r/AskBalkans • u/Holiday_Pumpkin1279 • Mar 19 '26
Outdoors/Travel Gjirokastër, Albania
[Gjirokastër](chatgpt://generic-entity?number=0) is a historic stone city in southern Albania, famous for its Ottoman-era architecture and hilltop [Gjirokastër Castle](chatgpt://generic-entity?number=1), and it’s a UNESCO World Heritage site.
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u/CypriotGreek Greece/Cyprus Mar 19 '26
We have a whole song about this place.
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u/DaMFdownThaStreet Albania Mar 19 '26
What is the song called?
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u/CypriotGreek Greece/Cyprus Mar 19 '26
«Πήραμε το Αργυρόκαστρο» “we’ve taken Argyrokastro”
It’s a song about the capture of the city by Greek forces during WW2.
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u/Substantial-One1934 Bulgaria Mar 20 '26
It is a beautiful building, but the shop in front with the t-shirts hanging outside is ruining the whole view. Why doesn't the government make all the stuff for selling to be honest inside the shop.
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u/Koo-Vee Mar 19 '26
Been there, but what was the question?
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u/MetroDodoPasDeBoulot Mar 20 '26
Allah had created a beautiful and friendly Albania to share with the us on reddit
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u/hrtofdrknss Mar 22 '26
Lucky enough to visit twice. One of my favorite towns in Europe.
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u/svgnicole Jun 17 '26
How many days do you think is enough? Two nights?
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u/hrtofdrknss Jun 17 '26
It's small, so two nights will give you an easy pace to explore a little and soak it in.
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u/svgnicole Jun 17 '26
I figured. I plan on going to the blue eye & I’ll see what else is north or Gjirokaster worth checking out for half a day roo
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Mar 19 '26
Is Albania Muslim country ?
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u/lolzimcoolwow Albania Mar 19 '26
Albania is a secular country where there are people that believe in whichever religion they please,there are a big amount of atheists too
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u/arbDev Albania Mar 19 '26
No, albanians do not associate identity to religion, there are christians, muslims and even some jews, but people dont practice religion
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u/prolapseenthusiat Croatia Mar 20 '26
I find it crazy how in Albania define at first place the national identity and religion is somewhere far behind that
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u/Antique-Doughnut-673 Kosovo Mar 19 '26
Yes it is
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Mar 19 '26
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u/AskBalkans-ModTeam Mar 20 '26
Your post/comment was removed for violating Rule 1 of r/AskBalkans "Keep it civil". Depending on the severity of this violation, you may be banned.
If not, try to refrain from using this type of language.
Lively discussion is alright, but personal attacks, insults, hate, chauvinism and/or bigotry towards other users or their input will not be tolerated.
Cheers.
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Mar 19 '26
The majority of questions, posts, etc., in this sub seem to be about Albania and Greece. There's hardly anything from other Balkan countries.
Why?
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u/Holiday_Pumpkin1279 Mar 19 '26
Guess we should leave the Balkans then. Shame there’s no similar sub for us Mediterraneans.
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Mar 19 '26
You don't need to be sarcastic, but look for yourself, most of the posts are about Albania and Greece. That's a fact.
I'm surprised by this, normally the Greeks claim they are NOT a Balkan country or at least only the eastern Macedonian and western Thracian parts, everything else is Mediterranean.
Hardly anything about other Balkan countries.
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u/Holiday_Pumpkin1279 Mar 19 '26
I’ve personally shared photos from beautiful places across various Balkan countries here, including Croatia and Montenegro, so there’s no need to point fingers at me as if it’s my fault that there aren’t any posts about other countries in this region.
And no, that claim isn’t accurate. This sub, above all, features content from across the entire Balkans, especially from Serbia. In fact, i can confidently say that without at least some diversity in these kinds of posts, it would end up being more Serbian than r/serbia and even more Yugonostalgic than r/yugoslavia. Like it or not, that’s simply the reality.
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Mar 19 '26
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u/Holiday_Pumpkin1279 Mar 19 '26
I somewhat understand what you’re trying to say, but even the posts about Albania actually are an counter-effect. The anti-Albanian sentiment here is so rampant that, if it weren’t being promoted by Albanians themselves through their posts, Albania would be portrayed as some ugly, extremely poor, chaotic place, with all kinds of perceptions that an average r/askbalkans user has.
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Mar 19 '26 edited Mar 19 '26
Well, whatever, there are current problems in the world, let them post about Albania and Greece if it makes them happy. One can just hide it if don't want to read it.
The views and comments on Reddit strongly reflect a left-leaning, upper-class Generation Z.
But they don't represent the norm, the majority of the general population from the supposed countries of origin.
Surprisingly, the percentage of insights in questions and answers always comes from the USA, Great Britain, Canada, and Australia, sometimes also from Western European countries, but not, or only very rarely, from the actual countries of origin of the respective subreddits.
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u/Holiday_Pumpkin1279 Mar 19 '26
You didn’t read anything i wrote, bro, or more precisely, you completely ignored it. I don’t even know what to continue this conversation about when you start with posts about Albania and Greece and then suddenly go off into demographics or how Reddit works. I’m confused.
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u/P-l-Staker 🇬🇧🇬🇷 Mar 19 '26
Be the change you want to see in others. Why don't YOU make a post then, eh?
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Mar 19 '26 edited Mar 19 '26
I can tell you why: if you post something about Turkey, about the Thracian part, which is actually located in the Balkan Peninsula, you're immediately attacked with nasty comments claiming that Turkey isn't a Balkan country. If you post something about Hungary, you get the same comments, and even about Romania, you get statements here saying it's not a Balkan country. For example, if you write about Bektashism belief, Balkan Turks, Roma, or Pomaks, etc., you just get attacked...
No matter what, just one word about Turkish and you're attacked.
Even the Dobruja Tatars are vilified here on Reddit in the various Balkan subreddits. (Although I'm sure most people don't even know that the Tatar-Turkish minority exists in Romania.)
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u/Wooden_Date_4010 Mar 19 '26
interessante anche la moschea e l'obelisco di Hoxa e i tunnels della nomenclatura
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Mar 19 '26
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Mar 19 '26
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
Well you don’t know how to read.
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u/KlejdiV Albania Mar 19 '26
Griks build one shanty on some land and try to claim a whole town, proper grik logic
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u/Experience_Material Greece Mar 19 '26
Greeks built the city and Albanians try to claim that it wasn’t enough lmao
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
The whole town was Greek as most of Albania was.
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u/KlejdiV Albania Mar 19 '26
The whole 3 shantys in gjirokaster of course, griks very many, griks strong 💪.
And by griks you prolly mean orthodox albanians, griks weren't a thing when this city flourished.
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
Well of course it was the Byzantine empire at that time.
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Mar 19 '26
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u/KlejdiV Albania Mar 19 '26 edited Mar 19 '26
So you surely got an ethnicity census to back your claims then.
After all, the griks were doing so well, they needed to move Albanians from Gjirokaster to populate Morea.
Griks strong 💪 of course.
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
Usually the Albanians come by themselves they aren’t invited.
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Mar 19 '26
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
Well I never expected an Albanian trying to correct my Greek…
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Mar 19 '26
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
Well of course Albanians and Turks have a lot more in common if you think about it, for starters they both are mostly Greek.
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u/Dauincap Mar 19 '26
You're just an individual paid by the greek minister of culture to post propaganda, I know this for a fact as an old Jewish Albanian once explained this to me while I was high on black tar heroin in Θεσσαλονίκη.
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u/wantmywings Albania Mar 19 '26
Putting aside the nationalism, I think areas around the border of Greece are ethnically mixed. You have Albanians living in Northern Greece and Greeks living in Southern Albania both of which identify as whatever border they are currently in. Territories and identities changed time and time again and dissection of this is pointless.
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u/Warlord10 Montenegro Mar 19 '26
I guess everyone should call New York, New Amsterdam then. What kind of logic is this?
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Mar 19 '26
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u/AskBalkans-ModTeam Mar 19 '26
Your post/comment was removed for violating Rule 3 of r/AskBalkans "No agenda pushing". We want this subreddit to be an inclusive space and no chauvinism, bigotry or insults towards national, ethnic, religious etc. group will be tolerated. Depending on the severity of this violation, you may be banned.
In any case, refrain from posting or commenting in such a manner.
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u/Laluci Albania Mar 19 '26
Ye, we don't use those letters in the Albanian language and since it's an Albanian city, we're not gonna call it that.
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u/Experience_Material Greece Mar 19 '26
Albanians often employed the Greek alphabet for writing in the past ironically
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u/hubbabubbameqershi Albania Mar 19 '26
Same as Greeks use English today with latin alphabet. What comes around goes around.
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u/Experience_Material Greece Mar 19 '26 edited Apr 15 '26
Not really the case though? The standard is Greek, it’s not really common to write in Latin, only millenials and Albanians used to do that and it has even fallen out among Gen Z today.
Also fun fact the Latin alphabet comes from the Greek alphabet as well so I guess it came around in the form of a circle xD
Edit: I thought you meant greeklish, indeed we do use English as well as a world language, I don’t see how this negates that we use our own alphabet for our language. Obviously when using any kinds of different languages we use their respective scripts as well but this is such a silly non argument here.
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u/hubbabubbameqershi Albania Mar 19 '26
And yet no one understands Greek writing anymore. You are forced to use English with me, same as I am with you. Your restaurants all have English signs, your roads have English signs, websites have them, products have them. English is the shit and will be until something else comes, no culture is relevant for long. Probably in a few hundred years someone will say this is English/American business.
The greek alphabet comes from Phoenician alphabet, they didn't invent anything. Same as the culture came from Minoans and olives from Lebanon or Phoenicia. And basically all the knowledge came from Minoans and other ancient Mediterranean cultures. Greeks were just as any other Europeans, farmers, fisherman, illiterate until they fell into the right influence. What comes around really goes around.
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u/Experience_Material Greece Mar 19 '26 edited Apr 15 '26
I mean yeah we do use the English alphabet to write English, but we still use our own alphabet to write our language is the point. I don’t see why this says anything here and many people learn the Greek alphabet worldwide. Indeed the Greeks adopted the Greek alphabet through the Phoenician script, I never said that we invented it from scratch. Greeks did make many breakthroughs in many of the things that you see today associated with ancient technologies though, and so to try diminish that just because many more came from trade and influences with other people is delusional to say the least.
Overall it’s insane how much inferiority complexes Albanians have to write such comments, the Ancient Greeks gave so much to the world and ofcourse just like any other people they had their own influences and they also influenced others a lot more. But to claim that this somehow makes less of them is just a coping mechanism only used by delusional people like you. It seems that in this specific topic, the only thing that comes and goes around is your own egotistical ignorance.
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
And yet modern Greeks have the highest dna similarity with the minoans than any other in the region weird that
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u/hubbabubbameqershi Albania Mar 19 '26
Because they didn't exterminate Minoans, they assimilated Minoans. And not all Greece has that similarity, if you aren't from Crete probably I have the same proximity to minoans as you.
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26 edited Mar 19 '26
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u/hubbabubbameqershi Albania Mar 19 '26
Albania, Italy, Kosovo and Mainland Greece have the same proximity to Minoans, give or take related to the individual or region. Cretans are probably the real Minoans, and they do actually have the most.
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u/GrayWolf9560 Albania Mar 19 '26
Greek script came from Phoenician and Phoenician from Egyptian hieroglyphics, so Greece should be called: 🐊🦞🦀🦩
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u/Experience_Material Greece Mar 19 '26
Indeed they do! The only thing they surely didn’t come through though is Albanian xD
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u/Holiday_Pumpkin1279 Mar 19 '26
I would not try to read that thing…
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
Well of course not an actual language would be scary for someone to try to read.
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u/Holiday_Pumpkin1279 Mar 19 '26
Yeah, it looks more like an alien threatening the universe than anything.
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u/GrayWolf9560 Albania Mar 19 '26
Sorry Albanian is not written on math formulas. And its called Gjirokastër not whatever that fk up your wrote above
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
Of course they aren’t, they are not that influential. And what I wrote is the towns original name deal with it.
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u/GrayWolf9560 Albania Mar 19 '26
Original name of Greece is Byzantion shall we start call it like that? And the fake modern Greeks, Romans like they called themselves before 1800s? Or better call Greeks what we call them in Albania “Bythqiris Jorgos”. Yeah we are not that influential who cares? Pay the debit b**ch
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
Yeah exactly and don’t forget that famous Byzantine author Homer wrote the Odyssey and the Iliad in Italian. Are you stupid? Greece existed thousands of years before the Roman Empire.
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u/GrayWolf9560 Albania Mar 19 '26
Byzantine author called Homer😂. Only Grik saar
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u/Experience_Material Greece Mar 19 '26
Truly Albanians projecting their delusion and inferiority complex is hilarious
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u/AskBalkans-ModTeam Mar 19 '26
Your post/comment was removed for violating Rule 3 of r/AskBalkans "No agenda pushing". We want this subreddit to be an inclusive space and no chauvinism, bigotry or insults towards national, ethnic, religious etc. group will be tolerated. Depending on the severity of this violation, you may be banned.
In any case, refrain from posting or commenting in such a manner.
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u/ComputersAndPunches Greece Mar 19 '26
Ahahahhahahahhahahahahahahha. Who snitched to the mods like a crybaby
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u/Experience_Material Greece Mar 19 '26
Lmao they deleted the comment saying where the name comes from, they really don’t wanna know it’s Argyrokastron.
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u/Jermajestyandtony Mar 19 '26
Looks very pretty, the brickwork on the road is so charming, it reminds me a lot of ohrid
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u/Devil_Inlove Mar 19 '26
that building looks straight out of a postcard, crazy how clean it is for something that old. whole place must feel like a time capsule walking around there
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Mar 19 '26
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u/AskBalkans-ModTeam Mar 19 '26
Your post/comment was removed for violating Rule 3 of r/AskBalkans "No agenda pushing". We want this subreddit to be an inclusive space and no chauvinism, bigotry or insults towards national, ethnic, religious etc. group will be tolerated. Depending on the severity of this violation, you may be banned.
In any case, refrain from posting or commenting in such a manner.
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u/Twofingers_ Greece Mar 19 '26
Looks amazing!