Leaving Vermosh

A view above Kelmend Province from Hoxha's Balcony

After nearly twenty days in the Vermosh valley, it was time to leave, and although I was ready to move on to the next adventure, I was ambivalent about leaving a place that had offered me some respite from the craziness that had preceded my coming. The area is not only relaxing, but the combination of open-armed hospitality and regular home-cooked meals left me in no shape to take on the road again. But, like all things, my time in Vermosh had to come to an end, and I headed back towards Shkodra with the group.

Life in Vermosh

 

Cricket in Vermosh

There were a lot of surreal moments in the three weeks that I spent in Vermosh, from hidden mountain villages to rapping middle schoolers to what was perhaps the country's first series of regularly scheduled cricket matches. But as I prepared to go, I mainly thought about the last weekend I was in the village, when nearly everyone else had left the house and I was alone with my book on the balcony, enjoying the wonderfully temperate mountain climate, a departure from the blistering heat of the south, and soaking in the calm that settled into the valley with the absence of my fellow travelers.

Week 3 - Lessons in Lepushe

Lepushe

During my three weeks teaching in the Vermosh valley, I tried to focus on giving my students a basic understanding of the language they would need for some tourism-related businesses. We spent time going over vocabulary from hotels, restaurants and touring, and then I gave the students the choice to prepare a short presentation from one of these categories in pairs or small groups. The resulting skits capped off our three weeks together, along with a reading from a small brochure that the group produced to advertise the community and the postcards that I had each student write to supporters of B3P.

Week 2 - Learning in Lepushe

Dinner with Arlinda

After the first week in Albania, I started to develop some kind of an idea of what I wanted to accomplish before I left. I decided to frame the classroom experience in a way that emphasized the main goal of the B3P project, which is to encourage the development of sustainable businesses in the region, in order to give people who grew up in the local villages and want to continue living in the area a chance to do so. Now, I realize that I might seem like a strange candidate for this kind of work. As someone who has started to make a life for himself as an expatriate, this is more than a little incongruous. After all, why would I want to spend a month working to encourage people who have already decided to leave to stay and rebuilt their community when I've seemingly decided to leave my own behind?

Week 1 - Landing in Lepushe

Hanging out on the Porch

With a little over a month of retrospective, I can say that I was entirely unprepared for what awaited me in the Vermosh valley. That's not to say that it was a difficult experience, but rather that all of the craziness of the first week needs to be understood in that context. I had some kind of idea that I was going to come to this mountain village and teach English, but I didn't know what the comprehension level of the students or how old they would be, or very much about the village or its culture beyond the minimal information I was able to scrape together via the vanishingly small number of websites that mention the area.

Arrival and First Days in Albania

Overlooking the Highway from Shkodra

When I was planning my trip to Vermosh, I made the mistake that many travelers make in assuming that things were going to follow my initial plans. Outside of guided tour groups, this rarely happens, and it's best to assume the worst, and hope for the best when traveling in this part of the world (or in general). Fortunately, I made it out the other side no worse for wear, and with some fantastic stories to boot.

Back from the Balkans

My monthlong adventure in the Balkans came to an end yesterday, and now that I'm back in the land of the German Shepherds (a reference that will be clarified later), it's time to make up for lost time and start posting. I'd hoped to be able to put up pictures and stories on a more regular basis while I was in Albania and on the road, but unfortunately the limits of technology and time prevented me from doing so. Fortunately, everything is still fresh in my mind, and I'll be putting up posts over the next few days recounting my time both in Vermosh and on the road.

A Short History of Albania

Albania is a young state with a long history. Although its lineage stretches back thousands of years to the Illyrian peoples who long inhabited the eastern Adriatic coastline, the modern country only celebrated its 100 year anniversary last November.

Vermosh

Vermosh, the northernmost village in Albania, has only been settled permanently for a little more than a hundred years, but it lies in a region with thousands of years of complicated and intermingled history. The more I learn about it, the more excited I become to have the opportunity to travel there next month, because Vermosh seems to represent the Balkan region and Albanian history in so many interesting ways.

Ticket purchased, hostel confirmed, ready to go...

After weeks of feet-dragging and hand-wringing, I finally booked my ticket today to Podgorica for the 31st of July, my first stop en route to Vermosh, the village where I'll be working in May. For the next month or so leading up to my trip, and hopefully during my time in Albania, I'll be using this blog to write about the group that has organized this project, the Balkan Peace Park Project (B3P), news about the region, and ongoing information about what I'm doing both in preparation and, once again, hopefully some updates once I'm there.