Author: Sefer Selimi Jr.
Whenever summer comes, it comes with emigrates. Our brothers, sisters, parents, family, friends, and fellows who open their homes covered in the dust of the absence. I have such a lot of myself and I do not doubt that every one of you awaits them with a calendar marked for these holiday days for our residents and hearts.
Among them I have a close friend, a former student of the excellence UT, who beyond all the barriers and cynicism of the district, continued his postgraduate studies in Switzerland where he also works for a large US company, whose signature today is worth millions of francs a month. Modest, humane and fully committed to professionalism and dignity to accomplish the tasks, which were trusted to him. Whenever he comes, our discussions last for hours and never end because neither of the problems of this country seem to end. As a patriot as he is, he is always worried about his hometown, even though this country has snatched him thousands of miles away without giving him the well-deserved chance to build a career, family and life here.
In one of the long nights during our conversations, he told me a story, perhaps a little exaggerated and moreover satirical but in essence very symbolic:
– A Swiss institute has sent its own expert to make a study of governments in the Balkan states within a year. To analyze the functioning of institutions and the social organization among them to make a comparative analysis in order to suggest the best solutions and examples, and thus to help increase the quality of public services and the efficiency in spending citizens’ money. Day after day, interview after interview, institution after institution, conversation after conversation he finally finishes his study. After a rigorous analysis in order to present the practical situation in the field, he writes only two words: ORGANIZED CHAOS. Of course, history is most likely invented but its morality is a disaster that we survive on our daily basis.
So for example, you pay for water and from the taps leaks a fluid, which is contaminated by asbestos pipes that are older than most citizens are
You pay for the cleaning of the waste which ends up a few miles from your home to get back again to you as a carcinogenic smoke.
You pay for construction permits; they build other than the approved one and they compensate it with two or three flats for the local party bosses.
You pay your whole life health insurance, but when you needed the most, you have to pay the doctor again who does not enter the operating room without receiving his tribute.
Hope God does not give you an illness, which exceeds the capacity of hospitals (which are often far from modern medical standards) than relatives, good wishers and philanthropists will gather to pay for your treatment abroad.
You pay for police protection but it often turns out that police protects crime instead of your private life and property.
Judges make decisions on behalf of the citizens of this state but justice is done by the realtors who stand in the nearby office that await for clients with an open pricelist.
Businesspersons do not leave without going to mosques or churches on Friday and Sunday in order to display their devotion to God and goodness, while they pay their heresies with the unpaid sweat of their workers.
The roads are constantly paved but never finished.
Politicians work for the people but all the time they get rich for themselves
Everyone fights crime and corruption, and in the meantime, they steal.
And the list of such paradoxes continues indefinitely. Things work but nothing is right.
The conversation with my friend about how he is in Switzerland continues endlessly, how it is in normal countries, how it is in institutions where work is evaluated based on professional criteria. What it is like to not be afraid to get sick and trust the doctor and the hospital. What it is like to have the courage to report the crime and not be afraid that the inspector will tell the criminal who denounced it. How it is when the law applies equally to everyone. How it is when you love your country because your country cares about you. We also talk about how to make this state a better place for living. To accomplish his dream to come back again here but not as retired person but as a professional who has so much to give to this country.
We are talking about ideas, projects … Talking until his enthusiasm is slowly getting lost and the despair with which he left for the first time, to again wait for the day he will return to work. On the day, he returns to his (normal) state, away from this organized chaos, which leaves you to breathe as much as you can only survive. Moreover, the day comes, he goes back in order to come back again next summer.
In the meantime, it is up to the rest of us to keep our will alive and fight organized chaos until we have a normal state, like that of my friend.