Kruja to Shkodra

Thursday, April 25

After breakfast in the hotel, Enea picked us up to begin the day in Skanderbeg Square for a lesson introducing us to a bit of Albanian history and Tirana’s place in it.  Yesterday, we’d seen the remnants of the fortress dating from the 3^rd century and rebuilt in the 17^th century.  The situation of the settlement, on the Egnatian Road (one of the great Roman roads), between Thessalonika (and later Constantinople) and Durres on the coast was a catalyst for its development during the Roman Empire.  After the fall of Rome, a succession of powers held sway until the Ottoman Empire took control of the territory in the 15^th century.  In the 17^th century, the presence of a fortress, bakery, hammam (bathhouse), and mosque gave present-day Tirana official status as an Ottoman town. During the early part of the 20^th century, the first independent Albanian state was formed, though that was followed by yet another succession of foreign occupiers and re-invention as a principality and a kingdom before being occupied by Italy just before World War II.  In the immediate postwar period, Albania was slated to become one of the Yugoslav republics, but Stalin decided he’d have better control if it were instead designated the People’s Republic of Albania, as it remained until the early 1990s when the Soviet bloc began to crumble. 

As we saw yesterday, the Italian presence is still very obvious in Tirana, and there are many examples of architecture in the service of ideology.  The fascist-era occupiers built the broad thoroughfare (and many of the buildings that line it) that runs for more than a mile from Mother Teresa Square to and beyond Skanderbeg Square.  Later on, the Communists, too, used architecture and its adornments as elements of their propaganda efforts.  

An aside here: Mother Teresa is very important to Albanians; we’ve already seen several statues of her and the airport in Tirana is named for her.  She was born in Shkodra, in the heavily Catholic northern part of Albania, which is our destination later today.  

The pedestrianized Skanderbeg Square has several features that deserve mention.  Rather than a level space, the marbled tile pavement (constructed of stone representative of the country’s various regions) forms a slight hill, symbolic of the fact that every ordinary Albanian can rise to great heights in this country.  Trees at one end of the square come from the far corners of the country and in several areas, streams of water course across it; they are symbols of the rivers of Albania.  

After a look at the exterior of the Et’hem Bey Mosque, which is undergoing restoration, and the adjacent clock tower, we headed out of town, bound for Kruja, which is usually thought of as Skanderbeg’s home town.  Kruja is perched on the side of a mountain and is a very popular tourist destination.  We were amazed to see a statue of George W. Bush in a town square; he was the only American to visit Albania and spent half of his four hours in the country in Kruja!  He and his wife Laura received a riotously joyful reception when he came as part of his response to Albania’s inclusion in NATO.

The statue, though, is not what draws school children and tourists alike to Kruja.  That is due to two other attractions – the Skanderbeg Museum and the Ethnographic Museum, both housed in the mountaintop Kruja fortress.  The first offers a good grounding in Albania’s early history, as well as an homage to Skanderbeg, the national hero.  (Enea regards much of the collection as more of a shrine to the man, rather than an objective presentation.)  In any case, the early Ilyrians and Greeks who inhabited the territory are well presented, as is Skanderbeg’s important contribution in uniting historically warring tribes to fight the Ottomans in the 15^th century.

The Ethnographic Museum is housed in the former home of a wealthy 19 ^th-century Ottoman family and provides an excellent picture of the life and work of the family and its servants.

We enjoyed a pleasant lunch of traditional Albanian dishes at a restaurant with a lovely view of the fortress and the valley below.  The day was very hazy, but Enea assured us that Kruja’s hilltop location normally allows views of the sea, as well.

Then, it was back down the hill to journey to Shkodra, where we checked into a traditional hotel late in the afternoon.  After a bit of R and R, we walked to the center of the city, past yet another statue of local girl-made-saint, Mother Teresa, and through the main street, now pedestrianized.  We ate outside with Enea, then walked on our own a bit more before calling it a day.