This n’ That

Apparently, I’m a person that can answer questions. My host brother asked me to tell the whole family that cannons, you know, the ones on sides of ships, exist. A debate about American currency amongst my family members was settled when I promised them that there is no $500 bill in circulation today (although my host cousin who “studied economics in Greece,” swore otherwise). A friend recently called me to settle another debate she was having with some Albanians: where England and Great Britain the same thing?

Another popular question I here is simply: “What is this?” One of the more memorable answers came this week. While I was cooking, my host mom told me that a “package had arrived from Germany.” An Albanian children’s magazine similar to Highlights called Mrekulli (Miracle) frequently distributes packages to its subscribers. We examined the contents of the packages and I look at a small note enclosed that stated the package came from a Scottish Christian organization.

The package contained the usual items: toothbrushes and toothpaste; colored pencils; coloring books; and sets of hats and gloves. There was also another item, tiny and wrapped in plastic. “What is this?” My host mom asked.

“It’s a towel for to wash the body like have us,” I said. In spending time abroad, I feel like it’s only Americans that have large wash cloths for the shower. Everyone else has fake plastic sponges, or if you’re German, a type of washing mitten that you put your hand in.

“I don’t believe you!” my host mom answered.

And I told her that you had to put it in water. Now I was really sounding ridiculous.

“I think it’s one of those notebooks for to write on with tape on them,” she replied skeptically. My host cousin had visited a few weeks later and armed with a post-it note pad, had decorated the backs of our kitchen chairs with his artwork.

Imagine her surprise when I cut the plastic off the outside and put it in a bowl of hot water.

“I would have died before I figured out what that was,” she said.

***
I went to get my haircut earlier this week on my day off. A wash, cut and styling cost $4. The weather was so nice outside that I decided to walk for a little until I took a furgon home.

I was enjoying the sun and walked about 20 minutes, when the city bus drove past me. I thought it was too late to flag it, so I didn’t bother raising my hand. It stopped fifty feet in front of me and didn’t start going again. It was waiting for me.

When I hustled to get in, the man that collects the fare told me that they remembered me from earlier that morning. How often has that happened to you in the States?

***
Speaking of uncanny Albanian memory skills, I was shopping at the gabi today. The gabi is a giant used clothing market that I will severely miss when I come home. I can’t imagine the number of people that pass through on a given day, much less associate people with the clothing they buy. When I showed up at a stand I visited a few weeks ago, the woman complimented my shirt (I had bought it from her) and asked me how I was. Now, I know that we’re probably the only foreigners she came in contact with, but it’s still pretty impressive.

***
Albanians use plastic bags and bags in general in ways I’ve never seen before. Sometimes, they use them to carry live chickens. I’ve seen kittens put in bags. Albanians are astounded when we tell them, “I don’t need a bag for that” after we buy something. Even the grocer across the street looks at me funny when I don’t want to put my carton of milk in a bag to carry it about 20 steps across the street to my house.

So when I bought a large messenger bag… should I have been surprised that the messenger bag was packed into a plastic bag and given to me?

Here you will find many treasures

- Hearing Albanian rap music that is trying very hard to be American and is even laced with English-language profanity on a furgon

- A student having a USB drive called, “Gangsta XXX” (I blame that on American culture being omnipresent on TV and music around the world)

- The healing powers of being able to shop at EuroMax, a chain grocery store that has a huge selection of Western amenities. They are even decorated for Christmas just as intensely as American groceries stores are now

- If I haven’t mentioned it before, Albanians gently shake their heads from side to side to agree with you; if the answer to a question is “no,” they will usually make a clucking sound

- Seeing a scorpion inside a house

- Using bay leaves not only to cook with but also to make tea (it’s delicious)

- Home remedies: Albanians telling us to eat dairy products if our stomachs are upset; telling us our stomachs hurt because our feet aren’t being kept warm enough; and telling us not to drink cold water because it will hurt our tonsils

- The actual monetary system versus the colloquial monetary system: frequently in spoken Albanian, someone will say something costs 4,000Lek. What they really mean, however, is that something costs 400Lek, or a little over $4 instead of $40. “Old Lek” and “New Lek,” as they are called, have been causes for a lot of confusion no matter how long we’ve been here. You go to a store and see a price tag for 20Lek, but when you give it to the cashier, he will tell you to pay 200Lek, even though what he really means is the sticker price of 20Lek.

- In Albanian, a vacuum is called a “fshese me korent,” or a “broom with electric.” I’m still deciding whether or not I like that better than the German “Staubsauger,” which means “dust sucker.”

“Here you will find many treasures”

- Albanian music channel playing “That Don’t Impress me Much”
- A random donkey walking by itself up the beach
- A group of three children, all around 6 or 7 years old, coaxing a milking cow up a steep hill
- A set of teeth that resemble those Billy Bob gag teeth from grocery store machines… randomly lying on the pavement. Uh, sir, I don’t know how to tell you this, but you lost your teeth.
- A dead, rigor mortised cat lying on a pile of bricks on the side of the road. Uhm.
- My neighbor. If the chickens and roosters next door aren’t already enough, she talks to her animals. She makes sounds when she feeds them and goes through an entire playlist of sounds. My favorite is when she says, “ben, ben, ben, ben” over and over again. I need to make a recording. “Chook, chook, chook” is a close second in terms of my personal favorites. It usually continues for five to ten minutes.

“Here you will find many treasures”

One day when I was standing in line with the sufflaqe stand with my Albanian teacher, Ervin, Outkast’s Mrs. Jackson began to play. The group of volunteers immediately began to sing along.

“I haven’t heard this song in years,” I said.

“Here you will find many treasures,” my teacher told me. He wasn’t kidding. I’ve heard songs I haven’t heard in years and seen television shows that I forgot ever existed. Celine Dion and The Cranberries are two of the more popular artists that I hear on an everyday basis at random.

The finding of long-lost treasures here continued the other day. As I opened an individually-wrapped piece of gum, I discovered that it had something in it. What was it, you ask? Printed on wax paper, it was a picture of a very young Sting that must have been taken in the late seventies or early eighties. And he was shirtless in it.

The hunt continues. What else will I find over the next two years?