Finding Tirana’s Unique Character
It's equal parts intoxicating, addictive, and disorientating — that nearly overwhelming sensation of finally finding yourself in a place that you've spent months of research on, to the point that it's closer to a fantastical locale like the Shire in one's mind rather than an actual location you can travel to and visit.
All the necessary ingredients of sleepless transatlantic travel, countless milligrams of caffeine to aid in the motions of deplaning and clearing immigration, and a harrowing bus ride with a driver constantly shouting what I could only guess might be Albanian expletives blended and bathed my brain in this rare stimulating drug as I took in my first glimpses of Tirana.
Passing Secretary Blinken's C-32A on the tarmac at Rinas Airport and then riding down the expressway flanked by Albanian and American flags only added to the trippy sensation that had my head swimming with euphoria and anxiety. Is this real life?
In fact, it was. This would be my new home for the next five months and the first leg in a greater year-long adventure that would have me looping around the Balkan Peninsula. I hadn't slept in about 28 hours at this point, but I was absolutely buzzing and determined to walk the 2km or so from comparatively polished Skanderbeg Square, where the airport shuttle dropped us, to my apartment in the Komuna e Parisit neighborhood. I popped a nicotine-coated toothpick in my mouth to help with the final trek as Google Maps comically read Albanian street names in its deadpan American accent through my earbuds.
“I guess you could say Tirana is a bit rough around the edges. It was hard for me not to immediately like it.”
I walked along the Lana River, really more of a stream, which ran alongside the main road and bisected the city, with most of the center to the north and Komuna and the trendy Blloku neighborhood to the south. Alas, Blinken struck again. Police had blocked off most of the main roads on my route for his motorcade.
After some improvisation, I stumbled onto Rruga Medar Shtylla, missing half-steps on the uneven pavement, weaving between utility poles and the overflowing orange public dumpsters, and passing through the clouds of cigarette smoke wafting from the cafe bars lining the streets. Beeping from impatient rush hour drivers in a noticeably disproportionate ratio of Mercedes echoed through the uniform chipped and faded concrete apartment blocks.
A flash of color from Tirana's many murals would occasionally pierce the muted gray and beige blocks, turning me into a bumbling, ill-attentive pedestrian as they held my gaze beyond the obligatory layer of spiderwebbing power lines characteristic of less than legit electricity connections. A stray dog, indicated by an orange tag in its ear, lazily glanced up as I walked by, completely unphased by the droning construction site it chose for a siesta.
I guess you could say Tirana is a bit rough around the edges. It was hard for me not to immediately like it. There may not be handsome centuries-old buildings on every street corner; the city's character resides elsewhere — in the abstract technicolor murals, the boisterous laughter from innumerable cafe bars, and evidence of a more recent and troubled history in plain view.
The very center of Tirana is quite polished.
Two months on from a cafe in Komuna
I'm still buzzing, now from the first of probably too many strong espressos at my local cafe bar downstairs from my apartment. The front outdoor area is on the street, while the back has seating that looks out into the courtyard of my Communist-era apartment complex, so families can enjoy their espresso and/or raki while keeping an eye on the kids playing. It's nice here. A real community of locals that can teach the ignorant foreigner a thing or two they won't pick up on in the center or chic Blloku.
One of the first things you'll learn here is that communities are very tightly knit and that family is everything. Everyone knows each other, and I watch people recognize each other, smile, embrace, kiss, and slap each other on the back as they laugh loudly about the latest gossip. It's a positive energy that creates a general feeling of safety, that everyone is looking out for each other.
Of course, that means people notice when a new regular shows up. By now, people in my building most certainly recognize me as the "new American." I've picked up at least enough Albanian to hear other patrons asking the waiter about me after they probably overheard me attempting Albanian, failing, and reverting to English to order some water, which is a deceptively difficult word. Ujë, which kind of goes like "oi-yeh" but as one syllable.
Like the other residents, I'm at this cafe almost on the daily. And sometimes on the nightly since it also operates as a bar until midnight. That's a common formula for almost all the cafe bars here in Tirana, and it's not uncommon to see locals get what my inner monologue is starting to call the Albania starter pack — a coffee, a water, and a raki — even early in the day. It's the version of that Chumbawamba song you didn't know you needed. No promises you'll get back up again after too much raki at noon on a Tuesday.
But I digress, as I'm working on an entire piece exploring the intricacies of Tirana cafe culture for Carolin of Solo Travel Story — your go-to guide for all things cafes. Follow the both of us for that one.
Besides, I had some abandoned military buildings in the hills to explore. I grabbed some "ujë" for the road and put it in my backpack.
The military ruins and bunkers in the Sauk Hills are relics of Albania’s communist past.
To understand Tirana, start with the outskirts.
The city abruptly ends about a 20-minute walk south of my apartment. After following some narrow winding roads, where the locals do some questionable vehicular maneuvers, and passing the posh gated residences and British school of the affluent Kodra e Deillit area, the paved road just...stops. In its place, a dirt track over whatever predated this wealthy community continues up through the Sauk Hills that overlook Tirana.
I followed the path cut through the hill, taking care not to step on any particularly large, jagged ceramic tiles or trip over the large ruts washed out by years of erosion. The pile of building materials pushed to either side of the dirt track hinted there may have been something here that was bulldozed to make way for the gated communities of the well-to-dos below. Either that, or I was straight up walking through what used to be a landfill.
Eventually, the construction rubbish thinned out, and the road rounded a corner to reveal the dilapidated husk of a two-story brick tower that looked as if it could keel over at any moment. It was the first of many relics of Albania's communist past out this way. The hole in the brickwork on either side that surely widened each year framed Tirana down below. Mount Dajti loomed large in the backdrop behind a thin curtain of haze.
“The place you snuck away to do some underage drinking in your youth has nothing on this spot.”
Just up the path on the right was a larger abandoned administrative military structure that had completely collapsed on one side, covered in graffiti inside and out. Beer cans littered the floor next to the remnants of tiny campfires that blackened the concrete inside. The place you snuck away to do some underage drinking in your youth has nothing on this spot.
Fixed into the hill next to the building was a large bunker complex — one of as many as 175,000 that Enver Hoxha's regime built in a decades-long fit of paranoia at the expense of the population's basic well-being. I sat on a cement slab — probably once part of the building's walls — and ate a sandwich while I listened to a farmer yell and coo at his cows and goats down in the valley below. The physical ugliness of the rotting buildings and the period of squalid repression they memorialized felt suddenly benign, juxtaposed with the hazy pastoral vistas beyond Tirana.
I've spent a lot of time out here since arriving in the city. At first, it was a conveniently close hike from the bustle around my apartment to escape into nature. Sounds from the city can't penetrate the natural barrier of the ridge line, and you can forget that you're anywhere near a busy capital city looking out at the mountains to the south.
The 360-degree view from the hills also makes it a highly strategic location for city defense, hence all the former bunkers, buildings, and anti-aircraft placements from both WW2 and the following period of communist rule. I found one, then another, and another. Every time I venture up into the hills, I find a new side path to wander up and a new bunker to eat lunch in.
Sometimes, the cows and goats like to join.
A campaign to beautify Tirana’s unsightly blocks with bright colors and murals began in the 2000s.
Tirana preserves and educates rather than destroys.
A post-hike espresso and a shower later, I was walking around Blloku in search of a pint or possibly something stronger.
My chosen route from Komuna to Blloku took me by some of my favorite murals in Tirana, a trait of the city that will leap out at you with a burst of color as you round street corners. Only a few decades ago, this buzzing nightlife district was anything but fun. Literally "the Block" in English, the area was reserved for the upper echelon of the political establishment during the Communist period. The average resident of Tirana was completely prohibited from entering the area, where the elite lived in comparative luxury.
While most of the villas have been replaced by residential apartment blocks, trendy bars and restaurants, and luxury shopping, the leafy grounds of Enver Hoxha's former residence exist as a temporal island in the district. The dictator's boarded-up windows — perhaps to his corpse's immense horror — now have a view of a KFC just beyond his empty pool.
The building isn't open to tourists, but given Albania's tendency to preserve and educate rather than destroy and forget — a trait of the previous government that resulted in the erasure of much Ottoman-era history — I have a feeling old Enver's house will eventually become a museum of some type when priorities allow. The capital has a lot on its plate, denoted by the numerous cranes around the center and beyond.
Prime Minister Rama — former painter, national basketball star, and mayor of Tirana who spearheaded the campaign to beautify the city with vibrant colors — told The Guardian in a 2019 interview that this might be in the works. And that day, as with my other frequent walks down Rruga Ismail Qemali, there appeared to be workers on the second floor making repairs to something. Avash, avash as they say here. Little by little, Hoxha’s house becomes a museum for the public good.
After sauntering further along the road and hanging a left, I was between yet another communist relic and my final destination. It’s pretty hard to miss the Pyramid of Tirana. The brutalist landmark was once dedicated as a museum to Enver Hoxha’s legacy three years after his death and given the acerbic nickname “Hoxha’s Mausoleum” by the locals (he was not actually buried there). They weren’t really fans of one of the most expensive building projects in the country’s history honoring a pretty much universally despised man.
Former dictator Enver Hoxha’s villa remains abandoned in Tirana’s trendy nightlife district.
Following the collapse of communism, the Pyramid lived many different lives. First, it was a conference center. Next, it was converted into a NATO base during the 1999 Kosovo War. Following the conflict, it became a broadcasting center for Albanian media outlets. Due to a lack of care and vandalism, it was nearly condemned to the wrecking ball but saved by public outcry. Instead of demolition, it was refurbished and converted into a youth center with a focus on IT startups in 2018. Of course, it’s also a popular landmark for tourists to take selfies on the steps and walk to the top for a view of the city.
The story of the Pyramid also reflects the local attitude towards preserving the painful past rather than paving over it, taking a once-detested landmark and transforming it into a source of rejuvenation on two fronts: education and tourism.
Just across the street from the Pyramid was my final port of call for the day: Komiteti Kafe Muzeum.
The dual purpose is in the name — the trendy cafe bar also functions as an informal museum, curated with an eclectic collection of relics like wood-paneled TVs and radios from the Communist era, but also farm implements and more traditional aspects of Albanian culture. It felt like a fitting place to rest my aching feet and enjoy a raki, of which they offer an exhaustive list ranging from the classic grape or plum variety to more niche infusions like chili and cinnamon.
“Knowing the substance of what’s around you unlocks something deeper than superficial beauty.”
The live cover band launched into a raspy acoustic cover of “Kryptonite” — they really like Three Doors Down here — and I winced slightly at the first sip of my raki.
When in doubt, just roll with it.
Thanks for joining me on a walk through the city. This piece introduces several aspects of Tirana and beyond I’d like to flesh out in the future — the abandoned military placements in the Sauk Hills, Tirana’s murals, and Albania’s search for national identity in the post-Communism era. Tirana certainly won't be everyone's cup of tea, but it's my favorite brand: unpolished with an incredible amount of potential. Many will look at the surface, which often isn't kind on the eyes, and think: what does this place have to offer? Where is the culture? What does it have going for it?
They're all questions that you have to work for to get answers to. Understanding the history of the country and its capital is the minimum baseline a visitor needs to truly experience it to the fullest and appreciate it. Even if you didn't do any homework, you'll have multiple chances to do this here, whether it's a walk in the Sauk Hills to explore the abandoned bunkers or a more curated experience at the House of Leaves near the center. Knowing the substance of what’s around you unlocks something deeper than superficial beauty.
Notice the emphasis the city places on its more recent history as if to say, "look what we're coming back from". It doesn't sweep it under the rug, but puts it on display while attempting to build a modern European capital around it. There are aches and pains — locals will say corruption is still a major issue when it comes to the numerous building projects around the city — but it's hard to ignore the energy of what feels like progress to a mere outsider.
If you still struggle to find Tirana's charm, it might just mean you're moving too fast, doing too much, and trying too hard, all with too many expectations grounded in Western Europe as possibly your only reference point. Take a beat, sit down outside at the nearest cafe, and order an espresso. Don't think about what you need to be doing next. Allow the frenetic energy in your brain stressing about what you should be feeling to fall away and soak up the relaxed pace of things around you.
That's when Tirana's true character starts revealing itself. ༄
Written by Seth Barham
