Tirana on a rainy day

I left Rome early this morning with one hour delay from our scheduled take off time due to severe thunderstorm. The trip to Tirana is short only about 1 hour and a bit. We cruise down the Italian boot to the heel at Puglia and then turn left, cross the Adriatic and land in Tirana, all very simple. The crew on Alitalia has to be seen, they are not just a crew, they are glamorous people, because flying anywhere even to Albania is an adventure. The male steward all have 5 o'clock shadows or a short beard, they do not merely serve drinks and snacks, no the central alley of the plane is like the catwalk of a designer fashion show. There is a certain style in the way they address passengers, the look, the hair, the manner, the voice intonation, everything is style. Even when they say goodbye at the end of the trip, it is either polite and sophisticated or you are dismiss as unimportant. If you speak Italian and are well dressed, you get a smile and a friendly ''Arrivederci''. If you are one of those Albanians on the flight, wearing capri pants, flip-flops, T-shirt and cheap jewellery, you are lucky if they don't throw you out of the plane, I got the usual Arrrivederci Dottore.

At the airport I was met by our office manager here in Tirana who was complaining to me that the airport lounge was full of loud mouth Northerners, meaning people from Skhoder or the border area with Montenegro and Kosovo, sort of the wild frontier hillbilly area. They have a certain accent different from the rest of Albania, the same with Kosovars who also have a German accent and use german words for car parts. The wealthier part of Albania is the south close to Greece, where many Albanians who are ethnic Greeks live. It's election time here in Albania and the vote is on 28 June. It's Sunday and Tirana is pretty quiet, the hotel appears deserted. Though the staff recognize me right away and I got big smiles. The hotel is in front of Parliament and there is a photo display of numerous infrastructure projects around Albania, amazing the number of big projects going on all at the same time in this small country, from Hydro electric dams, to super highways, to great bridge building and the expansion of the Tirana airport, the old terminal is only 1 year old and they are building a new expanded terminal now. There is so much to do, and so much remains to be done, still coming here is an adventure. Will does not want to come, he probably would get bored, no opera here or get propositioned for marriage within 20 minutes for a fee of $20,000 dollars. That is the new deal or racket for a way out of this place for those desperate enough.
Hopefully he would have the good sense to turn down such an offer.