Wikimedia chapters/Reports/Shared Knowledge/May 2018

SHARED KNOWLEDGE
Activity report

May 2018

Spring Agroexpedition in Sirkovo

Mario Šarevski with the farmer Vele Kocev on a tractor during the Agroexpedition in Sirkovo

On 4^th of May, with the visit of the crops in the village of Sirkovo in the Vardar valley of the central part of Macedonia, we have officially started the Agroexpeditions for this year. With this visit, we aimed to photographed and collect information about the most cultivated agricultural crops in this region as well as those with a long historical tradition and the newly sown crops. Primarily, we had a focus on the Papaver somniferum, commonly known as the opium poppy or breadseed poppy, which has a very long historical tradition of cultivating in Macedonia as well as it is one with the highest quality of units of morphine content in the world. Additionally, we photographed seedlings of vegetables, orchards of cherries, peaches, apricots, pears and blooming vegetable crops in this period. Agroexpeditions will continue throughout the spring, summer and early autumn with main focus of the most authentic agricultural crops and seeds of Macedonia.

Wikiexpedition in Pijanec

Group photography of the members of the Wikiexpedition in Pijanec

This expedition in Pijanec region was supposed to be held at the end of 2017, but for many reasons it was postponed to 2018. We later said it was the first one this year and we planned it for the weekend around Easter, but because of the bad weather conditions, the expedition was not held again. However, the team was determined to go and conduct the expedition, although the weather was variable throughout the weekend. Thus, with a one-month old list of villages to be explored, with a sleeping reservation, on Friday afternoon (on May 11th) the team headed towards Delcevo in the easternmost part of Macedonia. In addition to the usual members, Toni Ristovski, Kiril Simeonovski, Nino Bogdanovski, this time a new member joined the expedition and that is our photographer, Elena Markova (Serene Survival). In two days were visited 16 villages including Trstija which according to the decision of the Ministry of Local Self Government in 2014 is one of the newest and most recently recognized villages. Within this Wikiexpedition were also explored the oldest church in the region dating back from the Medieval times, the Memorial house of the 19th century's Razlovci uprising and several other cultural-historical landmarks.

Finals of the UEFA Cup & League Europa and Champions League - Editing days

On the eve of the forthcoming Europa League final 2018, we decided to hold the fifth Editing day for this year dedicated to the Finals of the UEFA Cup and League Europa, of Europe's secondary club football tournament organised by UEFA. This editing day was attended by 4 participants who have created 11 new articles. By this outcome we have reached the number of 110 newly created articles in total on 5 editing days held so far in this year.

Also we organized another editing day on 26 May, for the UEFA Champions League Final game, whereas we had three participant. with 5 new articles and 3 improved.

WikiBeer project: New Macedonian & different types of beer discovered

"Naše Makedonsko (Our Macedonian)", a new domestic produced beer in Macedonia

On 16^th of May, we continued with the WikiBeer project, whereas we realized the third field work. The excursion of taking photographs and information started with the visit of the "Centar Bar" a new lounge bar in the city center of Skopje, which is branded and serves only "Naše Makedonsko (Our Macedonian)" that is a new and one of the two most recent domestic produced beers in Macedonia. Than, the visit continued to the Irish Pub with main purpose to photograph and taste specific types of beers, about which Wikipedia on Macedonian language lacks of articles and content.

Final editing class at "Krume Kepeski" Primary School

On 23^rd of May, we realized our second visit of the "Krume Kepeski" Primary school where we held the final editing class with the students of the 9^th (final) grade. Considering the fact that this is the first time ever to conduct the education program in the upper grades of a primary school we had considerable results and observations regarding the outcome of the entire work done within the project. The project which provisionally (and colloquially) was named "Wikipedia in elementary schools" was attended by students who attend the classes of the optional subject "Study of the homeland" whereby with their research enriched or created new articles on Wikipedia on Macedonian Language. After the introductory lecture about Wikipedia and Wikimedia projects, held in February, some of the students created accounts and tried to edit on Wikipedia but due to the lack of knowledge and instruction their work remained unpublished. On this final editing class, in a period of just around one hour we succeeded with 10 students to create 8 new articles: 7 articles for rivers in Macedonia, 1 article for a cave in Skopje region with an image taken and uploaded on the Wikimedia Commons by the student and 1 improved article about a village in Western Macedonia done by a schoolgirl who carried a written text on paper for the village of Zerkle, which was a task for her homework on the subject "Study of the homeland". Due to the limited possibilities of only 5 registered user accounts from one IP address and the fact that there was no internet in the school: from our mobile router we created 5 user accounts with students, and another 5 on the internet from a mobile device shared by the teacher Slobodan Trajkovski. Considering all the work done and its outcome, we will closely observe in the summer period and made a new plan in order to improve this project in the future.

Geoexpedition on Hydrographical Features in Western Macedonia

Mario Šarevski with the laptop computer by the glacial lakes on Korab Mountain, Macedonia

On the last weekend of May, which was an extended holiday in Macedonia, we started the third organized Geoxpedition for this year which will be focused on the hydrography, more precisely on the hydrographical objects and features in the western part of Macedonia. Considering that the western part of Macedonia has a mountaneous relief with traces of glaciation on the scope are the glacial lakes in the mountains, rivers, water springs and swamps. On this first visit were photographed several very little known glacial lakes on the Korab mountain, and then rivers and one of the largest wetlands and swamps in Macedonia in the Ohrid region. The expedition will continue in the following month of June with another visit of Korab and Stogovo mountains in western Macedonia, as well as the rivers, streams and springs in those areas.