The Beach

I’ve mentioned countless times that summer in Albania is slow, which is not a bad thing at all. A normal day for me is two hours of lessons, after which I come home to drink coffee with my host sister, then I do some work, eat, nap, read, write and lesson plan. I cook with my host mom as well, which should provide the practical training I’ll need to open an Albanian-fusion restaurant once I come back home.
I also go to the beach, since it’s a ten minute walk from my house. You pay $3 to rent an umbrella and two chairs, and there’s a ton of restaurants and hotels on the beach front to get food. We always go to a little restaurant on the beach and get sandwiches of tomato, cucumber, “ham” and French fries (yes, the fries are in the sandwich) for $1. The waiter there is friendly and anxious to practice his English. “Can I make you a question?” he asked. “What is better—Albanian fast food or American? Because I have heard that American fast food is the best.” He found little disagreement from a group of Americans that would kill puppies for a real hamburger.

When I tell my colleagues at school that I went to the beach, they tell me I’m still white. Random strangers will say, “Oh, how white!” to me. Yes, I know that I’m white. Like, so white that I sometimes distort pictures because of how the light reflects off of me. I’m aware of this. I used to chalk it up to five years spent primarily indoors working my butt off during college. Now I don’t have much of an excuse.

One of my favorite things about the beach is all the watercraft you can rent. When I go with my host sister and host cousins, we rent a paddleboat and take it far out on the water. Then we swim off of it. Surprisingly, you can go pretty far out and still be able to touch or come close to touching. Although I know my limits as a swimmer, I think my abilities will really improve after these two years. You can also windsurf, rent sea kayaks or rent jet skis.

Throughout the day, all kinds of people walk through the maze of chairs and umbrellas selling their wares. I’ve seen normal things—like blankets, towels or olive oil for your skin—to the more weird, like curtains. I’m not sure who goes to the beach hoping to find a good deal on curtains, but they are there nonetheless. Men, who Albanians refer to as “uncle,” walk around selling fresh fruit by the kilo. Need entertainment? Someone will be around to sell you board games. The last time I was on the beach, the checkers seller made clucking sounds. That’s it. He walked down the aisles clucking, where others might announce what they were selling. Everyone stared. Nothing says checkers like clucking? I don’t know. But my favorite is freshly grilled corn. Slightly black on the outside and taking several minutes of burning your hand to cool off, it’s delicious.

But nothing that I’ve mentioned could ever hope to top the most beautiful and indescribable sunsets as the orange disk lights up the sky pink and purple.