Plentiful was the coverage in the media about the elections there on June 28th, which are still being debated, but it's only this week that the new government will be confirmed for the next 4 years, after the usual summer lull and everybody's vacation. With more people traveling in Eastern Europe, many new articles about Albania are appearing on all sorts of online newspapers and magazines. The same can be said about blogs written by people experiencing the little country, so mysterious to many for so long.
The beauty of having good reports online is that their cross references are so easily accessible, just by clicking the 'enter' key, if one is curious enough to investigate further. A good example of this type of dispatching is a series of 3 articles by Nathan Thrall that just appeared on the Slate website, entitled "Albania, The Muslim World's Most Pro-American State".
Summertime is coming to an end, and I have not left NYC to go anywhere, not even for a long weekend. Since my return from Albania in June, I've been continuously busy for a variety of reasons, which kept me at home for the past 3 months, hosting a young relative (perfecting her English for 6 weeks in NY), catching up with my annual medical checkups (with all the way around ok results, thank goodness!), coping with the unfortunate 'demise' of my trusted desktop, and then with the installation and quirks of its newest replacement, which never ends to challenge and amaze me on a daily basis.
The cool, rainy July, was followed by a mostly hot, and humid August, but September has started, as usual, with glorious days of perfectly dry sunshine and comfortable temperatures. Recently I spent a lovely afternoon and evening visiting some Albanian friends that live in the city, close to an area in the downtown West side, along the Hudson river.
Until 10 years ago this used to be the old Meatpacking district, full of smelling slaughterhouses and low level brownstones, now all remodeled into fancy boutiques, cafes, block long underground Chelsea market, restaurants, bars and night clubs.
The old elevated railway that ran all along this area was kept and transformed into an elevated long garden that offers a beautiful respite from the chaotic traffic of the city streets, and allows great views of the Hudson river, and the New Jersey coastline.
The project, called the Highline, includes a new hotel built over the old elevated line, and the gardens are being expanded to cover additional blocks northward, along the river.
This whole area of NYC is right across from the spot where, in the river, we recently had the tragic air accident of loosing 9 lives in the crash of a small plane and a sightseeing helicopter.
As the sun was setting, we walked to a nearby Thai restaurant for a leisure and delectable dinner.
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