I Got PERMANENT Residence in Albania 🇦🇱

The past few weeks have been busy, so here’s the recap. I searched for fall colors in Pogradec, I went to Korçë to apply for my residence permit, I trained the puppies a bit, I watched the Albania soccer game against Czech Republic, I received my permanent residence permit, and then I took a short weekend trip to Thessaloniki, Greece.

0:00 – Where is the fall foliage?
1:01 – Burning trash in the fields
2:13 – Applying for residence permit
2:44 – Work trip to Gjirokastër
3:50 – Ready to go home to my apartment
5:33 – Frustrations about lack of progress in my goals
6:35 – Picking up my permanent residence card
6:56 – Driving to Thessaloniki
9:09 – Beautiful hotel overlooking Thessaloniki

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Something that I’ve noticed over my 5 years here is that Autumn kind of sneaks up on you and then moves right past you the days are warm and sunny the leaves hold their green for a long time and then suddenly seemingly out of nowhere it’s cold and winter

Time and it’s not often that I see leaves changing color at least not where I live most most commonly the leaves Stay Green and then suddenly they just die and fall off the trees it’s not everywhere but I’ve noticed it here more than anywhere I’ve spent Autumn I’m not

Really sure what the reason is but I find it fascinating it probably has something to do with how little it rains at this time of year and that the ground likely doesn’t hold water because it drains into the lake but in any case there doesn’t seem to be any long drawn

Out Fall Foliage like I’ve seen in other places in the world and to be honest I kind of missed that there are a few things in this country that really signify the transition into winter the temperature drops more significantly when the Sun goes down the leaves start dying but the most telling

Is the smell in the air as soon as the sun goes down everyone starts lighting fires many people still use woodf fires to warm their homes which they’ve started doing due to the changes in the temperature but more than that people will light fires in their fields or Gardens and in

These fires they’ll burn whatever has been lying around maybe tree trimmings or whatever is left after harvest or even their trash I don’t know if you can see it but there’s Ash falling from this Sky see like this guy coming from that fire over there so you know winter is on its way

When the smell of burning plastic fills the air the kind of smell that just burns your nostrils and it leaves a low hanging Haze over the entire City back when I first got to Albania I applied and was given a 5-year residence permit well because it’s been 5 years since then I’ve been going through the process of renewing that permit so on a Tuesday morning I went with some co-workers to corcha to finalize the application

Process took about 10 minutes just had to sign a few things get my photo taken and be fingerprinted then I was told to come back in 2 weeks to pick up the card so the nonprofit organization that I work for has a project in another city called Jaster which is further south in

Albania kind of close to Greece about twice a year I make the drive down there to take some updated photos for our archive and to hear any updates from the project this time some friends and co-workers went along that hadn’t been in jur Caster in decades if Ever so after we had visited the soup kitchen and gotten the work part out of the way we went for a walk through the cobblestone streets of the old Town we had a nice dinner and visited the castle which has existed in in some way since before the 12th Century and I had a deadline for a client so I edited video in the back seat as we drove home through the night I’ll be totally honest I’ve been in this house for 5 weeks and at this point it’s starting to work wear on me

It’s hard to fully relax when I know I’m in someone else’s home it’s hard to sleep past 6:00 or 7: in the morning when I know I have to get up to let the dogs out of the kennel good morning because the owners haven’t fully moved into this house yet all their

Belongings aren’t here which means there aren’t many places to sit comfortably I spent a lot of time sitting at the desk and occasionally I will sit on the couch and watch some stuff on my computer screen but the couch isn’t the most comfortable Either most of all though I’m just ready to be back in my own home I still go usually about once a week to water my plants and hang out and watch sports or something but knowing that I have to drive back out to this house puts a

Damper on it makes it harder to relax at my apartment none of this is to say that I dislike it here it’s probably because I’ve been dealing with some other frustrations in my life at the moment and when that happens I want to go to where I can totally relax but this house

Isn’t that place for me simply because it’s not mine but I’m over halfway through the S and I’m determined to finish it well and a small thing that makes it a bit easier is when people come to hang out especially when there’s a game on and delicious food being shared Something else that I’m finding frustrating at the moment is my lack of progression and the goals I had set for myself while being here I’m over halfway through this experience and I don’t feel like I’ve gotten any better at playing the guitar or learning the Albanian language I do understand that both

Things are difficult and take time but I would have expected that spending time almost every day for the last 5 weeks would have yielded some kind of results I guess I shouldn’t be surprised surprised too often people want instant gratification or maybe not always instant but quick and I’m no

Different it’s taken a number of months of dedicated dieting to drop the weight up dropped it’s taken multiple years of time spent in the gym for me to feel like my body actually looks closer to what my goal is so it follows that learning a language and an instrument

Are similar and I knew that from the beginning it’s just a bit harder to accept when you’re in the middle of it and The Surge of motivation has worn Off and then one day about 2 weeks after submitting it my new residence permit was ready so I went back to cour to grab it this little piece of plastic that now allows me to legally reside in the country for as long as I choose it’s the

First step in the process of obtaining citizenship in this little country in the Balkans and then one weekend a friend of mine from work had to drive to Thessaloniki to pick up someone from the airport he asked if I wanted to go and stay overnight somewhere before swinging by the airport and coming back of course I said yes good morning puppies happy

Early morning how are you guys this excited every morning especially when it’s 5:30 so we it’s like people can tell what it is at least Partly Moment of Truth we find out we find out how busy the border is as soon as you cross the border from Albania to Greece so much changes the road opens up up to a big well-maintained Highway as you start coming down from the mountains making this drive soon after the sun had

Risen added so much to the beauty of the journey and we got to Thessaloniki after a few hours but the place I had found for us to stay was outside of the city so we just drove through and admired some of the sights from the car before

Stopping for lunch and a walk by the beach there’s a smell maybe it’s a bakery maybe it’s a restaurant I don’t know but there’s a little bit of like a you can smell the see a little bit and then just like a fresh I don’t know feels very Comfort Smell of I saw the longer stretch of sun over here okay yeah and then we headed to our accommodation for the night a beautiful little group of rooms perched on top of a cliff overlooking the bay with a view of thiki on the opposite Shore yeah exactly I don’t know if it’ll connect it’s Angel Bay 2 three this place this place is in Taken yeah this is crazy man H CH still feels nice though The that little thing that you can attach the camera to they even had their own private beach that we could relax at during the afternoon the water wasn’t cold ready but it wasn’t exactly warm either that wasn’t so bad no once you’re in it’s fine oh these rocks are kind of sharp

Though yeah And we spent the rest of the day on the beach and sitting on the hillside watching the light of the sun fade from the mountains in the distance as the lights of the city slowly illuminated and I think this is just what I needed some truly relaxing time away from my

Normal routine in the house it helped me recharge and be able to take on the last few weeks before the owner’s return and it made me realize that maybe it’s still a bit early to be concerned about what looks or feels like Autumn I really should be enjoying these

Moments that I’m in at that particular time rather than dwelling on something that I can’t control thanks for sticking with me I’ll be back Soon