A Gym "in Poor Condition for Decades" Finally Renovated: Centar Brags About the Parquet and LED Lights, but Not the Price

Students at the "Kole Nedelkovski" primary school in Skopje marked Children's Week in a gym that, according to the Municipality of Centar, had been in poor condition for decades. Now the 350-square-metre hall has been renovated, and Mayor Goran Gerasimovski joined the kids on the floor for the celebration.

The list of works is specific: the parquet has been sanded and varnished, the walls and ceilings repaired, new interior doors fitted, new inverter air conditioners and LED lighting installed, and the electrical wiring completely replaced. The changing rooms and basketball hoops have been restored too, and the rest of the equipment is being replaced. "We renovated the gym over the summer," Gerasimovski said.

It's good that the kids now have a gym they can actually train in. But the phrase "in poor condition for decades" says more than the renovation itself. Generations of students did PE in a space that the municipality itself describes this way. How many other school gyms in Skopje are still waiting for their own mayor and their own summer?

And one more question the press release skipped: how much did the renovation cost? When a municipality brags about details down to the air conditioners, the price tag shouldn't be a secret.