B and I went on an epic day trip (16.5 hours!!!) to visit the disputed territory of Kosovo and the small country of North Macedonia. At our first border crossing, one American guy had to get off the bus and I don’t know what happened to him. I think instead of a real passport he had his land crossing card, so I’m hoping he only had to catch an expensive taxi back to Tirana.
Kosovo
We had a brief tour of Prizren, Kosovo. I learned the following:
- Ottoman towns in the 1500s have three things: a mosque in the middle of town, a stone bridge, and lots of coffee shops. After reflection, that does feel true for every one I’ve visited.
- These people take weddings seriously. We saw store after store of pageant dresses. The guide explained they do big weddings here, lots of fancy clothes, gold, and cool cars.
- Kosovo is recognized by a lot of countries but not others. It sounds like Serbia is a bit clingy and won’t give it up.
- Most Kosovons are ethnic Albanians. Their official flag represents the six neighboring countries, but the flag that’s in the heart’s of the people looks just like Albania’s.
North Macedonia
After Kosovo and an uneventful border crossing, we visited Skopje, the capital of North Macedonia. Here I learned the following:
- The new town center was rebuilt recently. Tons of money has poured into here and they have rebuilt buildings and facades of communist buildings and put up a ton of huge statues. The main ones are of Alexander the Great, but since the dispute with Greece over the name Macedonia, the official title of that one is ‘warrior on a horse.’ Ha!
- The old town felt a lot like Turkey and had several mosques, a stone bridge, and lots of coffee shops.
- This was a major trade route back in the day so they had caravansaries, which were fancy way stations. These ones by far out-classed the ones in Western Europe at the time.
- There was a lot of corruption in redoing the new town
- The name Macedonia is disputed by North Macedonia and Greece. Both claim it and Alexander.
Skopje walking tour
We had the most unique tour guide ever in Skopje. He was a ball of energy and spoke fast, mainly pointing out things. Then he walked fast and we ran behind him. He was opinionated and said stuff like, ‘T-mobile building, German owned.’ Ha! Like the T-mobile building is cool enough to talk about on a tour. And then he was off on the next factoid. We did that for about 45 minutes.
When we were done, he kept going with B and me for another 10 minutes or so. We said we wanted to eat so he took us to a restaurant he liked nearby and then off he went. I have to say, the food here was dynamite. We got chicken skewers, stuffed peppers and baked beans and super yummy naan type bread.
Return to Tirana
Unfortunately, the tour went downhill at this point. We ended up driving for the next five and a half hours before getting back to the apartment. It was hot in the bus and sunny and the seat in front of me was reclined the whole time so I was really uncomfortable for about ten hours of driving. When we got home, we both had to do legs up the wall to get our cankles down to size.
As an interesting sidetone: four of the people (from Norway and England) on this tour were in Tirana to see Kanye West in concert. On my Lake Bovilla tour an American and a Greek kid were here for it. So weird people would come from around the world to see that guy! But I do appreciate supporting live music.
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