledged as it  should.

We had to fight to have women represented in Parliament, we have the 30% quota now,  we had to have campaigns for empowerment, you know we have done that with the Network through media, to have greater competition for decision­making positions. We never had a  woman mayor of Pristina. Why not? When we know that there are women  who  work  hard, we have two female ministers and a president, but unfortunately her    role is not great enough to have an impact in Kosovo. The  Prime  Minister  is  more powerful  than  the  Parliament,  but  knowing  that  Kosovo has had previous activists such as  Mother  Theresa[1]   who  won  the  Nobel  Prize,  we  can say that something has   been done, but not enough. But we always are with those who speak up for women, I mean, women’s groups, activists  speaking  up for this cause at the local level as well as the  central, speaking up so we can  advance,  make decisions and be recognized, how shall I  say, for her tireless work at that time, before the war but also now after the   war.

Anita Prapashtica: What are the dreams about the future that you think have come through?

Marta Prekpalaj: I have many, but I will focus  only  on  two.  One is about having a  center for women here in Has, where I would continue my work as a sort of counselor, advising and preparing other activists of Has, this I desired to do there. In truth,       there is a huge need for such work, I mean, for giving different training so that the work that     is left  continues  and  the  work does not stop in particular periods. Another wish I have  as a woman from Has, is about establishing a professional school in Has, a sort of high school, because there is a need for one of a higher level than the one we have, because there is the need for it, how shall I say, taking into consideration  the  reforms  in  education.  However,  this does not depend on me and on the association. This depends   on the government and we have submitted a request. We need to advocate to have a professional high school here in Has for women, which would continue the future work      for the economic development of Has. These are two ideas of mine for the work of the association  I  have  founded,  Visionary  Woman of the  21st  Century.  We  need to get involved, have a staff that will continue with further activities. How shall I say, this is it. There is also other stuff, but I will stop  here.

Anita Prapashtica: What are the other  ideas?

Marta Prekpalaj: We’ll see. We have plans, how shall I say, to continue with different activities even in other regions where we have  not  been,  because  there  are  some regions where we think there are  only  few  activities.  Here,  in  the  region  of  Prizren, there are some areas, villages, while I have been more concentrated in rural areas. I    mean, there is an area called Ana e Vrrinit here in the surrounding of Prizren, where not much has been done. A little work is also needed in Opoja. Something has began, some colleagues have already started to help a little, as much as they  can. Thank you for realizing this (smiles), for choosing me for this project. I wish you success! I thank the Kosovo Women’s Network, a lot! Igballe and you, Nicole. Thanks to   everybody!

Nicole Farnsworth: May I ask something else? When you were a little girl what were your dreams? What did you want to  be?

Marta Prekpalaj: Well, like every kid, I had many dreams. I wanted to be a teacher and   I became one, so my dream came true. My goal was to be a teacher and it happened. I think that it came through. My goal was to be this, to become a teacher and I am one. I think it was it.

Anita Prapashtica: And you honey? What do you want to  be?

Marta Prekpalaj: During our activities, I also did some acting. I liked acting, but I had    no opportunities. As an amateur, during student years, I performed in some   dramas.

Anita Prapashtica: Diana [Marta’s niece], you? What do you to do when you grow up?   Do you want to be a teacher  too?

Diana: I don’t know.

[1] The reference is to the self­help organization Nënë Tereza, not to Mother Theresa of Calcutta, an Albanian, who was beatified in  2003.

 

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