I met a poor population, but welcoming. Generally, it looks like what I heard or read about Turkia ! I will confirm it when I will be there (or not). Expecting that, here, I've got 10 propositions everyday to be drived, people are so curious about me they offer me the coffee just to keep me with them and answer to their questions, if I need help to find a hostel or anything else, they gang up to find... Warmhearted.
But it's after passing the first impression.
When I arrived in Shkoder, in the north of the country, I thought I missed my way :"But where am I ? Is it Mozambik or what ? Excuse me sir, the way of Europe, please ?"
The south suburbs where I have found a correct little hostel, is covered with rubbish like I had never seen before ! In the middle of a wasteland, 2 dogs are fighting for some ordures, in an other, a little horse is tether (horses there are plastivore ?), a bigger dump has overflowed in the river, making a little dam... Just one old bridge, where 2 cars can pass together, let some people fishing in the river... Some crummy houses making think about shantytown and closed to there, some building sites or new (but empty)... and everywhere group of inactives men who talk, play chess or domino, children play football...
Gloops !
I go in the center to visit a little, and there, despite of the broken pavement and some dump in the corners, it's a european city like elsewhere, with avenues and places and coffee shops, whitout interest in particulary. I spend there one day to look at this strange (for me) population, sit down at a coffee terrass or walking in the street : it's the first time I feel realy "elsewhere" : I don't no where but it's nothing to see with what I know, and I have everything to learn.
The muezzin voice record me I am in a muslim country : indeed, it's not a church I see in the center place, it's a beautiful mosque. It's 9 a.m., the coffee terrass is full, but I notice something : there are just men here ! All ages, but no one woman. The atmosphere is nice, they seem to know themselves all and pass from table to table and from coffee to coffee to salute, talk a little, to laugh... then I look at the street circulation : it confirm what I have seen yesterday...
But for the "driving method in Albania", it is worth writing a special paragraph :
Very simple : in the city, you have no traffic light, no signs, a very few zebra crossing (old and invisibles) which serve to no one, and it's necessary to have a real phisical separation to force drivers to respect the right traffic way. To drive in Albania (if one day you are forced), you will need a good survival instinct, to stay quiet, and above all a good klaxon ! This is the security element number 1. More, it's a true communication mode, more sophisticated than it semms to be, and I suppose young albanians do "klaxon - second language" at school...
It serve to say "Caution, I come !", Caution I here", Caution I have passed", "Let me pass", "Hi", "good bye", "Have you brought the bread ?"etc... It's klaxonning everywhere and everytime ! It's so established in the drive custom that a lot of people have tunned their klaxon : from the pathetic buzzer to the police siren, passing by all klaxons 2 or 3 pitch, car alarms... on the national road, which is straight, I'm sure a blind driver would be able to drive just with ears ! It's like a long wedding convoy which would never finished.
There is no speed excess in town : just one acceleration could make a disaster. I have seen a moped going a little too fast : 50 m farest, it's the "drift" to escape a walker...
Yes, because on top of the drivers who drived so badly, in total ignorancy of the wing mirror, there is the walkers who cross in the traffic without any worry about cars, horsecarts, potholes... I see driving school 's cars, but I suppose the main lesson is "How to stay alive from the point A to the point B"...
But I note that no one is nervous : there klaxon is not synonymous of reprimand like in France, it's realy to "communicate".
What have I seen during the last 4 days ? However the poverty of the country, the road between Shkoder and Durres looks like a beautiful large French national road, realy straight, with petrol station and washing station every 2 km (I find increadible quantities of wash station everywhere : they spend their time to wash their car, here !).
A last word on my environment : lot of plain, separated by little mountains, and a lot of agriculture (Maize above all)
and some livestock farming. Not like in switzerland, of course ! Just 2 or 3 cows in the same meadow, for local using. And above the towns like Shkoder or Lezhe, I see casttles, in good condition seen from the road... I should visit one before to leave the country.
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