 The best library at the University of Tirana.
IV
Since my last update a couple days ago, a lot has happened. I
really feel like some progress has been made here in Albania.
Yesterday I started off with a meeting at the Embassy with two NGOs
who both have a desire to create orientation programs for incoming
college students. Universities in Albania offer absolutely nothing
to help new freshmen get a grasp on what college life is about.
They offer no help for students to know where to turn for
assistance, or even what is expected of them as students. The State
Department has provided some funds to a group here that produces a
small orientation booklet, and they want to make sure that this
organization is getting everything they need in the booklet. One of
the important dynamics for the diplomacy efforts from the US is to
make sure that all the parties with a stake in the process are
included, and there is also a student-led group affiliated with
George Soros's Open Society Foundation who produces a different
type of orientation book. Services like this cannot afford to be
duplicated, and competition is actually more detrimental than
helpful in some cases. The purpose of the meeting was to help
facilitate a partnership between the groups.
I'm not sure I made the difference in bringing the two groups
together, but since the group producing the packets was a
religiously affiliated organization and most of the student leaders
here seem to be atheists, I was in a position to leverage my
experiences as a student and share my faith to hopefully help some
folks reconcile, and ultimately accomplish what should be a simple
goal: produce an orientation booklet for students containing the
right information. You might think reaching consensus in the US
Senate is hard . . . these groups simply don't understand the
concept. Explaining how the students' information could simply be
added to the more established book, and that everyone would
benefit, was so much harder than you might imagine. Thankfully, we
left the meeting with smiles, and traded business cards (the
Albanians call business cards "visit cards"), and a commitment to
work together.
Later that day I led my most productive afternoon of training
with another college, and the students really grasped the concepts
I have been preaching about gaining credibility through service to
your fellow students. Often, my suggestions that they work to
improve textbook availability, clean up their facilities, and
organize teacher evaluations are unimportant when compared to the
massive corruption they face in their universities. While my heart
goes out to them for the reality they face, they’re very likely to
be punished or even failed out of school for challenging the staff
and administration, so I have been trying to help them see the
value of beginning small and addressing issues that will improve
the quality of life for their fellow students.
After all, student representation in Albania is THREE WEEKS old,
and they want to flip an entrenched culture of corruption and
hierarchy in a few short weeks. I respect their passion, and I
would probably have a bandana on my head and a megaphone in my hand
trying to start a revolution if I was a student here, but I know
that wouldn't serve them best right now. I'm trying to help them
develop a long-term strategy that will give them some credibility
and greater support from their own student body. Their responses at
this session were really great, and I felt like this might have
been the first group that collectively bought into some of the
strategies I struggled through with the interpreter. They asked
very complicated questions and furiously took notes.
Imagine 50 pairs of Albanian eyes transfixed on you, as you try
to explain an example from the movie Shawshank Redemption. I told
them about how in the movie Tim Robbins regularly writes the state
prison library begging for some books. In fact, he writes them for
years with no response, but all of a sudden a semi truck of books
shows up, and Robbins gets his library. It doesn't matter if he
only got the library to shut him up, it matters that he served his
fellow prisoners. I told them that sometimes you can get a response
because of persistence just as much as the validity of your
request. These students often feel like their universities are like
prisons (the facilities look like it), so this dumb little story
relayed well.
If nothing else, in a nation where nothing has really been that
"fair" for so long, I have to start somewhere with them. Selecting
a need such as books was a pretty good place to start. Who has a
full-fledged university in the capitol of a democratic nation with
no books in a library? That's ridiculous, and with a sister in law
who is a librarian, I have a greater-than-average appreciation for
libraries. Needless to say, I think the rector of their school will
be getting a few letters and petitions in the next week or so.
Ironically, his newly renovated palatial office suite sits directly
above a tiny library housing a couple hundred old books and lit
with a single dangling light bulb.
 A training session for arts and sciences students, University of Tirana.
It is funny to see how they eat things up like stories from
American movies. They told me that Arnold Schwarzenegger movies are
their absolute favorite, and although I haven't pulled any great
leadership metaphors from Kindergarten Cop or anything, I do try to
weave anything I can from American culture into the training. I
think my office mates in the Smith office should know that in the
last week, Albanians have come to believe that Ken Griffey Jr. is
the greatest baseball player in history, and that communism has
very deep roots at the University of Washington. I think Albanians
are quite wise in these regards, and of course I had nothing to do
with planting these seeds of knowledge in their heads.
Seriously, this work with students has been tough, but it’s
worth it. This session yesterday was one of the toughest, but most
rewarding, leadership experiences I have ever facilitated, and I
have great hope for the future here.
Last night after the training, I had time to meet with some
Albanian political guys I had been connected to through my
relationships with the National Prayer Breakfast. These two guys
(Dorian with the Socialist Integration Party and Gerti with the
more conservative party in power here in Albania) were actually
able to attend the prayer breakfast this year in DC and saw Bono's
speech, so we had even been in the same room just a few months ago.
Anyway, the American Embassy political guy met us there, and we
watched a great soccer match between Sweden and Paraguay. World Cup
soccer means a lot more when you look at it with the perspective
that Ivory Coast stopped a civil war just to root for their team.
You can't help but be interested, when it seems like everyone in
Albania is fired up about soccer. At night people just huddle
around TVs everywhere to watch the games.
Today I started my day with a meeting at one of the nicest
private universities in Albania. It's called the Universiteti UFO.
The place was absolutely beautiful, and it was the first school of
any kind that actually had swept floors, no broken glass, and
central air conditioning. They even had wiring for PowerPoint
presentations in their classrooms—the only time I have seen any
type of technology in the classroom in the whole country.
I've heard about many students in Albania who graduate from
college with technical degrees without ever having worked in a lab,
built a bridge, or dissected a cadaver. Needless to say, that's a
little disconcerting, and I was pleased to see that this school at
least had a dental lab with some fake teeth for the students to
look at. Believe it or not, there are students graduating in
Albania with nursing degrees who have never drawn someone's blood.
Scary.
Anyway, after meeting with the president of the school—they
offer nine degrees, but are best known as a dental school—I felt
much more educated about the process of higher education in
Albania.
One of the crazy dynamics I have been trying to put my finger on
is the seeming obsession they have with elections. The decades of
communist rule here have developed an addiction to exercising their
right to vote. It's good that they value that, but they still have
low voter turnout, and it results in a ridiculous repetition of
services. In a country of 3.2 million people, they need about four
universities to serve their students. They have 14. In a country
with an elected prime minister, president, parliament, and about
1,000 other positions, people can always shift blame.
Things quickly get messed up at a university where the president
is elected, as are the deans of the departments. The deans here
just ignore the decisions of the president and look to build power
in their own department. Everyone claims to be accountable to the
electorate, and nobody is placed in a position due to merit. It's
"campaign overload," and higher education is incredibly political.
The result is that the students wind up losing the most.
Tonight I just got back from a training they held for about six
remote schools who all came in to meet for the sessions at a hotel
outside of Tirana. It was so weird, but they put us in a room for
the training that they use for Albanian weddings. I was standing
there training students under an arch where the bride walks in for
the reception, and felt very strange. As usual, the Albanians took
their seats at the flowery tables and just whipped out their pens
and looked at me ready to write, as my translator repeated what I
had to say. I guess in a country where your dictator convinced
everyone that the United States was a weak country where people
were starving to death in the 1970s, they aren't really fazed by
some wedding decorations at a training session. I just began by
saying a little phrase I have heard my dad say many times, "We are
gathered here today…."
Tomorrow is a huge day, as I will witness the very first
election of the Albanian National Student Assembly and meet the
winners as they are announced. I'm also looking forward to a
meeting I have with the Albanian minister of defense, Fatmir Madur.
Fatmir is well connected to friends in Washington, DC through an
international prayer group and is one of the strongest US allies in
the Albanian prime minister's cabinet. These folks are extremely
proud that they have 85 marines fighting with our guys in Iraq, so
it will be interesting to discuss our faith and maybe even some
defense issues with Fatmir.
I am watching the ONE channel my TV gets in my hotel room, and I
must have gotten caught up watching this stupid Julia Roberts movie
. . . it's in Italian with Albanian subtitles. Of course, I have no
clue what either language means. The TV channel is in a different
language (never English) every time I turn it on. I'm holding out
for the NBA finals to come on, but I won't hold my breath.
I am missing home, but really learning a lot and meeting some
great people.
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