Packing

I am a notorious over packer. I like to have everything I might need and most things I might want. But I don't hold a candle to my dad. Somehow, for this three week trip, we are carrying more than I packed for two years in Peace Corps and WAY more than I took when I travelled after PC. Most of it is the nature of the trip. The main point of the trip and what my dad has been talking about for the past three years is to do some climbing. Everything else is centered on this one fact. Unfortunately, to be safe, climbing has a lot of equipment and we had no confidence that any of it could be rented or purchased there for any reasonable price. So we are bringing our own and that means about 30 pounds of ropes, harnesses, helmets, and metal fittings. We are also planning on camping, so that means more stuff, like a tent, sleeping bags, cooking stuff etc.  right now this whole thing feels a little bit like an expedition to Everest or something, only we don't have any Sherpas. I don't think all the stuff would be as big of a deal if we also weren't taking a long way to get to Albania. Things would be really easy if we were just flying direct and then renting a car. No problem! But that's not what we are doing. We are flying to Rome, taking a train across Italy and then a boat across the Adriatic Sea. Somehow, I have faith that it will all work out . . . Maybe we can rent a donkey to help us with the gear . . . 

Patring

Now, about Patring. Patring was a teenaged girl that lived with my parents the whole time that they were in the Philippines, the two years in Davao and the year and a half on Bohol. When I was younger, that didn't seem too strange- that was just how it was. But as I grew up it started to seem more strange- we don't even have a housekeeper now! When I joined the Peace Corps myself, I started to seem even more strange. They had a housekeeper? And Peace Corps paid for that? Of course it is not strange in the Filipino context, I don't think they intended to have a housekeeper, but they did and it became part of their Filipino normal. My mom wrote about how Patring came into their lives (and about the dogs and cats that kept them company too):

http://mindanoinday.blogspot.com/2008/03/of-girls-and-dogs-and-cats.html

So the first thing we did in the morning after arriving in Davao was go and visit Patring. We found her at home, in the house across the road from her clinic. She is not practicing right now since she has been having problems with her eyes lately. Because (I think) of the visit a few years ago, this was not the tearful homecoming that they probably had then, but it was emotional nonetheless. Patring is exceptionally sweet and I can see why my parents loved her so much. She came with us for a few hours and met us again when we went to the beach.

For me, more than any other person, Patring was the one that I had an image in my head about. In some ways, she is the Philippines for me.

And she is beautiful.

Hajde Korabi!

My dad arrived safe and sound (and with my new iPod touch!) on his wedding anniversary and just in time for my birthday. We headed directly up to Peshkopi where he immediately slept off the jet lag and I returned to packing and saying goodbye. On my birthday I had a small party. All my friends were pretty considerate of my gift restrictions and tried to give me small/light gifts. Unfortunately, lots of small/light gifts still add up to a lot and some hard decisions had to be made.

On the day after my birthday my dad, a couple of other PCVs, two of my OA kids and I started out for our adventure on Mt. Korab. At (nearly) the last minute the plans that I thought had been made fell through and other arrangements were made. Sometimes I think that all my efforts to plan ahead are just in vain, like banging my head up against a wall. . . But I still have to try.

Anyway, the arrangement's were made, we had a furgon pick us up and take us to Radomir, the village at the base of the mountain, about two hours away from Peshkopi. As we got closer it just got more and more beautiful. The weather wasn't great, but the rain and clouds added to the atmosphere of the whole thing, especially when a full rainbow came out. I don't know if I have ever actually seen the end of a rainbow before, but this one touched down in a village below us; I'm convinced that if we had looked we would have found some gold. . . Or at least really good food.

Our last minute accommodations turned out to be pretty great, with a family in the village of Radomir. We ate some good, fresh food and slept on sheep skins on the floor. In the morning, we got up early and started up he mountain. With a general direction and a map drawn on a cigarette carton we climbed towards the highest peak we could see. At about 2:00, we reached the top of this ridge. From there, of course, we could clearly see two important things- first, the ridge we were on was a peak, but not THE peak, and second that there was a much easier way up (and down) than the way we came. Knowing that we didn't have enough time to reach the REAL peak, we decided it was good enough to have reached a peak, took our pictures and headed down on the path.

We caught our furgon back to Peshkopi and I spent my last night in town frantically packing and trying one last time to consolidate everything. In the morning we headed to Tirana to have a calm night in with Jan and gear up for the next leg of our adventure.

Next up: the Accursed Mountains (finally not forbidden).

Sent from my iPod

Shi, Shi, Largoheni

(rain, rain, go away)

Today was another rainy, cloudy day. It was actually not bad because we were inside the museums in the Kruja citadel for most of the day and the clouds and fog were really beautiful for all the pictures that we took at the top of the mountain. Kruja is the one place that I have been to in Albania that really has it together as far as touristy things. The history museum is very well done (very Skanderbeg-y, shume mire!), and the ethnographic museum was great. The man running the ethnographic museum is simply adorable. Kruja also really has it together for souvenir shopping. I decided to go ahead and spend some money while my parents are here and buy some things that they can take home with them, so I bought a nice hand woven rug. I also bought myself a necklace and my mom bought me some hand made silver earrings (did I mention it's my birthday?). I really can't imagine a better birthday then exploring a castle in Albania with my parents . . .

Parents in the country

My parents have come to Albania!

Albania was one of the few countries that they missed on their way home from their own Peace Corps service in the Philippines over 30 years ago. At that time, Albania was completely closed to the outside world (they also missed Greece because of a war going on in Cyprus), so they were really excited to be able to come and visit me (oh, and they also maybe wanted to see me a little bit). Being good parents that they are, they brought me lots of presents, including a 5lb block of cheddar cheese and huge jar of peanut butter. Because my mom is currently working for an airline, they were able to fly for very cheap.

After they arrived (only 12 hours later than we had hoped- oh the joys of flying standby), we headed up to Peshkopi to meet my friends and see my place. It was a bit of a whirlwind of a few days with lots of coffees and lots of people. Dylan, my new sitemate came up the next day; Kenji, my current sitemate is still around for a few weeks; and Meredith, our closest neighbor right over the border in Macedonia came for a visit. The three days we spent in Peshkopi would have been perfect if it wasn't for the rain. Now, I have to be careful here, because in general I would say that rain in Albania in the spring and summer is a good thing- it means 24 hour power and cool temperatures that are not unbearable to live in. Unfortunately it also makes it a little hard to really explore town and means that the hike I had planned with the Outdoor Ambassadors kids was not a roaring success (we had 3 kids show up and went out in the rain anyway, by the end of the hike, the weather had cleared up and it was lovely). Even with the rain, we had a good time and my parents got to meet most of my friends and coworkers, if only briefly.

The next part of the trip is what I like to call the "Albanian travel experience." Now first, I really wanted to go on this boat trip in the north that goes down a river/lake from the town of Fierza to Koman (or more usually from Koman to Fierza). I tried for weeks with some of the volunteers in that region to figure out a way to do it in two days from Peshkopi. For the life of me, I believe now that it is not possible. Because the ferry leaves at 7am from Fierza and it is not possible to get to Fierza before then without spending the night there and it is also not possible to get from Pehskopi to Fierza in one day . . . Anyway, so we gave up on the boat trip. I guess I will just have to try to do that before I leave when I have more time (3 days instead of 2). Even though we couldn't get on the boat, we went up north anyway, over the mountains to Kukes. The road between Peshkopi and Kukes is only 88 km-about 55 miles- for those of you in CO, think Denver to Fort Collins. Normally the drive from Denver to Fort Collins takes about an hour, maybe and hour and a half if you have traffic leaving town. Ok, now imagine that road is unpaved and goes winding through some crazy mountain peaks and valleys full of switchback turns . . . the drive takes about 4 hours and you get out of the car (or in this case an old van with almost no shocks or suspension). My parents are tough travelers (former PC and all), but I may have overestimated them on this one.

Once we got to Kukes, the plan was to continue on down the road a bit, but the volunteers there convinced us to stay the night there (which I am really happy we did). We got to hang out with the truly cool PCVs of Kukes (who are now my new neighbors) and got to see a children's day festival in the morning. Think combination field day, talent show, dance team performance, and three ring circus . . . it was fun.

We are now in Tirana, staying with Jan. Today we did the grand Tirana tour including the history museum (not bad, but not great- it helps if you speak Albanian because not everything is translated). Tomorrow we are headed up to Kruja to see Skanderbeg's castle. Then it's on to Gjirokaster, Saranda and Burtrint before heading to Corfu and Athens in Greece. Happy travels!