Obsessions can be of lasting duration, as with my history of 47 pilgrimages to the European continent since 1985, or they can be more self-contained, like our three journeys in the past 13 months, all to vicinities on or near the Mediterranean and Adriatic Seas.
- #45 Feb. 2024 Nice, France
- #46 Nov. 2024 Split, Croatia
- #47 Feb. 2025 Skopje and Ohrid (North Macedonia); Tirana, Albania; and Budva and Kotor in Montenegro
Traveling has always provided me with the mental conditioning necessary to subsist amid countrymen with whom I’m often radically at odds, a topic to be treated elsewhere in greater depth.
In an academic sense, Europe is the great love of my life, and that’s just the way it has been for me since I was in my early twenties. Being anywhere in Europe is a spiritual exercise for me, and as close to a religious feeling as I’m ever likely to experience.
This year’s opening excursion was no exception, functioning as an exercise in the metaphorical closing of circles. Skopje and Ohrid are places I first visited in 1987, when they were part of the ill-fated nation of Yugoslavia, and during the same year I’d have continued to Albania if allowed. But at the time Albania was Europe’s North Korea, and setting foot there had to wait until 1994.
- Hip Hops: New Albanians on a beer holiday in Old Albania (1994)
- Edibles & Potables: 31 years of Albanian cuisine (1994 to 2025)
- Edibles & Potables: Might there be Cincinnati-style chili in the North Macedonian homeland?
- Hip Hops: Pivo in Skopje with the greatest seismologist of them all (1987)
Obviously the passing of three or more decades served to heighten my fascination with how much these areas had changed (noting that it was the first time I’ve been to Montenegro).
Tirana in 1994 was in recovery from hardcore communism, notable for a village-like atmosphere. No longer, and while Albania’s capital city still doesn’t feel mainstream European, it is a thousand times shiner and more modern, and bears a pulse all its own. Among the other lessons learned was the fact that Tirana’s airport absolutely rocks at 4:00 a.m.
The countryside has catching up to do, and yet Albania is wealthier than it’s ever been, even while remaining the poorest country in Europe (annual incomes for ordinary people are around $10,000).
In 1987, Skopje (now independent North Macedonia) was similarly bucolic, a provincial outpost marked by weird brutalist architecture in the center and rows of barracks-like high-rise housing on the periphery, both legacies of the 1963 earthquake that destroyed most of the city.
Some of both remain, albeit submerged by an extensive and thoroughly kitschy remaking of downtown that is without parallel in Europe, and maybe anywhere else.
Communist and brutalist buildings have been given neoclassical or baroque Potemkin wrappings, new grandiose edifices have been erected along with fountains and staircases, and hundreds of statues pop up from every conceivable direction.
Skopje might be the world’s first purpose-built Instagramable, TikTokening capital; it’s like a wild and crazy movie set, and oddly, I rather enjoyed it, although many citizens sensibly question the expenditures as being better directed toward basic infrastructure as opposed to bling.
Ironically, the oldest part of Skopje survived the earthquake, being stolid and low slung. It’s the bazaar from Ottoman times, now subject to comprehensive gentrification, if still indicative of the crowded marketplace where you can buy anything, from a screwdriver (tool) to screwdriver (drink).
An hour and a half away from Skopje by car is the town of Ohrid, perched on the lake of the same name, which is one of the continent’s oldest and deepest, and a veritable eco-tourism superstar. Ohrid has positioned itself as a resort community, and I’d guess there’d by a Gatlinburg vibe in high season, but the peace and quiet in February was grand.
Our Balkan idyll was a rarity in my time roaming Europe, as all our connections were made by car via pre-arranged drivers (think Daytripper.com, the Uber of longer distances). Of course there was nothing wrong with this, and in fact these drives were flawless, revealing much that we might have missed on a train or bus.
Still, I’m a rail fan at heart. Albania, at present the sort of upwardly mobile place where everyone wants a car or two, is in the process of building back some of its train routes. Maybe someday I can experience them.
The lingering Muslim influence is heaviest in Albania, where attractive new or revamped mosques are everywhere; the country achieved independence only in 1912, and those 500 years of Turkish occupation left ineradicable traces to people and their landscapes. During the communist period the official policy was forced atheism, which has been replaced by religious diversity in which the genuinely pious are probably solidly in the minority.
According to two Macedonian and one Albanian driver, the presence of so many mosques owes not to piety but a sort of Saudi Arabian no-limits credit card for anyone seeking to build one. The sheiks want minarets, and so up they pop.
The Montenegrin coastline around Budva and Kotor was as spectacular as promised. We took a 13-hour roundtrip automobile ride from Tirana in order to witness it; while grueling, I wouldn’t trade the day for anything and would like to spend a week or two exploring Montenegro.
The upshot is that I was deeply moved throughout. With advancing years I find myself more than ever an advocate for the planet’s underdogs, and to my mind, we were among them in the places visited this time around.
I won’t root for US Steel, Microsoft, Elon Musk, Vladimir Putin or the Dodgers; some guy with a great restaurant who is struggling on a side street in Tirana, well, that’s a different story. I’ll go to war for him.
North Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro; they deserve their moment in the sun, too, quite apart from American, Russian or any other form of exceptionalism. I never much liked being a capitalist imperialist, after all.
That’s all I have right now. Maybe there’ll be more later. Keep an eye on my Facebook page for photos; I’m still sorting through them.
