Pictures of Shkodra

I really want to have dental work done at that place ^^.

Children frolicking in a construction site

Horse drawn carriages in the street

The mosque and the fountain in the middle of town

The first and last time I want to visit a foreign police station.

I am writing this from a police station. What started as a simple walk has ended here. I am completely fine, nothing happened, the guest house owner really overreacted.

We went of for a walk yesterday afternoon, it's about a 35 minute walk into town. Once we got there we decided that it was time for a beer. Which turned into several beers and at some point switched to cognac for a few drink then back to beers.  We had a few small bowls of chips, then a few bowls of apple chunks. It seemed like an odd dish to get in a bar but they were amazing. Someone also bought us some roasted almonds. So all in all it was a great night. That bar shut, we went somewhere else. About 1 AM we decided to head back to the guest house.

We got back to the hostel and the gate was locked. I gave Claire a boost over the fence, figuring that it would have the key on the other side. It did not, but that didn't matter anyway because we were completely locked out of the house. I looked for a way to get into the yard. Claire looked for a way into the house, the search proved futile on both ends. I could hear Claire making an absurd amount of noise, surely they were going to wake up and let us in. They did not. Claire climbed back over the fence and we walked back into town to find a hotel.

Found a hotel, crashed out, ate an awesome breakfast the next day and started the walk back to the hostel.  The owner had called the police because we didn't show up back at the hostel. We tried to explain that we came back and it was locked. The owner made such a big deal about how he hadn't slept a wink, which was clearly a lie because he would have heard us in the yard.

We had to go to the police station and retract the missing persons report, we were asked a a lot of questions  that seemed excessive and unnecessary. How many years we had spent in school? What are our father's first names? The detective really kept pushing the fact that we needed to tell the truth.

 I don't know why they think we would lie about it? We had done nothing wrong, we were safe. It was a super strange situation.

A cat asleep on a hay bail, the Albanian Alps in the background. 

UPDATE

The owner received a 700 EURO fine. When the police came to the guesthouse they found out he hadn't been paying his taxes. Today he tried to tell us that it was our fault he got the fine and hinted that we should pay it. I am leaving when Claire leaves because this dude seems to be loosing his shit and I don't want to be the only one here with him.

Time to stop Peter Pan-ing

I thought once I stopped working in a coffee shop I would be able to kick the caffeine addiction. I was wrong. What is one to do when tiny little cups of delicious tasting energy are less than a dollar?
I'm back in Tirana for a few days, the weather is poorly so I have taken to a coffee shop to write this and feed my addiction.

I'm back in Tirana because I was offered a teaching position in Ankara. I deliberated over the decision to take this job for a long time. About an hour, which for me is a long time. I have a tendency to be impulsive and make flippant life decisions.


I don't know if I am  ready to work again. It means a lot of thing, responsibilities, having to get up at a certain time, I won't be able to leave a city just because I don't like the weather. But reality has come crashing down, eventually:

•  I am going to need to make some real money- this job could offer me that. 
• It would be nice to know where I am going to sleep every night- this job could offer me that. 
• It would be nice to have a people I know around me that aren't going to be leaving at dawn to catch a train - this job could offer me that. 
• It would be nice to have more than four different outfits- this job could offer me that. Dear lord I could go shopping again.
• It would be nice to have some professional experience to put on my resume - this job could offer me that. 

But something is wrong, I can feel myself hesitating when I think about it. It's the Peter Pan syndrome. Peter Pan syndrome is a sociological term that was coined a few years ago in reference to generation Y. We are the generation that refuses to grow up.

We spend longer in school, working menial jobs, living off our parents; we get married later, put off kids until our 30's because in our own eyes, we're still children. Gone are the days, where men would be in full time employment and and women would be chained to the kitchen with a baby by 25.

 We are given so many more opportunities and one of these is travel. The world is no longer a big scary place, it is in our backyard and through the miracles of budget airlines, accessible.  So we see the world and tell ourselves after  we have conquered that, we'll stop, get a job... grow up.

I guess that's what is wrong with me, if I take this job I'm growing up and god forbid making a mature decision. I may as well just buy a house in the 'burbs and pop out some babies because that's what this job is saying about my future.

I guess I am over reacting, as it's only a four month contract. There will be plenty of time afterwards for lustful adventures and drunken mistakes.

But I'm still unsure.

PS. These pictures in no way correlate the story. They make up for the lack of picture of Tirana.

A fitting farewell to what may be my last post from Albania.

Saranda, Albania

I went for a casual three hour bike ride today. When I finally returned to Saranda, I had forgotten how to walk. I stumbled a few steps, laughing, before the feeling eventually returned to my extremities.

To the left is the map of the route we took. It was 14.9 KM one way. I am going to call it a 30 KM round trip - completed in a little over three hours .

I‘m a good sport but some things are beyond me.

I am pretty willing to try anything that is considered a national delicacy. The above however, was something I just could not handle. It may look pretty innocuous,  but it was not. When I walked into the kitchen I was asked to stir a pale brown liquid whilst it thickened. When I asked what was in it, my host said he didn't know, the women made it. Next he cut some old, stale bread into small chunks and threw it into the liquid. It quickly became mush. When it was piping hot it was sprinkled with cheese (which was very nice) and hot oil was poured on top. Hot, wet, oily bread. 

Bread should never be wet, the only exceptions being: 

• Bread and butter pudding
• In the pre-cooking stages of French toast
• If your at a Supra and there is no napkins and you have to wipe your hands on bread instead

My first HELP X

My first Help X job is simple. It is in a hostel in Saranda, Southern Albania - I am to help out at the hostel, clean up after breakfast, sweep/mop floors and check guests in. Easy. The only problem is I am the only person here. 

I don't know if I am to just wait until (if) someone turns up. I've completed the cleaning jobs, made fresh coffee for if someone shows up, I'm probably going to drink it all. The weather is poor at the moment so I am not missing much outside. 

It is the perfect time to write some blogs. The above picture was me testing out the mobile function, I can now send something from my mobile, directly to the blog. Dangerous I think, it will probably lead to an increase in random, poorly thought out prose. 

Not unlike this post. 

Crazies on the bus. Part 2

It has happened. Not once, not twice, but thrice times I have been vomited next to on public transport. The first two were small children and the third was a middle aged man.

Berat, Albania

1. I will start with the middle aged man because that occurred last night and is still fresh in my mind. The thing I don't understand is, he was a local adult, he could speak the same language as the driver. Why didn't he alert the driver to the fact he was feeling unwell? He could have pulled over calmly and this man could eject the contents of his stomach into some shrubbery instead into a plastic bag less than a metre from me. But alas, it wasn't until after he had spewed, that the bus stopped. 
2. The second time. I had probably one of the worse hangover I have ever had in my life. I was supposed to hitch hike with my friend back home, but I just wasn't feeling up to it so I decided to catch a bus. (This was the day after I got the blood clot, a story for another day.) The driver made me take the seat right at the front, in between a boy in his late teens and a woman with a two year old daughter. Before we left the mother gave her child a bottle of coke and this cake thing that is the equivalent of a twinkie. About two hours into a five hour bus ride, this little girl was sick. All over her mother, the floor and the chair. The smell was vile, I probably would have retched even if I wasn't hungover. This time the bus did not stop, we waited until the designated rest period. I entirely blame the mother in this instance. That was way too much sugar for a child.
3. Which brings me to the first time someone vomited next to me on a bus. It was a 12 hour bus ride from Ho Chi Minh City to Nha Trang, during the day, this was not some cushy sleeper bus. I was with my sister who has the ability to sleep through anything so she was not phased by anything that was going on around us. Three hours into the journey a young family hoped on to the bus, two children under seven and a baby. The baby screamed - non-stop for five hours. The parents passed it around the bus and tried to make it hush but nothing seemed to work. Then it (I say it because it was wearing gender neutral colours) vomited. Everywhere. I don't know how it was possible for such a little person to create so much mess. But it was hideous, I started retching. Elisha told me to move away from it if it was going to make me sick. I would have had to step in it to get away. So I closed my eyes and dreamed of the beach. It will never be known if the child vomited because it screamed for five hours, or if it screamed for five hours because it was already sick. 

Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

My drunken ramblings

When I get back to the hostel after spending time drinking, I think it is the perfect time to talk to my friends at home. It is the middle of the day for them, so my conversation are always less coherent then theirs.  

• "I just wanted him for his passports."
• "Predictive text is my enemy; it's weak me. Fuck. Against me**"
• "Farmville will fix it! Imaginary things that rely on you. You'll feel need to milk the cows and harvest and loved when it remembers your name."
• "I'm calling shenanigans - you are too old to timezone by yourself."
• "You could play in photoshop and make things. Then sell them as business logos if you get bored."
• "It can be a chapter in your memoir."
• "I'm jealous, you'll get to eat salt and vinegar chips."

These boots [gum] were[n't] made for walking [down wet cobblestones].

Kala Castle

 The path to the Kala Castle is a very steep, narrow cobblestone path. The only shoes I have are gum boots, so when it started to rain I thought I'll be fine - these are all terrain shoes. Apparently not, as soon as there was a little bit of water between the soles of my shoes and the cobblestones it was as if there was large chunks of lard strapped to the bottom of my shoes.

I broke up the walk to the castle by visiting the ethnographic museum. There were signs everywhere saying no photos but the woman running the place must of liked the look of me because she said, "For you, photos ok." It was probably because I was the only person they had seen in a while. I didn't want to push my luck so I only took this one photo. The loom.

15C Loom

 I think looming has died out as an art form. Perhaps because the term looming as such sinister connotations, when someone looms you don't think of weaving together a beautiful rug. You think of a creepy 40 year old man in a black trench coat, creeping up behind you as you read a book in the dying afternoon sunlight.

Cannon guarding the entrance to the castle. 

When I first walked into the castle, I bought my ticket strolled through the archway. There was an older woman in a peach coat, I walked past her, she started to follow me. Being young I figured I would just walk a bit quicker surely she would soon lose interest in me. No. She chased me, she legitimately chased after me. I turned around and looked at her (I assume my face said "what are you doing you crazy old bat") she said nothing and just stuck out her hand. I think somebody should tell the beggars of the world that aggression doesn't work, you get much further with politeness and a pathetic look in your eyes.

SIDEBAR - When I was in Pristina waiting for the bus back to Skopje, I was enjoying a coffee with a young American fellow. A small beggar child came up to us. He was dressed like a very tiny gangster; wallet chain, sideways hat and all. He demanded money, not please, just "give me money." He must have felt us smirking at his attire, because he threatened to hit me. Come on kid, if I had even thought about giving you money I was most certainly not going to now. Your four foot tall you can't threaten me into giving you money.

After I walked up to the castle, I came back down crossed the river and walked right back up the mountains on the other side. This was not a gentle walk up the cobblestones, this was an actual trek. There was a path, which was overgrown and scattered with fallen trees. It wasn't bad and to get to the top was only about 20 minutes, there was supposed to be remnants of the old area of Illyria. There was very little left of the ruins. Only one wall. The trek was up there was worth it for the amazing view of the city.

The view of the city. 

There was an odd man walking around at the top of the mountain, he was wrapping the trees in multicoloured construction tape and carrying two unopened umbrellas on his arm.

I thought this sign was funny. "These trees were planted with the support of the EU." Is that it, that one lousy little tree that looks like the next big gust of wind would blow it over? There were a few more around but all pretty much in the same shape. Hopefully just because it is winter.

Osum river

Tirana- The small town capital city

Before I start I will admit my opinions of this city are probably tainted.

 I'm waiting for some people. People that I was working with in Georgia, we organise a month ago to meet on this day in the capital of Albania, today is the 29th and I have heard nothing from them. They still have another seven hours in which they can appear but I have a sinking feeling that they are not going to show up. It may seem paranoid, but I think it speaks more to my fear of abandonment over anything else. If they were not going to show up they could have sent me a text message, I wouldn't have been upset. To just completely ignore previous plans is a jerk move. I think I would be more forgiving if they were other travellers that I had just met somewhere and didn't know to well, you expect travellers to be flippant and flighty when it comes to planning a trip. But I worked with these people for four months. I'll be crossing these chums off my Christmas card list. (I have never sent a Christmas card in my life, but if I were going to they would not be receiving one.) 

It feels like Tirana has not evolved with the rest of Europe, for a country that is so close to Italy, Greece and Macedonia it seems remarkably underdeveloped. I know that Albania has had a tumultuous past but so have a lot of countries in this region. Sarajevo for example was a war zone 20 years ago but looking at it now it seems to be a thriving metropolis  Yes, there are still bullet hole shaped reminders sprayed into some of the buildings but they are people who look toward the future and the capital city reflects that. Tirana doesn't look like they are taking any steps towards the future, after spending five days here I could see very little signs of improving infrastructure, there are talks of building a tram system, but they are exactly that, talks. One of my favourite things about European capital cities is their efficiency, being mega, super anal retentive and coming from a city that has the efficiency of a square tire it is something that I get really excited about. I know it's not really fair to compare Tirana to Berlin or Paris.

The city itself is pretty run down, there is very little to see or do, there is three major attractions. The Skanderberg Square, the clock tower and the pyramid. The pyramid is about to be demolished, you can climbed to the top of it, but the windows are broken and it looks like a death trap. You can walk between these places in less than an hour. 

Tirana was not what I was expecting, you most certainly don't need a week here and if your on time limit you could probably completely avoid it and not feel deprived. 

I don't like be completely negative, I posted this and felt so guilty I instantly got a stomach aches. I have come back to add some positives. There is some truly delicious food in Tirana, I have eaten at a few local places and it has all been so good, amazing ice cream from street vendors, the people are fantastic as well, everyone is really friendly and make you feel very welcomed here.  I am looking forward to Berat.

Sorry there are no photos to accompany this article but my camera had no battery and I never got around to charging it before I left. But here is a picture of a robot I drew, I am trying to convince my friend to get it tattooed on his body.