Albania, part 2

1.       People

The Albanians are typical southerners… They just don’t care. They don’t care too much about tidiness (the rubbish on public beach, crammed and stinking trash cans standing along the main street), they don’t care about traffic regulations, they don’t care about punctuality (they never hurry up). On the one hand that could be sometimes irritating for people of different cultures (such as ours), but on the other hand I think we could learn from the Albanians how to deal with stress ;) In general they are really kind, hospitable and open for the others :)

2.       Habits

As in others countries in the south of Europe, the cities starts to be teeming with life not until the evening. At that time a lot of inhabitants come out to meet with their family or friends in bars or restaurants. We can observe groups of young pretty girls, usually dressed up in rather provocative way, and handsome boys who stroll around the city center or who just sit somewhere to talk. During the day there is much less people in the streets or in the public places. You can see some people sitting in cafés to drink their morning espresso, elderly men playing chess in parks and traders who stand along the main streets of the city trying to sell some goods (clothes, chickens, goats, whatever you want!).

3.       Gesture

If we talk about habits I think it’s important to mention about two important gestures. I mean nodding and shaking someone’s head. In Albania they do it inversely to us. It’s good to remember about that in everyday communication and especially when you try to explain to a bothersome beggar that you’re not going to give them a money (yes, it’s from my experience :P ).

4.       Religion

According to the statistics 58.79% of the Albanians adhere to Islam, 17.06% to Christianity and 24.29% of population is either irreligious or belongs to other religious groups. As you can see there are a lot of Muslims, however these are not a radical factions so you don’t have to be worry about your clothing. At least in bigger cities it’s hard to find someone who follow Islamic dress code. In general, the Albanian Constitution declares freedom of religions. In spite of this diversification, people of different beliefs get on well with each other. They say that first of all they are Albanians so religion of other people don’t matter so much.