Albania

In 1997 I went to a world cup qualifier in Hanover Germany, with Mike and Anders. The opponent was Albania and I remember when the 2000 Albania fans showed up together in a dark mob. This was my first exposure to Albania.

Albania was a closed-off, inaccessible country for forty years under the rule of Dictator Enver Hoxha. The Hoxha regime also left behind over 173,000 concrete bunkers scattered around the country as the paranoid dictator was forever worried about invasion.

We stayed in Berat, in the centre of the country inside the walls of one of the oldest castles on earth. Built-in the 4th century BC and burned to the ground by the Romans in the 2nd century BC, the castle as it is seen today is mainly from the 5th and 6th centuries.

Natasha founds us another great restaurant, this time a very friendly family-run place near our hotel, also inside the castle walls. The daughter served us, but she doesn’t know any English, but the mother does. Usually, it’s the other way around, but the daughter was able to serve us just fine. I had chicken with rice. And that’s all it was splendidly cooked and seasoned chicken with simply tasty rice. Natasha had two meals, stuffed peppers and vegetables over eggplant, both we very good. Albania is among the most affordable places in Europe, I think our meal came to 16 or 17 CAD. The mother had us come inside and try a delicious fig soaked in lemon and sugar for dessert.

I’ll try and explain driving in Albania. Try and imagine the half dozen or so of the most bat-shit crazy aggressive road incidents you’ve ever seen, then condense them into one hour. Then, each subsequent hour the is same as the first. It's like that.

It’s quite shocking when you first witness it, but this is what they do. Imagine a two-lane road, straight, curve, doesn’t matter. If there is a slow-moving truck or caravan, they don’t care if there are cars coming they just pass straddling the centre line, as the oncoming car you just move to the shoulder a bit and all three cars somehow fit. This could be done at low speeds sure, but they do it at normal driving speeds. Now you know, when driving in Albania, and you see a truck coming, you know the old guy texting and smoking in the car behind him is coming out, speeding down the middle, whether you’re ready for him or not.

Did you know John Belushi was born to Albanian immigrants?