As My Crazy Life Begins To Approach Critical Mass

 Hello Readers…Miss me?

It turns out that I couldn’t have imagined being so happy over here. Teaching is amazing, and everything I hoped it would be. I was asked to be on the Halloween planning committee and judge the costumes too. Today I even gave my 11^th graders a creative writing assignment to write how they think/want Sleepy Hollow to end, (before we read the end) and some of my students were so excited they had to read and act theirs out to me during my 15 minute break ! One student actually called me “Captain” which made me want to stand on my desk and re-enact “Dead Poets Society” and a group of my students approached me after class to ask if I would host a Bulgarian cooking class at my flat so they could cook for me and teach me the traditional dishes. I of course said yes, and they are looking up vegetarian meals for me since I can’t eat meat. I was just so overjoyed that they wanted to spend more time with me, and interact with me showing me their culture. How amazing is that? It’s like I get to do everything I ever dreamed of doing, but in a single year. Who could ask for more?

You couldn't ask for more! He says

But I know I promised you I would finish my travels, so here are the countries we have left from my “Peter-Jackson-Wrote-My-Trip-Backpacking-The-Balkans-Everyone-Says-I-Am-Crazy” trip! Albania, Kosovo, and Macedonia. Tonight’s post is Albania (I’m going in order btw)

I've been known to sleep with my  passport

I'm packing my grateful eyes!

So I will be honest with you readers, Albania was not on my radar until I started this journey. I have this life goal, you may call it ridiculous, but hey, not YOUR life goal-so I don’t care. ;)  I want to visit all 195 recognized and unrecognized countries/nations. If I die trying to achieve it, I will die a happy and fulfilled person!

I started off by getting to the Podgorica bus station very early in the morning, I then took a bus to a different part of Montenegro where I waited for two hours to transfer to my next bus to get to Tirana. Let’s discuss how I was drafted into the “Bus Station Workers Breakfast Club.” So basically I am sitting there, eating my grapes that I took with me for the trip and this woman brings out a tray with 5 espresso cups on it…there were 4 workers. I thought nothing of it because they were talking amongst themselves the janitor, the shop woman, and the ticket sellers. Then all of a sudden this woman approaches me with the makeshift tray and speaks to me in “Serbo-Croatian-Montenegrian” to which I respond in a mixture of Czech and Bulgarian. The gist? Here is our espresso, have some.

Thankfully this is true!

Tigger understands me!

Seriously... it was intense

Now readers if you know me at all you know I never drink coffee, never mind espresso, never mind MONTENGRO espresso which is incredibly strong, they put no sugar in it, and it’s basically acid. But I couldn’t get them to understand that, they thought I was just being polite. So what do I do? I take a sip. It was HORRIBLE. I thought I would die, I had to keep drinking though because that woman was so happy that she started telling people who walked in that the American loved her espresso. How could I let her down after all of that? I kept drinking while talking to her in a mixture of languages detailing my travels and the places I liked. Thankfully the coffee break was over after 30 minutes and they all went back to work leaving me sitting there with my cup…I slowly poured out the rest of that sludge into the waste bin next to me. This was a covert operation, how did I succeed you ask?

I met new friends! I met this adorable couple from New York first. They were tying to figure out a bus schedule and couldn’t read it so I helped them and we got talking. One of them used to be a lawyer but now he is in a Ph.D. program in Anthropology at U of Chicago. His boyfriend meanwhile just passed the bar after completing his Law program at NYU. Really impressive couple! But they were fantastic asking me about Bulgaria and Fulbright, it was a great conversation and we detailed the south, what we liked about Europe and too soon they had to go. But they covered me from prying eyes while I poured out a huge chunk of coffee. The next opportunity I had to ditch the coffee came when I was helping some Aussies figure out how to get to Athens. Apparently I was literally the only English speaker in this bus station who could: read Cyrillic, speak Czech, read a map, figure out a bus schedule, and stealthily get rid of intense espresso that would have melted the ice burg that took out the Titanic.

Here is my coffee...you know just in case

He really didn't know...

This picture was actually really hard to get!

Finally it was time for my first bus which got me near Tirana the capital of Albania. Then we had to quickly change into this mini bus that was waiting for us on the side of the road. It was a horrible trip thanks to all that espresso I drank and the lack of air, but I befriended these other Aussies and a few Brits on the bus who were going to sail around the world. I ended up educating them on Dr. Who because I refuse to let a British person not be well versed and we thankfully finally arrived in Tirana.

I found a taxi and got to my hotel which was really luxurious and unexpected since it cost so little. But they were helpful and I soon unpacked what I needed to, washed up, called my mom, then hit the town. Ever get lost in Albania at 8 pm? No? Oh good, well I have. You can’t find a map in Albania to save your life…so instead I took a snap shot of my hotel address and when I was lost I asked people in establishments where the street was. Here’s the thing I bet you are thinking “if I got lost in Tirana I would panic.” Right? Well I didn’t. Getting lost is always my favorite part of travelling, I find so many unique hidden spots that are absolute gems that how could I ever get angry?

Don't tell me you don't find that gorgeous!

I found my way back but only after finding a really cool open market, a nice gelato place, this cool old shop where I bought my best friends niece a shirt because her dad is from Albania, and all the statues I wanted to visit in daylight.

Day two I hit the streets and found an agency to sell me a bus ticket to Pristina, the capital of Kosovo. I wanted to know my game plan so I could make sure I saw all the sites but also made it to Kosovo on time. I brought my lunch with me and ate in the park where this old man came and tried to ask me for help with his cell phone. When I explained in Czech that I couldn’t help he gave me the traditional “male head of the household greeting!!!” He kisses both cheeks and holds my shoulders. Yes, I am that lucky!

I felt like they "wanted me" like Uncle Sam!

Isn't she adorable? My travel booker!

Then I saw the opera house, the mosque, a few museums, the clock tower, revolutionary statues, and basically everything you could possibly wish to see while walking for hours around Tirana. Ladies and gentleman you don’t know how beautiful the world is, and how amazing it is to be part of it until you are catching a man falling off a wall in the center of Albania because he overshot the landing, or following a group of grandmothers across a crazy intersection because no one messes with them, and eating in a park that is dedicated to revolution and reform. Tirana was great. I learned a lot, saw beautiful places and experienced a culture I never even considered visiting. In part I did it so that I could one day tell my Bffl Vicky’s niece Simone: I went to your fathers country and this is what it is like…But I also was thrilled I could skype with her while there so she technically saw her fathers land. How amazing is that?

After tackling Tirana I went to bed, packed and ready to board a bus the next day to go to Kosovo. I woke at 5 am to catch a 6 am bus very close to my hotel (seriously there are NO bus stations in Tirana what???) and when I came down to check out the old, tiny, adorable, man behind the desk took me outside and lead me to his car. Apparently instead of calling a taxi as I requested the day before, he just volunteered to take me, so yay! It was a quiet ride, but nice. I got on my bus and my next post will detail the crazy trip I took into war torn, currently rebuilding, Kosovo!

I refuse to listen to Beiber!

Tonights song is “Through the Looking Glass” from “Wonderland, Alices New Musical.” Because sometimes you really have to take a chance and enter into a world you know nothing about to find a deeper part of yourself and “what might be.”

Anna