English in Kosovo

When I’m listening to a conversation in Albanian in Kosovo, I feel a bit like a non-Russophone French person trying to read War and Peace in Russian.

I should probably rewind and explain that sentence.

Tolstoy’s War and Peace is a masterpiece of Russian literature, but it also has a great deal of dialogue in French. Russian society at the time of the Napoleonic invasion was, ironically, greatly influenced by France. Members of the upper class spoke French fluently, even to the point of forgetting Russian. Even proud Russian-speakers occasionally threw in French words. Consequently, Tolstoy uses a fair amount of French in the book.

Now, English isn’t nearly so prevalent in Kosovo, but there are some similarities. There has been a tremendous international presence in Kosovo for the last ten years (since the end of the war with Serbia). I am just one of many English-speaking internationals here. I work at a research and development think tank where everyone speaks English more or less fluently. For my benefit, conversations often occur in English. Even when I’m not involved in the conversation, however, you can still hear English words seasoning the Albanian speech.

To me it sounds something like this:

Albanian Albanian Albanian...political development...Albanian Albanian Albanian...then KFOR has to enforce the fucking regulations...Albanian Albanian Albanian...gain the upper hand....Albanian Albanian Albanian...

It’s quite interesting to observe which words are in English in these conversations. My personal favorite are the conversations where the only English words are swear words. Other English words are those connected to international organizations and development, which makes sense because these organizations all operate in English. It’s also interesting that idioms are quite common. I suspect this is because these idioms are shorthand for conveying certain specific concepts that aren’t as easily rendered in Albanian.

I’ve been paying so much attention to this because it’s been really strange for me to live in a country where I don’t speak the language. At any rate, this is what I think about when I’m witnessing conversations where I only understand every tenth word. It's definitely like War and Peace.