Here in Kosovo convenience is not the goal for every facet of our lives. We have all of the essential modern conveniences like indoor plumbing, of course, and most of the extras like cars and wifi and even a few fast-food restaurants. However, compared to life in America, “convenience” is basically nonexistent. And that’s okay.
One word that I would use to describe life in America is “efficient”. Americans, in general, make very good use of their time. We order our coffees to-go and then hop in our cars and try to shave minutes off of our GPS’ estimated arrival time. We plan our schedules down to the minute, and anything that can be more convenient and efficient than what we were previously doing is an absolute must. We pick up groceries in the parking lot of the store, and let’s not even get started on our addiction to Amazon.
If it sounds like I’m ragging on fast-paced American culture, I’m not. These are just the things we do. It’s how we live, and I am in no way condemning it.
I have, however, come to know a new way of life since my move to Europe. We all know that life moves slower here, so that is not my main focus in this post. Rather than writing about the difference in the paces of life in Kosovo and America, I want to communicate a treasure I have found in the often frustrating lack of my comfortable American conveniences.
I have been thinking about this lately primarily because of an experience I had earlier this week. I take language lessons online via video call (a very modern convenience) with a woman from another city in Kosovo. I know her from when I lived in that city, and I did not want to change teachers when I moved back to Peja, my home here.
In order to pay my teacher, I cannot just whip out Venmo and send her the money every month. We don’t really do things like that here. I don’t think they are available, but even if they are, I don’t have a local bank so it would not work for me anyway.
Because of this, I am forced to go to Prishtina every month to meet in-person with my language teacher. It’s kind of a pain to go to Prishtina, since I don’t have my own car, so I am fairly confident that if I could pay Sabrije through my phone I would do it at least nine out of ten times. But that is simply not an option, so I figure it out. And we always have the most wonderful time. This week, I brought my friends and we all met together over coffee, then went to a thrift shop Sabrije knew of. We went to the mall and shopped and ate and had a special, fun night just for us girls.
Last time I went to Prishtina to pay Sabrije, I ended up at her house eating my favorite traditional Albanian food simply because she found out I liked it while we were ALREADY eating lunch out at a cafe.
My friendship with my language teacher would only be growing weaker rather than stronger if I were able to keep my interactions with her solely online. But because that’s not an option for me, I have been able to cultivate a close friendship. And I am so thankful!
I’m sure that if I thought through my life and experiences here, I would have plenty of more examples as to how I find unexpected upsides to things that seems annoying and inconvenient. I love my new home. I love so many things about it. But I can often find myself frustrated with the inefficiencies of the government systems, or the inconvenience of having to do things in *gasp* person(!!) that I am used to doing from the comfort of my own home. But I am finding freedom, too, in my inability to bow down to the god of Convenience.
Traveling Truly 