[International Version 01] Eastern Macedonia, a Weapon against Stillness

Day 1,085, 14:14 • Published in France France • by Dhelk








Dear Macedonian friends, please allow me to introduce myself before you read this article. I am Dhelk, an eFrench journalist who wanders throughout the New World and who writes down his travel’s tales in his newspaper: eGlobe-Trotter chroniques. The initial goal of this newspaper was to make discover each week a different place of the eWorld to the eFrench people, which they hardly know. I travelled to Limpopo, Java, Karnataka, Florida, North of Brazil, Beijing and Marmara. And this week, I decided to write an article about one of your regions: Eastern Macedonia.
Of course, the article was already published in eFrance, but I thought it was a good idea to let you read it, so that you could know what a foreign journal could think of your country, after a week spent living in your community.
Do not balk at criticizing the elements that I spoke of and which could be wrong, or at bringing some details about the events that I may not have dealt with enough. You may even vote and subscribe this newspaper, if its concept had ever pleased you.
My friends, get ready to discover your own nation…






A hazy sky dotted with blue shards, numerous swift round hills in my sight… My travel to Marmara had some surprises left for me. From the Bosphore’s banks to the foggy mountains of Bulgaria, including the Greek coast of the Aegean Sea, the landscape didn’t stop changing ; the smells and sounds alternated during my journey.
Getting round the Bulgarian outpost to reach Macedonia wasn’t easy stuff. Soldiers were at bay, and you could feel the tension in the place. After proving myself acceptable to the Macedonian border department, I could enter the region of Eastern Macedonia. Numerous stone quarries spread in harmony in the emerald green landscape, with some clear-watered rivers. After a three-day walk, I reached the town where my acquaintance was waiting. Overcrowded and animated, the city fully reflected the Macedonian state of mind, the one of a nation which had suffered to defend its cause and which could make anything to keep its sovereignty.
A new chronicle is opening, let yourself be tempted, and come in…






Spring 2009 : a wave of Macedonian players arrives on eRepublik. After a few weeks of adaptation, after which was created a specific network of a community, made of various forums and chats, the first actions for the creation of a parallel eNation were led, outside the official ways given by the game. The Macedonian community develops and succeeds to create the first page in the Wiki of an eNation which is not listed among the countries of eRepublik. A first victory which symbolizes a struggle for existence, whose ending will happen later only…

Indeed, after some weeks of parallel existence, the Macedonian decide to implant their amazing project in eRepublik itself, thanks to weapons. The military domain had always been one of the principal conditions in the way to acknowledge a nation. Then, it’s not surprising to see the Macedonian Phalanx emerging in October 2009. An independent army, financed and supported by eRussia, which settles the foundations on the eMacedonian nation, which will rise eleven months later. Inspired by the Russian president of the time, MorethanKantose, the Macedonian Phalanx was naturally integrated into the Russian army, and helped to invade the eUSA in 2009, beside PeaceGC. But this beautiful adventure ends in January 2010, as a huge part of the Macedonian players gets desperate of never seeing their nation officially represented in the New World. Some leave, but many stay and revive this hope.

Nine months later, after the enormous fail of the first version of eRepublik Rising, administrators decide to turn back and to give a new look to the New World Map. The names of the newcomers are given in September 2010 : Macedonia is among them, the challenge is going to be fulfilled.

However, the euphoria following the official arrival of Macedonia among the nations of eRepublik is replaced by a new discussion a few days later : the official name of the nation. Indeed, the administrators decide to copy the IRL geopolitical context, and give to Macedonia the awful name “FYROM” (or “Former Yougoslav Republic of Macedonia”), used by the Greek who fear an hypothetical claim to their region, which is called… Macedonia. Weeks of intense negotiations follow, and the Macedonian succeed in getting the eNation named “Republic of Macedonia”. They can eventually begin to build the country…






The only Macedonian region having high resources of Stone, Eastern Macedonia is nothing but the economic heart of the country : you can find there a high rate of national capitals (most of them being foreign), which is far much superior to those of the two other Macedonian regions. “Eastern Macedonia is our only spring of exportations” United Macedonia (current president of the country) confided me. Since, the whole national economy belongs on this region’s activities, and it’s the only one who can help Macedonia to avoid the territorial stillness it has to face.

Surrounded by two countries willing to capture it, one is in EDEN, and the situation between Macedonia and the other is tense, Eastern Macedonia is both the heart of the Macedonian economy, and the main weakness of the country. Therefore, the Bulgarian and Greek presidents chose it as their military goal in their respective mandates. This situation puts this highly important region into an unsteady position, whose consequences may be terrible for the sovereignty of the Nation.

“It’s less thanks to the strength of its weaponry than thanks to its citizens’ nature that a nation rises upon others”, Baden-Powell told us. Macedonia will be a striking example of this quotation if EDEN attacks its main region, because Macedonia’s freedom rests upon the survival of Eastern Macedonia…







To join a community is always a singular experience, but it is even more singular when you make it with a growing nation. I am not really old in the New World and I didn’t know the excitement around the building of my own eNation, but as I lived in the Macedonian community, I could feel this so unique feeling, the one which fills us with a patriot joy which we only share in such moments.
I would like to thank all the people who I could talk with, including United Macedonia, Macedonian_Lion, and Hristijan Cvetanovski. I thank them for allowing me to interview them, and to tell the history of their eNation.




Dhelk
eGlobe-Trotter chroniques
Over the edge, and over again...


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| Thanks to Kyle Hyde for the translation |