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Like a Berat out of hell
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Buses leave at the crack of dawn in Albania. A nation of early-risers who like to get what needs to be done done as early as possible. Like old people, or parents of teenagers. A history of car-jacking and huge numbers of potholes means people don't like to venture too far after dark. So, we had to get up at 7am (how early!!!) to catch the morning bus to Berat. Actually, we missed the bus, so a man whisked us into the back of his Mercedes and drove us to the bus, free of charge, so we wouldn't have to wait for the next one 2 hours later. The trip took 2 and a half hours to reach one of Albania's two 'Museum Cities', and as we arrived the sun was shining, and there was a clear blue sky, enhancing the brightness of the whitewashed old houses that clungto the hillside, which itself was topped with a 15th century citadel.
Before getting stuck into the sightseeing stuff we did what Albanian men have made a national pastime - doing coffee. Between 8am and 9pm daily you will see groups of men taking hours over an espresso, just watching people and occasionally talking to each other, with ridiculously over the top gesticulations. With high unemployment levels, then what else are people expected to do? I think there were two other tourists in town that day, and we bumped into them in the excellent Onufri Museum in St Mary's Cathedral. Onufri was a 16th century Iconic painter, but I don't want to go all Bill Bryson on you and give you the boring details....... Still, as Albania is such a secular society and that it is the only country that has successfully enforced Atheism, it was impressive that things like this escaped the Communist Age.
The old citadel walls, slowly giving way to the ravages of time, were an excellent place to walk and view the surrounding mountains. A bunch of kids were also playing football there - and had painted goalposts on the remains of a 16th century building - and they invited the foreigners to play. I took up the challenge and managed to man-mark my opponent out of the game. He was about 7, but he didn't get a bloody kick!!!! Although we used the world language, football, to communicate, our goalkeeper managed to say in broken English "You. Play. Not good." I picked up my jumper in disgust and left them without a goalpost as I ran off crying.
We had planned to get a 3pm bus, but after lunching and arriving at the bus station at 2:50 we found out the last one had left at 2pm. Instead we caught a bus headed for Tirana and were then dumped by a roundabout in the middle of nowhere and told to catch a minibus. We flagged one down about 10 minutes later, which was already full, but were squeezed in and raced back to Vlora, narrowly missing several cars, a flock of sheep and actually hitting a bloke on a moped. He was unharmed, not that the driver stopped to do anything other than hurl abuse.
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