(Not so) European Vacation part 2

So the day after Professor D and I flew back to Prishtina, we left rather early to collect a rent a car outside town. Alas, Prof. D did not have a very restful night as he was introduced to the many sounds of my inner city neighborhood, including the pack of dogs which awoke him at 5:00 a.m., then 5:15, 5:25, 5:35 (you see where this is going), the sounds of the city water supply being turned back on (water is turned off every night from 11 pm to 5 a.m.), and a few car alarms. I don't make this stuff up.... if you are coming to my house, bring earplugs!

Now I had put a great deal of thought into our journey, and I had certain voices in my head that morning. "They've redone the road from Kukes to Puke. It's fine now." said the senior staff attorney in my office. Meanwhile, a guidebook published last year said "the road between Kukes and Shkodra has been fully upgraded." Armed with this knowledge, I decided we would go into Albania via the town of Kukes and drive the 120 km or so west to Shkodra on Saturday, and on Sunday we would take a ferry through gorges in the north to a different border crossing and head back to Prishtina for Prof. D to catch his plane. A two day Albanian adventure.

A cab driver in Prishtina dropped us off at around 7:30 am outside the rent a car gate that was locked. I yelled a hello or two to no avail, and the cab driver, taking some pity on us, the two Americans he just left on the side of a rather deserted road, honked his horn. This awoke the guard who came out and let us in. After an exchange of a handful of cash for a set of keys & a letter from the car company saying I had permission to use the car [no need for a pesky contract], we were in a Nissan Tirana (how appropriate) heading toward Albania.

The border crossing was uneventful. The border guards took Prof. D away into the building - told me not to come - into a room with a computer, which they paid no attention to at all as they pulled out the registry book to hand write all our info and give us a paper for our car. Apparently, they asked Prof. D something about soccer, not understanding that he is American and that he would not have an opinion on European soccer even if he could understand what they were saying. After about 20 minutes at the border, we were free to enter Albania.
The first thing we noticed were the pillboxes. We read about them, that they were everywhere in border areas, and they are. A fear of invasion by the (fill in the country of your choice) in the 1970s resulted in thousands being built - most big enough for one soldier. They are still scattered around the countryside.

I had heard that the entrance to Kukes was rough, and reality proved this correct. It was dirt and rocks. Sometimes, the road diverged into two and you really couldn't tell which side was the one less travelled by. Once, we climbed a hill and found ourselves in a gas station - not along side a gas station, but in one, as the road went right on into the station and by the pumps. We didn't stop for a refill.

By the time we got to Kukes, some thirty minutes or so after we crossed the border, I was tired and was looking forward to the fully upgraded motorway that awaited us to Shkodra.

In Kukes, we stopped for coffee and got our first taste of the Albanian fondness for ceramic and plaster figurines - our cafe terrace was full of them. The waiter and the owner of the hotel/cafe were very nice and helpful with changing money and telling us that Shkodra was about 2 and a half hours away. We also stopped in the center to take some pictures of the area.

Water levels throughout the area are extremely low, due to lack of rainfall, and you can see how far down the banks the actual water level is - it usually goes right up to the greenery. We wondered if our ferry was even running if water was so scarce.

Beautiful towering mountains surround a portion of the town. Our guidebook noted they are part of the Dinaric Alps - the highest peak about 9000 feet. (I know this should have been a clue, but it did not sink in.)

It was time to depart Kukes. We found the road we wanted, and while the workers were literally paving a part of it, it was good road - smooth, paved, modern, with marked lanes, for about 2 miles... we rounded a corner and the world opened up before us. Those mountains we took pictures of now stood between us and Shkodra. And that fully upgraded road, well, I guess it could be in the eye of the beholder - I have been debating: if 60 % of a road is now paved while previously 0% was, does that qualify the road to be described as "fully upgraded" - a question perhaps more suited to philosophers than mathematicians. And we could see the road winding up the mountains (anywhere between 3,000 and 8,000 feet) before us. It was a challenge, an adventure, a nightmare(??), as Prof. D. reminded me of his absolute fear of heights as he wondered aloud if the road was like that the entire way to Shkodra and whether he would survive such a trip.

I was doing all the driving as Prof. D does not drive stick. And it was okay although exhausting for the first thirty minutes, that felt like 5 hours, and during which time we traversed about 10 km. Then the mountains got steeper, and the turns sharper. At one point, the steepness of the first outright switchback took me by surprise, and the car stalled out - on a hairpin, at 6000 feet, with no guardrails anywhere (the only thing on the side of the road are plaques every 50 feet or so dedicated to individuals who have died on the road), and we rolled back a bit before I got the emergency brake up. I restarted the car and off we went, but not I suspect before Prof. D lost 10 years off his life. After that, if I put the car into third gear, Prof. D. would ask me to slow down, so I traveled about 50-60 km in second gear - poor Nissan Tirana.

About two to two and a half hours later, we arrived to the town called Puke (pronounced Pook-ah), about half way to Shkodra. I was intensely aware that per my office colleague's comment, we had just finished with the good part of the road, and would now be driving on the old, unrenovated road. By this point, my shoulders were cramped, and my hands permanently clutched upon the steering wheel, but there was no way I was driving back, so forward we would go. Puke was the biggest town we saw on the road - about five blocks, two cafes, a store, and a mosque.

And true to my colleague's word, the road was now mostly dirt and stones and holes and trenches and ruts. Every now and then, I would look around and notice how breathtaking it was to be up in these mountains. It's very unspoilt natural beauty, but utterly brutal for drivers. At one point, we were on our way down a pretty high mountain when we looked off to the side and saw this crazy dirt road cut into the side of another mountain. We laughed and consoled ourselves that "at least we aren't on that one. ha, ha." Predictably, when we reached the bottom, we realized our road was taking us straight there.

I was parched after hours of driving and wanted some water. Prof. D. however would not give me the water bottle until we found a wide enough part of the road for me to pull off onto, as he believed, not unjustifiably, that should I take my attention off the crazy, winding, dirt, mountain road for the second it would take to put a water bottle to my mouth, we would die. It took a while to find such a pull off, but when we did, water never tasted so good.

There wasn't much traffic on the road. We saw the occasional bus with passengers, and several police patrols sitting by their cars along the way, which I thought was smart as they are presumably there to respond to accidents, of which, judging by the number of memorial plaques along the road, there are many. And every so often, usually near the mountain peaks, children would appear along the side of the road, selling cherries or something puffy that looked like a flower. We never saw a house, or an adult, and so could never explain how they got there, yet children sightings were frequent.

Four and a half hours after we left Kukes, we arrived to the end of the mountain range, and the river valley of Shkodra. I never wanted to drive again, although recognizing this was not realistic unless we wanted to investigate taking up permanent residency in Shkodra, I was willing to settle for finding a hotel, parking the car, and taking the night off.

The first hotel we tried had no vacancies, and for a moment, I feared we would be sleeping in the car, but then the second one, the Colosseo, had rooms and we checked in. It was right across the street from the Al-Zamil mosque, which dominates the architecture in the center of town. The hotel was fine - comfortable and clean - and it had parking right in front.

Shkodra is on a lake - 4000' above sea level - and is where two main rivers come together. Its main tourist attraction is a castle. I didn't know the Albanian word for castle, and multiple attempts-at-giving-our-destination-in-the-four-languages-we-knew-between-us later, a taxi driver finally understood where we wanted to go, and for the price of about $3 round trip, he took us up the hill on the outskirts of town where the castle was perched. The views were impressive.

The earliest walls of the fortress date back to 350 BC, and the castle and ramparts to medieval times. The castle is known as Rozafa in the town, named after a legend. Three brothers were building the castle, but the walls kept falling down each night after they spent the day building them up. They decided a sacrifice was necessary to appease the divine power, and that it would be which ever wife would come up the mountain first with their lunch. The two older brothers told their wives to stay home, and Rozafa, the wife of the youngest brother, was the one to bring their lunch by. She agreed with her husband to be walled into the structure on the condition that her right arm was left free to hold their son, her right breast left free to feed her son, and her right foot left free to rock their son's cradle. Legend says this is what the brothers did - immured half of her in rock, and the castle remained and remains standing.

A much happier fate awaited me as we finished our tour of Rozafa and headed back to town for dinner. An attempt to locate a restaurant from the guidebook failed, and we ate at the hotel, and it was fine. I fell asleep to the Eurovision song contest playing on my television - and by chance ended up seeing the eventual winner - the Serbian entry.

As I slept, I seriously felt as though I was still driving - even to the point of feeling the air from the dashboard a/c vent on my face. I awoke at sunrise to the call to prayer from the mosque across the street and felt as though I had driven another 120 km overnight.

I had been told to leave 2 and a half hours for the trip from Shkodra to Koman, the ferry town, and the ferry was scheduled to depart at 9 a.m. Prof. D and I set off at 6:30 a.m. for the next leg of our journey.

European Vacation (part one)

You may recognize this… the gilded statue of Nike, the Greek goddess of Victory, the gods' personal charioteer, outside Buckingham Palace – taken on a particularly blustery day in mid May. She personifies how I felt at the end of my vacation, but first, how it began… in London…

Reconnecting with old friends, doing embarrassingly touristy things (touring Tower Bridge, having tea at The Orangery , wandering the Tate, and catching Wicked), and having the ideal hotel location (the Citadines at Trafalgar Square) proved to be the perfect combination in London. The great memories have numbed the absolutely painful shock of how expensive things were in London. I had heard all about it: the dollar had dropped; London was always expensive; be prepared. It’s more than 2 to 1, dollar to pound, at the moment.

I landed in Gatwick’s North Terminal and changed $100. By the time I reached the South Terminal, 10 minutes later, it was almost all gone – spent on a train ticket, a bottle of water and a map. I persevered. I tried to develop immunity. “Five dollars for a coffee, no problem, two please.” [I highly recommend the Flat White Café in Soho for a great coffee.]

Coffee was one thing, but the big money was yet to come. My need for new jeans (remember, holes developing from the wash) and new shoes (also had holes, but not because of Prishtina water, but because of Prishtina sidewalks) meant I had to start mentally tricking my extremely frugal brain into thinking that the prices were really in dollars, which I did. Seventy “dollars” for a pair of shoes – not bad, and 45 “dollars” for jeans, sure, I can do that. I shopped around to find those bargain jeans - most were 90 "dollars" or more. What was I supposed to do? My jeans had holes, people! Not since I was 12 years old and saved 8 months of allowance to buy my first pair of Levi cords (baby blue in color) have I so agonized over a purchase of clothing. So I left London with two new pairs of jeans and two new pairs of shoes. The shoe sales lady seemed inordinately pleased that I was purchasing two pairs of shoes - as if they did not sell very many of their ridiculously overpriced shoes. And then I said something at the register, and hearing me, the sales lady's expression changed to one of comprehension, as if she had me figured out - this stranger willing to lay out a bundle for a couple pair of walking shoes - and she said "So, you're Canadian." "Sure," I responded. Why not? Although now I wonder, are Canadians wealthy, or big spenders, or fond of walking shoes, or do I now have a Canadian accent? I'll never know.

I also entered the first Boots I came upon and went to the cold/flu aisle where I filled my basket with a variety of cold remedies, having exhausted what I thought would be a year's supply in my first six weeks in Kosovo. (No, they don't sell decongestants or the powerful cough medicine in Kosovo - at least not without a prescription. Instead, they offer you herbal remedies in the pharmacies - please...) My shopping apparently caught the attention of the store security guard who began following me around - my choice of decongestant and ear plugs obviously intriguing. At the counter, the cashier looked very concerned and brought over someone else in a white coat. I then vaguely recalled that in the States, some kinds of cold medicines are used for manufacturing meth, and I think the number of boxes you can purchase is restricted, so I pondered the believability of my story should I have to tell it ... an American... in Kosovo...herbal remedies only...in London on holiday...stocking up... Oh, yeah, that would work. As I was assessing the feasibility of having to buy one box of cold medicine in every Boots in the area, the white coat person turned to me and told me not to take all the medicines at the same time -- (four boxes of pills, two bottles of cough syrup). -- "Um, okay, thanks" I said. And off I went with my purchases.

After five days, I reluctantly returned to Gatwick to depart (not before I bought another box of cold medicine at the Boots at Gatwick - no such thing as too prepared). I flew back from London to Prishtina with Professor D who had come over to Europe to celebrate his 40th birthday – the celebration included a very nice dinner in London with friends at the Grape Street Wine Bar (highly recommend it – reasonable, tasty food, and a nice selection of reds) and a wish on his part to see Albania. This set in motion the second part of my holiday…

Daily Stuff

Here is an update on some of the subjects I discussed earlier as well as some random stuff.

On the protests, the police arrested the leader of the self determination party shortly after the deadly protests in February. He is still in jail awaiting a trial on charges which I am told amount to failing to apply for a permit for a public gathering. His supporters held protests in late March which were peaceful and uneventful.


The birds are gone...for now. Someone had told me in mid-March that the birds only come into Prishtina from the countryside in the winter because the city is warmer than the country. I didn't dare to hope that this could mean the birds would actually be leaving their perch outside my window at some point, but indeed, they did. By the end of the first week in April, all but a few had flown away. The trees lining the fields along the roads leaving Prishtina are now full of giant nests - so the birds are busy multiplying in time for next winter.


I had maybe two weeks of peaceful sleep when it began to be interrupted again on a nightly basis - this time by dogs. Yep - now we have a pack of stray dogs living in the courtyard. Not packs of dogs at the level of post-Ceausescu Romania, at least not yet. It is a group of three or four which during the day, don't bother anyone. I walk by them every morning. But at night, late, at around 2 a.m. or so, if anyone is per chance unlucky enough to be coming home at that hour, the dogs give chase and bark and growl as loud as they can. And then at around 5:30 a.m. or so, they just start howling. An end may be in sight for this as well, however. Protesters gathered last weekend outside the police building to express their disagreement with a soon to be implemented stray extermination policy. I suspect they lacked the political clout to force changes to the policy.

On garbage, someone, probably the owner of the Thai restaurant in the courtyard, organized the removal of the garbage on my side of the building. One day I came out and it was gone - a pleasant surprise. As for the piles on the other side of my building, someone set it on fire so it too is gone in its original form. Now there is a waxy black ash with charred jagged plastic edges scattered throughout a stretch of land about the size of half a basketball court. Let's see if it lasts.

What else? It appears that the washing machine/water/detergent is eating through my clothes. My jeans have two holes in them as does a t-shirt. I think the water is very harsh here. Considering I only brought two pairs of jeans with me, this could be a problem at some point. I am choosing to ignore the holes for now, but believe me, they will not go unnoticed for long, and not in a "look how fashionable she is in worn jeans" way but in a "OMG doesn't that American chick have any self-respect at all, how can she wear clothes with holes in them" way. There is no chance of me finding a pair of jeans here to buy. The average Kosovar woman is about a size 2, and the boutiques reflect this fact- literally not stocking anything above a size 6. So, to my petite friend T., this place would be mecca to you fashion-wise.

I found soy burgers in a grocery store. The box is in German and Turkish. It was a great find since soy has not yet taken off here. The burgers are unlike any soy burgers I have ever seen in appearance or texture. Nevertheless, they are strangely edible.

I am very much looking forward to a vacation in London in May followed by a weekend road trip to Albania. I hope I come back with some good stories and photos to share.

Kosovar Signage

A typical road sign in Kosovo looks like this - in this case, the destinations are provided in Albanian, Serbian and Turkish. This sign was from the Prizren area where a number of Turkish minorities reside, thus, the Turkish translation. [I have heard a number of Kosovar Albanians complaining about how poor the road signage is in Kosovo, but speaking as a resident of D.C., where it seems entry to certain roads, like Rock Creek Parkway, is a well kept secret, devoid of any signage whatsoever, I have actually found the Kosovo road signs to be accurate and helpful.]

Now if you are NATO in Kosovo, you have to come up with a road sign understandable to all 17,000 troops who are on the ground throughout the province and originate from some 35 countries (the force is made up of troops from both NATO members and non-member states). The answer.... animals. [In Bosnia, if memory serves, they used colors, so Blue Route, Red Route, etc., and you would look out for stripes painted on various landmarks along the routes - just like hiking trails are marked.] All over Kosovo roads, you will see yellow signs with images of animals such as snakes, birds, rats, and this one, for example, indicating three roads - Duck/Goose (I can't tell), Horse and Lion.

Finally, in signs unique to a peacekeeping region, all the bridges in Kosovo are preceded by signs indicating speeds not just for trucks, but also for tanks.

Prizren

Fortunate for me, the Kosovo judges held an anti-corruption seminar in Prizren, a city about 80 km southwest of Pristina. I had been hoping for a chance to visit since when I first attempted to buy postcards in Pristina, the only ones I found showed scenes of the town of Prizren and they were beautiful - lots of Ottoman architecture, a pretty river, mountains. The reality did not disappoint.

The bridge is from the 15th century and the mosque from the 16th century.

The Orthodox churches/monasteries, which had been torched in 2004, are being rebuilt, and as with many historic Serb monasteries in Kosovo, are under NATO protection, in this case, the Germans guard them.

You can see the largest Orthodox monastery in Prizren behind the mosque on the hillside.

A weekend away.

I travelled to Lake Ohrid in Macedonia for the weekend. I had always wanted to go there, but in 1990, when I was backpacking around the Balkans, I basically ran out of money in Belgrade - I had enough cash to get me to Sarajevo where I knew I could live on a few dollars a day, but could not afford the transport plus the more expensive room and board at the popular tourist destination of Ohrid. Life worked out - I saw Sarajevo and much of Bosnia before the war started, and not just during it and after. But now I finally had the chance to see Ohrid.

Ohrid is the deepest lake in Europe and one of the oldest lakes in the world - it is shared by Albania and Macedonia. On Saturday, I went on a boat ride to the far end of the lake to see the St. Neum monastery. It was freezing on the boat, which is probably an activity more suited to warmer weather, but I figured I had traveled five hours to reach the lake, so a little cold weather should not stop me from going out on it.
St. Neum Our boat.

The monks of St. Neum apparently had a thing for peacocks, for they are everywhere on the grounds, and they are absolute show offs. I'm not sure I had ever seen a peacock with its feathers spread - here you'd turn a corner and three would be there preening. As if completely indifferent to the admiring stares of tourists, they'd pose then slowly turn their backs to you in full preening position to look out at the beautiful view from the upper wall of the monastery. Not a bad life!

First he preens...then he ignores you!

Sunday provided perfect, sunny and warmer weather to explore the town of Ohrid itself. It is very tourist friendly with a cobblestone path leading through the old town to ancient churches, mosques, a fortress and an amphitheatre dating from Roman times.
I joined my friend from the UN whom I worked with years ago in Croatia for dinner at a traditional Macedonian restaurant in Ohrid Saturday evening. He is a Sikh from Bombay and when we walked into the establishment, I felt as if I were with royalty. The waiter, addressing only my friend, asked where he was from, looked very impressed to learn he was from India, and looked insanely pleased to learn he spoke Serbian. Indeed, the waiter would barely address me, and I don't know whether it was because I was an American, or a woman, or a foreigner, or reminded him of an ex-girlfriend.. ..who knows. But since it seemed they had never before met a Sikh, and were extremely happy to have a Sikh in their establishment, I figured we were in for good service, well at least my friend was, but I would benefit residually. The fish was great, the wine was okay, they brought us free baklava for dessert, while a folk music trio played in the background - where a fiddle player played the typically upbeat melodies of folk music from this region to the typically non-upbeat lyrics of death, lost love and lonely souls. One song you could really tap your foot to went like this: "You have broken my heart, Jelena; You have crushed my soul, Jelena; You have taken my life, Jelena."

The waiter, who had consistently and steadfastly spoken only to my friend throughout dinner, came with our coffee at which point my friend asked for a toothpick - a usual staple on the table of a Balkan restaurant, and so it was here, except my friend could not see them because they were hidden by the oil and vinegar bottles and were on my side of the table. The waiter removed the bottles to reveal the toothpicks all while giving me a look which I think was intended to burn my flesh from my bones. I interpreted it as: "How dare you not tell this great man where the toothpicks were. You are not worthy to sit at this table." My friend and I agreed that the waiter looked genuinely angry at me. And as we were leaving, profuse goodbyes were dispensed to my friend from the waiter, the owner, the fiddle player and practically everyone else in the restaurant. I was just happy I got my coat back. Perhaps we will be the subject of a new chorus for the fiddle player and his band: "You honor us with your presence, oh great royal Sikh; Our hearts are full because you have come here, oh great royal Sikh; How we would like to crush the life out of the terrible wench who hid the toothpicks, oh great royal Sikh."

A walk up Mother Teresa...

Okay. Today for some reason, the gremlins are gone, and I can post more photos. So back to the main street tour. It really is a walk through Kosovar Albanians' history - from battling the Ottomans to life under Tito to battling the Serb forces. When you walk down to the end of the street, this is the view. I hope I get this right - I believe this is the Carshi Mosque - the oldest standing building in Pristina, built in the early 15th century. It marks the start of what was the old town in the city but not much remains. You can see two more minarets to the right and behind the mosque. Pristina's mosques are beautiful, although many are run down.

Pristina has a combination of very old mosques, like the Carshi, and newer ones which blend into the urban landscape, like the one shown on the right. [If you want a better look at the photos, I think you can click on them and get a full page view.]

Alright, continuing our tour up Mother Teresa St., on the same end as the Carshi mosque is the monument to Brotherhood and Unity - a popular slogan from the world of former Communist Yugoslavia.


The tall building behind the monument is a European Union building.

If you look closer at the Brotherhood and Unity statue, you'll see it has been surrounded by barbed wire, and the base is covered in graffiti. Apparently someone tried to blow it up in 1999 but it is still standing rather forlornly in the square.


I suppose the authorities are attempting to keep away future graffiti artists and others who might have a more nefarious agenda for the monument, although I don't think citizens pay it much attention or notice any more. Perhaps, it is a work of modern art - a telling commentary on the original subject matter of the monument.

The next monument to see on Mother Teresa Street is of the Albanian national medieval hero, Skenderbej, who managed with his army to hold off the Ottoman Turks for 25 years during the 15th Century. I believe this monument was put up two or three years ago.

If you continue up Mother Teresa Street, the next monument you reach is hers, as shown in my previous posting. The statue is pretty much located midway on the street.



And finally, toward the end of the street is a monument to Zahir Pajaziti, a Kosovar Albanian who was a commander in the KLA, (look it up), and who was killed in skirmishes with Serb forces in 1997 - one of the first heroes to Kosovar Albanians of the conflict. He is carrying a Kalashnikov and has a grenade strapped to his belt. Fresh flowers can always be found at the base of the statue.

That's your tour of the monuments in my neighborhood.