Translations and Other Language Solutions in Albanian Language

We know relatively little about Albania, but interest in the country continues to grow, both culturally and in terms of tourism. As for the latter, travelling around Albania, one can encounter at every turn “races of the reign of Enver Hoxha in Albanian politics, architecture, people’s thinking, religion and history.

Who was this Enver Hoxha? Enver Hoxha was the founder and leader of the People’s Republic of Albania and Secretary of the Albanian Workers’ Party. He was prime minister of Albania from 1944 to 1954 and foreign minister from 1946 to 1953. Hoxha imposed economic isolation from the rest of Europe, banned all religions and established strict state control over the population. A look around in Albania reveals that Albanians were inspired, in Hoxha’s time, in many areas by North Korea. The reasons, it turns out, lie in the deep worship of dictatorship and protectionism that the great Enver Hoxha taught the people over many decades, ruling after the Second World War until the mid-1980s. During his reign, Hoxha gradually destroyed all diplomatic and economic relations between Albania and the Soviet Union, China and the Yugoslav republics. Thus, at the end of his era, which coincided with his death in 1985, Hoxha had completely isolated Albania from the rest of the world. It knew neither the communist East nor the capitalist West. Although the first multi-party elections were held in 1991, the population voted overwhelmingly for the Communist Party out of fear. It was only years later that multi-party coalitions started to form. For decades, dictator Hoxha tried to convince people that they lived in one of the most developed and happiest countries in the world. The state intervened in every possible aspect of people’s lives, including their private lives. The interference took the form of absurd prohibitions – no religious rituals, no cats or dogs, no phone calls abroad, no private cars, no beards, etc. Even the train tracks are said to have ended at the border. Little was allowed, but what was allowed was in fact compulsory. Hoxha was known for his strong political views, which he put into practice. For example, he called Albania the first atheist country in the world. Official figures currently show that the majority of the population is Islamic, but in reality, only about 5% of these believers practise their religion. In fact, Albania under Hoxha ‘s influence has today become one of the few exceptions in the world where different religions peacefully coexist and even support their neighbour’s choices. In the 1970s and 1980s, Hoxha ordered the construction of bunkers throughout Albania, due to territorial disputes with neighbours and a paranoid fear of unjustified threats of attack. 222,000 bunkers were planned, but only about 174,000 were built. Many workers died during the construction of the bunkers, which is why the bunkers have plaques commemorating them. Bunkers are everywhere in Albania, big and small, and it is definitely the country with the most bunkers in the world. Crossing the Albanian border, you get the feeling that you’ve arrived at a secret military facility or a Hollywood film set where a movie about war is being shot – everywhere these peculiar architectural forms poke out of the ground. Of course, they are not so visible in the cities, but the border meadows are literally covered with them. Bunkers have also been built on roadsides, in backyards, gardens and parks – wherever the enemy might suddenly arrive. Statistics show that Albania has about 24 bunkers per square kilometre. It is both ridiculous and tragic because this utterly pointless bunkerisation programme weakened the country’s economy by wasting huge resources that the country had so badly lacked for decades – people lived in unimaginable austerity, even getting electricity three times a day for a short while. It was only after 1990 that the State abandoned the maintenance of the bunker system. Some of the bunkers are now used as sheds, storage or other utility rooms, some have been converted into roadside cafés, but many are simply abandoned.