Adventures in Albania

Sunday, 5 February 2012

Our purpose

As humanitarian missionaries for the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints our purpose is to find organisations and individuals who are already working with the poor and needy. We identify ways that we can support and strengthen these organisations so that their capacity is expanded. We look for partners who we can work with on projects which will be sustainable, and in this way, we help people to help themselves. Our aim is to relieve suffering and foster self-reliance for families of all nationalities and religions.

This is the health centre in the village of Grabjan which is aprrox. 1 hour outside Tirana. We received a request to go there because they were needing some basic items of equipment.

Shall we start with a list?

New chairs for our waiting room please....

Very hard-working but frozen doctor.

Serious problems with leaking roof and building subsidance

Nurses office, Ola's heart went out.......

This is one of 3 nurses serving approx 5500 people, with 2 doctors.

The clinic provides all healthcare for families including babies and children. The babys slide out of these scales so that is definitely on the list!!

These pictures shows the simple life these villagers live. Their livlihood is mainly agriculture and they raise sheep, chickens, pigs, cows etc. The staff at the medical centre work do a terrfic job in difficult conditions with limited resources.

Here is our local police station. Dave gets saluted every time he passes! Because he has the title 'Plaku' he gets respect! ps Plaku=old man.

This is a common scene, older men gather together outdoors for games of chess, backgammon and dominoes.We see them everyday on the pavement or in the squares.

Recycling!!

This is the wiring for these apartments, (ours is a little better than this). There are no poles or pylons, the wires are attached wherever.

Electricians required!!!

Ola supporting local economy

These two teddies look so innocent hanging out to dry???......then we noticed teddies everywhere.......
stuck onto fences, tied to garden posts, attached to flagpoles, on half-finished buildings, in people's doorways??? Why, we asked, and were told that the teddy is there to ward off the 'evil eye', the teddy becomes the focus of the evil eye and so misfortune or bad luck is directed away from the property.

Albanian language is extremely difficult to learn and we had no training before we arrived. Here is Dave studying Albanian verbs.

Talking to a friend; no Albanian needed.

This is where we live, middle building, top floor, at the back. The street is Boulevardi Bahram Curri.

This is the river Lana which flows down from the nearby mountains carrying a lot of junk. Workers wade into the water and clear all the rubbish out of the dam. We saw a fridge in there one day.

This is a good example of thrift and hard work. She is an expert knitter producing lovely woolly socks and slippers. Ola was inspired by her to buy needles and wool and has managed to finish a scarf!

This is the local creperie across the road.

Ola likes the pana nutella (chocolate, cream and bananas),

Dave goes for Hawaiian (chocolate, pineapple,banana,coconut).

Visit to Vlore

This week we drove to Vlore which is 3 hours south of Tirana. It was nice to leave the city and see a bit more of Albania. We had pre-arranged visits set up to visit the hospital and the orphanage there.

The intensive care unit has 11 beds and one vital signs monitor for all!

This is a machine to clear people's airway, you can see why they would like a new one!

They perform surgery here without the benefit of proper ceiling theatre lights; they walked us in to an operating room where there was a patient on the table having surgery....Dave was brave and didn't faint! We hope to help this hospital with new equipment.

Next we went to the orphanage.....this was the greeting we received! The children just wanted to be picked up and played with.....which is what we did.

Fortunately this transpired to be a well-run orphanage funded by the government. The children are happy and well looked after, well-fed and clothed. It is a bright cheery place with good staff.

Some of them transfer here from the abandoned baby unit in Tirana when they are approx 8 months old; others are left here by mothers who cannot look after them. They live here till they are 7.

The little girl to Dave's left called him GJYSHI pronounced jooshie,,,,,it means Grandad.

This visit was a happy experience for us but we know that it probably won't always be the case.

New Years Eve in Albania

New Year's eve is the biggest holiday event of the year, much bigger than Christmas

Albania was closed for 40 years under communism and no celebrations were allowed apart from New Year so Albanians make up this by making it the biggest best night of the year.

These fireworks are done by the local people, practically everyone set off a firework display. We watched from our window on the 8th floor. Many people were on the roof of buildings, we could see for miles, it was spectacular!