Visiting

Hands down, home visits are the favorite activity of our guests. It has been our privilege to go on many home visits during the past several days. Today we were in Darshen and it was a bit chilly but yet a beautiful sunny day for a January visit. The pictures taken were a mix of activities with a rare scene of one set of sisters making the raki (Albanian moonshine) for their family. We checked on the local livestock (David standing alongside the cow shed) and also I included a picture of today's children meeting time with Xhina telling the story of Abraham and Isaac. The last picture is of Genti and Shpresa modeling a traditional wedding costume. One of the ladies in Vlashi is starting a business of selling the traditonal costumes to brides of today that wish to celebrate their hertiage with a newly handmade wedding dress. (By the way, just the wedding dress sells for 350 Euros) It takes the seamstress about 2 weeks to make just the dress. If anyone is interested in buying one she is taking orders!

It's great to be back and visiting the work here in Albania. Since arriving on Thursday afternoon, we have been making arrangements to get some work projects in order. Hopefully, Monday we will begin work in Vlashi to reconstruct a drainage ditch to re-route the rain water that comes down from the hills behind the village. Joe and Judy Bachman from Roanoke, Illinois are visiting with us and Joe will oversee the construct that will take place. Today, Joe and Judy visited the English and computer classes. The weather has been great with the sun shining and temperatures in the mid 60's. Let's hope this continues still the project is completed.