My Passions

Passion. 

Energy.

Hope.

When my family and I moved back to Albania in 2013, I was filled with passion. 

I could imagine the ministry of MOPS impacting my cousins, my friends, and other women. 

I could imagine that the type of relationships that had brought me so much joy and freedom to me over the last three years would be experienced by women in my home country. 

“I was full of energy for women to experience being seen, heard and loved.”

Moms who didn’t have the chance to go to America as I did.

Moms who had to work much harder just to make it from one paycheck to the next. 

Moms who were still sharing a 2-bedroom apartment with their in-laws.

Moms who hadn’t been out on a date with their husbands in years! I was ready to go — full of passion and energy for women to experience being seen, heard, and loved in a MOPS community.

My Fears

And I also had a lot of fear. 

Even though I grew up in Albania, I had lived outside Albania for years. My husband Josh is American, and we had spent the last three years in the US. I was no longer “Bona from Tirana.” Now, I was “Bona who just came back from America.” I never thought I would feel so much like an outsider in my own country. It wasn’t just the perceptions of others. My mind actually worked differently now. I had become used to doing things a different way while I was gone. 

A Simple Shopping Trip Gone Wrong

I still remember my shock while I was out shopping at an outdoor market with my cousin Blerta. 

Josh and the kids and I had returned to Albania a few days earlier. We had rented a partially furnished apartment, and I was going out to buy some things we needed for the bathroom.

The August heat hit me.

Nearly 100 degrees! 

Blerta and I walked down the street to the market near the center of town with about fifty shops facing each other. The shopkeepers open the backdoor of their homes, or they one room shed-like structure. They pull out a table in front of this room (there’s a tarp overhead to protect items on tables from the rain). Then they sell items both outside on tables and inside the room. 

A one-lane road separates the stores with shops on one side and shops on the other side. People walk through the road. Some are shoppers. Some just passing by. Bikes whiz by and occasionally a car slowly passes through forcing the pedestrians to quickly step in between the tables. I had walked through this road many times as a kid. 

The road is known in Tirana as “Cham” road, named after the Cham people who live there. They are Albanians and are descendants of people living in the Cham region of Greece, who were forced to flee for their lives in the 1930s. They came to Albania and were given apartments in the center of town. As a kid walking through the Cham road was just like walking anywhere else. 

“I felt at home and not at home.”

But that day with the bikes whizzing, the cars, and other people bumping into me, I felt at home and not at home. I fit in but I didn’t. I laughed like my cousin did when cars almost brushed up against us, but it bothered me more than it used to.

Inside the Cham shops, there’s room for at least a few people to be in between the tables. But often there are five or ten people each asking a question about an item. Then, if they buy something, they reach over shirts and bras, or watches or silverware, or pots and pans to hand money to the shopkeeper, get the item and then get their change.

Usually, there are multiple conversations going on at the same time as different customers ask about different items and the shopkeeper responds, often calling nearby shopkeepers to ask a question. You might overhear something like this:

“It’s 1000 lek but for you, I’ll give it to you for 800 lek”

“I don’t have it in black. But look at this red one. It is nice.”

“We don’t sell soccer balls. Keep walking straight.”

“Hey Genti, do you know if Bona still sells thread?”

“I hadn’t shopped to the outdoor market in years. I was used to Target or Walmart”

Unlike most of the other men and women there, I hadn’t shopped to the outdoor market in years. I was used to Target in Vernon Hills or Costco just off of I-94 or Walmart in Gurnee with store aisles wide enough for two grocery carts plus two active girls to run around!

We stopped at a shop when I saw something I liked. I turned to my cousin Blerta to ask her what she thought. She liked it too. Then, I asked the shopkeeper, a large man probably in his 50s, “How much does this cost?”

He replied. I put it down and then asked about another item.

We asked about the prices of two or three items. 

The shopkeeper became increasingly agitated until finally, he folded his arms and spoke sternly, “If you’re not going to buy anything, then leave.”  

“No!” I didn’t back down. After all, what was wrong with me asking the prices of a few items before deciding. I looked him in the eyes and spoke, “I am going to stay here as long as I want.” A few people turned their heads, and my cousin began pulling me away, not wanting to cause a scene.

“I am the customer here.”

“You can’t talk to me that way,” I continued, making my tone even firmer. “I am the customer here.”

He interrupted me.  

In some versions of this story, as it has been told and retold, the next thing I did was say, “I demand to talk to your manager.” At this point, people from Albania laugh since everyone knows there are no managers in these family-owned businesses usually operated by just one or two people. 

I don’t know whether I actually said this. But I know was upset. And I know the shopkeeper became angrier and angrier.

He walked towards us. My cousin pulled me away and we went to the next store. As we left, she told me, “It looked like he was about to slap you.”

After that ordeal, I thought, “If this is what happens when I’m just going out to buy a few items, what else might happen when I try to lead a ministry?”

Your Passions and Fears 

What about you? 

Have you ever launched into something new filled with both passion and fear? 

If you’re like me, you go back and forth from feeling one moment like you can change the world to the next moment of being paralyzed with fear.

What have the moments of fear looked like for you?