A big part of travelling is learning new things. I enjoy it so much sometimes I yearn to go back to studying. Yep. I know.
I’ve hit two months on the road and also come to the end of my time in the Balkans. I’m posting this from Turkey. Landing in Istanbul was a big travel dream come true and I have a very exciting three weeks ahead.
Rather than reflect on my ups and downs and so on, I thought I’d share some of the fun, weird and interesting facts I’ve learnt in the last eight weeks. In some cases I’ve generalised and used the term Balkans, even though I didn’t go to every Balkan country. But it’s easier than writing out Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, Macedonia and Kosovo each time.
Transport
1. There is a LOT of Mercedes in Albania – new and old cars, buses and trucks. Some say as many as 80% of vehicles spot the Mercedes logo, but I don’t know how accurate that is. Private car ownership only became legal in 1991. Former Communist leader Enver Hoxha used to favour Mercedes so that’s the suspected start of the trend.
2. There’s no car sale yards in Albania. Despite all the Mercedes, I never saw a car yard. I saw some cars for sale, but they were usually parked in bus stops.
3. There’s no bus stations in Albania and there aren’t many big buses. The most popular form of public transport in Albania are furgons (mini buses). The furgons leave from different places in the city depending on your destination. For example, in Tirane, furgons for Shkodra leave from the other side of the city to furgons for Berat.
4. Bus drivers always have an assistant, who will help with luggage and walk through the bus checking and selling tickets. Sometimes there’s even a third helper. I don’t know what they did.
5. Passengers avoid bus station tax by boarding the bus around the corner from the bus station. It took me ages to work out why they didn’t just walk 100m to the station.
Money
6. Montenegro uses the Euro, but it’s kinda not supposed to. After it split from Serbia it adopted the Deutsche Mark but when the Euro was introduced it switched to that. Nobody seemed to mind at first, and then there was a brief “hey, what do you think you’re doing” moment, but now Montenegro’s a candidate to join the EU so all will most likely be forgiven. Kosovo also uses the Euro, but that was introduced with the cooperation with the European Central Bank.
7. Non-Euro countries will often take the Euro. Often in Serbia, Albania and Macedonia, the price of a hostel or meal was quoted to me in Euros and I had to ask what I owed in the local currency.
8. Shopkeepers will round off your bill instead of bothering with small change. They will nearly always round down, but on the rare occasion they might need to round up they will do so with a lot of apology and an offer to run and get change while you wait.
Eating and drinking
9. You will drink some of the worst coffee of your life. It’s usually espresso or Turkish coffee. It’s the later you need to worry about. When prepared well it’s delicious. If you buy a cup from the man carrying a tray down a carriage on the Belgrade to Bar Railway, have a chaser of water or juice at the ready. If you have the option of a Macchiato you are definitely not in rural Albania anymore.
10. Tea will usually be herbal. Sometimes my waiter didn’t speak English, so although I could order tea, giving a preference of what kind was out of the question. The result was usually green or a red fruit tea. Often, even when I could ask for a black tea, they didn’t have it.
11. Every country has burek – a pastry usually filled with meat, cheese or spinach – and considers it its own creation.
12. Yoghurt is a popular drink, especially at breakfast. Often people will wash down their burek with a tub of yoghurt, drinking it from the tub instead of eating it with a spoon. It’s also commonly sold in cartons like milk and I saw it listed on a restaurant menu under “soft drinks”.
13. Most cafes don’t serve food. Many are only for drinks and wifi, although some may serve desserts.
14. Some cafes in Albania won’t seat groups of men. A sign reading “Te Shoqeruar” means men can only go to the café if they are with a woman. Cafes in the Balkans, especially in Albania, are very male dominated. But more modern cafes want to attract female customers so they use the signs to stop the café turning into another men’s club.
Culture
15. English language films are subtitled but not dubbed because it’s too expensive. Watching a lot of Hollywood movies is how many people I met improved their English.
16. Some kids in Serbia only go to school for half the day. Some grades will attend in the morning and the rest will go in the afternoon. I couldn’t get a detailed explanation, but I think it has something to do with stretching resources, for example only needing half as many classrooms.
17. In Albania many couples date in private, because the pressure to marry is intense if their families find out about the relationship.
18. Hearing Western music is a flashback to the 1990s. Most music that was familiar with was from a long time ago and it was played everywhere. But pop charts feature music from other European and Balkan countries. There’s a lot of different languages on the radio.
19. So many people know the Tassie Devil. Looney Tunes was popular back in the day and even if people don’t know where Tasmania is, they know about the spinning devil.
Language
20. Ciao is a common greeting in Serbia. It works for hello and goodbye.
21. Hello is often said when answering the phone in Macedonia, but not as a greeting in person.
22. Some signs will use English words because the word in the local language is too long or complicated.
Random
23. Stuffed bears are hung outside houses in Albania to ward off bad spirits. I’m talking about teddy bears. Of all colours and sizes. Hanging from balconies.
24. Serbia has one of the highest rates of smoking in the world. It is legal to smoke anywhere, so that’s what everyone does.
25. In Albania you can buy individual cigarettes from a kiosk. One girl I met said it stopped her from smoking a lot. I noticed we stopped at kiosks frequently.
26. Smoking inside public buildings is banned in Kosovo. You risk a €50 fine, but it’s a risk a lot of people take.
27. Balkan men carry man bags. They are always black and worn across their body, not just off a shoulder. As far as I can establish, the contents are usually wallet, mobile phone, cigarettes and a lighter.
28. Receipts are given for the smallest of purchases. A bread roll for 20 cents? You’ll get a receipt. At a restaurant a new receipt was brought to the table everytime I ordered something such as another drink. At the end of the meal the waiter counted all of them to give me my bill.
29. Kosovo uses Monaco’s mobile phone network, among others. Landlines are technically Serbian numbers, but mobile numbers will be either from Monaco or Slovenia.
10 Comments
“Montenegro uses the Euro, but it’s kinda not supposed to. After it split from Serbia it adopted the Deutsche Mark but when the Euro was introduced it switched to that. ”
The real cause were republic’s presidential and assembly elections in Montenegro in 1997 or 1998 (I already forgot exact year). Their (seems to be life-long) president Milo Djukanovic didn’t have as much support at that time as he hoped for, so he introduced number of populistic measures to gain votes (and of course, won elections, like every time since 1990 until today). Second cause was big corruption affair where he was also involved into, it was about smuggling ciggarettes from Italy. One of those populistic things was to break up with FRY central bank, and that was explained by high inflation hitting Montenegro inferior economy (compared to Serbian economy), so excuses were targeted that Deusche Marks won’t osscilate at all as Montenegro makes up to a promile of total DM summ, compared with de-stabilizing Serbian economy that reflects weakness of Dinar to not-really-important Montenegro (in monetary/economy way). Also, introducing DM was understood like opposing to federal government institutions that were mostly controled by Serbia’s politicians at that time, so it was excellent motivation for Montenegrin nationalists to switch to Milo’s side at elections.
Thanks for the information Marko. Including such detail in my article would have made it twice as long 🙂
“Serbia has one of the highest rates of smoking in the world. It is legal to smoke anywhere, so that’s what everyone does.”
it is not.
you can smoke in open space areas, and in most caffes, pubs, restaurants.
Actually, these have to “choose” to be smoking-friendly or not. Smoking-friendly pub pays higher taxes (for example), but non-smoking ones have much less people in there, so in reality, everyone chooses smoking-friendly “mode” of their business of this kind (as these taxes aren’t high at all).
If you have property that is larger than 70 sqr meters and you want to run a restaurant, you can choose to split it into two areas for smokers/non-smokers. Properties with less sqr meters can only choose between the two.
you can not smoke in any kind of institutional or public service building (including hospitals, schools, bus/train stations, administrative buildings, etc). you also can’t smoke in offices of private companies (prohibited by state law), but I believe some people still do that if other coworkers don’t care.
Thank you once again Marko. I did see plenty of people smoking in bus and train stations. And on the buses and trains.
Please remember these are the observations of me as a traveller. I do not at all proclaim to be an expert 🙂
ah, don’t take my replies as correcting you 🙂 I don’t know why, but I’m in a mood to go into details tonight (empty office, deadlines smiling at me, etc). Actually, what’s interesting in the Balkans is not really following the rules I guess, so with smoking as well.
Love this article, a great snap shot into different cultures!
Hello, thank you for your article. I am am American and hope to travel to Serbia, Bosnia and Macedonia next year. I am still trying to figure out the combination of cell phone, tablet and camera to bring. My main question is..if i was to use a wi-fi only device, was it difficult to find wi-fi spots? Also, do you know if there is an inexpensive USB type device that can be purchased over there to make a laptop/tablet into a wi-fi hotspot so that internet can be had in non-wi-fi areas? When i was in Latvia/Poland etc three years ago, I had only a small laptop and was stuck many times without internet, but needing it. For example…on a train and not knowing how to find my hostel at night. Or bus information etc.. Stupid, that I did not get this information before hand, I know. Thank you, Sara
Hi Sara,
There is plenty of wifi available in Serbia and Macedonia (I didn’t go to Bosnia). Most cafes offer it and sometimes it’s even on buses! In Serbia I got a prepaid SIM with VIP mobile and had internet as part of that on my phone.
I travel with an unlocked phone, small laptop and an SLR camera, but that’s because I’m blogging as I go. I met a lot of people that survived with a smartphone and small camera.
I don’t know of a device that can give you internet access, however in my experience, I wouldn’t have needed anything like that. If you get a prepaid SIM you may be able to get internet included. Always write down any directions or important information, even if you have internet access. You never know what could happen and it’s best not to be stranded in a new city with no idea where you need to go.
Keep in mind that a lot of information that you think should be online (like public transport timetables) often isn’t and Google Maps isn’t all that reliable in some areas. It’s best to go back to basics here: ask people 🙂
You could easily travel in this region without any internet access at all and be fine.
Have a great trip,
Megan
“6. Montenegro uses the Euro, but it’s kinda not supposed to…” – Montenegro introduced DM, then Euro, then left the union with Serbia (in that order). Nice blog 😉
Excellent description. Short and concize…it really made me lough, as a local.