Ne jemi Bishqemi

This past Tuesday was a holiday in Albania. Whereas it seems that we take great care in America to put as many of our holidays as possible on Fridays or Mondays, Albanians aren't afraid to let them fall smack in the middle of the week. While a long weekend has its obvious advantages, sometimes it feels really good to wake up on a Tuesday and say, "You know what I need to do today? Nothing. Nothing at all."

Anyway, Tuesday was Mother Theresa day in Albania. In case this fun fact slipped by you unnoticed, Mother Theresa was an Albanian. She was born next door in Macedonia, but ethnically speaking, her family was Albanian. (Lineages: people take them very seriously over here.) So here's to you Mother Theresa, and your life of service that we could all learn a thing or two from.

Next week, I'm planning to make a short trip back to Bishqem to visit my host family before heading to Elbasan for a Peace Corps conference. Bishqem has made the occasional appearance on this blog, but I've never shared a nice, coherent group of pictures that display the highlights of this little town- my home away from home in Albania. In honor of the upcoming visit, here that is:

Bishqem from the neighboring radio tower:
Once you get away from the main highway, the town quickly turns into an agricultural village that is filled with scenes such as this in the spring:

A group of the older homes in town:

My host family's house. The bottom floor is empty for the time being, but if time and finances allow, they hope to open a store in the space in the future:

The stairs leading up to the second floor of the house. The spring flowers in Albania were beautiful.

Upon entering the house, you find yourself in the living room. While I was occupying the second bedroom, this room also served as my host brothers' bedroom.

The second bedroom and my living quarters during training:

My host brothers- Ramazan (left) and Taulant (right):

Life in Bishqem included lots of time spent walking along the highway:

The Autogrill! Bishqem's one stop shopping spot. The Autogrill offers the Albanian traveler and the residents of Bishqem a car wash, gas station, coffee shop, restaurant, internet cafe, and market (which my host family manages). Many hours of PST were spent at the Autogrill, and yet this is the best picture that I managed to get of it. Nice fountain, though, yeah?

Bishqem's 9-Year School (grades 1-9 all meet in the school in Albania) and the site of our language lessons.

The closet... excuse me... the classroom in the 9-year school that held our language lessons. From left to right: Jeff, myself, Laura, a sweet map of Albania, Oriola (language teacher extraordinaire), and Susan.

And finally, one more group shot. Each of the host families in Bishqem graciously invited the other Peace Corp Bishqemers to dinners at their respective houses in order to meet us and stuff us silly with ridiculous amounts of food. This picture was taken after the dinner at my host family's house. Left to right- me, host mom, Susan, host dad, Jeff, Laura.

And there's that. Good times in that little town...