A personal story from post-war Albania that shows how humanitarian mine action enables safety, development, and the possibility of home
A Door Opens, a Home Begins
In those years we lived like students with a family. One bedroom, a little corridor around a bed, a small window, a couch pushed to a corner, our son sleeping with our baby daughter, Ela, who was just months old. I tried to keep the work at the office and the field, not at home, so I had never told John Anderson much about how we lived. One day we returned from the north and John said, I want to visit your family, I want to see Rudina and the kids. I was nervous. He walked in and stopped at the door of that room, and he saw everything at once, the bed, the cot, the window, the life of a young officer in a poor country. He said nothing then. In the evening, he invited us to dinner with Todd and some other military friends. After I walked him back to his hotel he said, Beni, you changed my life, his voice had passion in it, but he did not explain why. The next day he came with a small machine, a heater, and he said, put it by the bed for the children. It is a gift we keep to this day.
Kosovo War, 1998 – 1999
He was kind, but he did not let kindness break rules. Once we were in a bunker while the Serbs fired heavy shells across the line. The noise was like thunder, and our friend Todd from the US Navy side put a satellite phone in my hand and said, call Rudina quick before John comes back. I called the neighbor and asked for Rudina and told her I was at a hotel, and everything was ok. She said, do not lie, I can hear it in your voice, just take care. John came over and saw the phone and anger came to his face like a flash, and he said, never again, these are not toys, and he was right. He was my friend, and he protected me from my own impulse more than once.
Clearing the Ground for a Home
The first apartment we own is the one we live in still. The way we got it is a story with luck and pride and a little fight. A developer was digging the foundation for a new building and needed clearance on his land. Someone told him to call Beni, saying I could help. Back then, a lot of people had souvenirs from the war, grenades and guns which were stored and forgotten about in old basements. I went with my colleague and a detector, checked and cleared what was there and let them dig the land safely. I got talking with the developer and he asked me where I lived, I said I was renting nearby, and he asked why I had not bought a house yet, I laughed, on a government salary back then, even rent was difficult. He told me about mortgages, about deposits and the modern process of home ownership. I was nervous, but excited by the opportunity. So, we borrowed 12,000 euro from Rudina’s parents, a huge pile of cash in a bag. She arrived with my uncle, a bus driver, to keep her safe. The developer gave me a handwritten receipt that said he’d received our deposit, and I kept it in my pocket for safe keeping. I was very nervous.
Prices were rising, paperwork was slow, but after several months the developer called me to the property office and we signed, and I finally held the paper that said the apartment was ours. The first time I saw the mortgage money was at the cash machine. We were on our way to the coast with the children and I stopped at a mall to take out the last 38 euro we had for the weekend. I put in the card and stared in amazement at the screen filled with zeros. I looked around to see who was watching me. I printed the statement. 52,000 euro! I withdrew 150 euro to test it, my hands were shaking, and I went back to the car with my eyes wide. Rudina said, what is it, and I said, the bank made a mistake, and she said, it is not a mistake, it is our mortgage, do not spend it, we need to give it to the house! On Monday we went with the developer and made the transfer. My account was back to 38 euro.
We moved into bare rooms and slept for months on a mattress given to us by a friend who managed a hotel. We needed more furniture and there was a local shop where the owners saw us coming repeatedly, trying to decide what we could afford. The woman recognized Rudina, and we started up a conversation. We explained that we didn’t have enough money to furnish our whole home, but she spoke to her husband, and they told us, take what you need, give us copies of your identity cards, pay us every month without interest. They trusted us because that is what good people did back then. Years later we replaced those things with new items, and we gave the old couch to my parents. When I visit them, I still see it there with a blanket over the arm and I feel proud of how we all helped each other.
This chapter tells one story of what safety makes possible. Explore the other stories of humanitarian mine action in Albania.