Iowa Martins in Albania

Friday, April 08, 2011

Trip to Croatia part 1

6 April 2011



The most prominent impression on this trip so far is the dingy, backward nature of Albania. When we got two hours from Tirana, the “roads” turned into farm tracks with holes, large rocks, and erratic path, and an illogical, often incomprehensible plan for the future. Immediately when we entered Montenegro—certainly not a country picked in the top one hundred itself—the road became paved. It was still only 1¼ care widths wide, but it was clearly marked with reflectors to the sides. As I told Maura, I got the impression that Albania should be embarrassed about the condition of their roads. The ADA and Alpet filling stations should be embarrassed. One of the only ways we knew that we were on the correct road is that there were large gas stations. The 'roads' leading to the stations, however, were mere suggestions of constructed pathways. The further we drove north, into Montenegro and on into Bosnia and Herzegovina (this is ONE country, I thought it was called Bosnia Herzegovina, but the official name has the word and between the two countries. I am still trying to research how this came about. All of these countries are members of the former Yugoslovia), and finally to Croatia, the road became increasingly well developed. The crowning jewel is the Croatian super highway that is being built near the west coast. It’s so beautiful, it seems that post cards could be printed that feature the fantastically tall Romanesque column built to support the transport marvel.





The only problem with the highway is that it is not finished yet. As we were driving we would sometimes realize that we were not on the highway, anymore, but we were on the two lane coastal road that roughly parallels the new structure. More than once, we looked around, saw the highway above us, and looked longingly, and lovingly toward it’s concrete. After the third time, we realized that the road is not finished yet. At one point we saw the gaps, and visions of Sandra bullock driving a bus at 50 miles an hour flashed through my brain. In fact, at one point, not 60 seconds after we had been heaping praise on Croatia because of their road, and wondering who helped them, where the money came from, etc, we found ourselves on a nearly Albanian-type suggestion of a route with holes and boulders.




Sometimes, I think how interesting it would be to be on a trivia show and be asked a question that involves the domain name initials for Croatia. Albania has .al; Montenegro has .me; Greece has .gr. Alex Trebek would read, "This country has the initials .hr in it's domain name and the initials on cars." I would calmly say, "What is Croatia?" All of the arm chair Jeopardy players would be amazed that I knew the answer and would wonder why on earth Croatia would be abbreviated HR. It's because IN Croatia, the country is not Croatia, but Hrvatska. I can see the logic. If you say the word Hrvatska with a bit of gusto and scaping in your voice, it sounds a bit like Kr (with some imagination). This is another time when I am disturbed by the fact that English people have to change the names of foreign countries to something that suits our tastes and abilities.

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