[Apr. 2024] On the second day in Gjirokaster, Albania, we gathered at 8:15 and went to the Ethnographic Museum first.
It is very close to the House of Skenduli, a traditional house that we visited the day before.
The day before, our guide, Giorgio, said something like “I don’t like that museum,” so I thought we wouldn’t go.
The museum building is also in the shape of a traditional house, but it was more orderly than the house we visited the day before.
There are various exhibits in each room.
I thought Giorgio said that the reason he “doesn’t like it” was because “this is not the original house, but a restored replica,” but according to the guidebook, this building was originally Envar Hoxha’s house.
Maybe that’s why he doesn’t like it.
Speaking of Hoxha, he was a dictator who built communism in this country in one generation, and then decided to close the country and purged many people.
Albania only opened up in the early 1990s, after his death in 1985, so Hoxha may have been a nasty guy to Giorgio, who is in his late 40s.
The reason why this museum building is a restoration and not the original is simply because the original was burned down in a fire.
There were some very nice kilims spread out here and there.
If they sold things like this, I would buy them.
It must be an antique.
There was a round table in the middle of a room, and according to Giorgio, men gathered and danced on this table during wedding parties.
We also saw a pan used to cook rice balls (as Giorgio called them, but it was probably a traditional dish called Qifqi).
It was a pan with a few round moulds where batter filled with rice is poured.
And according to Giorgio, this shape saves oil.
We were told that not only the family whose traditional house we had visited the previous day, but the people of this town are known for being thrifty.
There are locals with that reputation all over the world, like Genoa in Italy or Scotland.
In the room lined with national costumes, there was one that looked very similar to the costumes of Greek guards.
Some say that it is an Albanian original apparently.
When this skirt is spread out, it is said to be as long as 30 metres.
There were also shoes with pompoms on display.
