The Mihajlov family’s holiday retreat was home to precious family heirlooms which Zaklina Mihajlova had inherited from her great grandmother.
Exquisite silk curtains, Macedonian kilims and hand-woven folk costumes were among the treasures she had lovingly kept through decades of collecting original handcrafts.
All of them are now lost to the flames.
"We were monitoring the Snowy Mountains fire updates non-stop, but nothing could prepare me for seeing my tranquil place, my beloved family heirlooms in flames on TV... I am still processing the emotions.
“Unfortunately, we did not just lose the house. The house is not a problem, many lost houses, but this house was like a Macedonian museum. I am so sad that all the Macedonian handcrafts, rugs, original woven costumes, some up to 300 years old, ended up in a pile of ash.”
“There were curtains woven by my great-grandmother sourced from home-bred silkworms, there were old hand-made casserole pots, many old Macedonian home wares."
Mrs Mihajlova says she had been adding to the collection for years, intending to eventually create a museum in Sydney to showcase the cultural items. She says the loss of the original handcrafts is a loss for the entire Macedonian community in Australia.
Mrs Mihajlova encountered devastated country upon returning to their holiday home days after the fire.
"As soon as we crossed the ramp where the road was closed, the view was heart-wrenching. There were dead birds with burnt wings on the road.... The trees stood like thin, black toothpicks in the landscape.
Mrs. Mihajlova says residents told her the fire had made its way over Lake Talbingo at a distance of three to four kilometres, likely via embers carried by the wind.
"There’s a hydroelectric power plant [nearby], huge pipes the size of a double-decker bus. From there, the mountains burned and fire came from behind and entered the township. Residents explained yesterday that they couldn't breathe for so long and that the hill in front of the lake burned in just under five minutes".
Those residents also told of fierce winds of about 80 kilometres an hour roaring through the township.
Whilst Zakilna Mihajlova's family holiday home was the only house destroyed in the fire, she is grateful that it was only one in the entire town.
"It is good that only one house was burned, though it was ours, because it saved all the other houses. It’s not good that everything inside it was burned, but that's life."
As families prepare to undertake the massive process of rebuilding their lives and homes, Mrs Mihajlova says she is grateful to those who, after hearing of her family's loss at Christmas, were willing to donate some of their Macedonian heir-looms to the museum.
"I hope we will establish [the museum] in the near future as the Australian-Macedonian NSW Council is considering building a museum house in Sydney.
“I have been planning this for 28 years with Macedonians living in Talbingo, to start building a monastery halfway between Talbingo and Melbourne, and perhaps, within the monastery, we can dedicate a space for a Macedonian room.”
