diff --git a/CMakeLists.txt b/CMakeLists.txt
index 6ceb59d6b..70f9c0b8b 100644
--- a/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -8,6 +8,12 @@ CMAKE_MINIMUM_REQUIRED(VERSION 3.13)
 PROJECT(Columnstore)
 INCLUDE (CheckCXXSourceCompiles)
 
+# MariaDB server adds this flags by default for Debug builds, and this makes our external projects
+# ABI incompatible with debug STL containers
+STRING(REPLACE -D_GLIBCXX_DEBUG "" CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_DEBUG ${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_DEBUG})
+STRING(REPLACE -D_GLIBCXX_ASSERTIONS "" CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_DEBUG ${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_DEBUG})
+
+
 FOREACH(p CMP0135)
   IF(POLICY ${p})
     CMAKE_POLICY(SET ${p} NEW)
diff --git a/build/bootstrap_mcs.sh b/build/bootstrap_mcs.sh
index 6450af79a..7ba080db3 100755
--- a/build/bootstrap_mcs.sh
+++ b/build/bootstrap_mcs.sh
@@ -371,7 +371,7 @@ run_unit_tests()
         warn "Skipping unittests"
     else
         message "Running unittests"
-        cd $MDB_SOURCE_PATH
+        cd $MARIA_BUILD_PATH
         ${CTEST_BIN_NAME} . -R columnstore: -j $(nproc) --progress
         cd - > /dev/null
     fi