04 December was the ten-year anniversary of Sushil and me meeting in Mumbai, and we decided to mark the date with a weekend getaway. Sushil searched for the best price-versus-points destinations and gave me three options: Bucharest, Sofia and Tirana. As I'd been to the first two, the capital of Albania won.
Albania has a prevailing reputation for corruption and crime, with an Americanesque reverence of guns. But this aspect of Albanian culture is hidden deeply enough to be of little note to the average traveller, and our weekend passed without incident. I was fond of Tirana; despite what the EU might say, it’s quite obviously European, with a very heavy Italian streak. Juxtaposing this are moments when you look around at the architecture and infrastructure and think 'I could be in India'. A beguiling mix.
Albania is also known for its conservative views on homosexuality. It is progressing, and we did see some PDA between a couple inside one of the nicer restaurants, but the lack of any gay bars and little openly-queer life makes it unappealing as a frequent destination.
Tirana itself is small, and almost everything of note is walkable from the central Skanderbeg Square. We saw everything we wanted to over a few hours, and spent the rest of the time in cafés, bars and restaurants. Tirana definitely has a Mediterranean café culture, with outdoor seating almost everywhere, hosting happy smokers sitting and chatting for hours with nothing more than a cappuccino. Technically smoking indoors is illegal, but this is very loosely enforced, and we actually had to leave one restaurant as it was just too much. But we found some absolute gems, notably Era and Noor, and had a much more sophisticated weekend than we expected heading into it. It turned out to be a very lovely anniversary weekend.
Cheers,
Shaun
Shaun
The city from our hotel room.
Mural on Skanderbeg Square. I am unsure if it is meant to be comforting or menacing.
The one mural I wanted to see was the very Soviet façade of the National History Museum. Unfortunately, it was covered for renovations, so I only got to see the cover mock-up.
Forever Green Tower
During the Cold War, Albania built tens of thousands of bunkers. Most are disused, but some have been refashioned into museums, art galleries and the like.
The Tanners' Bridge is described as a "well-preserved 18th century Ottoman stone footbridge". Fair enough, but as it is included in almost every 'what to do in Tirana' list, I expected its surroundings to have been a bit more charming. The tourist board has missed a trick here.
When I read about the Pyramid of Tirana (An Albanian monument to the Communism that nearly crushed the country is now a crumbling wreck), it of course became #1 on my list. I knew it was slated for redevelopment, but I hadn't realised how far along it already was. I expected less efficiency from an ex-Stalinist Mediterranean government, but unfortunately we were too late to see the pyramid in its glory.
"One Balkan, Stonger Balkans". Commendable, but still very optimistic at this point (see: n. balkanization).
I was quite taken by this bit of civic action. Tirana used to be much greyer and drabber than it is today. In the 00s, former mayor (and current PM) Edi Rama started painting many of the buildings across the city. Though he received some criticism for giving focus to aesthetics when there are many pressing needs across the city, it has greatly improved the feel of the city, and crime and littering reportedly decreased notably in districts that had been improved.
One of the endless cafés in Blloku, Tirana's hipster neighbourhood. Once walled off and accessible only to high-ranking Communist officials (hence 'The Block'), it is now the trendiest and liveliest area of the capital.
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