Not hardly. My grandfather was Greek Orthodox. The government destroyed or re-tasked all places of worship starting in the late 1940s, so I doubt that my relatives had any religious affiliation.
As for my grandfather, the area where he is from was a real melting pot of religions and cultures at the time he was growing up (early 1900s) consisting of Christians (Greeks and Macedonians) and Muslims (Turks) as well as a smattering of others, including Jews. I always recall him telling jokes about the Macedonians, as if they were the Polacks of the area.... When I was a young teenager and dabbling in electronics I built him a shortwave receiver from a Heathkit. Set up the antenna and everything. He would often spend his evenings listening to broadcasts from Albania and other Eastern Bloc countries, as he spoke and wrote in a number of their languages. Dan Sent from my iPad > On Jun 3, 2014, at 2:52 AM, "arche...@embarqmail.com" > <arche...@embarqmail.com> wrote: > > Your Albanian relative are Sunni Muslim, then? > During the 1970s I could pick up Radio Tirana on my shortwave when no other > European stations were accessible except those with repeaters in the West > Indies. The same lady announcer would read the news every time, and she > sounded like the grim reaper. She was not a good cheerleader for communism. > Gerry > >> On 6/2/2014 10:13 PM, Dan Penoff wrote: >> Albania was probably the country who came the closest to pure socialism in >> its day. >> >> My grandfather would get letter from my cousins which inferred that we were >> all rich beyond belief and the streets were paved with gold, so to speak. >> The things they told the people about the West were really outrageous, at >> least from what we could see. >> >> One of the last letters I saw from them before the government collapsed and >> the Hoxhaist state was more or less dismantled had them asking for several >> thousand dollars so they could buy motorbikes for everyone in the family to >> help them to be able to get around. >> >> This was in the early 1980s, I recall. >> >> In 1966 or 67, I traveled with my Dad to NYC to visit the Albanian >> representatives at the UN. We had gotten word that one of the relatives was >> very sick, and my grandfather wanted my Dad to travel to Albania to deliver >> medicine to the family under the auspices of a Red Cross visit. I recall >> the men from the consul or whatever the diplomatic entity they were being >> very skeptical and not so nice. They would, however, grant my father and >> any other member of our family a visa to enter the country if we liked. >> >> The next day we took the train down to D.C. where we met with some people >> from the State Department. I remember was the State Department person >> telling us that we were welcome to go to Albania if they issued a visa, but >> once we crossed their border we would, for all intents and purposes, vanish >> off the face of the Earth, as the US had no diplomatic relations with the >> country. >> >> Needless to say, my Dad said "The hell with it!" and more or less told my >> grandfather they wouldn't let us in the country. >> >> Dan >> >> >> >> >>> On Jun 2, 2014, at 5:37 PM, Randy Bennell wrote: >>> >>> Just like in Washington DC (and probably Ottawa too). >>> >>> >>> >>>> On 02/06/2014 4:12 PM, Andrew Strasfogel wrote: >>>> Commie socialist capitalists? >>>> >>>> >>>> On Mon, Jun 2, 2014 at 3:58 PM, Rich Thomas < >>>> richthomas79td...@constructivity.net> wrote: _______________________________________ http://www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com All posts are the result of individual contributors and as such, those individuals are responsible for the content of the post. The list owner has no control over the content of the messages of each contributor.
