Where the Anger Remains

It is Tuesday afternoon, late October, and a few hundred people have gathered on Rruga e Durrësit in Tirana, the capital of Albania. They stand around in small groups, talking and smoking. Some are waving the Albanian flag. Every now and then, someone starts a chant. As a visitor who has stumbled upon the gathering by chance, I find the scene remarkably peaceful. The only reminders that the protests have not always been this way are three rubbish bins, apparently set alight out of habit and the façade of the Ministry of Education. It is against this façade that the anger of many Albanians has erupted – anger that has specifically Albanian roots on the one hand, but is also part of a broader European context, and for which Germany has long lacked any sustainable form of public expression.