Albania 2011

Not the real name of the lake. I and fellow passengers found ourselves on an 11-hour bus ride from Thessaloniki to Tirana. That included about an hour at the border between Greece and Albania. The way to Tirana led through rugged mountains, through tunnels, one of which had the wreck of a passenger car that richoeted between the walls of the tunnel and was barely recognizable as a vehicle. Then winding on through mountain passes to the Small town of Korca and Lake Ohrid, that is shared between Macedonia and Albania. On to Ebasan and finally, after dark, Tirana.

The little girl from Korca, Albania, and her mom

If you decided that I am a heartless bastard, blame her. She stole it. While we were getting bored waiting seemingly endlessly on the Greek side of the border with Albania, I saw her sitting there with her mom and grandparents and walked over and put my headset on her head and gave her my MP3 player to listen to, and went to get a large cup of good coffee, that a small kiosk, thankfully, sold. After that, I had these eyes looking at me, from the seat in front of me, on the bus. We could not even talk, neither of us, nor mom, spoke the other's language. We stopped at Korca, where she apparently lives, she sat and just looked at me, I stroked her hair and we said, 'bye-bye' and she was gone. My heart tightly clutched in her little hands.

Waiting impatiently at the border with Albania, on the Greek side

Scenes from the western shore of the very large Lake Ohrid, shot and composed on the fly from inside of the moving bus

I saw them rushing up and had about 3 seconds to compose this shot. I am pretty happy with it.

You want some adventure? Take the train in Albania.