Macedonian Home Cooking

We came for the food.  In 2003, a Swiss organization called Pronatura chose Brajčino as the first eco-village in Macedonia, aiding it to create a tourism industry that could help preserve the village's natural beauty and rural lifestyle.  The help included trail markers, information panels, updates to homes that wanted to offer "western quality" accommodation.  The people of Brajčino, three old women to be precise, took it upon themselves to create a small sub-industry.  They developed set menus and prices and began to offer tourists home-cooked Macedonian meals.  Almost a decade later, this has become one of the main tourist draws.  "A lot of Italians go there," someone had remarked in Ohrid.  "I don't know why."  We knew exactly why.  Brajčino has become an unlikely foodie destination.

Upon arrival, we were sadly informed that one old women no longer does it, one had rented out her house for the season and the third had a broken leg.  (When an ancient, whiskered woman lifted her black hemline and tapped her cane against a bandaged, swollen knee later that day, we deduced that she must have been apologetic women #3).  "But you can eat in my home one night and in the restaurant the other," our host Divna said.  It felt like a let-down, but when we saw the wooden table on Divna's front lawn set for a welcome snack, we couldn't imagine a more perfect place to eat.  It ceased to matter what exactly that food experience would be.  Divna's chickens ran around, the bigger of her two roosters was on a fornicatory rampage.

Over the next two days, two breakfasts and two dinners, we experienced truly divine locavore eating.  The potatoes were bright yellow, the egg yolks were flame orange, both so packed with vitamins and nutrients that the color and flavor were exploding with vibrancy.  Homemade sheep cheeses differed in textures and flavors, crushed walnuts replaced roasted peanuts when the mood struck, trout from the river (which was stocked from nearby Lake Prespa) replaced the normally offered beef.  "There used to be eight cows, now there are only four.  Young people don't like raising them," our host had told us.  Though, I'm sure veal would have popped up had I not requested meatless dining.

There was, actually, a little meat in Merlin's first dinner.  We were each given a clay pot with four small stuffed red peppers.  My polneti piperki overflowed with spiced rice and his had some ground beef mixed in.  Macedonian food is almost always verrrry slowly-cooked in clay dishes, which is why restaurant equivalents just don't cut it in most cases.  Rice plays a large role in the cuisine, both because of Turkish influences and the fact that they grow a lot of rice.  In the peppers, and mixed into our vegetable soup starter, the grains were flavorful and toothsome - with the appearance of brown rice, but the taste of black, wild rice.

At our dinner in the restaurant, which had been opened just for us and felt just as cozy as any home, we received a crash course in Macedonian cuisine.  Everything we'd jotted down as something to look out for on our travels, appeared before us: tavče gravče (butter beans slow cooked in an earthenware dish - considered the national dish), Macedonian pie (a savory pastry of leeks, spinach and herbs), ajvar and pindzur (a quintessentially Macedonian red pepper paste and its fresher, less cooked down salsa-like sibling).  Ajvar is something we've been trying wherever and whenever we can.  Every cook has their way of doing it.  It is made in enormous batches during Autumn, cooked for hours and hours in jars and eaten at every meal throughout the year.  "I make too much ajvar!" the restaurant chef, Milka, said laughing.  Her annual batch is made from 100 kilos of red pepper, from her own garden and those of other village women.

Ajvar is one of those things that Macedonians insist you must try homemade.  These sort of declarations are usually frustrating, like "try to get yourself invited to a wedding!"  On it.  It's one of the reasons places like Brajčino and homestays in general are so special.  You actually can eat a homecooked meal in a foreign country, you just have to explore your options.  Here's some ajvar served as part of one of Divna's excellent breakfasts.  Alongside is a dry, cornbread with specks of salty sheep's cheese scattered within in like chocolate chips and a sprinkling of sesame seeds on top.  Before eating, we poured kefir over the cake and dabbed on some blueberry jam as directed.

Yogurt was not the only homemade drink on the menu.  We drank white wine, liker and rakija all made by Divna and her husband.  Rakija is your usual privately distilled liquor, clear, strong.  Liker, as far as we can tell, is the girlier version.  Infused with fruit and with added sugar, it is a more pleasant sip.  Adult juice.  These two spirits are usually served with pride and a personal touch.  Some have mint leaves inside or are yellower in color, from extra wheat added during fermentation.  Divna's rakija was particularly strong and her liker, plum.

We felt at home at Divna's, but there was something freeing about having our experience in Milka's restaurant.  Homestays are now a big part of our traveling experience, we try to set one up in each country if we can.  Still, we worry about crossing the line between paying guests and house invaders.  No one has ever made us feel this way, especially not Divna, but it feels much less intrusive taking up someone's time with questions when you aren't also pulling them away from their own dinner, family and/or favorite television show.  Milka's restaurant was decked out in full traditional kitsch, but her low, neat ponytail, athletic shoes and zip-up vest over a v-neck t-shirt harkened back to her 18 years in Sweden.  Like almost everyone else who grew up in Brajčino, she left during young adulthood.  It was wonderful to talk to her about life before and life now, about her recipes, the sources of her ingredients and her family.

In the morning, we'd hear Divna setting up the breakfast table, beneath the grape arbor.  The vines had recently been pruned, so a drop of sap would drip onto our scalps or into our cups of coffee now and then.  The old women of the town would come and visit her as she ate and would, later, recognize us in town.  One, who rose no higher than Merlin's bellybutton and who we'd seen weeding a large garden the day before, spoke rapidly to us as we waited for the minibus.  Afterward, we decided that she must have been trying to figure out if we were the great grandchildren of one of her friends who'd moved to America.  Milka's daughters are in Sweden and Australia now.  The Aussie one has two boys and is pregnant again.  Milka is hoping for a girl.  That way, she explained, she can pass down all of her secret recipes.

Brajčino Apples

The first thing we saw in Brajčino was a man dumping crates of rotten apples into a stream.  He waved to us without smiling.  We watched the apples bob and swirl down the current.  This was once the apple capital of Yugoslavia, but the people here are just now learning again how to grow, sell and store them.
Here, a group of farmers and hired boxers sort spoiled fruit from good, boxing up what they can.  So much (too much) was winter softened, barely sellable... but still sweet.  One man handed us two apples as we walked by and we ate them with appreciative sounds.  They really were pretty good.

The orchards of southern Macedonia are in full bloom right now.  This is the beginning of a high plateau that covers much of the country, cut off from the warmth of the south by mountains, still springtime cool.  The leaves are just unfurling on the oaks and sycamores, but the orchards are fully green, with clouds of white flowers and an industrious buzzing of bees.
At one time, the apples that were grown in the Brajčino valley were sent all over the balkans, from Ljubljana to Zagreb.  They were prized for their flavor and their hardiness, and the cider brandy made from the fruit was famous in Macedonia.
"When I was little," a woman we spoke with said, "the trees were huge - bigger than any other apple trees, bigger than these little ones they plant today."  The woman, named Milka, was back in Brajčino after years living in Sweden - she, like almost everyone else in the village, had left as soon as she got a chance.

There are now only about a hundred and thirty people in Brajčino, down from close to a thousand two decades ago.  Communism ruined the apple industry in this part of the country.  The orchard owners, many of whom had grown wealthy, left as Tito came.  Lands were appropriated, fruit trees were left to languish untended for years.  With the old people went the know-how that had sustained the industry for so long, and, even after communism fell, there was little interest in trying to plant new trees.

"We only plant a few trees," Milka said.  "Not like the people down there," she said, gesturing towards the towns further down the valley.  "The young people plant so many. We just have enough for ourselves."
It's not quite accurate - the older residents of Brajčino grow enough fruit to sell and make a living - but her point about the size of the orchards is true enough.  In the high, sloping soil there's not much room for big operations and thousands of trees.  The orchards are small collections of a few hundred apples, following old terraced land down the stream, spilling out around the village and creeping a little ways up the valley towards the snowline.  One of the main problems that the villagers have is preserving their harvest - because there's no large-scale refrigeration infrastructure, they're forced to sell most of their apples in season, at rock-bottom prices.  If they save some fruit, it's liable to go bad, like the crates the man was dumping into the stream.

As we ate breakfast on our last day in the village, a big truck pulled up to the stone building next door.  About a dozen men and women got out - Roma, dressed almost in rags - and unloaded hundreds of packing boxes.  A few farmers showed up, opened the building, and the packing began.  Without refrigeration, the fruit was on the verge of being utterly spoiled - it must have sat inside those stone walls for at least six months.  We asked Divna, the woman we were staying with, where her neighbor would sell the apples.  She didn't know. "When we sold ours it was March," she said.  "They went to Russia."
The workers toasted us as we passed by with our bags.  I stopped for a few quick pictures and one young Roma man laughed and shouted "facebook."  The sun was shining, everyone was in a good mood except the owner of the barn.  He walked from bucket to bucket, looking at the fruit that had been cast aside and grumbling.

We left town with about a dozen small apples, given to us by a man by the bus stop.  He was unloading crates of small cider apples from his tractor cart, stacking them up against an old Volkswagen bus.  Another man came to talk with him and they both stood, smoking, for a while.  They looked at the apples, picked them up and turned them in their hands, then put them back in the crates with heavy expressions.  We talked to each other about how they must remember the trees of their youth, when their fathers and grandfathers had the richest orchards in Macedonia and someone could grow wealthy selling apples.  It seems doubly distant now, those bountiful days wiped away, replaced by cheap fruit and competition from China.  They're trying though.  Springtime Brajčino is still full of apple blossoms.

Happy Labor Day!

"It's a day to be in nature with family..." explained Stefanija, an aspiring singer who was visiting her cousins for the holiday. So, everyone just sits around drinking and grilling?  "Yes, exactly," she laughed.  Labor Day seems to be the same the world over and we were lucky enough to join in on a real holiday barbecue.  We'd been hiking in the sun for two hours during which we'd met a turtle stuck in some shrubs and a recently road-killed snake.  Don't drink and drive, folks.  Behind every house, we could hear laughing and clinking of glasses.  Meat-tinged smoke made signals in the air that read YOU ARE JEALOUS.  Then, in the village of Ljubojno, this minimart-cum-restaurant appeared like an oasis. We sat for a drink and a moment out of the scorching sun.  What we got was much, much more. 

Two generations of men sat around a table on the porch. The front door of the store was open and they went in and out getting what was needed. Traditional music played on the stereo and plastic plates covered the tables - sliced tomato, whole hot peppers, grilled slabs of sheep cheese, scattered amongst the beer and rakija. The main event was about to begin.  There was a gas grill sitting amongst piles of empty bottles, but attentions were turned to the other, larger one.  "This is the best grill in.... in the world!" proclaimed Lambed, the grillmaster.  He'd welcomed us and taken our drink order when the others had looked a little skeptical.  Soon enough, we were embraced with full Macedonian hospitality.  "We'd like to invite you to join us for some meat."  It's not polite to turn down an invitation.

Nor is it polite to refuse a gift.  Our order of "wine" had arrived in the form of a one liter bottle of Macedonian white.  (That's the equivalent of 1 and 1/3 normal bottles for those who may not know).  When it was around four fifths of the way done, another was sent over.  "From him!" one man said of another.  Our place was cemented.  We received a taste of the first batch of meat off the grill: a veal burger, chicken cutlet and hot dog.  You'd be amazed at how good those three things can taste when wood-fired to perfection.  The whole batch of meat, which also included sausage wrapped in bacon and veal chops, had been marinating all day.  A halved onion was rubbed over the surface of the hot grill before anything went on.  This was an artform. 

Macedonia's Labor Day used to take place over three days - May 1st, 2nd and 3rd.  After the fall of Communism, when the actual completion of labor began to take precedence over the celebration of it, they shortened the holiday to two days.  Now, it is just one.  In small villages like Ljubojno, teenagers go and live with family or friends in neighboring cities in order to attend high school.  So, Labor Day is a rare day back at home during the school year.  We'd seen the bustle in Lake Ohrid, Macedonians who can afford to make a whole weekend of it gave a peek at what the town must be like in the summer high season. 

Some places were sleepier because of the holiday, some were more crowded. The little store in our home village of Brajcino, a (somewhat) sobering hour's walk from Ljubojno, was closed for the afternoon.  That didn't stop men from sitting outside under umbrellas, drinking beer and playing cards.  They left their recyclables lined up by the door and went home for the holiday dinners their wives had prepared.  Cars from Slovenia and Serbia filled the small parking lot in the town center.  We're pretty sure all of the former Yugoslav countries have the same Labor Day holiday. 

You see mini-reunions happening all over on days like this.  Cousins who only see each other once or twice a year fall easily back into familiar roles, dogs bark at visitors they don't recognize, young couples smooch and smoke cigarettes in secret. Like Stefanija and her friends, most people ring up their relative with the most picturesque residential location and pay a visit.  It's hard to compete with the Brajcino area in that respect.  The weather couldn't have been any more perfect and outdoor breakfast tables easily transitioned into lunch tables and then dinner.  You could smell baking almost everywhere.

The plows, shovels and tractors stay put for the day.  Except for this man, out on a joyride.  The kids of the town clearly knew he was coming and hopped on his cart.  Lest we forget the true meaning of Labor Day (drinking and grilling), Tractor Man didn't just brake to pick up new passengers.  He happily used the opportunity to pour himself a drink.  Happy Labor Day from Macedonia!

Everything Except The Trout at Ohrid

Macedonia’s Lake Ohrid is famous for its trout.  In the chilly, mountain depths of these waters, the ohridska pastrmka (pastrmka means trout) has swum since time immemorial, and has been fished here since Neolithic times. It’s one of the only European fish to have existed since before the last ice age, and the species is probably some million years old.  Reportedly, it’s delicious.  The problem is, it’s almost extinct.  That doesn’t stop restaurants here from serving it.  Neither do the police, though it’s officially illegal to fish for it or sell it.
This is the “Macedonian Riviera,” and the eating here in Ohrid town has been almost uniformly excellent, with lots of cheap, pleasant restaurants dotting the waterfront and the side streets. We’ve been avoiding ohridska, but eating just about every other watery fauna we can get our forks into.  Here’s a look at what’s on offer in Ohrid that’s not endangered.

The first meal we had in Ohrid, we ate squid and shrimp – neither, of course, are native to the lake.  At MoMir restaurant, which juts out over the water, the squid came lightly spiced and perfectly grilled.  As tender as can be, with a bit of char and a smoky scent, they were better than any we’ve had since Croatia.  The shrimp were poppy red and full of ocean brine.
(At a later meal - we won’t mention the place - we were actually served fake shrimp, which were somewhat disgusting – they were like frozen fishcakes molded into the shape of a prawn, breaded and deep-fried.  We’ll spare you a picture.)

Ohrid also has European eels, which are quite plentiful both below the surface and on the town’s menus.  Sadly, the lake's stock is now mostly artificially kept up, as the lake's outlets have been dammed, and the eels aren't able to return to the Sargasso Sea where they spawn (this process is really interesting, actually - the Sargasso Sea is in the middle of the Atlantic ocean).
Arriving piping hot, baked with peppers, onions and tomato in a clay dish, the eel was like molten fish fat.  The taste had none of the muddiness that other eel can have, the meat was falling apart and lusciously, intensely flavorful – a heady mix of bay, basil and (we think) paprika.

At Letna Bavča Kaneo, a restaurant on a tiny, pebbled beach, we ate plasica while kids threw stones in the water and a swan swam haughtily by.  The sardine-like fish arrived in a jumbled pile, breaded and fried crisp - just how the locals love them.  Plasica are also native to the lake, and are the fish's scales are used to make Ohrid "pearls," which are essentially glass beads covered with a fishy paste (you'd be amazed how many gift shops sell them).  The fish were tasty in a snappy, easy-to-eat way, a great snack as the sun set.

It’s hard to sit beside a deep, cold lake and not think about flashing silver scales or the smell of a freshwater fish frying in butter. Fortunately, there are also other kinds of trout here – and they’re very tasty.  Guides suggest the mavrovska, belvica, kaliforniska and rekna varieties as better alternatives to ohridska   Belvica is also found in Ohrid, and is less threatened, but it might be a good idea to avoid it anyway.  This beautiful half of mavrovska was pan cooked, thick-fleshed and juicy.  The pink meat was dense without being dry, the flavor was of mountain water and cold winters.

Another alpine treat, and a bit of a surprise, this “fish broth” was more like a potato and trout soup. Ohrid’s cuisine is wonderful for its mixing of coastal and high-altitude aspects, a phenomenon that this dish perfectly encapsulated. The lightness of the starched broth and slight piquancy recalled the Mediterranean; the savory, rooty potato and herb components called up images of high villages, pines and swift running water.  The fish, of course, is what draws the line between the two. It worried us a little that the species of trout wasn’t specified, but it seemed unlikely that a restaurant would waste rare specimens in a stewpot.

It's a little sad that we couldn't taste the local specialty.  Guidebooks published as recently as five years ago call it one of the culinary highlights of Macedonia, and those who've tried it call it unforgettable.  But we haven't really missed it.  Eating by Lake Ohrid is pleasure enough, whatever is on the table.  The water is so blue, so intricately patterned, so vast that it feels like a world unto itself, a mystery in the mountains.  From afar it can be frighteningly rough or glass-smooth; up close it's so clear that sunlight hardly refracts off the surface.
Also, we can't feel that bad about not trying the trout - locals prefer pork cutlets anyway.

Castle Hunting: Zamokot Samuil

Zamokot Samuil is all about the view.  Walking the ramparts, it’s hard to force your gaze inward to the crumbling walls and tin shacks that populate the castle’s courtyards.  Instead, look out over the bristle of pines to the slate-grey waters and the snowy peaks beyond.  It’s one of the great ancient vistas in the world.

The castle is one of the oldest and most well known in the Balkans, built on the site of an earlier Byzantine castle that was likely pre-dated by another, 3rd century BC fortress.  It’s a massive-walled, very wide structure that’s mostly been ruined and partly been restored.  While the walls have been reconstructed to some degree, the inner keep and some old towers exist only as bare foundations.  The gate fortifications have held up, and are impressively sturdy.  This main entrance faces outward toward the water and the steepest stretch of hillside, where now there are a few souvenir sellers in the shade and a cooler or two of water and soda.

It seems funny that a castle in Macedonia would have more visitors than any we’ve been to recently, but that was the case.  Sunday daytrippers and tourgroup biddies clutched at the handrails and huffed up the steps.  Little crowds formed at the most picturesque points, as people waited their turn to take a photo.  Usually, I’m not all that keen on excessive safety precautions at castles like this – one of the delights of travel in Eastern Europe is that nobody impedes you from taking a bad spill – but there were so many people that the railings were necessary.
All of us - tourists from Slovenia, Holland, Macedonia and the two of us - were entranced by the water.    From on high, the rippling patterns on the surface made the lake seem vast and infinitely complex.

Tzar Samuil built the fortress during Ohrid's peak, when it was serving as the capital of the First Bulgarian Empire.  The old town – a hilly stretch of waterfront on a pretty curve in the lake – was originally ringed by lower town walls, with the castle serving as the last means of defense.  The town’s population was contained inside these walls until the Ottomans conquered the region in 1395 and began building around the outside.

Little is left of the lower walls, except a few gates and stretches of stonework.  Here, at the “upper gate,” the old doorway and small bastions remain, complete with rusting embellishments and weedy firing slits.  Traffic rumbles through the narrow opening at great speed, tires chattering on cobblestones, pedestrians ducking out of the way.

From below, the fortress isn’t very impressive - the huge flag almost makes more of an impression.  But it's atmospheric and the rebuilt ramparts are a pretty addition to the cities skyline.  The truth is that Macedonia, although littered with ruins, has very little in the way of surviving fortresses.  Because the country sits at a vulnerable spot in between tectonic plates, there's a long history of earthquakes; even the thickest walls eventually tumble if they're shaken too many times.  The restoration job was heavy handed, but Ohrid is Macedonia's prime tourist destination and tourists love a castle.

Diminished by distance into a simple, forested line, the far coasts seem untouched by time.  The walls too, and the mountains that ring the water.  With a light breeze drowning out the sounds of town and the sun clanging off the stones, it’s easy to lose touch with the senses of the present.  It’s easy, too, to imagine that nothing’s changed on these walls, that the year is somewhere around 1000, when Tzar Samuil reigned.  Even if it’s not the most fascinating fortress, Ohrid provides a backdrop that can’t be faulted.

The Oldest Place You've Never Heard Of

Lake Ohrid is one of the oldest lakes in the world, right up there with Lake Titicaca.  Most lakes come and go in the span of about 100,000 years, filling up with sediments or drying out from some other cause.  Its depth and the plethora of natural springs that feed into it have kept Ohrid from such a fate.  Plenty of water for a long life, that's what they always say, right?.  Lake Ohrid's birth is estimated to have taken place around 5 million years ago and it has never once dried up. It is beautiful and vast with water that is incredibly clear.

Basically an enormous drinking well and seafood buffet, Lake Ohrid attracted seaside residents pretty early on.  Prehistoric times.  With at least 7,000 years of continuous human habitation, the town of Ohrid is considered one of the oldest ongoing settlements on earth.  Exploring the town feels like finding a memory box in an attic, a collection of heirlooms and evidence of the past that were deemed special and important enough to be saved.  Rifling through such a collection, you can't help but feel like what you're really doing is getting to know the person who owned the box and marveling at how long and full their life seems.

The residents of Ohrid didn't really want to save the Ancient Theatre of Ohrid at first.  Built in the Hellenistic period as a dramatic theater, it was utilized during the Roman era as a gladiator ring.  Once that empire fell, Ohridians (I've made that up) wanted to get rid of this massacre ring in which Christians had been executed.  So, they buried it.  This wound up being fortuitous, as it preserved the bottom level of the theater incredibly well.  Dug up in the 1980s, it was put to use once more - though, seasons ticket holders no longer get their names carved into the seats like the ancient theatergoer whose signature you can kind of make out above.

Legend has it that, as recently as the 15th century, there were 365 churches in Ohrid.  Supposedly, it was one for each day of the year, which probably made it extremely difficult to nab a seat for mass.  They have not all remained, although you see small white crosses lit up amongst the stars and street lights when night falls.  Above, Sv Jovan Kaneo sits in one the prettiest look-out points on the lake.  Built in the 13th century, it's just a baby compared with the ancient body of water it looks down over. Many of the churches were turned into mosques during the Ottoman era and then destroyed after that empire's fall. 

Such was the case with Sv Kliment at Plaošnik, near the castle.  This monastery had so much historic significance, though, that it was completely rebuilt in the 21st century.  The building only dates back to 2002, but the excavated foundations in its front lawn are from a 5th century Basilica.  It is also the site of what could very possibly have been the first university in the Western world.  St. Clement started the school himself, in 893AD, and it rivals only the University of Salerno in Italy for the crown. 

During those same Ottoman years, a Turkish neighborhood was built in the lower part of Ohrid, below the fortified walls in which the Christians were kept.  Their community, in Mesokastro, grew up around this plane tree, which is now 900 years old.  The trunk must have split ages ago.  People say that a barber shop was once housed in the crevice, which is possibly the most Turkish thing I've ever heard.  (See: Things Turkish People Like).  Later, it became a cafe.  Now, it simply sits at the center of the town square, bolstered by support slabs which give it a monumental look.

The old Robevi family mansion, they were one of the richest families in all Macedonia, is now the Archeology Museum.  Findings from Plaošnik and the Ancient Theatre are housed here and the house itself is a lovely site.  We visited with the hope of seeing one of the Golden Masks.  Near Ohrid, in Trebenište, five golden masks from the 1st millenium BC were found in 1918.  They are said to be worth around 20million euros each and are housed in Belgrade, Serbia and Sofia, Bulgaria.  A 6th was found in Ohrid in 2002, by a man named Pasko Kuzman who simply put the relic in a cigar box on his mantle and called it a day.  We read in an outdated guidebook that it was to become the first mask to be exhibited in Macedonia in 2008 - in this museum - but this doesn't seem to have happened.  Maybe he's moved onto using it as an ashtray?

At the center of it all is still the lake, sitting pretty and watching the views around it change hands, change faces, change centuries.  Beneath its surface are sunken jewels, a treasure chest for a history buff.  There are the remains of a Bronze Age stilt village, still sticking up from the sand.  The lake has grown up and over it in the 3,500 or so years since it was built.  There are sunken World War I tugboats and a coastguard boat and airplane from World War II.  Of course, there are also living species rare in this world covering the deep, lake floor. 

But for Albanians,  Lake Ohrid is simply the seaside.  Families come here to swim, tan, dine and stroll.  Through the old cobbled streets they walk in colorful summer clothing, even in the late Spring.  Some things haven't really changed since prehistoric times.  The shores of Lake Ohrid are still prime real estate.  Unfortunately, some of the oldest residents of the lake are being fished out of existence - but more on that later.  After all these years, the deep, clear water of Lake Ohrid is still providing humans with life-giving sustenance - beauty and relaxation. 

Things Albanian People Like

White head kerchiefs. It was one of the first things that set Albanians apart. Whether it was a nice lace kerchief, a simply cotton cloth or an old t-shirt, women opted to cover their heads with white fabric. Most non-religious head covering we've seen, throughout Eastern Europe and the Caucuses, was done in black or just whatever scarf was lying around. In Albania, they were uniformly white.

Littering. Unfortunately, Albanians really, really seem to like littering. Young men do it with relish, sending a wrapper or soda bottle out the window of a moving bus. We saw a woman at Berati Castle empty her cafe's small trash can over the edge of the castle walls. Needless to say, we got into the habit of carrying our garbage until we saw a proper place to dispose of it. Trash covers so much of Albania's beautiful landscape and is basically an ever multiplying invasive species in Tirana. It's a huge shame.

Molto Way. Just about half of the wrappers tossed here, there and everywhere were from Molto Way snacks. These cream-filled croissants are advertised on billboards all across the country and found in the hands of just about everyone. To be fair, there is also Replay, a rival filled croissant packaged snack, but Molto Way is definitely the front-runner in the market. We tried a Molto Way Double, filled with coconut frosting and chocolate frosting. As a loved one of ours likes to say, it was a "sugar gut bomb."

Living on the top floor. This is really a strange phenomenon and I haven't uncovered a reason. At first I thought it had to do with locking family members away to protect them from violent blood feuds, but it seems only to be "vernacular Albanian architecture," as one source put it. Since most houses are in some state of construction, these one floor homes on stilts are everywhere. Many finished houses never bother with walls on the bottom floor.

Warding Off the Evil Eye. While completing said construction, it's very important to ward off the evil eye. This is most often done with a stuffed animal hung from the highest point. We saw teddy bears, cabbage patch kids and one very large Spider-Man that would have fit in at a boardwalk carnival. Good luck charms in high places.

Bicycles. I've come to notice that a large amount of bicycle riding occurs in countries that are either particularly poor or particularly well off. It's probably because you either have a green initiative that develops bike paths and encourages the use of bikes for environmental and traffic purposes - or people simply can't afford cars. In Albania, this is definitely the case and even the bicycles are well-worn, antiques.

Loading down their bicycles. I just wanted an excuse to use this photo, because I couldn't decide between it and the one above. You don't usually think of bicycles as having a full trunk load - until you go to Albania.

Homemade Raki. This isn't the raki of Turkey, made from anise-seed like Greece's ouzo or France's pastis. It's more like moonshine, made from anything. Some locals like to liken it to grappa, but I'm not sure that grapes are necessary. It is often infused, always strong and, as far as we can tell, almost completely homemade. In fact, when we went to buy a small bottle of it, we could find none at all. Jack Daniels, Russian vodka, but no raki. What gives? We went to a bar and the woman pulled a whiskey bottle out when we inquired about raki. No, not whiskey. She handed us a taste. So, we were able to buy a bottle of raki after all - a whiskey bottle filled with the stuff. Home-made for sure.

Work-horses. They trotted alongside our rental cars on just about every non-highway road in the country. Most often, their carts were loaded with huge piles of long grass on their way to begin the transition into hay. We saw this horse-drawn mock pick-up truck a few times and were ecstatic about getting a photo. Sometimes, the horses carried only the load of its owner. This brings me to another thing Albanian people like, riding side saddle. We did not see a single person riding otherwise.


Honorable Mentions 

Being some of the nicest people we have ever encountered, anywhere. This is really true. We also benefited from two other things Albanian people like: Speaking English and America.