And then a small and sturdy man walked up to me. He spoke in thickly accented English: “I heard you’re looking for me.”
“Are you Bekim?” I asked.
“Yeah. Sal tell me you’re traveling with your bike. You had some problems or what?”
Major problems, I thought to myself, and then I remembered all the stories I had heard so far along my journey—my sea mates being separated for months and years from their loved ones, the young fencer whose father had just died, the story of Edis and his family’s sacrifice for their people. Maybe my problems weren’t so major after all.
“I’ve basically run out of gas, and I’m on reserve. You’re like an angel. I’m serious. I’ve been sitting here so long . . .”
Bekim smiled sheepishly. Shrugging his shoulders, he offered me gas and a place to stay. I had no hesitation in hugging this random Montenegrin man. Joy sometimes does that to me. I wasn’t all that surprised to learn that Montenegrin farmers aren’t big on hugs. Vodka, yes. Hugs, no.
We drove to Bekim’s farm, where I met his whole family. Bekim showed me around his land as he explained, “I am a farmer. My father was farmer. For thousand years, we farm this land.”
At first, I didn’t believe him, or thought the number was lost in translation. “A thousand years? Are you sure?”
Bekim looked at me as though I had just questioned the color of the sky. “Yes,” he explained. “A thousand years, twenty generations, my family work this land. It is ours. And we, how you say, we belong to it.”
Well, talk about permanence. Wars had been fought, conquerors had come and gone, the world had changed, and here Bekim’s people remained on the same land through it all.
As Bekim explained to me, his family only had one main source of income: their lone dairy cow. A thousand years of farming this land, and it was barely giving them enough to survive.
Bekim and I sat in his yard, looking out at his field as he explained what the land meant to them, even if he had to work in a local restaurant to make ends meet. “We are connected with this land like blood and meat together, you know?” Bekim explained. “You understand, like we are born over here; we are grown over here; and we die over here. We can’t live without it.”
“I can feel that,” I told him. “You know, in the Western world we all live with our iPhones, with computers, with Facebook, with Twitter.”
“No, it all over here also.”
“Really?” I asked, almost forgetting that Bekim was my peer. In fact, he was even younger than I, and yet in many ways, he felt like he had been a part of this land since its beginning.
“Yeah, but not like the other places,” he assured me. “We don’t have time for it every day. We have to work our land, and at night when we go home we are tired, very tired, and we have to rest and sleep. We don’t have time for computers.”
Together, we looked back out at the land—how much history had passed over it, from kings and queens to Soviet troops and Bosnian rebels, to MTV and the iPhone. Years ago in London, I came across a preserved building from World War II near Farringdon Station. Its walls were in ruins, the roof long gone, yet life teemed around it. People were heading to work. Children were walking with their parents. History changes, but the routines of our lives remain the same.
Eventually we headed back into the house, and as the sun went down, I fell quickly to sleep, overwhelmed by the ghosts of history and another hard day on the farm.
After breakfast the next morning, I convened a small family meeting. Bekim sat in the middle of his couch with his wife next to him. His father sat on another chair, and his mother sat close by. And I stood awkwardly in front of them like an actor about to give the worst performance of his life.
As I explained my trip, Bekim translated for his family. They all nodded as I thanked them for their kindness, and then I took what seemed a dangerously long and deep breath before adding . . .
“I would like to buy you a cow.”
Bekim didn’t say anything at first. And then he finally translated it to the rest of the family. Suddenly, the whole group began to cry out, “Kráva! Kráva!”
I couldn’t tell if they were happy or if “kráva” was an ancient war chant, but then Bekim got up. With tears in his eyes, he walked toward me and hugged me. And he didn’t let go. His family was still crying out, “kráva,” behind him, and this time, I was the one being nearly bowled over by another’s gratitude.
Finally, he explained, “Buying us a cow, that will help our family more than you can imagine. You see, having one cow is like a store for one family. You have milk. You have cheese all the year. But with two cows, you have store for other people. You go to the market; you sell your cheese, your own milk. You have bought us a store.”
I smiled at his family and began to repeat the word, “Kráva?”
Bekim laughed, “Yes, Kráva. This means cow.”
And so together, we all began to chant, “Kráva. Kráva.”
I was going to buy them a cow.
I drove off that morning and saw Bekim’s family standing in my only good rearview mirror, the other still tucked into my backpack, after losing it on the mean streets of Delta, Colorado.
I had started in Hollywood. I was now in Montenegro. I had begun to see the history of the world in motion, the past and the present forever trying to renegotiate the future. And the thread that moved through it all spoke to what mattered most. Home isn’t just a collection of memories and fears; it is also the most permanent thing we have. It is the harbor in our storm, and sometimes the only thing worth fighting for.
Chapter Six
“When the world says, ‘Give up,’ Hope whispers, ‘Try it one more time.’”
—Author Unknown
“You must please feed the children of my family.”
Unfortunately, the border guard’s eyes weren’t as sympathetic as his plea. They were bloodshot, and by the way he was swaying and holding onto the immigration counter that separated us, I could tell he was drunk. Very drunk. I could also tell that he was hoping that this weary English traveler on a yellow motorbike might be willing to pay a small bribe for entry into his country. What he didn’t know was that this English traveler was extremely poor at the moment.
“I am traveling around the world, with no money,” I said sheepishly. “So I have no money . . .”
This pissed him off. He tried his best to pull himself up from his drunken stupor, spitting the words out as though they tasted bitter, “Bike no come to Albania.”
Bike no come to Albania? These were not words I was prepared for. How was I going to make a drunken border guard understand that if he didn’t let me through my entire journey would be over? Over!
The only thing I could think of was football—or as the Americans call it, soccer—the most popular sport in Europe, including Albania. I started to talk to my soon-to-be BFF all about “the beautiful game,” asking who his favorite team might be.
“Manchester United!” he shouted, as though celebrating a goal right in the heart of a football stadium.
“Yes!” I cried. “Manchester forever!”
And in those words, our budding friendship began. No one had to know that I was actually a Liverpool fan. Thankfully, I knew enough about my archenemies, Manchester United, to convince Mikos of our mutual love for all things Manchester.
“My friend, we like you,” Mikos shouted, his preferred form of communication, it seemed. “Welcoming you to the Albanian home!”
I thanked him and quickly left the border crossing before he changed his mind.
I had never before been to Albania, but I realized one thing very quickly—Albanians are very proud of their heritage. They are deeply connected to who they are as a people, and there’s a fierce pride that comes from that connection.
As I drove to the closest town, I found myself wondering about my
own “home.” Would it always be England, the place of my birth? Would it be Greece, the home of my ancestors? Or was it now Los Angeles, where so many miles away, my house and girlfriend and dog all waited for me to return—hopefully in eager anticipation. Maybe because I felt so disconnected from home, I decided to jump on the Albanian bandwagon and get a tattoo of their national flag. Well, sort of.
I was walking down the main street of the small border town when I saw the distant light of a ramshackle Albanian tattoo parlor. After discovering that the two tattoo artists inside spoke English, I asked them what kind of tattoo I should get. Their suggestion: the Albanian flag, on my neck.
“Guys, my girlfriend might not like that too much,” I explained.
“Why not?” the younger brother who worked at the parlor asked, as though there might be something wrong with my girlfriend.
“Well, unless she’s secretly Albanian, she’d probably be confused.”
I waited, expecting some sign of understanding before I finally threw my hands in the air, and sighed, “Women!”
This they understood, and offered an alternative plan: a henna tattoo of the Albanian flag on my leg.
A henna tattoo on my leg, I could do. Lina might have more to say about an Albanian flag on my neck.
In the morning I headed off to Pristina, the capital of Kosovo. At first glance it’s a bleak-looking place, with concrete reminders of the uniformity of the Soviet era scattered throughout the city. The heavens opened up, and rain was pouring down from heavy gray skies that matched the buildings below it. Cars and scooters and bicyclists crowded the rain-soaked streets, honking and yelling against the onslaught of traffic. I worked my way through, praying that Kindness One would behave while I sought a safe place to find some food and shelter and rest. And that’s when I ran into him. President Bill Clinton.
Or more like the henna tattoo version of him, because there in front of me stood a large imposing statue of the forty-second president. In gold. Probably not solid gold, but you never know. I made an illegal U-turn to ask a local about the statue. I met more than a local, though—I met a new friend.
Eleonora could have been any Western woman in any Western city. She was in her forties, wearing blue jeans and a fashionable blazer. The only thing that set her apart was the colorful hijab she wore on her head. She crossed her arms and looked up at the statue with me. She explained why Bill Clinton was standing there, “Usually our statues are for dead heroes, but Mr. Clinton helped our people a lot.”
As we began to walk down the street, she explained to me, “Thanks to him and the others, we are in freedom now. We are independent now for five years.”
Like Edis, Eleonora couldn’t have been far from my age, and yet she had experienced so much—the horrors of war and the pride in the independence that followed. We walked through the heart of Pristina, the rain subsiding. As we walked she pointed out the different parts of her city to me, offering up the history of her country and her people—ethnic Slavs who had converted to Islam under Ottoman rule. As she spoke, I was reminded, again, of why I was making this journey. It was for these moments—these random encounters on rainy afternoons. I was not only meeting someone new, but also getting to know an entire people, and their history.
Eleonora took me to a local mosque, where we sat down inside. Like Edis in Sarajevo, she also had her own story of war.
Her voice grew quiet as she told me: “My family, they were taken by the Serbian forces . . . police actually . . . and they sent them to Lartse. It is the border between Macedonia and Kosovo. My family, they were sent away on trains.”
Her eyes began to glaze over, as though she were watching the terrible scene unfold in front of us.
Finally, I asked, “Where were they sent to?”
Her face grew dark, her pain heavy and palpable, like humidity. She spoke in a strained whisper as though it was too hard to say, “To the camps.”
She looked at me, life burning in her eyes once again, “It is something that nobody wants to happen again. Not here, nowhere else.”
I was ashamed for all of us. That at the sunset of the twentieth century, there could still be concentration camps in Europe. Never forget, they said after World War II, and yet less than fifty years later, we had to learn the same lesson again.
Stories like Eleonora’s made me wonder if it’s just too hard to love people. If having a family is really just making yourself vulnerable to the inevitable pains of life lurking around each and every corner. Maybe I wasn’t running. Maybe I just didn’t want to be hurt.
She cleared her throat, trying to sweep away the pain that filled the quiet mosque, “But not all of the people did bad things to everybody. Most of them were police and the private military, but not the people.” She touched her heart as she continued, “The people did not commit those crimes. So we learn to forgive. We must remember that no matter who we are, where we come from, we are human first.”
We sat in silence for a while. I looked around the beautiful mosque, which still had pieces missing from being bombed in the war. As much as Eleonora spoke to the hope of peace, I couldn’t help but wonder: How do you forgive when your families are stolen in the night? How do you forget when what you hold sacred is shattered to pieces, and the life you once knew simply gone?
I know that all of us have good and evil in us. We are all capable of hurting others—some on grand scales, many more on small ones. And it all comes back to the same flawed idea: that somehow one person is more important than another. I know that for a long time I was mired in that selfishness. I only thought about myself, about what I wanted. I lived in the lonely belief that my feelings were somehow more important than those around me. And then one day I woke up in so much pain; I realized that the rewards of my selfishness would never outweigh the pain of isolation.
As we left the mosque, serendipity brought me up close and personal to someone who had truly lived and embodied selflessness. Mother Teresa. Or should I say a statue of the great lady. Bronze—not gold.
I’d admired Mother Teresa as much as the next chap, but I had never really learned too much about her. And then suddenly, I found myself in front of that statue, and I was absolutely mesmerized. Maybe that’s the point of building these permanent fixtures—to forever inspire others by reminding them of the paths that some have chosen. I had always assumed Mother Teresa was an Indian woman, but as I found out that day, she had gone far from home in order to carry out her work. Because Mother Teresa was actually of Albanian descent—I knew there was a reason I got that tattoo!
Born in Macedonia, she left her people for Calcutta at the age of seventeen because she wanted to be of service to those who suffered most. She believed that it was only through loving one another that we might ever find love within ourselves. She had given up her home for a different vision of reality, for her dream to help the world. I looked up at the statue, and I knew right then, as I knew my own name, that I would do everything in my power to go to Calcutta. I wanted to see what this woman had accomplished by making the whole world her family.
* * *
I left Kosovo and rode into the country of my parents’ birth: Greece. I used to spend my summers in Greece and was looking forward to spending some summer nights in the Greek heartland. After crossing the border I was thankful not to have to feign love for Manchester United with any drunken border guards. Instead, I sailed through and right into the northern town of Thessaloniki.
And then the wind went out of my sails, or rather, the wind went out of Kindness One. I was planning to head east to Turkey and cross the Bosporus Strait to Asia, but my little yellow friend had other plans. I was driving through Thessaloniki, looking out at the sea, feeling the quiet air around me. The pains of the war ravaged countries I had only just visited felt so distant here, lost against the lapping clear blue water.
After being treated to some food and gas, I hopped back ont
o Kindness One, only to have the bike stop in the middle of the street, in the middle of traffic, in the middle of a herd of honking, angry Greeks. Did I ever tell you that I don’t really know how to fix a bike? I think I did. But I will tell you again. For dramatic purposes really.
I don’t really know how to fix a bike.
I pushed my bike off the main road and began asking people where the nearest mechanic was. No one seemed to know. Finally, a local shopkeeper suggested that I go down a little alley, where I would find a mechanic. A good one in fact. Before I left, the shopkeeper added, “He likes money.”
He likes money? Well, let’s see how much he likes someone without any.
I met Gianni. And Gianni met me. I told Gianni about my problem. Gianni didn’t seem to like where my story was going.
He looked at me and then he looked at Kindness One, disapproving of both. “Why you go with yellow bike?”
I smiled. Trying to be as upbeat as possible as I explained, “Because it makes people happy.”
He grunted at my response, so I thought I would hit him with my proverbial left hook: “And when people are happy, they do nice things.”
He walked around the bike, tinkered with it for a minute, and then stood back and replied as though he were ordering a coffee, “One thousand euros.”
One thousand euros! I tried moving the conversation to my rudimentary Greek, but that didn’t help much either. Apparently, it would cost a thousand euros in any language. I explained my journey again, but Gianni just shrugged his shoulders and went inside. Well, so much for Greek solidarity.
I continued to wheel my bike through the streets of Thessaloniki and realized that, in my shock at Gianni’s quote, I had forgotten to ask what was wrong with the bike!
More people started honking at me, and a few even started yelling again—my people really love to yell. All I needed was to find that one person willing to help me out. In the end, I found three. The first was an old Greek chap who helped push the bike out of the road and onto the path of another mechanic, who became my second angel. Once I arrived there, I met my third: an American woman who was getting her car fixed.
The Kindness Diaries: One Man's Quest to Ignite Goodwill and Transform Lives Around the World Page 9
