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#722 · Aug. 13, 2022, 12:12 p.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania History

While defensive bunkers were built for ordinary citizens, the party elite got something truly extraordinary dug out for them underground. Not just one, either. If things went south, the elite was supposed to evacuate to the nearest one and basically ride out the aftermath of an attack.

Some of them are open to visitors these days. The scale of bunk.art is mind-blowing. Rooms and corridors just keep going and going, but you won't get lost.

What strikes you is how pointless the whole thing was. So they lock themselves in there, stay for a month or two. Then what? There's nobody and nothing left up top. Who's going to keep them alive and how? You can't last long in a shelter like that.

They designed it all under serious secrecy. Engineers were constantly rotated so nobody had the full picture of how the whole thing worked. Clearly a quality improvement (:

In some places it turned out pretty funny: in communist Albania, regular particle board was considered fancier than wood. So the dictator's office was covered in it. While the simpler rooms got natural wood instead.

I'll wrap up the bunker topic here.

#721 · Aug. 12, 2022, 11:12 a.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania History

The story of Josif Zagali, who designed Albanian bunkers, is quite remarkable.

In essence, most of these structures were ordinary Soviet pillboxes. The engineer mastered the design during his studies in the USSR and proposed a project based on this model back home.

Enver Hoxha was so impressed by the simplicity and cost of the solution that Josif was immediately showered with titles and awards: tens of thousands of bunkers were built according to his design, he became the chief engineer of the Albanian Ministry of Defense and received the rank of colonel. Isn't that success?

But his happiness didn't last long. In 1974, due to the dictator's paranoia, the engineer was stripped of all his positions, branded a foreign agent—before that even became fashionable—and imprisoned for 8 years for sabotage he never committed. Against this backdrop, his daughter died of breast cancer, his wife lost her mind, and friends and acquaintances began avoiding any contact with his entire family.

#714 · Aug. 12, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania History

Oh, these bunker enthusiasts. They get into power and start pulling all kinds of crazy stuff.

After World War II, communist Enver Hoxha became the leader of Albania, immediately turned into a dictator, and ruled until his death in 1985. Beyond political repression and extrajudicial executions, he was deeply concerned with the country's security. And what solves that problem better than a bunker? That's right, lots of bunkers!

Starting in 1967, Hoxha actively built defensive bunkers. By 1985, there were already over 170,000 of them. And get this—the population back then was only 3 million people. The budget spent on bunkerization could have provided two-bedroom apartments for every family on the housing waiting list and solved the housing crisis. But nope.

Building a bunker isn't enough though—you also need to teach people how to use it. So twice a month on Sundays (the only day off in the week), all residents aged 12 and up had to go through training.

Even today, you can stumble upon a bunker by accident, whether you're in the capital or some remote mountain village. The government is now trying to get rid of these structures, but it's turning out to be expensive and slow.

#713 · Aug. 11, 2022, 5:17 p.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania Other

In Albania, there are practically no house numbers anywhere. People somehow live in a system where there are only street names and that's it.

Mail gets sent to addresses like "Tirana, Kemal Stafa Street, the house near the mosque, John Smith". And it works. It's up to the postal workers to know all these people.

In my opinion, this solution doesn't scale very well. Especially in a world where people are constantly moving.

I mean, just the other day I was moving into a place, and the location on the map was marked incorrectly, with only a pretty long street name in the address. I had to ask locals for directions.

#710 · Aug. 11, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania History

It's one thing to read about this stuff in the news. It's a completely different story to see it in person.

Back in March, Albania renamed the street where the Russian embassy is located to Free Ukraine Street. They even put up a new street sign. Yandex Maps, by the way, still quietly shows the old name. Google and Organic Maps have it right though.

The embassy itself, as usual, looks more like a prison than an actual country's representative office.

#700 · Aug. 10, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania Hike

I crossed the pass from Valbona to Ses. It was a pleasant hike and not too difficult (↑1200m and ↓1400m over 10km). The only thing was that rain started in the last hundred meters or so, but it didn't ruin anything.

What surprised me was how many people were on the trail. In Valbona, it seemed like there weren't many tourists around—they were all scattered across the guesthouses. But in the morning, everyone headed out to hike together, plus there was a stream of people coming from the opposite direction, so it was pretty crowded at the pass.

Not all the hikers were properly prepared. I was especially impressed by two overweight guys who set off with just a half-liter bottle of water. They made it to the halfway point. I hope they managed the second half too.

If someone came with heavy luggage, you can hire horses to carry the bags. The animals are really worked hard—they load them up to the max, and often not even skillfully. I saw a load fall off one horse, and the handler had to quickly tie everything back on. Mostly they carry hiking backpacks. The hike isn't really difficult enough that you can't carry even a large backpack yourself. So there's no point in making the animals suffer like that.

#690 · Aug. 9, 2022, 11:13 a.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania Hike

The trail takes 7-8 hours, so there's no point heading out on the day you arrive. I ended up staying in Valbone. There's a real construction boom here—they're building a hotel and a bunch of guest houses. The rest of the infrastructure though is pretty bare bones. There isn't even a decent shop. But if they really just started investing here recently, I'm hoping this doesn't turn into some never-ending project and actually becomes a great development with proper infrastructure to match. The Albanian Alps could definitely attract more tourists that way.

For now though, the one working café with its half-finished second floor looks pretty weird. And honestly, they only serve espresso and beer there. The camping area behind barbed wire is pretty depressing (like, how did anyone even think that was a good idea? ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯ ).

Until the hotel is finished, you can only stay in guest houses. The one I picked is actually pretty nice. And the food is decent too. Though like everywhere else, they dump an insane amount of salt on absolutely everything. Weirdly though, the desserts came out unsalted.

#680 · Aug. 9, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania Hike

I've never had to make so many transfers to get to the start of a hiking trail: 50km on a minibus through serpentine roads, 50km by ferry across the incredibly beautiful Lake Koman, and then another 50km on a minibus through serpentine roads.

I left my car in Shkodër so I could do a circular route: Shkodër - Valbona - Ses - Shkodër, instead of being tied to some specific point on this route. Otherwise, I'd have to add another day (or even a day and a half) for the return journey (because I'd have to do the hike twice).

PS. Now I have like a million photos of the lake, and I'm not sure what to do with them (:

#670 · Aug. 8, 2022, 12:11 p.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania Other

Something went wrong. And the auto-posting arranged the photos in a really weird way. Sorry about that. I've rebuilt it. This should look better now.

But the internet will be unstable for a couple of days.

#652 · Aug. 8, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania Other

I wasn't planning to go to Podgorica. I wanted to rent a car in Belgrade and head straight to Albania from there. But I checked with a couple of local rental agencies, and they all told me their insurance doesn't cover Albania, so I should look for a car elsewhere. Though honestly, I wasn't too keen on it anyway—I'd have to drive through winding mountain roads instead of a nice highway. The rental companies in Montenegro don't have insurance issues. Plus it's closer.

Whether it was Podgorica or Bar, which I stopped by on the way, both seemed pretty dull. There's not much to do, and the infrastructure and roads are pretty rough. At least I was just passing through.

Right after crossing the Albanian border, we suddenly hit traffic. Three kilometers took more than an hour. It would've been faster to walk. And throughout the whole jam, various Roma kept coming up to cars, knocking on windows, and asking for money, water, or food. A lot of the people asking were kids. It looks sad and feels uncomfortable. During the entire traffic jam, I never once saw a driver share anything with anyone.

#653 · Aug. 8, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramAlbania Other

But check out how charming this Albanian Shkodër is! The center is small, but really lovely. I expected it to be much simpler.

#642 · Aug. 7, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramMontenegro Other

Back in 2017, I took a train from Pune to Mumbai in India. The ticket said it was a superfast train, and we covered 150km in 4.5 hours. I never thought I'd experience that kind of speed in Europe too.

I took an overnight train from Belgrade to Podgorica. We covered 440km in 12 hours. Pretty much on par with that Indian train, except here at least they don't call it superfast.

No air conditioning on the train—the saving grace is the windows that actually open. It's an old train, the kind you see on Russian Railways. But for 30 euros, you'd expect something more comfortable (this is a sleeper cabin; there are also regular seats, which are cheaper). People warned me that the cars often smell like smoke, but I guess I got lucky. My neighbor wasn't smoking, and there was no tobacco smell at all.

It's a night train, but once we got to the Montenegrin side, it was already getting light. I couldn't tear myself away from the window. The tunnels kept blocking the view every now and then—sometimes for several minutes at a time.

The sheer number of tunnels and bridges, and the engineering effort that went into them, is impressive. Definitely worth taking this route at least once.

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#641 · Aug. 4, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramSerbia Other

I really love how small local restaurants in Serbia just close down for their vacation period (and honestly, this is pretty common practice across Europe too). And it's not just a rare thing – it's totally normal here.

"So, we're all taking a break, come back in a couple weeks." At least someone's actually managing that work/life balance (hopefully).

The only inconvenience is that nobody updates their hours on Google Maps. So sometimes you show up to find the doors locked and have to frantically search for another place.

#640 · Aug. 2, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramSerbia

#639 · Aug. 2, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramSerbia Hike

Когда я наткнулся в интернетах на картинки Лазарева каньона, сразу стало ясно, что мне срочно туда надо. И вот я доехал.

Виды невероятные. Всего 230 км от Белграда и можно хайкать. Что ещё нужно? (:

Не обошлось без приключений. Я заранее нашёл разные маршруты, выбрал, как я наивно полагал, оптимальный круговой. Первые километров 10 были идеальными. А дальше появились тропинки Шредингера: идёшь себе, а тропа внезапно заканчивается и куда идти — непонятно. Хотя на карте путь четко обозначен.

В такой ситуации сразу думаешь "А может обратно той же дорогой, что и пришел?". Но смотришь, что уже пройдено больше половины, только что был хороший спуск, и решаешься проверить вдруг это просто локальный участок зарос. Как-то пробираешься вперед, и вроде вполне терпимо выходит. И чем дальше уходишь, тем всё менее привлекательным становится вариант с разворотом.

Уверенности в решении идти вперед добавило то, что тропа через какое-то время действительно появилась снова. Но история с пропажей дорожки повторилась не раз. Что совершенно удивительно: иногда путь был отличным, с отметками и указателями. А потом заканчивался так же неожиданно, как и начинался. Как люди попадают на старт такого отрезка для меня осталось загадкой. Признаков телепорта замечено не было.

Где-то пришлось буквально прыгать по поваленным деревьям и прочим буеракам. В итоге вместо ожидаемых 20 километров вышло чуть больше 30 (пришлось идти в обход), и еле удалось успеть выбраться в цивилизацию до темноты. Справились почти за 10 часов с парой недолгих привалов.

Вживую красота неописуемая. Гораздо лучше, чем на фотографиях. Я очень рад, что получилось сюда добраться. Все трудности и мучения с лихвой окупились. Но если соберусь второй раз, то кругом уже не пойду. Скорее буду придумывать что-то с тремя самыми интересными точками (один, два, три).

Тут бегает всякая животина. Попались (предположительно) безногая ящерица (не путать со змеей) и пугливый олененок, который преследовал нас четверть дороги. Пару раз выбегал на видное место покрасоваться, но фотографировать с близкого расстояния не давался. Под вечер стало слышно сов.

Непонятно почему настолько впечатляющее место активно не развивают. Проложить здесь человеческие тропы, пустить рекламу, и хороший поток посетителей гарантирован. Всяких немцев хлебом не корми, дай по природе полазать. За весь день не встретил ни одного туриста. Даже обидно.

PS. Маршрут по которому я пытался пройти тут, но повторять не рекомендую. Возможно он просто протух с момента публикации в 2017. И не ходите в одиночку. Место довольно дикое. Мобильная связь часто пропадает. Если что помощи можно ждать очень долго.

PPS. Саундтрек к видео ниже крутили по радио по дороге в каньон. Мне кажется, он идеально подошел (:

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#629 · Aug. 2, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramSerbia

#628 · July 30, 2022, 3:59 p.m. · ↗ TelegramSerbia Other

I just couldn't drive past this sign. Totally caught my eye by chance, would've missed it otherwise (:‌

#627 · July 24, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramSerbia Event

Since January 16, 2022, there's been a tent camp set up in front of Serbia's National Assembly building (the local parliament). These guys decided the current government is illegitimate, declared themselves the only legitimate temporary parliament of the country (apparently that's allowed?), and have been manning the place 24/7 for over six months now.

The police don't bother them, and honestly, everyone just acts like nothing's happening. Online people say it's a puppet opposition movement controlled by the president.

Out of curiosity, I walked over and asked what this whole thing was about. There were maybe 3-4 people there, but they weren't exactly eager to chat (probably because of the heat; it's +38°C in Belgrade right now). To get rid of me, they handed out a printout in Serbian explaining that they think the current government is illegitimate, and it had their website address on it.

I checked out their site—it's a really weird movement with no clear goals. I liked the part about how they think politicians are unnecessary in general. Yet they regularly hold meetings where they issue various decrees. For example, they gave all Serbs permission not to get vaccinated. If that's not politics, then what is it? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

#626 · July 20, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramSerbia Food

Meanwhile, outrageously sweet watermelons have appeared on the market (:‌

#616 · July 18, 2022, 11:11 a.m. · ↗ TelegramSerbia Hike

Овчарско-кабларское ущелье офигенное. Там хорошо. В тени деревьев на высоте гораздо комфортнее, чем под солнцем в низине.

За 6 часов нахайкал чуть больше 15км (мой маршрут; тропинки лучше смотреть в Organic maps, гугл, например, и про половину троп не знает). 15 км вроде и немного, и перепад высоты в 700 метров терпимый. Тропы все отлично размечены. Заблудиться будет сложно, даже если очень захотеть.

На тропинках куча монастырей. Первые построились еще в 14 веке, а потом появлялись все новые и новые. Монахи спасались в ущелье от турков и войн. До наших дней дожили чуть больше десятка. Но концентрация все равно впечатляет.

(translation pending)