Bajram Curri

Last week, I went to Bajram Curri in the district of Tropoja with Theresa Weaver, a pioneering missionary who has been in Albania about as long as my aunt and uncle have.  It was an incredible opportunity, and God used the time to teach me many things about missions.

We traveled to Bajram Curri with Astrit, the pastor of the church there, and his wife and three precious children.  On the long journey, I got to know his kids, who enjoyed teaching me how to count and say the colors in Albanian.  Astrit's land rover broke down on the way, and we were able to make it to a tiny mountain village not far from the road.  There, we found a mechanic, who worked in a metal lean-to and who miraculously happened to have the bolt we needed to fix the car.  As we sat waiting for the mechanic to finish, we watched villagers walk by with their donkeys and cows.  It was my first time being in an Albanian village.

On my first day in Bajram Curri, I went grocery shopping with Theresa and Rakaela, Astrit's twelve-year-old daughter.  The town is so different from Tirana!  It is in the far north of Albania, so the winter is bitterly cold and dreary.  Theresa said that the mountains surrounding Bajram Curri are stunning, but we couldn't see them through all the fog!  Over 70% of Bajram Curri's population is Muslim, and the people think with a very backwards and old-fashioned mindset.  Most of the people who live there were originally from villages, so they live very simply and do not enjoy many modern conveniences.  The stores there sell only a small variety of necessities, so Theresa often has to cross the boarder into Kosovo to do her grocery shopping.  Human trafficking is such a threat in Bajram Curri that young girls mostly stay in the house, and NEVER go out alone.  In fact, trafficking is so common in north Albania that members of the Albanian mob from Tropoja were depicted in the movie Taken.  It is very difficult to live there, and even more difficult to carry out effective ministry.  Astrit certainly has his work cut out for him as the pastor there!

I spent the week helping Theresa with her various ministries.  She, Astrit, and Violca, Astrit's wife, are involved in the Manna Program, feeding children who live in poverty.  Every day after school, about a dozen children come to the Manna Center for a nourishing lunch.  Violca, a remarkable woman, cooks for them every day, and Theresa teaches them Bible stories.  One morning, we realized that the Manna Center had flooded because someone had left the water on in the bathroom.  No one had used the facilities since the weekend before, so the water had sat for several days and done damage to the walls and doorways.  We waded through an inch of icy cold water to remove the furniture from all the rooms.  Then we swept away the water, dried the floor with towels, and replaced all the furniture.  By 11:30, we had the Center cleaned up and prepared for the first group of kids to come for lunch.  I loved meeting the children, and it was a wonderful experienced to be involved with the feeding program.

My favorite part of the trip was helping Theresa teach her English class.  On Mondays and Wednesdays, she teaches about sixteen Albanians, ranging in age from 12-15.  I helped her prepare and teach the lesson about how to describe feelings in English.  We played games with them, and it was fun to get to know some of the girls in the class.  They were all friendly and eager to learn, and they all adored Theresa.  On Thursday, six of the girls came over for lunch.  Theresa and I made them lasagna because she likes to introduce them to American food.  We also helped them make bracelets that tell the story of Christ's birth, death, and resurrection. Theresa is involved in such a wonderful ministry with these girls, and it is amazing that their parents allow them to come to lunch with a Christian woman.  As a single, Christian woman who works hard and travels alone, Theresa is not looked upon well in the primarily-Muslim community.  Yet she has won the respect of many Tropojans, and, miraculously, they allow their daughters to spend time with her.

I learned so much from Theresa during that week.  She is so full of joy, so strong in the Lord.  She wakes up early every morning infuriatingly cheerful, and throughout the day she continually thanks God for simple things that people usually take for granted.  Each night before she goes to bed, she thanks God for how he blessed her that day.  She is involved in some of the hardest ministries in one of the harshest regions of Albania, but she faces the challenges with steadfast persistence.  Not to mention, she taught me many useful things about being a missionary, such as how to understand the culture, how to cook with staple foods, and how to use a Turkish toilet. 

Bajram Curri may be a depressing place, but it was enlightening for me to see what the more rural areas of Albania are really like.  I am grateful that I got to experience a little bit of what life is like there.  It was encouraging to hear the stories of some of the believers there, and sobering to hear the backgrounds of the children who come to the Manna Program.  What a tough place to be a missionary in!

*Pray for:

• The small church in Bajram Curri - that the believers would stay strong in the Lord, and that more people would come to know Him.
• The Manna Program - that the children who come for lunch would learn to love the Lord.
• Theresa's ministry to middle school girls - that more of the girls would become believers, and that their parents would continue to allow them to spend time with Theresa

Southern Albania

This past weekend we took a tour of southern Albania.  My aunt stayed behind to organize the attic, but I went with my uncle and cousins and a missionary friend, Ben Walker.  It was an incredible week!  The things we saw on the trip were truly astounding.


Our first stop was Apollonia, one of the most famous places in Albania.  We got out of the car at the walls of an orthodox monastery from the 1200’s.  The thick wooden gates opened into a beautiful courtyard, surrounded by old walls lined with Greek statues and other ancient relics.  Inside the monastery was an empty, antique chapel painted with frescoes of the saints, as well as another chapel that is still used for services.  After exploring the monastery, we walked up a hill to see the ruins of Apollonia, an ancient Greek city dating back to the 5^th century BC.  The remains of Apollonia consist of the stately columns of an old senate building, an impressive amphitheater, and stones that marked the boundaries of a promenade.  We hiked further up to the peak of the hill to explore a maze of underground bunkers, built during Albania’s communist era.  On this hill, we found pieces of pottery that may have been from the ancient Greek city.  It is incredible to think about what other ruins could lay buried under the communist bunkers!

That night we stayed at a hotel in Orikum, a beach-side town that overlooks the Adriatic Sea.  As we were driving to the hotel, we stopped on the side of the road in Vlora to watch the sun sink over the Adriatic in one of the most incredible sunsets I have ever seen. 


The next day, we drove through the mountains on a winding road called Llegora Pass.  From the top of a mountain we had a stunning view of the Adriatic.  The way the light played on the water made it look as though the sky and sea blended together seamlessly.  We stopped in the seaside village of Dhermi, where my uncle found an Albanian man named Ashir to take us to a pirate's cave.  We all climbed into Ashir's tiny boat, and we rode to the cave, an opening on the face of a cliff.  It was small, as a rockslide had closed off the deeper recesses of the cave.  The water inside was turquoise, and the sun shone through a hole in the high ceiling.  We were all in awe of the beauty.  After we had a good look around the cave, the man took us further down the shore to a small, secluded beach.  The pebbly shore was surrounded on three sides by cliffs and opened to the clear, blue water.  We played there for an hour or two before Ashir took us back to Dhermi.

  In the evening, we went to the castle of Ali Pasha Tepelena, a tyrannical muslim warlord from the 1700’s.  He built the castle in the early 19^th century for his Christian wife – a mysterious story which we can't seem to figure out.  The castle was incredible.  It was on an island, built in the shape of a triangle with three turrets.  The walls were over 5 feet thick.  It was almost dusk, and we explored the dark recesses of the castle by the golden light that came through the small windows.  The castle was a maze of halls and arched doorways, and was exactly how I would have pictured a medieval castle.  We climbed a stone staircase and emerged on a rooftop courtyard.  There, we sat on the thick walls and watched an incredible sunset.  

We spent the night in Saranda, a charming city by the sea that is popular for tourists.  The view from our balcony overlooked a bay, and across the water we could see the Greek island of Corfu.

On Thursday we took another beautiful drive through the mountains, this time to the historical city of Butrint.  Butrint is an island that contains the incredible ruins of a Roman city that become prominent in the 4^th century BC, but was built several hundred years before then. We wandered through the incredible ruins of an amphitheater, public baths, a private villa, insulae, and a temple complex to the god Asklepius.  Then we walked further up the path to a baptistery from the Byzantine period.  The circular-shaped building was full of columns, and the floor was covered with gravel that had been laid down to preserve a beautiful mosaic beneath.  Next was a Byzantine basilica, a large, majestic building with arched walls.  Another thing I enjoyed seeing was a small gate in the city wall, which is commonly associated with the Scaean Gate mentioned in the Aenied.  At the end of the path was a castle, which has been rebuilt and converted into a museum that held beautiful Greek statues and pottery.

On Friday, the last day of our trip, we went to Syri i Kalter (Blue Eye) natural spring, a pool of water fed by an underground spring that is shaped like an eye.  In the evening, we went to the historic town of Gjirokastra.  I loved Gjirokastra, a picturesque little town with cobblestone streets and old-fashioned buildings.  While there, we went to Gjirokastra castle, a massive fortress that we loved exploring.  From the walls we had a wonderful view of the town, and we watched the sun set over the mountains.



We had such a wonderful time on the trip, and I learned so much from it.  One thing I really enjoyed was getting to see more of the country.  Tirana may hold one-third of Albania’s population, but it is not a good representation of the rest of the country because it is much more modern in comparison.  We drove through many villages and small towns that were so different from the capitol, and I feel as though I now have a better understanding of what Albania is like. 

Another thing that impacted me on our trip was seeing my uncle evangelize.  He struck up a conversation and presented the gospel to almost everyone we came in contact with.  It made me wish I could understand more Albanian!  The people he spoke with were very receptive and seemed interested in what he had to say.

 After seeing the incredible things that we saw, I am completely in awe of God’s creativity.  As we watched so many sunrises and sunsets over the Albanian mountains and the Ionian sea, I was frequently reminded of Psalm 19:1 "The heavens proclaim the glory of God. The skies display his craftsmanship!"  There are no words to describe the greatness of our God!

**Pray for: Bajram, Veka, Ashir, Kosta, and the others that my uncle witnessed to.  Pray that their eyes would be opened and that they would receive the Gospel.