What Our Day Might Be Like In Albania

Each day we see interesting sights.  There are a lot of signs in English in Korca, but of course 99% are in Albania as you would expect.  There are numerous "mini markets".  Across the street from of the mini-markets is a "small-market".  I do not know which one is really the smaller of the two.  We mostly shop at the "super market" that is near our flat.  There are two fruit and vegetable stands very near the super market that we shop at.  Then just up the street from the super market is what I would call a "medium market".  We refer to it as "Brothers" because two brothers own it.  They speak a bit of English there, so we can ask for necessities like ice cream, french fries, chicken, etc.  At the super market,  Elisabet, I asked for help finding eggs this morning so they called for someone, who I think is the accountant, and she immediately understood me, replied in English, and led me to the eggs.

There are other interesting signs other that the signs in English.  Take the one on the left for instance.  We see this sign often if we take the tarmac road down our usual mountain hike rather than the footpath through the open area and small forest area.

As a college student imagine how you would have felt innocently walking along the road when you came to this sign.  Would you have gone left or right?  Obviously the lady in the picture above shunned going to class and headed straight to Korce Biarra for an afternoon in the sun.  Perhaps she even met her lover there?  If she had gone on to class, she could have stopped at this Fast Food restaurant across the street from the university after class.   I am sure her sweet heart would have been waiting for her there!

Some of you may be wondering how we spend our free time.  We usually teach from 9:00 AM until about 2:00 PM.  Then we are left up to our devices.  There are three things we do to entertain ourselves.  First thing in the morning and often last thing at night we are at our communications center - well, really at our coffee table in the living room.  This is where we use our electronic toys: laptop, iPad, smart phone, Kindles, camera, etc.  In the morning we check email, facebook, Words with Friends, the news, the weather, DWTS results, etc.  The last thing at night, you would likely find us snuggled on the couch watching one of our favorite TV series.  We download episodes from itunes at a buck ninety-nine a pop.  This is really not too bad if you consider the cost of cable TV in the US.

Most days we take a short walk in the morning and a long walk in the afternoon. We generally go up the mountain on one of two routes - tarmac or footpath.  When we go up the footpath, we often are greeted by friendly four-footed creatures of three varieties - mostly sheep, but a few goats and dogs often lurk amongst the sheep.  We have routes of many lengths to follow: from the crueling trek to the cross on top (one time) to the stroll up a short distance and then across the hill to the other side of town.


This is a shot of the local football stadium.  It is supposed to be one of the best in Albania.  It looks rather small to me - more like the Zizkov Vitoria stadium in Prague and not at all like Old Trafford.  It is not close to Livestrong Sporting Park either, but a good venue for football at the Albanian level.


Returning to my signs in English theme, very near us is a shop selling material, drapes, etc. called "American Mode".  Down the street is a clothing shop called "American Trend".  There are other clothing stores called "Secret",  "London Fashion" and "Queen Fashion".  There are many smart shops that sell clothes and shoes.  Albanian young ladies are very stylish. They however tend not just to wear stylish clothes, but stylish shoes.  This would be fine, except that most of the streets and sidewalks are either: cobblestone, rock, in process of repair, rough tarmac, or worse.  But they walk on as elegantly as possible in their spikes.  

There are Taverna, Cafes and Baste all over town.  I have even seen a couple signs stating "Bar and Grill".  A taverna is a full service restaurant.  A cafe is a place where coffee and other drinks are sold - no food.  Restaurants specializing in pizza are ubiquitous in Korca.  A baste is a place to bet on sports.  Betting is very big here it seems.  We also have three beer gardens not far from us - much closer than the university.

One really nice thing about Albania is that, whereas the Police might hassle a citizen, they (and everyone else) here are very nice and respectful of foreigners.  This is just the opposite of Nigeria and other countries.  At a fruit/veg stand, I did not have enough small change and tried to pay with a large bill.  The guy implied (no real words exchanged) that he would take my small change and then said, "Tomorrow".  So I went back the next day and tried to give him some more small change.  Apparently I was totally confused, because when I held out my hand with various small coins, he just said,  "ok, no problem" and took none of them.  Hence I walked off wondering what really happened yesterday.  I was just happy that there was "no problem".

We feel quite safe here - similar to Czech.  I know we stick out here as Korca is a relatively small place without much tourism at all - a few bus tours from Greece bother to stop here.  The people in the supermarket have always been nice to me whenever I try and pantomime the article I am looking for.  It has seldom worked however, so they get the English speaking lady.  I thought I did a good job this morning of pretending to crack open an egg and frying it, but my acting failed to register with any sane person in the store!

Next blog will discuss more about the changes that have taken place in the last twenty years going from the Soviet camp to the Western camp.

John

Another Time, Another Place...

 We are seven hours ahead of our friends from our home area. We are in the same time zone as our Prague friends and one hour ahead of the English – and their really good football matches. We are two hours behind people in East and Southern Africa and five hours behind our friends in Taiwan and South Korea. We are several thousand miles geographically from most of you.

But time and distance tell only minor parts of the differences stories! Geographically we live in a land the beauty of which continually grows in my heart. We see mountains from our flat and from everywhere in Korca.

The hills are alive with the tinkling sound of bells on the sheep and goats that roam the foothills with their shepherds. The city is alive with the sound of traffic, the chatter of people walking along the streets, the conversations we here (often louder than in the USA) from the people socializing in the parks, and the calls from the minarets. On Sunday mornings, the songs burst forth from the Orthodox Churches around. Weekdays we hear the whirring of table saws cutting up firewood and the thud of axes splitting the logs. Firewood is a big thing here – more on that later.

The sound we perhaps miss the most is hearing the English language spoken. We of course speak English while we teach and while we are with the Lorings. We also speak English when we go out to eat with Dutch or Americans who live here. We have had good conversations in English with only one Albanian so far – the lovely young lady who translates for us in church.

The best way to know what a marvelous invention central heating is to move to a cold place where there is no such thing. We have a nice, large flat with plenty of room, two bathrooms, reasonably nice kitchen, etc. But, there is no central heat! Now, those of you who do not live in North America and by now realizing one more of my wimpish qualities – aversion to cold rooms inside – but please indulge me. When the temperature goes near freezing with no central heat, life becomes more interesting. We have a wood burning stove in the living room/kitchen area. In other places we have lived, the odor of people who cook and live with wood was somewhat of a novelty to us. Now we have become that novelty. It seems that most of my clothes now have the distinctly fire wood odor. We do have electric heaters and do not look forward to our electricity bill because I am going to run them reagardless of cost. But our situation does remind us of how blessed we are in the US and how nice we had it in Prague, Mazatlan and East Africa regarding heating of houses.

It also seems that each weekend I am subject to “Tringing”. This is a word I am using to describe the disappointment one experiences when he is eager to watch a sporting event on television only to find that the satellite carrier (Tring, that is) has advertised that they will carry a certain match, but when you naively sit down to watch it, only the words, “signal scrambled” appear on the set. We think Tring is guilty of not paying the Premiership for the game, and therefore losing its signal at the last moment. In our flat, we get CNN International and a few Dutch channels and along with some channels we don't care to watch – about ten in all. We go over to the Lorings to watch (or not watch if we are Tringed) sporting events.

Did someone mention coffee? We naturally make coffee every morning and it is quite acceptable the way we make it. However, should I want a really good cappuccino or latte, I may need to leave this country. Of course the coffee here is perfect for Albanians, but to us it is strange to me and we have not become accustomed to it. I have had two cappuccinos and they were both tolerable. Phyllis has not yet ordered one here. They are very strong and taste distinctly different from those in the US or other parts of Europe where we have lived. I may get the nerve up to order a latte here, but am very pessimistic about what the results will be. We were told by one friend that she describes how it should be made to the waiter. Since I know about two words of Albanian, that will be difficult for me!

Speaking of food, we are getting quite good at shopping here. Yesterday we bought cashews, walnut and dried cranberries. This would indicate that we are now able to find many items that we did not hope to find after our first week here. We have a nice (small) supermarket very close to us and lots of little shops and vegetable/fruit stands. We buy bread that is baked fresh daily – no preservatives. My staples are eggs, bread, chicken (frozen), peanut butter, cookies and nutella, jam, bananas, pears, sausages, coffee and coke zero. Liz is buys peppers (which cost a dime), tomatoes, cucumbers, and all sorts of other stuff. We are really lucky to have a good variety of food stuffs available. Did I mention ice cream and pop corn? Now you know we live in a land of plenty.

Living in a land of plenty is not a big deal to most of you. But, in Albania, it is a relatively new occurrence. Go back twenty years and there was one kind of bread, one kind of cheese, one kind of most things and ration cards limiting how much you could buy. Most of the old Soviet countries lived with these restrictions.

I think next blog will continue with the changes to Albania in the last twenty years. For now, thanks for reading this blog and see you next time.

John

The Evangelical Church in Korçë and Sheep

When John and I take walks on the hillsides surrounding the city of Korce, we often see a shepherd with his flock of sheep (and a few goats.)  We also see some of the work being done by the Evangelical Church of Korce and its Kennedi Foundation. The roots of the Evangelical Church in Albania go back to 1892. Today's  work includes ministry to the the elderly for which a large building to house the elderly is now under construction on a hillside.  We often walk by this building which a Dutch volunteer mission team is currently working on.

This work is possible today because of foresighted early missionaries named  Phinneas Kennedy and Edwin Jaques.   Kennedy is still well known and remembered by the elderly in Korca.   Property for the Church had been purchased in and around Korca between the two World Wars. Missionaries had to flee Albania when the Communists came to power, but wisely took the deeds to the Church's properties. 

After the opening of Albania and the demise of Communism here,  the deeds were taken to the new government and the property was restored to the Evangelical Church.  The picture on the right shows that the Kennedy Foundation and the Misioni Baptist Konservativ are together responsible for this new facility.

Go to this link to see more information about the Kennedy Foundation in Albania


Learning about the various ministries of the Evangelical Church in Korca and the Kennedy foundation amaze us.  The ministry programs of the church include a Ministry to the Elderly, a Feeding Program for Children, a Medical Clinic with Nurse on Staff, a Home for Abused Women and addition to a vibrant preaching and teaching misistry. Language programs and Music Lessons are also offered by the Church Staff.  We see the Church and Foundation Staff as the Shepards to a large, hungry flock.  The following Scriptures illustrate the work of the Church here:

Ezekiel 34:31

You are my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, and I am your God, declares the Sovereign LORD.

Ezekiel 34:15-16

¹⁵ I myself will tend my sheep and have them lie down, declares the Sovereign LORD. ¹⁶ I will search for the lost and bring back the strays. I will bind up the injured and strengthen the weak, but the sleek and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd the flock with justice.

Isaiah 40:11

¹¹ He tends his flock like a shepherd: 

   He gathers the lambs in his arms
and carries them close to his heart;
   he gently leads those that have young.

John 21:15-17

¹⁵ When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?”   “Yes, Lord,” he said, “you know that I love you.”
   Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.”
 ¹⁶ Again Jesus said, “Simon son of John, do you love me?”
   He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”
   Jesus said, “Take care of my sheep.”
 ¹⁷ The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?”
   Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.”
   Jesus said, “Feed my sheep.

This little Church building is about half the distance from our flat to the top of the mountain where the Orthodox Christians planted a cross after the 1997 troubles.

The Cross overlooks the sheep and the City of Korca

To get more information about Albania, see the following site

Albanian Anthropological observations

We have been in Albania for two weeks and have settled into our assignment of tutoring Ashlie and Isaac. When not on school time, we enjoy taking walks about the city of Korçë. There are always interesting anthropological differences to observe. Here are some of my observations and what I have learned from our host family.

I see many older women wearing all black and some younger women also. This mode of dress indicates they have been widowed. The custom is that they continue to dress in all black and never remarry. It is considered shameful if a widow remarries.

I see wedding dresses in quite a number of shops. It is the custom here for a bride to rent three dresses: one for a Friday night feast with the groom's parents, another for a Saturday dinner with the bride's family, and a third for the Sunday wedding which may take place in a church or city hall. After the wedding the bridal couple drive through the town in a decorated car while honking horns gather everyone's attention.

We see old men gathering in one park to chat while women in aprons and shopping bags gather in another for a chat.

We see cut logs being delivered to houses by small three wheeled trucks or donkey carts. Then men proceed to split the logs by hand as they chop for many hours to prepare the wood for heating in the small wood burning stoves that heat these apartments in the winter. I have been told that it may snow as early as November. This town sits at the elevation of 4,000 feet in a high plateau area between mountain ranges. Will tell you later what kind of weather winter presents here. Right now it is feeling very much like fall in the Midwest.

Many of the streets are narrow cobblestone or combo of broken stone and dirt. These also double as walkways as there are no sidewalks in the residential areas. Unlike Prague where we were looking down to avoid puppy poop, here we look down to dodge donkey dung. Many of the streets are currently dug up to put in larger sewer lines in order for waste water to flow more freely with capacity to also carry flushed toilet paper. This makes for the current bit of inconvenience, but we are grateful to have good water pressure to take showers, do laundry, and the water is safe to drink.

My Life Inbetween: Reflections on Albania and Life

We have been in Albania for nearly two weeks now and are becoming more adept carrying on our daily routine. We have found that the first few days in a new country are often the most difficult. If you do not have any concept of where your flat is, how to shop, how to get from point A to point B, essentially how to function at any level, you essentially become like a child dependent on his parents for every task in life. Fortunately, whenever we have moved to another country, a person or family has taken us under their wings and taught us the basics. We are grateful to people over the years for showing us around patiently while we learn how to live and not just to survive.

The Lorings are helping us adjust here in Albania. We can now shop successfully for food, go for walks around town (currently staying on our side of town), take the trash out (this is very important) and other basic activities. We even went out to eat on our own once. One item I want to secure early in our stay in any place away from home today is a cell phone. If I have a phone and know that I can call for help to our host family, life is much less scary.

I took a walk this morning by myself as Phyl(Liz)z is a bit under the weather. Korca reminds me a little of Albuquerque, where my brother lives. He can leave his house and be walking in the foothills of the Sandia Mountains within a few minutes. Fortunately we have a similar situation here. I walked up the street past “our” grocery store, continued up toward the Korca Brewery and turn left just before the brewery. If one walks a few hundred meters on the road you pass institutions that make me think how blessed I am. A landmark building is a home for the handicapped. This is actually a wonderful facility that takes good care of its residents, but I can see them looking out the window through barred windows while I am strolling freely up the tarmac toward the sky. Next, I see what I perceive to be a family-built little prayer chapel, but it may be something else. The road becomes very steep when I reach this point, moving from a pleasant grade that raises the pulse somewhat to a cardiac intensive uphill that taxes my body. But, foolishly I attack it with gusto – more on that later.

Near the top of this steep road is an Orthodox Church. I doubt that this marvelous little structure set so high up is attended by many – perhaps it is more of a museum – I don't know. As I reach the church building I make the decision to continue walking upward and not turn off on the road to the track that runs relatively level (no tarmac, just lots of rocks on this road) and loops back to town. I continue on the steep, upward path. I am breathing heavily, but feeling pretty good as I trudge up the steep tarmac. However, about ten or fifteen minutes later, it becomes apparent that this path is going to defeat me. The top of the foothills seems mile off and very much higher. I slow down and walk a little farther when I see an old gentleman sitting on a bench by the road. I break Albanian cultural traditions and greet him with a “Hello”. He naturally looks at me and almost smiles, but it would be just too much for most Eastern Europeans to greet a stranger on the road, in town, or anywhere.

I realize that if he has stopped at this point, maybe I should too. I turn left onto a gravel path to a cell tower but the path seems to go no farther. The old gentleman gets up and starts walking slowly down a path that goes away from the road. I stand and try to decide whether or not follow him down as his ambling looks more recreational than my trekking on the tarmac. While I am pondering the road or the path, I hear the slapping of a jogger's footsteps. I man is jogging down the road and passes me by. Just then a Mercedes roars up the hill. I realize that I am caught “inbetween”.

My chronological age matches more closely that of the older gentleman so peacefully meandering down the path away form the tarmac road. However, my cultural positioning matches more closely the man jogging downhill and the Mercedes roaring up the tarmac. What to do? I want to go down the path, but I somehow end up walking down the tarmac. I find my cultural positioning stronger than my desire to stroll down the path with the older man. Somehow staying on the tarmac seemed safer than walking on the path. I will attempt to choose the path next time.

Albania is the fifth “foreign” country that we have lived in. However, our town, Korca, contains the fewest English speaking people of the place we have lived. Tanzania and Nigeria are former British

colonies and contained large English speaking expat contingents. The Czech Republic was a tourist oriented country and of course we taught in an English language school there so we lived in an English language environment. Mazatlan was a tourist town also and we had an English language church to attend Sunday mornings which put us in touch with a few hundred English speaking people. Here, we are quite isolated linguistically.

We have spent approximately ten percent of our lives living outside the USA. This puts us in good stead for undertaking assignments such as the one we are on. It also causes my world view to be quite different from the typical American, but still worlds away form the typical Czech, Mexican or Albanian. I am “inbetween” many cultures but live for the most part in the culture of the richest country on earth and I greatly appreciate it riches. The riches of America are what allow us to work in other countries!

Why are we in Albania? The answer is simple. We feel equipped by our past and blessed by our present circumstances in life so that we can do things others might find difficult. However, especially to me, John, living in another land and teaching missionary children is a joy. In fact, it is much easier for me to live here and teach than it would be to minister in certain areas at home. God gives us grace and abilities to do different things and I feel that this is mine in particular and that Phyl(Liz) is well equipped for this type of undertaking also. She is so creative in all aspects of life that she can function well in all places and situations. One of the greatest evidences of this fact is how she can make a great meal out of the foods we have been able to buy here.

Our great joy here is working with Ashlie and Isaac. Ashlie is fourteen and a beautiful young lady. She is much like our granddaughter Kaley in personality – not a morning person for one thing. Isaac is a no nonsense type of boy somewhat like our grandson Steve. He is very sharp academically and tackles all assignments with gusto. We supervise their computer based home schooling from 9:00 AM until they finish their work – usually around 2:00 PM. We do take the mandatory (in my mind) snack break around 11:00 each day. It has been fun getting to know Ashlie and Isaac and finding how to best work with the learning styles of these two very different young people. John does the math and science for both of them while PhylLiz usually takes on the Bible, History, Geography, Spelling, etc. Each day is different in who supervises exactly who supervises which subjects depending on the number of assignments each one has for the day and who is away doing a quite rigorous hike or bike ride – each of them go on about a two hour hike or bike ride each week, leaving us with only one student at the beginning of Monday through Thursday. On Fridays we then all go together on a walk/adventure accompanied by food and drinks.

Our first few days here have gone well. We did have a period of about forty-eight hours of clouds, rain and gloomy weather, but for the most part, the weather has been sunny. It was a little too warm the first week, but now that fall is here, our highs are in the sixties and seventies – just right.

On my walk this morning I saw something that I have never seen in America. There were a group of boys playing football (aka soccer in America) in what was essentially a forest. It was an orderly planted forest of pine trees that are quite tall with their lower branches trimmed quite high. My thoughts were that playing on such a field would teach one to keep his head up while dribbling and that passing must be more pinpoint that on an open field. I think these are two lessons that should apply to all of life. We need to keep our thoughts on high while we go about the basics of life and make sure our communications with others are spot on and clear. Otherwise we will be crashing into barriers in life and our words with our family, friends and colleagues will not convey the message we want them to as they bounce off our different personalities.

Speaking of football, the Lorings are great fans and we can watch the Premiership matches with them anytime. Ian and his Albanian friend Holder watch all the Manchester United matches. We will be headed to the Lorings later this afternoon to see Arsenal's match at 4:00 followed by the Man U match at 6:30. I think God knew what he was doing when He brought us here!

Our First Sunday and Monday in Albania

Sunday has come and gone. We attended the service at the Church Ian and Caralee have started here in Korca and enjoyed the experience even though we did not understand the language. The service was much like the one at WFC in Lenexa, the IBCP in Prague and the Vineyard in Mazatlan. It is great to know that the Holy Spirit is alive and well wherever we go and that the same Spirit is of course omnipresent. We will add a brief video of a portion of the worship. You may recognize some of the melodies even though the words are different.

Sunday afternoon we spent at the Lorings for football, food and fellowship. The major attraction was the Manchester United match with Chelsea – United is the family's favorite team. Liz likes Chelsea because of the uniform color. I am one of the disappointed and struggling Liverpool fans. The Tottenham v Liverpool match played clearly on the Loring's TV – we watched the second half. However, the Man U game was scrambled by the satellite and we could not watch it. Several frantic phone calls by Ian and a friend who was also there watching proved fruitful as the picture appeared around the twenty-fifth minute. We (Ian, Holgre and I anyway) all concentrated on the match while Caralee fortunately concentrated on food preparation! We were served delicious multi-grain rolls and a oatmeal scotchie type bar. Ashlie watched some of the game but Isaac had a friend over and was otherwise occupied for most of it.

Isaac requested waffles for dinner and there was near unanimity concerning his request – so waffles it was – with maple syrup, bananas and yogurt. By the time we finished eating and had talked a bit more it was time for us to retire home and prepare for the next day.

Monday came quickly for us following a good nights sleep. Coffee, a little computer time, breakfast, showers and one load of laundry filled the early morning.

Ashlie reported promptly at 9:00 AM for school, but Isaac had his PE – a bike ride from 8 to 10. Ashlie and John did math and science together and were quite successful. Isaac did not come to 11:00 as he was stung by a bee on his bike ride and took a little while to recover from that. The Lorings have hired a young man to take either Ashlie or Isaac out for PE two days a week each. The normal routine is to bike one day and hike the other.

When Isaac came, John did Math, Science and spelling with him while Liz supervised Ashlies' Communications and World History. Liz and Ashlie also went on a short shopping trip for necessary food items to sustain us through school time. At 3:00 PM we declared school is out and the kids left for their house and lunch. We had grilled cheese sandwiches and fruit followed by a rest period.

Now it is time for blogging, games, coffee. We plan on taking a walk soon and looking for restaurants and other places around town.

We terminated our intended long walk early as rain started falling and we had some thunder and lightning.  We walked with our umbrellas up for a while, but it became evident that we were in for more than a short shower and returned home.

Liz fixed dinner with the few items we had - we were going to stop at the grocery store after our walk, but the rain changed things.  We played Quiddler and BananaGrams after eating.  The Internet was down but came back up in time for us to get this posted tonight.

New to Albania

We expected life in Albania to be different than in any other place we have been, but there is always culture shock.  There are a handful of English speakers, and I doubt we will learn much of the local language in the three months we expect to be here, so we appreciate keeping in touch with family and friends back home.  Internet and skype availability are wonderful.

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We live in a city of about 60,000 inhabitants.  We were told the city is divided into three sectors:  the Orthodox (the area in which we live), the Muslim, and the Gypsy.  One cultural phenomena that we observed last night as we walked down the main boulevard was that there were great numbers of men walking together and enjoying Turkish coffee in outdoor cafes.  Women walked together in groups and dined together.  We saw very few couples together, but we did see an elderly couple, several mid-age couples, and a few young couples hanging out together.

We ordered our first meal out which was a pizza, because "pizza" is pizza in any language.

Many of the old cobblestone streets are being torn up to put in a new sewer system,   which is a good thing as the lines are too narrow to handle flushing paper down the stool.  So a canister sits beside each toilet to collect the discard paper.  This we take to a trash bin daily.  If that is the only inconvenience we are quite lucky.  We were told that the city of Korce has had 24/7 running water for the last 5 years and is the only city in Albania that has thanks to a good manager of the Italian and German funds who helped make it possible.  We were also told that for only the last 2 years has Korce had electricity 24/7.  Many cities and most villages in Albania still do not have much electric power.

John and I took a long uphill walk this morning(one on which our students showed us yesterday.)  We enjoyed the exercise and the view.  We did however get very warm as the temperatures here are still in the 80's.  It cools off in the evenings which is a very good thing as there is no air conditioning.

We have much to learn and more of life to experience.  We look forward to working with our students: Ashley and Issac.

A new life in Korce

We were picked up at the Tirana airport by a professional driver sent by our host family. He was able to phone the Loring family that our luggage did not make it, but we were reassured that this does happen and it would be sent to us. I wanted to keep my eyes open, though terrifically tired, to see the our new country. The first part of the four hour trip was through the capitol city of Tirana. I soon realized the need for a professional driver as car dodged pedestrians, taxis, buses, crazy drivers, donkey carts, and delivery trucks, through city streets, then onward and Upward across the mountains to Korca. John was with either so exhausted or so frightened that he closed his eyes and did not see much of the adventures journey as our pro driver would pass slow moving trucks around the narrow curving mountain roads. There was one viewpoint where we stopped to take pictures of Lake Ohrid which is on the border of Macedonia and Albania. Our driver pointed out beyond the ridge of mountains was also the border between Greece and Albania. We arrived to find our new host family to welcome us and show us our new home. We are able to stay for six weeks in a nicely furnished apartment compliments of a Dutch couple who are currently on home leave.

Arriving in Korca Albania

Our daughter, Gretchen, shuttled us to KCI on Monday, September 12th. We each had a backpack and a small roll-on as carry-on luggage packed with essentials in case our three large pieces of checked baggage did not arrive with us. Good planning as those three pieces of checked luggage did not arrive in Tirana when we did. Our flight out of Chicago was delayed due to a slowed baggage scanner, according to the pilot. We landed in Brussels with no cross Atlantic sleep and 30 minutes to make the transfer eto our next flight. John said he felt like O.J. Simpson's commercial as we ran down the stairway, through the long, long passage ways, short wait (fortunately) through passport check, and able to find the gate where we were to board our next flight with 2 minutes to spare. Whew! As I passed by the first flight attendant, I asked for water, please. I was so thankful she brought a cup of cold water just as we were seated.

We had a very strong feeling that our checked baggage did not make the very speedy run through the airport that we had just made, though the stewardess assured us that every effort is made to keep checked luggage and passenger together. From Brussels we flew to Budapest where we also had to go through passport control. We were there with enough time to change clothes, brush teeth, and rest before the final leg of the trip to Albania.