If you’re familiar with Japanese literature, I’m sure you’ve noticed how more often than not, the sea is a constant, overlapping with the characters and their emotions. The sea and the land, in harmony, forming a strange analogy, to both the main character, and you, the reader.
Today, as I woke up from the sun shining bright (which is unusual here in Poland), I instantly started reminiscing about the south of Albania. I can confidently say that for most people back home, that is not just a destination, it’s the destination.
The coast is surrounded by stark mountains, where alluring olden villages are gracefully embedded on the side, overlooking the sea from afar. These ancient settlements are housed by simple, yet, heartwarming people. They grow olive trees, they fish, they make their own wine, the holy trinity of every southerner. Sitting in a garden of one of these villages on a late afternoon and just watching the sun go over the horizon, words can not do it justice.
You can swim to coasts where you can’t go by foot, you can swim inside caves hidden between the rocks, eroded for millennia by the ravishing sea, or just dive down and explore the sea floor. But what image comes to me much more vividly than any other, is how the sunlight morphs with the water once you are underwater.
Even now, thinking back, it feels like I can hear the sea, the calling of the depths, which is music to my ears.
– Hansi Brahimasi
Volunteers in FRSP 