There is a misunderstanding out there in the wider world that, since the war was four years ago and there has been international aid and because this is Europe, Kosovo has reached some kind of developed stage. It’s just not true, says David Finley, previous director of World Vision Kosovo.

The family is shy discussing details but they are open about the essentials, that they are poor. “My worries are enough money and enough food,” says the father, Nexhat Budakova. None of the children’s shoes were newly purchased, he admits. They are hand-me-downs from his wife’s sister.

Nexhat wears a cheap pair of rubber shoes as he sits talking in the living room. Normally Kosovars leave their shoes at the front door, a move both practical and hospitable. But Nexhat is not wearing socks and it is not fitting for an adult to go barefoot. The room is furnished with two ancient sofas. The walls are water-stained.

The Budakova family lives in Robovec, one of 1,500 rural villages where beyond subsistence agriculture there is little or nothing to do.

“At the end of the NATO bombing in 1999 Kosovars were excited about the prospect of independence from Yugoslavia. Now Yugoslavia is gone, whittled down to Serbia and Montenegro, but so is the population’s excitement. People are just talking about feeding their families,” Finley said.

Kosovo is a harsh place to live. Its economic and health care indicators are among the poorest in Europe. The GDP per capita was estimated by USAID at $946 in 2001. This ranks it below Chad, Liberia and North Korea ($1,000) and just above the Republic of the Congo, Mali and Nigeria ($900) in 2002.

The GDP per capita for Switzerland and Germany, where large numbers of Kosovars go to find work and send money home, was $32,000 and $26,200 respectively in 2002. The figure for the United States, much beloved by Kosovars for President Bill Clinton’s decision to force Slobodan Milosevic out of the Serbian province, was $37,600.

Infant mortality is estimated at 25 deaths per 1,000 live births or about the same as China and North Korea. It is significantly more than the 16.9 deaths per 1,000 live births for all of Serbia and Montenegro, of which Kosovo is still a part. Infant mortality is 4.36 deaths and 4.23 deaths in Switzerland and Germany respectively and 6.75 in the U.S.

Nexhat appears to be beaten down to nearly nothing. It shows in his face, dark, deeply lined and brooding, and in his stooped shoulders. Sometimes he seems to have to muster the strength to speak. He says his children bear psychological scars from the war in 1998-1999. He says he is okay but his behaviour strongly suggests Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

His uncle, Ramiz Budakova, 66, says: “He’s not telling the truth. Since the war he is lost completely.”

PTSD has powerfully impacted the population, as high as 25%, according to a study in 2000. The health system is ill equipped to handle the casualties. There was only one social worker per 20,000 people and one sociologist and one psychologist per 100,000 people immediately before the NATO bombing in May 1999, says a World Bank report. The toll of
PTSD on productivity is immeasurable.

The Budakova family’s economic situation is bad. Nexhat, his wife and six children, his mother and his brother share an old, rundown farmhouse. They have two cows and half a hectare of land. They live on significantly less than $1 per person per day.

Nine-year-old daughter, Sahide, sits barefoot on the living room floor listening to adult conversation. Her pants are too short and her legs are thin and without shape, displaying no obvious musculature. She looks malnourished.

Sahide is shy and can’t string together enough words to make a sentence in front of so many adults. She nods that she likes school though and says she enjoys playing handball. She also says she has no shoes of her own, just the shared lot of plastic boots. She wears one pair to the afternoon shift at school each day.

She slips on a pair of the boots without socks when she steps a few meters beyond the front door of the house to draw water from the well. The well is deep and it takes time to pull up a bucket of the icy water. It has only been raining occasionally this day but a damp cold permeates the air and creeps into the bones.

Sahide didn’t put on additional clothing when she stepped outside. She focuses on her task, head down and gaze fixed, as if it helps her forget the cold. A shiver passes through her frail body from time to time but she shakes it off and keeps drawing water. Her thin, exposed calves become mottled. Her shoulders narrow against the and when she is done she goes straight back inside.

Sahide’s mother, Kadrije, 32, clings to her 2-year-old daughter, Fitore. She shivers as she mentions another unpleasant winter chore, washing clothes for 10 people:

I catch a cold washing for everyone.

When Sahide’s 10-year-old brother, Refik, enters the room he sits on the floor by the wood-burning stove to absorb the heat. He doesn’t remove his parka. A dampness clings to the boy’s coat. It fills the room with a musty smell and conquers the meager heat put out by the stove.

Refik says likes school, especially math, and he wants to be a pilot. He once saw a pilot on television somewhere. Because he has just come from school, Refik is the only family member in the room wearing socks.

GDP and other statistics are taken from the CIA World Fact Book online unless otherwise noted.

Photo: John Schenk (World Vision)