What Albania’s Protesters Want Travelers to Understand

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Perhaps the most relatable thing Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner ever did was to marvel at the unspoiled beauty of Albania and wonder, “How is it possible that not everyone is here right now?” But where most people would then text their friends or maybe post on social media, President Trump’s son-in-law gathered a group of investors to buy an uninhabited island. That the former military base sat within an environmentally protected area was a non-issue for them, thanks to recent laws granting foreign-backed luxury tourism investments special exemptions.

In May, when fences went up on the fragile wetlands and bulldozers arrived on Sazan Island, residents of the nearby town of Zvërnec in the south of Albania protested, using one of the region’s beloved species as their symbol. “The Flamingo Revolution” quickly spread to the capital, where the nightly, peaceful demonstrations in Tirana are now in their third month. The pictures and cutouts of the symbolic birds stand tall, bright, and pink, as signs declare “Albania is not for sale,” the simplest distillation of the protestors’ demands.

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That’s not to say that Albanians don’t want tourism, nor investment in tourism—but politically engaged locals are advocating for a future in which major government decisions are done with transparency and an aim to benefit Albanians. Below, we cover how the protests reached this point, how they have evolved, and what this means for responsible travelers—whom Albanians do hope will continue visiting.

From a dark history to a bright future

Albania sits just across the Adriatic from Italy, and it shares a southern border and Mediterranean climate with Greece. But unlike its neighbors with a century of modern tourism under their belts, Albania took its first steps into that particular arena within the last decade. The number of foreigners visiting Albania has more than doubled in the last 5 years and tripled in the last 10, now welcoming 12.5 million visitors a year—a hefty load for a country of just 2.3 million and shrinking (mostly due to economic migration). Following World War II, the country spent 45 years completely isolated from the rest of the world and at the whim of a severe and vicious communist dictatorship. In the 1990s, it suffered extreme poverty and violent civil unrest; it remains Europe’s sixth-poorest country.

It is, however, rich in pristine sandy beaches, impressively blue water, and sky-kissing peaks—all of which frequently go viral on social media. But those who travel in the country often come back in awe of something less easily captured on an iPhone: the hospitality of the people.

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There’s almost no petty crime or pickpocketing, and the most likely things for a traveler to be a victim of are random acts of generosity. Outside a few crowded beach hotspots in high season, Albania remains the kind of place travelers dream of, where they can stumble into a small town, stay at a guesthouse that costs less than lunch in Venice, and probably field at least two dinner invitations from total strangers. Where one can look out from lonely hiking paths high above the glassy spring turquoise of Komani Lake and—like Kushner—wonder why every tourist in the world is not beelining there.

The sale of this pristine nature, in opaque deals and with little of that money making its way to the people who form the country’s greatest asset, makes the protests vital to Albanians and to anyone who has traveled there. Or might someday. Or who simply cares about the rights of people to determine their future and that of their land, particularly in a country where those freedoms have been restricted in the past.

A uniting cause

“If it was not Jared, they would not give a shit about what is happening in Albania,” Albania’s fourth-term prime Minister and leader of the Socialist Party Edi Rama told Politico in June, framing the protests as anti-Trump. (He has also variously insinuated they are stoked by social media disinformation, Iran, antisemitism—the Kushners are Jewish—and Serbian propaganda.)

Protesters would argue otherwise. Though the current protests were sparked by the Kushner’s access to advantages from the Albanian government, the Sazan Island incident was a greater representation of Rama’s many dubious dealings. At their core, these are anti-government protests, and the end goal is for prime minister Edi Rama to resign.

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There’s no single person or organization behind the protests—it’s supported by environmental activists, anti-corruption groups, and individual citizens, with a heavy presence of young adults. “Everyone just goes. We have a place, and we have a time, and we all go,” says Linda Alia, founder of Tirana-based Albanian Food Tours. She sometimes brings guests to the peaceful protests at the end of city walking tours, especially if they seem curious about what’s happening. “Everyone is there, there’s old people, there’s young couples with children, there’s stations where children can actually paint, there’s all types of people,” she says.

It’s not that the protesters are against tourism and development, either. “We actually want people to come and to invest in our economy,” says Alia. Plenty of good developments have come to Albania in recent years and have made positive impacts on the tourism industry, like new roads and airport expansions that brought new airlines and more direct flights.

But with the good has come the bad. “All of our politicians are corrupt,” Alia continues. “There’s all this money coming in, and we don’t know where it’s coming from. And in the end, there’s huge inflation.”

Albanians have seen this type of development before, Alia notes, pointing to a region called the Green Coast, along the country’s southern coast near Dhërmi. “It used to be a beautiful area, now it’s full of private villas and resorts that none of the locals can actually go to.”

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Tourism on Albanians’ terms

At 10-year-old Restaurant Roshniku, just outside the UNESCO World Heritage city of Berat, manager Ardit Fiska says that, when it comes to tourism investments, “the thing that would help us is infrastructure” noting the lack of trains and difficulties of driving in Albania (traffic, roads, other drivers).

Five years ago, his family expanded their winery into the first certified agro-tourism operation in Albania, meaning that those coming to taste wine or take cooking classes had a place to stay. Now, guests learn to make flaky byrek in the wood-fired brick oven and sit down to abundant meals featuring an array of local cheeses, and—if they happen to luck into the spring season—crisp-skinned, silkily tender, roasted goat, before staying for the night. “Every year we are adding new rooms, and the village people here, they are turning their houses into guesthouses,” says Fiska. “We hope not to grow so much, to stay like this, growing slowly.”

When guests ask about the protests, he says he doesn’t have much to add to the conversation, since he isn’t in Tirana. Though the issue is national, in his small mountain village the movement feels far away and hasn’t impacted his guests’ travel plans. It’s the case for many outside the capital (and even those within Tirana say the protests haven’t impacted visitors’ experiences). Their businesses haven’t slowed down, and he urges visitors to continue with their travel plans. “Go to rural places,” he recommends. “Stay one more day in the village. That will be the best experience because it will be the real Albanian hospitality.”

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What’s next for Albania

The things that make visiting Albania so wonderful—jaw-dropping scenery and that every restaurateur and hotelier foists their father’s homemade raki (grape brandy) on everyone, immediately—remain firmly in place. Even better, the streets of Tirana fill each night with masses peacefully announcing to their government and to the world that they want it to stay that way.

Prime Minister Rama refuses to step down, but even if he did, there’s little hope that what would follow would be an improvement. But there are other signs of hope, say protestors.

That so many people are out and protesting has been a buoying sign for many in a country where corruption has long been accepted as part of life—and fighting it has been futile. “Maybe with a lot of work and being vocal and putting the words out there and showing up every day, then there might be a change,” says Alia. “Maybe not in this exact case, but at least in the future that they might be a bit more transparent, or [that corruption and backdoor dealings] will not be done so blatantly.”