Albania 🇦🇱 - a reflection

Lots of time yesterday to reflect on my Albanian experience.  A wordy post ahead 😊

Albania is a land of physical beauty with a spine of rocky mountains, with autumn trees and a dusting of snow.  I've heard that there is some great hiking to be done in the mountains to the north, but advised to be in at least pairs due to bears and wolves 😳.  The mountain rivers are a beautiful milky green colour. Then there's the coastline - opposite side of the Adriatic sea to Corfu and Greece and similar beautiful clear green waters.  The coastline has many resort towns and is progressively getting well set up for tourism.  This time of year has orchards brimming with citrus, pomegranates, persimmons and olive groves and vegetables plentiful in the river deltas.  .

Albania has a closed currency and it can only be bought within the country.  The ATM withdrawal fees are exhorbitant at AUD$15 a withdrawal 🙄.  Cash is king here and so bringing currency in euro or GBP is the best way to go.  The money changers are not allowed to charge commission.  The exchange rate seemed the same everywhere.  You can rarely use card to pay for anything.  All transport is paid in cash, accommodation in cash (booked online but have to pay cash), most tours and restaurants also.  Larger supermarkets and restaurants in the capital often accommodated card payments.  

Transport - Regional busses are plentiful and are parked up 30 mins before and leave exactly on time.  Local busses are frequent and cheap and also run to schedule. You can get to anywhere you want to go by a combination of regular means and then unconventional.  As a man at the bus station said to me, “Its Albania, anything is possible” and he was right.  Revert to rule 1, cash is king.  

As a nation reinventing itself, I saw a mix of modern and old fashioned contrasting next to each other.  Tractors are used but horse and carts are still used in many agricultural areas, donkeys pulling ploughs or loaded with bags of onions or citrus and then into town to sell their wares with Mercedes passing them on the highway. Shepherd tend their flocks of sheep, goats and turkeys with a stick and move them to greener pastures and just sit or stand and wait while they eat.

Automation has changed the landscape of employment in the western world.  In Albania there are so many jobs that we no longer have.  Petrol attendants dealing in cash, bus conductors who walk through the bus collecting 60c fares and dispensing tickets, little stalls where people sell their home grown pumpkins, citrus etc.  small business is everywhere.

Food - Albanian food is carb heavy, rich in flavour and smaller portions.  We serve unnecessarily large portions at restaurants at home!  Italian Influences in the north and then Greek in the south.  The low food costs meant I just carried my bag of muesli for brekky and bought fruit from a stall and local food for lunch and dinner.

The men - lots of barber shops as short hair is the norm, tracksuits are king as are black puffer jackets.  My guess is 90%+ smoke.  Drinking is not common and if so, home made raki. They are skilled tradesmen with stonework.  Tourism is a huge industry and an employer for many.  They work back to back days, long hours without a break for 8-9 months of the year and Dec and Jan time when many take a break.  Older men meet in parks to play chess, checkers and cards.  The young men see cars as a status symbol and drive Mercedes, Audi and BMW if they can afford a car.  The young men in the capital are more stylish with shiny red puffers and skinny jeans and fancy trainers. 

Women - a woman's work is never done and traditional roles are most common.  The older women who have been born into and raised in communism are usually heavy smokers and prematurely aged due to hard work, making bread, jams, cheese and cooking all day and minding kids and often working in the fields too.  Often no english for women 40+ yrs of age and with little education. 

The young woman are, by contrast, fashion conscious.  Beautiful hair, gel nails, red lipstick, fancy boots and stylish clothes (even if knock off brands).  Faux fur and leather and leapard skin complete the look.  The contrast been them and their mothers is chalk and cheese.  Young Albanian men therefore find it difficult to accurately determine western women's age as, for example, women 40+ do not look like me.  

Stray and abandoned animals are difficult to see and when money is tight, then feeding people comes first for families.  I did my bit by patting animals, sharing a sandwich and donating cat food to organisations.

Muslim and Christian seem to exist in harmony and when I asked, this was confirmed by many.  I experienced mostly kindness, walking me to find what I needed, talking in Albanian on my behalf to make sure I got to a destination, people driving me in their personal cars.  A couple of small negative experiences but that is travel.

So, Albania has surprised and delighted me.  It's unconventional which is to be expected of a nation with such a recent oppressive history.  It is not realistic or fair to expect each country we visit to be the same as home as then, why would we ever travel? I don't want to visit another country and eat the same food as at home!  Travel challenges you, humbles you and stretches the brain at times.  A few more Balkan countries to explore if time permits.