Funny Stories

[Risto the Great]

Absolutely brilliant! You realize this is a sign? Do I have to spell it out for you? Okay fine if you insist. You have to run for office. Someone people just have this luck about them, you my friend might have that kind of luck. You are a good talker, seem charismatic, funny, relatable, seem to be well off, ...... older. You have all the makings of a successful politician.

Unfortunately, I have a handicap. I know you haven't seen me in real life. But I suffer from a social affliction. You see, I am utterly gorgeous. People see me and do not believe I can be anything more than simply beautiful. It is a curse! I wish I could look like Phoenix and be ugly AF. People would take me seriously.

Hold on.......carry the 2.......LOL you are only a couple years younger than my mother.

Don't worry about carrying the 2. Just carry me! I am tired! Young, beautiful, buff and carefree at 50 now. Shoot me please.

[vicsinad]

Reminds me of time I overheard this at my school once.
Kid: So, your Macedonian, that means you're Arab right?"
Other Kid: No . . .
Most of the kids at my school think most of the Balkan countries (well, mostly Albania specifically) are in the Middle East and the Montenegro is in Africa. Which led to a lot of very dumb sounding insults going around.

Haha. When I went to college, this girl thought Macedonia was in South America. Good teaching moment!

[vicsinad]

Geez you Americans sure have a weird sense of humour. I think you guys take the term "Punch Line" too literally...

Word of advice for anyone who happens to meet Vicsinad or Gocka in person, if they happen to utter the phrase "Let me tell you a Joke", I'd say that's your queue to either put your guard up or start running

Hah. Well I guess my definition is if I can look back and laugh at it.

[Tomche Makedonche]

That's funny and sad: all to common in the states. It's what you get for being honest!

Here's a police story.

I was 15 years old, a total of 8 of us Macedonians were driving around in two cars figuring out what to do. Pulled up into a Burger King, saw about 10 Albanians that we had rumbled with before. We got out of our cars. Some old Macedonian guy came out of BK and said we should leave because there were more Albanians inside. We didn't take him seriously. Meanwhile, Albanians had been following us like they typically did on weekend nights. So two more carloads of Albanians show up.

So, we started fighting. Outnumbered about 3 to 1, essentially getting our butts kicked. My brother had left his car running and some Albanian put it from park into drive. I jumped in the car to put it back in park, and suddenly getting kicked in the head and body from two directions. One Albanian tried dragging me out of the car by the feet. I reach for a pipe from the back of the car and whack (more of a tap) him on the head. I look out of the car and I see one cousin on the ground getting stomped on by three Albanians and I don't see any other of the Macedonians. But another car pulls up with Albanians and they pop open their trunk and start passing out weapons (pipes, bats, knifes, chains, etc.). I saw my life flash before my eyes.

But they all start running toward an Italian café a few hundred meters away. A moment of relief. But then I see my brother and a few cousins headed in that direction, just in front of the Albanians. Meanwhile, another Albanian had put the car back into reverse and I jumped in through the backseat this time (my cousin laying on the ground was behind the car and I feared it would run over him), but an Albanian was sitting in there, punching me in the face. I manage to get the car in park, but now I'm getting kicked in the face and feel the blood running down my head. After what felt like a lifetime, the Albanians start scattering. The police had arrived.

I hid the pipe on the tire of the car like an idiot thinking it would be better if they found it outside of the car than inside of the car. Police rounded most of us up. Then a couple ambulances came. My one cousin had his head bashed in with a baseball bat. His little brother was freaking out. Cops slammed him to the ground. Meanwhile, probably 5-6 more carloads of Albanians showed up. A few of my older cousins showed up as well after my brother had called them after getting into hiding in the café, which was all Italians who held the Albanians back from entering. Cops had difficult time keeping the sides separated.

Then I see the cops by my brother's car. They can't get inside because the doors were shut and locked and the car running. The Albanian who I hit in the head insisted I had a pipe. Cops eventually find the pipe by the tire. So, I get thrown in the cop car.

On the way to the station, the cop asks if this was an ethnic gang thing. I said no. He said, "well, why are you wearing a Macedonian shirt?" I had no answer. I was too shaken up.

Meanwhile, at the station they're interrogating me. Then I hear some yelling. It was my brother and older cousins getting kicked out of the station. Apparently, they pissed off the cops when they had asked for coffee with doughnuts. I'd say this is the funny part of the story.

Five minutes later, I hear more yelling. This time it was my dad. Yelling at the officers, saying he was going to sue the entire police department and city. I get released, not before being charged with x, y, and z.

Charges were dropped eventually. Not so much for my brother, though, who in the following three weeks got two more disorderly conduct tickets for fighting Albanians. One of them was for tackling and beating the **** out of three Albanians at school for mocking our cousin who got his head bashed in. Mind you, my brother was a state wrestling champ, so he knew how to fight.

And that was the start of a 3-year "street war" between Macedonians with some Serb cousins of ours and the Albanians in metro-Detroit. In those 3 years, I was jumped more times than I have fingers on my hands, so I was glad when it came time to go away to college to get the heck out of there. I refused to fight in school, to not jeopardize my academic track, but it made me appear very weak in front of the assembled crowds every time Albanians ganged up on me, especially after my brother had graduated.

The funniest part of this entire saga may have been: 1) when I dressed up undercover as an Albanian; and 2) at a hotel party, my cousin was so wasted he knocked on the wrong hotel door, which ended up being a room full of Albanians. The endings to those stories are pretty funny, as well.

My brother has a lot more stories that are great: one, for example, was when he was working as a host at a restaurant and Albanians came in. He knew they were there for him. So he goes: "would you need a translator for the menu?" He fought the four Albanians right then and there in front of 100 people eating their dinner. He eventually got one of their shoes and started beating him with it while the others fled. The Albanians had spread rumors that they had sent my brother to the hospital, but he came into school the next day and returned the shoe to the Albanian. Probably one of the most embarrassing moments in that Albanian kid's life.

I got beat up pretty good by a group of shiptari my second year in America. It was during the 2001 conflict. A couple shiptari were wearing UCK shirts a few days after those Macedonian soldiers were ambushed. I ripped the shirt off one of them, then 5 or 6 come out of no where and start whaling on me. No Macedonians came to help me, even though we outnumbered Albanians in school. I got a few good ones in, but they beat my ass good. Thank god a couple polish kids I played soccer with came to break it up before the dean showed up.

Geez you Americans sure have a weird sense of humour. I think you guys take the term "Punch Line" too literally...

Word of advice for anyone who happens to meet Vicsinad or Gocka in person, if they happen to utter the phrase "Let me tell you a Joke", I'd say that's your queue to either put your guard up or start running

[FoxTale]

Ah, the terrorist incident.

Basically: I was sitting at a cafe, talking Macedonian to my baba on the phone, looking on the MTO forum, and an old couple must have thought I was talking Arabic and planning Armageddon, because they left and 5 minutes later the police arrived saying they had reports of an aggressive individual talking in a foreign language. The cops sat down by me, apologized in advance but said they have to follow up on all calls. I explained what was going on; the guy said he served in the Vermont National Guard and had been to Macedonia several times, and then muttered his disdain for what the Greeks were doing to the Macedonians. They took my information and left.

Afterwards, a Bosnian guy who was working in the cafe came out and said he'd never seen that happen before. There's a first for everything! Almost got arrested for speaking Macedonian -- reminds one of Greece!

Reminds me of time I overheard this at my school once.
Kid: So, your Macedonian, that means you're Arab right?"
Other Kid: No . . .
Most of the kids at my school think most of the Balkan countries (well, mostly Albania specifically) are in the Middle East and the Montenegro is in Africa. Which led to a lot of very dumb sounding insults going around.

Absolutely brilliant! You realize this is a sign? Do I have to spell it out for you? Okay fine if you insist. You have to run for office. Someone people just have this luck about them, you my friend might have that kind of luck. You are a good talker, seem charismatic, funny, relatable, seem to be well off, ...... older. You have all the makings of a successful politician.

Seriously, Macedonia would be so much better off if Risto was a politician there, too bad he is an Aussie.

[Gocka]

Absolutely brilliant! You realize this is a sign? Do I have to spell it out for you? Okay fine if you insist. You have to run for office. Someone people just have this luck about them, you my friend might have that kind of luck. You are a good talker, seem charismatic, funny, relatable, seem to be well off, ...... older. You have all the makings of a successful politician.

You guys are thugs!

OK, my (more sensible) little story:

It was the 90's. I just finished uni and was in my first year working at an accounting firm. The local Macedonian community had organised a protest about the Greek embargo, the naming, the flag ... the vibe. My father was the president of our community back then and we were all front and centre on the protest march.

The march lasted a few hours and a good friend of mine who was known to be quite an agitator was carrying the largest banner. We ended up at our parliament house and he was holding the banner for hours by that time. There were filthy Greek spies filming all of us and it was quite a volatile day.

My friend was so tired of holding the banner. He begged me to hold it for a minute so he could rest his arms. I picked it up, held it in the air for about 1 minute ... the local newspaper cameraman snapped a great picture of me and I made it into our local newspaper the following day on page 3!

It was glorious, all my 1 minute's effort was rewarded with instant fame and notoriety.

After the news article was printed, there were 3 death threats from (verrry hevvvy grik accksents ....) on my phone when I got home from work the following day. I am happy to report I am still alive (and famous).

Anyway, my friend still gets annoyed when I remind him of my personal glory.

Hold on.......carry the 2.......LOL you are only a couple years younger than my mother.

It was the 90's. I just finished uni and was in my first year working at an accounting firm

Phoenix has offered me a hand job but I think he is too ugly.

This is the epitome of our cause. Right place, wrong people.

Haha that's great. I always look suspiciously at someone when they ask me to hold the banner. I think to myself: "This dude's not going to return and I'm going to be stuck with this responsibility."

Anyway, next time I'll stick around to see if I can get famous!


My dad has told me many funny stories of Macedonian-Americans involved in politics. Once he and some other Macs were invited to the White House for some discussion/conference on American NATO policy. There was about 40-50 people at the meeting. George W. Bush was giving a little speech. Well, when Bush began talking about NATO expansion, he mentioned "Republic of Macedonia" and one of the Macedonian guys in attendance jumped out of his seat, pumping his fist in the air, shouting, "Macedonia forever! Thank you George, thank you!"

Bush paused. Everyone turned to look at the guy. My dad sunk as low as he possibly could into his chair out of embarrassment. Bush ignored the Mac guy and continued his speech. Needless to say, the Macedonian-American delegation was not granted a private audience with Bush, as was the goal.

[vicsinad]

Haha that's great. I always look suspiciously at someone when they ask me to hold the banner. I think to myself: "This dude's not going to return and I'm going to be stuck with this responsibility."

Anyway, next time I'll stick around to see if I can get famous!


My dad has told me many funny stories of Macedonian-Americans involved in politics. Once he and some other Macs were invited to the White House for some discussion/conference on American NATO policy. There was about 40-50 people at the meeting. George W. Bush was giving a little speech. Well, when Bush began talking about NATO expansion, he mentioned "Republic of Macedonia" and one of the Macedonian guys in attendance jumped out of his seat, pumping his fist in the air, shouting, "Macedonia forever! Thank you George, thank you!"

Bush paused. Everyone turned to look at the guy. My dad sunk as low as he possibly could into his chair out of embarrassment. Bush ignored the Mac guy and continued his speech. Needless to say, the Macedonian-American delegation was not granted a private audience with Bush, as was the goal.

[Risto the Great]

LOL you wish. Got some freaky fantasies there, clearly you hand around RTG too much.

Phoenix has offered me a hand job but I think he is too ugly.

[Risto the Great]

You guys are thugs!

OK, my (more sensible) little story:

It was the 90's. I just finished uni and was in my first year working at an accounting firm. The local Macedonian community had organised a protest about the Greek embargo, the naming, the flag ... the vibe. My father was the president of our community back then and we were all front and centre on the protest march.

The march lasted a few hours and a good friend of mine who was known to be quite an agitator was carrying the largest banner. We ended up at our parliament house and he was holding the banner for hours by that time. There were filthy Greek spies filming all of us and it was quite a volatile day.

My friend was so tired of holding the banner. He begged me to hold it for a minute so he could rest his arms. I picked it up, held it in the air for about 1 minute ... the local newspaper cameraman snapped a great picture of me and I made it into our local newspaper the following day on page 3!

It was glorious, all my 1 minute's effort was rewarded with instant fame and notoriety.

After the news article was printed, there were 3 death threats from (verrry hevvvy grik accksents ....) on my phone when I got home from work the following day. I am happy to report I am still alive (and famous).

Anyway, my friend still gets annoyed when I remind him of my personal glory.

[vicsinad]

Ah, the terrorist incident.

Basically: I was sitting at a cafe, talking Macedonian to my baba on the phone, looking on the MTO forum, and an old couple must have thought I was talking Arabic and planning Armageddon, because they left and 5 minutes later the police arrived saying they had reports of an aggressive individual talking in a foreign language. The cops sat down by me, apologized in advance but said they have to follow up on all calls. I explained what was going on; the guy said he served in the Vermont National Guard and had been to Macedonia several times, and then muttered his disdain for what the Greeks were doing to the Macedonians. They took my information and left.

Afterwards, a Bosnian guy who was working in the cafe came out and said he'd never seen that happen before. There's a first for everything! Almost got arrested for speaking Macedonian -- reminds one of Greece!

[Gocka]

Gocka...I was waiting for the part when Big Bubba gives you a visit...

LOL you wish. Got some freaky fantasies there, clearly you hand around RTG too much.

That's funny and sad: all to common in the states. It's what you get for being honest!

Here's a police story.

I was 15 years old, a total of 8 of us Macedonians were driving around in two cars figuring out what to do. Pulled up into a Burger King, saw about 10 Albanians that we had rumbled with before. We got out of our cars. Some old Macedonian guy came out of BK and said we should leave because there were more Albanians inside. We didn't take him seriously. Meanwhile, Albanians had been following us like they typically did on weekend nights. So two more carloads of Albanians show up.

So, we started fighting. Outnumbered about 3 to 1, essentially getting our butts kicked. My brother had left his car running and some Albanian put it from park into drive. I jumped in the car to put it back in park, and suddenly getting kicked in the head and body from two directions. One Albanian tried dragging me out of the car by the feet. I reach for a pipe from the back of the car and whack (more of a tap) him on the head. I look out of the car and I see one cousin on the ground getting stomped on by three Albanians and I don't see any other of the Macedonians. But another car pulls up with Albanians and they pop open their trunk and start passing out weapons (pipes, bats, knifes, chains, etc.). I saw my life flash before my eyes.

But they all start running toward an Italian café a few hundred meters away. A moment of relief. But then I see my brother and a few cousins headed in that direction, just in front of the Albanians. Meanwhile, another Albanian had put the car back into reverse and I jumped in through the backseat this time (my cousin laying on the ground was behind the car and I feared it would run over him), but an Albanian was sitting in there, punching me in the face. I manage to get the car in park, but now I'm getting kicked in the face and feel the blood running down my head. After what felt like a lifetime, the Albanians start scattering. The police had arrived.

I hid the pipe on the tire of the car like an idiot thinking it would be better if they found it outside of the car than inside of the car. Police rounded most of us up. Then a couple ambulances came. My one cousin had his head bashed in with a baseball bat. His little brother was freaking out. Cops slammed him to the ground. Meanwhile, probably 5-6 more carloads of Albanians showed up. A few of my older cousins showed up as well after my brother had called them after getting into hiding in the café, which was all Italians who held the Albanians back from entering. Cops had difficult time keeping the sides separated.

Then I see the cops by my brother's car. They can't get inside because the doors were shut and locked and the car running. The Albanian who I hit in the head insisted I had a pipe. Cops eventually find the pipe by the tire. So, I get thrown in the cop car.

On the way to the station, the cop asks if this was an ethnic gang thing. I said no. He said, "well, why are you wearing a Macedonian shirt?" I had no answer. I was too shaken up.

Meanwhile, at the station they're interrogating me. Then I hear some yelling. It was my brother and older cousins getting kicked out of the station. Apparently, they pissed off the cops when they had asked for coffee with doughnuts. I'd say this is the funny part of the story.

Five minutes later, I hear more yelling. This time it was my dad. Yelling at the officers, saying he was going to sue the entire police department and city. I get released, not before being charged with x, y, and z.

Charges were dropped eventually. Not so much for my brother, though, who in the following three weeks got two more disorderly conduct tickets for fighting Albanians. One of them was for tackling and beating the **** out of three Albanians at school for mocking our cousin who got his head bashed in. Mind you, my brother was a state wrestling champ, so he knew how to fight.

And that was the start of a 3-year "street war" between Macedonians with some Serb cousins of ours and the Albanians in metro-Detroit. In those 3 years, I was jumped more times than I have fingers on my hands, so I was glad when it came time to go away to college to get the heck out of there. I refused to fight in school, to not jeopardize my academic track, but it made me appear very weak in front of the assembled crowds every time Albanians ganged up on me, especially after my brother had graduated.

The funniest part of this entire saga may have been: 1) when I dressed up undercover as an Albanian; and 2) at a hotel party, my cousin was so wasted he knocked on the wrong hotel door, which ended up being a room full of Albanians. The endings to those stories are pretty funny, as well.

My brother has a lot more stories that are great: one, for example, was when he was working as a host at a restaurant and Albanians came in. He knew they were there for him. So he goes: "would you need a translator for the menu?" He fought the four Albanians right then and there in front of 100 people eating their dinner. He eventually got one of their shoes and started beating him with it while the others fled. The Albanians had spread rumors that they had sent my brother to the hospital, but he came into school the next day and returned the shoe to the Albanian. Probably one of the most embarrassing moments in that Albanian kid's life.

Jeez Victor! First I said funny, you damn hoodlum. I thought I was the violent one, you are supposed to be the hippy.

I got beat up pretty good by a group of shiptari my second year in America. It was during the 2001 conflict. A couple shiptari were wearing UCK shirts a few days after those Macedonian soldiers were ambushed. I ripped the shirt off one of them, then 5 or 6 come out of no where and start whaling on me. No Macedonians came to help me, even though we outnumbered Albanians in school. I got a few good ones in, but they beat my ass good. Thank god a couple polish kids I played soccer with came to break it up before the dean showed up.

Those little piss ants only fight when they are at least 3 to 1.

Tell the story about Victor the terrorist.

[vicsinad]

That's funny and sad: all to common in the states. It's what you get for being honest!

Here's a police story.

I was 15 years old, a total of 8 of us Macedonians were driving around in two cars figuring out what to do. Pulled up into a Burger King, saw about 10 Albanians that we had rumbled with before. We got out of our cars. Some old Macedonian guy came out of BK and said we should leave because there were more Albanians inside. We didn't take him seriously. Meanwhile, Albanians had been following us like they typically did on weekend nights. So two more carloads of Albanians show up.

So, we started fighting. Outnumbered about 3 to 1, essentially getting our butts kicked. My brother had left his car running and some Albanian put it from park into drive. I jumped in the car to put it back in park, and suddenly getting kicked in the head and body from two directions. One Albanian tried dragging me out of the car by the feet. I reach for a pipe from the back of the car and whack (more of a tap) him on the head. I look out of the car and I see one cousin on the ground getting stomped on by three Albanians and I don't see any other of the Macedonians. But another car pulls up with Albanians and they pop open their trunk and start passing out weapons (pipes, bats, knifes, chains, etc.). I saw my life flash before my eyes.

But they all start running toward an Italian café a few hundred meters away. A moment of relief. But then I see my brother and a few cousins headed in that direction, just in front of the Albanians. Meanwhile, another Albanian had put the car back into reverse and I jumped in through the backseat this time (my cousin laying on the ground was behind the car and I feared it would run over him), but an Albanian was sitting in there, punching me in the face. I manage to get the car in park, but now I'm getting kicked in the face and feel the blood running down my head. After what felt like a lifetime, the Albanians start scattering. The police had arrived.

I hid the pipe on the tire of the car like an idiot thinking it would be better if they found it outside of the car than inside of the car. Police rounded most of us up. Then a couple ambulances came. My one cousin had his head bashed in with a baseball bat. His little brother was freaking out. Cops slammed him to the ground. Meanwhile, probably 5-6 more carloads of Albanians showed up. A few of my older cousins showed up as well after my brother had called them after getting into hiding in the café, which was all Italians who held the Albanians back from entering. Cops had difficult time keeping the sides separated.

Then I see the cops by my brother's car. They can't get inside because the doors were shut and locked and the car running. The Albanian who I hit in the head insisted I had a pipe. Cops eventually find the pipe by the tire. So, I get thrown in the cop car.

On the way to the station, the cop asks if this was an ethnic gang thing. I said no. He said, "well, why are you wearing a Macedonian shirt?" I had no answer. I was too shaken up.

Meanwhile, at the station they're interrogating me. Then I hear some yelling. It was my brother and older cousins getting kicked out of the station. Apparently, they pissed off the cops when they had asked for coffee with doughnuts. I'd say this is the funny part of the story.

Five minutes later, I hear more yelling. This time it was my dad. Yelling at the officers, saying he was going to sue the entire police department and city. I get released, not before being charged with x, y, and z.

Charges were dropped eventually. Not so much for my brother, though, who in the following three weeks got two more disorderly conduct tickets for fighting Albanians. One of them was for tackling and beating the **** out of three Albanians at school for mocking our cousin who got his head bashed in. Mind you, my brother was a state wrestling champ, so he knew how to fight.

And that was the start of a 3-year "street war" between Macedonians with some Serb cousins of ours and the Albanians in metro-Detroit. In those 3 years, I was jumped more times than I have fingers on my hands, so I was glad when it came time to go away to college to get the heck out of there. I refused to fight in school, to not jeopardize my academic track, but it made me appear very weak in front of the assembled crowds every time Albanians ganged up on me, especially after my brother had graduated.

The funniest part of this entire saga may have been: 1) when I dressed up undercover as an Albanian; and 2) at a hotel party, my cousin was so wasted he knocked on the wrong hotel door, which ended up being a room full of Albanians. The endings to those stories are pretty funny, as well.

My brother has a lot more stories that are great: one, for example, was when he was working as a host at a restaurant and Albanians came in. He knew they were there for him. So he goes: "would you need a translator for the menu?" He fought the four Albanians right then and there in front of 100 people eating their dinner. He eventually got one of their shoes and started beating him with it while the others fled. The Albanians had spread rumors that they had sent my brother to the hospital, but he came into school the next day and returned the shoe to the Albanian. Probably one of the most embarrassing moments in that Albanian kid's life.

[Phoenix]

Gocka...I was waiting for the part when Big Bubba gives you a visit...

[Risto the Great]

Those bullshit physical tests would never pass as a determinant of whether you are drunk in Australia. What a load of rubbish! Sounds like an excuse to get dodgy looking Macedonians off the streets!

[Gocka]

C'mon, out with it.

LOL Listen, I take story telling very seriously.