And then, to Prizren - I waited around in the morning for Vladim to call, and then called him; however, his projects are devouring his life whole, and I was watching a perfectly nice day go by. So I suggested that I would call him tomorrow, to which he replied "thank you", and then headed out to the bus station with Enver's dad, to find a bus to Prizren. It wasn't that hard. I shook his hand and hopped on.

Roads in Kosovo are good but packed - which means, perhaps, that they are good roads for about half of the traffic that they receive, and far too much of that traffic are asphalt destroying vehicles like tanks and APCs. I saw another helicopter flying low over the valley, giving me the assumption that these are a part of regular surveillance in Kosovo. Frequent outposts, forts, military camps - Kosovo is almost entirely one big barracks.
The scenery reminded me of British Columbia - green hills, evergreen trees, and low rolling farmland. I could understand why a Kosovar would emigrate to Canada's west coast.








Prizren has a large number of beautiful orthodox churches, mixed in with the plentiful mosques; the difference between the two, aside from the obvious, is that the mosques are open to visitors. The orthodox churches are surrounded by razorwire and have a garrison each of soldiers guarding them - seriously.
Retribution is rife, and the often muslim Albanians have been accused of destroying the churches. But even though they are guarded and protected, they lay empty; the Serb community that once used them has been expelled.

Prizren, though, does have a touristic little cobblestone area with pleasant cafes and restaurants along the river. It is also possible to buy postcards here - whether they were published before or after the war is unclear, although my assumption is before.

The Blue Guide to Albania and Kosovo is acompanying me on this trip; easily the most exhaustive english language guide to the two regions that exists, it is quite good at listing all sorts of architectural and historic information, however seems to assume that you are doing a master's degree with your thesis on Ottoman architecture in the Balkans. The casual visitor will still be impressed at the depth of detail awarded to relatively minor sights in Albania and Kosovo, relative to a global scale. Yet as usual, the suggested amount of time spent is too much; one day is just fine for Prizren. In my case, half a day is fine.
Prizren, though, has a pleasant atmosphere to it, if you ignore that squads of German KFOR troops and everpresent razorwire and land cruisers. And the Kosovars - that is, the Albanians that are left - continue their lives like normal, or whatever seems to pass as "normal" here in Kosovo.








The ones that survived the Serbian attacks were basically robbed - at least, the lucky ones. Enver's family lost all of their possessions, but their house was left intact. Mr. Metohu's bank account was closed after the war, meaning he lost his savings. But he told me that slowly he reaccumulated furniture, and restarted his life. They let their house out to two expats, who both pay generous rent to him. He is one of the lucky ones - none of his immediate family were killed by the Serbs.

At night, Prizren is busy, although I read in my untrustworthy Lonely Planet book that there is a curfew from 11pm until 4am. Who knows; things change quickly in a place like this. Prizren's cafe-lined cobblestone streets were packed by 9pm, but by 11:30pm they were nearly deserted.The air of late june is mild and comfortable, and Turkish and Balkan music rings through the streets. Kids trying to sell me stuff are still a problem, though - and so it goes.
















To Gjakova



Back