1st day in Albania June 8th

It is my birthday today I’m already 41. I guess it should be time to settle and have family, but I’m not sure if I can stay on one place. The last few days have been very interesting and I felt very nice traveling and meeting people and I feel it is something I would like to do for next few years. So I got up around 9 and took my photo camera and went to the park. As I was taking pictures young guy asked me where I’m from. His English was very good so we started to talk. He told me that he just came from Greece, where he has been working illegally. He offered to show me Tirana and tell me hi story. We spent together almost 3 hours. He was telling me that he comes from a small place in north Albania and that he has 3 brothers and 2 sisters. Most of them are working abroad. He told me that to get a working visa for 1 year in Italy cost 3000 Euro. This is why most of Albanians work illegally. I told him that I need more oil for my car and we went to ask in a fish restaurant. They told us that they can give me 10 liters in the morning. I was planning to leave Tirana in the evening, but if I could get more oil I would stay one more night. He asked me if I could give him some money to go back to Greece. I have already invited him for lunch and I have told him that if he can find more oil that I will pay him 20c a litter. He went to ask in some restaurants and I went to internet café to update the website. He came back in one hour and told me that he could not find any oil. I gave him some money and he has left. At 3 I had appointment with my friend. He picked me up in the internet café and we went to the park to make the interview. He is a historian and he told me about the history of this interesting country. Since I could not get more oil I have decided to leave Tirana. I have set up my video camera and was taking pictures of the route. It was not very clear where to go. I tool some side route which was quite bad. There were many nice cars and a lot of gas stations and washing places. I also saw many new houses. I got a bit lost so I asked in some village how to get to the sea. Nobody could speak English but one guy offered to show me the way with his motorcycle. It was about 10 km. He ask me if I want to go for cafe in the gas station. He told me that he is married has 3 kids and that he was working abroad. Now he does not have any work, but he seemed quite happy and he insisted to pay for my juice and birthday desert. I was quite surprised how nice he was. I took a picture of on the motorcycle. He told me about a nice place called at he sea called Sjunghen. It was about 50 km and was quite easy to find. I parked my car close to the beach and went to look around for some nice place to stay over night. I found a nice place right on the beach. As I was leaving a police patrol stopped me and asked me where I’m from. They told me that I can stay at the perking lot at the restaurant on the beach. It was very noisy and I asked them If it is OK to park at the beach. They agreed and left. I parked my van and went for a walk on the beach. There was one restaurant with a loud music and large video projection but no people. I sow the police man in the restaurant and they invited me for a drink. One of them told me that he new Teplice – a Czech border town with Germany. They were very nice.