Traditional Farming in Albania
In October 2011, I had the pleasure of visiting Albania for about five days with a good friend from Kosovo, Naim Shala. My purpose in going to Albania was to photograph, but I quite unexpectedly learned a lot about the traditional farming methods and organic agriculture that are widely practiced there today. Since I had not visited Albania since 2002, I was quite unprepared for the amazing changes that have taken place there over the intervening eight years! When I arrived at the Tirana International Airport in 2002, it was truly a "third world airport" - small, dirty, crowded, chaotic, and still looking very much the communist-era concrete block terminal it was when it was built by Enver Hoxha, the long-serving dictator of communist Albania. In 2011, though, it was totally different! This time, I stepped into a modern, light, airy, glass and steel structure that looked like it had been airlifted from Europe, replete with cafes, shops, baggage handlers, taxis, and all the