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elderly who stayed behind. Those who came to the village in the period of communism used
to work in the agricultural cooperatives. Nowadays some of them are shop or cafe owners,
while others work as seasonal workers. The rest of “newcomers”, who settled here after the
collapse of communism, either work as construction workers or perform other physical work
(such as working in the gardens, picking olives, grapes and oranges, working in local
restaurants and bars on the coast), that is everything that pensioners are not capable of doing
anymore. Many of them, especially if they were not born too far, visit their birthplaces, where
most of them are still registered as residents. These “newcomers” often declare themselves
according to the place from where their patrilinear ancestors originate. Throughout my
fieldwork I have never heard them referring to themselves as villagers or fshatarët.
In a number of conversations with the “newcomers” I often asked them about the locals’
attitude towards them. At the beginning of our talks they were usually rather reserved. Later
on, however, most of them expressed negative feelings towards the rude attitude of the
fshatarët (villagers), referring to them as njerëz të këqinj (bad people) and racistë (racists).
One of my companions was Enkeleida, who moved 25 to Dhërmi/Drimades from Mallakastra
(a place north-east of the Himarë/Himara area) together with her family (husband, daughter
and son) in 1984. At the beginning she said that when they moved to the village they did not
have any problems. “The locals accepted us warmly” she noted. But through the hours of our
conversation Enkeleida became more talkative and when describing her work in the
agricultural cooperative she said:
When I moved here I did not know any Greek. I often cried as I couldn’t understand
the language of my co-workers. But after a while I learned their language and today I
can speak Greek.
Later on Enkeleida noted:
Although I have lived here for twenty-five years, people still perceive me as being
Turkish. Most of them are racist like the Serbs in Kosovo. Still, I could say that those
who returned to their native village after a number of years in emigration are quite
different from those locals who never migrated.
25 Similarly to other citizens who migrated within the country, the migration of Enkeleida and her family was –
following their application – approved by the Communist Party or the so-called Party of Labour of Albania
(PLA). They were decreed to move to Dhërmi/Drimades, where they worked in one of the largest agricultural
cooperatives in the coastal (Bregu) area. A few years after the collapse of communism, Enkeleida’s youngest son
immigrated to Italy, where he is studying economy, while her oldest daughter moved to Vlorë and got married
there. Five years ago Enkeleida and her husband bought an old house in the village centre, which they are now
slowly renovating with the money they earn during the summer in their fast-food kiosk on the beach. Throughout
the year Enkeleida’s husband earns money performing occasional jobs in the village and its surroundings.
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