Skip to main content

Europe's Rough Corner

The New York Times has named Albania as its Budget Destination of the Year. Matt Gross, the paper's frugal traveller, whose piece on Tirana was published a few months ago, writes this time about his trip to the South of the country, taking in Gjirokaster, Sarande and Butrint.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Why do these "morons" keep referring to Albania as "muslim" or "majority muslim country"????
This is Absurde and False. Most albanians are atheist and only a small minority practices religion.
6:50 pm
olli said…
OK. But aren't you at least happy that people are saying good things about the country and encouraging others to visit?
11:22 am
Anonymous said…
Yeah of course.
It's a good feeling to get such "rare" positive articles from major newspapers like The New York Times
5:50 am
Mërgimtari said…
A man was walking down the street in Belfast when a masked gunman approached him and held a gun to his head.

"Are you Catholic or Protestant?" the gunman asked.

"I'm an athiest!" the terrified man replied.

Said the gunman, "Yes, yes, but are you a Catholic Athiest or a Protestant Athiest?!"
6:04 am
Anonymous said…
A man was walking down the street in Belfast when a masked gunman approached him and held a gun to his head.

"Are you Catholic or Protestant?" the gunman asked.

"I'm a Jew!" the terrified man replied.

Said the gunman, "Thanks be to Allah, who has led me to this Jew!"
4:27 pm
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Albania and the Perils of the 21st Century

Another article on religion in Albania appeared yesterday. Patrick Poole, writing in the American Thinker , argues that Saudi funding for the construction of mosques and the training of imams is a threat to Albania, since these mosques and imams reflect the fundamentalist interpretation of Islam dominant in Saudi Arabia.
34 comments
Read more

Kamëz Part 3

For those who want a lengthy detailed report into the election there will, undoubtedly, be a range of them to chose from. In the meantime, here are my brief reflections on the last few weeks. At the heart of the problems around this election is the unwarranted influence of political parties on all aspects of the electoral process. Every institution responsible for organising and facilitating the election is under the control of political parties. The Electoral Code itself was heavily revised only days before the original date for the elections and only weeks before the actual date (Law 9676 13 January 2007). It was these revisions, specifically Article 181/2, that created the overly complicated identification requirements that caused so much confusion, and undoubtedly disenfranchised some voters. Let's be clear though: these revisions were not designed to protect the interests of the electorate. They were drafted primarily because the political parties do not trust each other. The ...
27 comments
Read more

Big in Albania

Ask me how much I knew about Albania before coming here and my list would be a short one: Enver Hoxha, bunkers and Sir Norman Wisdom. I have no idea when or how I acquired this extensive body of knowledge, but the association of Norman Wisdom with Albania was by far the most interesting part of it. I remember watching Norman Wisdom's old films on British television. My parents were fans of his wholesome, slapstick comedy, but apparently missed the ideological significance of Pitkin's relationship with Mr Grimsdale. Pitkin, the downtrodden and oppressed representative of the workers, triumphed every time over his capitalist oppressor, Mr Grimsdale - and he got the girl. It took a theorist of Hoxha's insight and profundity to discern this deeper political message. It always seemed tremendously unlikely, yet the story of Sir Norman's fame in Albania has been reported in worthy sources like the BBC , the Guardian and the Daily Telegraph . According to the Guardian, when Wi...
22 comments
Read more