Dispatch from Albania # 2 Nov. 17, 1999

[Learned: people who have been helped through the years by IRC - in addition to "our own" Andy Grove who got out of Hungary in 1956 were artists Marc Chagall and Jacques Lipschitz, Franz Werfel (SONG OF BERNADETTE), and Wanda Landowska, famous harpsichordist. Eleanor Roosevelt supported the organization. Also, Mother Teresa was from Albania.]

Weep-&-smile-of-the-day: Across the street from the apt. is a dilapidated school where children play soccer amidst the debris. Two small boys found an old board that had fallen off the side of the school and placed it atop a mound of dirt to make themselves a teeter-totter.

ClifBar & Peets Coffee (both from CA) for b’fast. Then began our stroll around town through unpaved alleys, unrepaired streets, and lumpy sidewalks. Several wide, beautiful red brick streets surround the square where stands the gigantic statue of an Albanian who fought the Turks in the 15th century, lost, but is still beloved. His silhouette looked quite grand with the double-eagle Albanian flag flying near his face against a backdrop of beautiful cumulus clouds. We saw lotsa well-dressed people, some lovely shops that Kathy calls "Mafia Shops", and produce stands with tangerines, apples, potatoes, cabbage, about a dozen kinds of cheese, and hundreds of healthful-looking eggs sold by people who were definitely not dressed in high style "Mafia" clothes but looked clean except for their teeth. I suppose dental care is a luxury. Young boys set up overturned boxes along the sidewalks to sell cartons of cigarettes. Some of them used their own merchandise.

Quite a few soldiers walk around unarmed, but some seriously armed with FK47 rifles surround the government buildings. Kathy advised me not to get too close, because if you do and if they ask you to halt and if you don’t halt, they shoot you. Think I better learn the Albanian word for "halt"? At that place, we walked on the other side of the street behind two nuns. And when we passed a small park where "the Mafia hangs out," we found ourselves 2 priests to follow. Felt plenty safe, whether we were or not.

Crossing the streets is a major hazard. The jazzed up Mercedeses (stolen in Italy directly across the Adriatic) zoom around, looking pleased that there are few stop lights and if there are stop signs or policemen,, those are definitely to be ignored. Pedestrians must gather in herds to find a time and place to cross. Now thinking I’d rather see a rifle than a Mercedes.

Heaps of garbage and debris are everywhere. Kathy says the garbage gets picked up occasionally by the collectors, but not very often. I asked her why there aren’t rats among all the heaps of garbage we passed (and wondered if I really should have got that cholera shot), and she said that the numerous cats keep them under control. Looking closer, at each site I found a King of the Mound Cat guarding its adopted territory.

Lunch of tomatoes, onions, then potatoes, eggplant, and tough steak at an open cafe, then walked to IRC headquarters where I met the staff. The place is a 3-story bldg down a rutty alley behind a new fence. It was robbed recently because news got out on the streets that the IRC was taking its money out of the bank and putting it into a safe inside its building (true) to be sure their money is available when Y2K hits. After that robbery at gunpoint, the IRC hired several guards (looking armed but with no bullets) and built a gigantic locked gate.

More tomorrow after visit to Durres to photograph a clinic for handicapped, a kindergarten, a school, and 2 refugee camps.

Love, Carolyn

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