Written by: Ben Andoni
Inserted into the anthropological matrix, ambition today is one of the greatest drivers for change. Is it good? Absolutely. The ambition of the Albanians for their independence gave birth to the true Renaissance. However, the excessive ambition in the culture of the Albanian individual (perhaps not even) seems to be related to and is a consequence of the turbulence of historical periods, the transition from a very closed regime to a globalized one, etc. The demand for a good life has caused many to not be restrained by a simple aspect of ambition: its ethics. Over time, this has caused us to appear very far from the interests of the country and unable to pour it into the great vessel, which unites the sweat of the people who make and elevate Albania.
A few years ago (Zaloshnja, BW, 2023) the media statistician, Eduart Zaloshnja, referred to a frightening waste of money in Albania, one of the poorest countries in the Balkans and beyond. In his extrapolation, it was written that approximately: “…11% of the money that manages to accumulate in the Albanian State Treasury is then wasted or divided between corrupt politicians or officials and their corruptors. The above percentages translate into a 20 billion dollar hole in the last 20 years…”. There is no day that the news absorbs attention for corruption, for tricksters, for “visionaries of evil”, who after the '90s have returned to normality. Unfortunately, they include our generation X and even that Z, just the one that is seeking changes today, in Europe and everywhere. Ambition that ignores ethical boundaries is quite tangible in us. You have it materialized today in the filing cabinets of SPAK offices flooded with corruption files. And what is the need for ambition, if it does not produce well-being and Albanians continue to remain poor? Who needs this vanity that we see today in the photos of vacations and entertainment of the so-called VIPs, or the types of expensive cars that almost run us over on the roads, from where they look at us contemptuously. Is this ambition simply part of social welfare, or the status of a new class that is seeking confirmation? The data show that only a very small part is getting richer, close to the current Rama government. Many questions arise, but let's turn to history, which contains some of our people who had positive ambition and gave the country great things, still functional.
There are not many, but we would like to mention one of them. He was an engineer Gjadri (Gjovalin), who died early with a son (Eng. Egon Gjadri) who had to raise him alone on the construction site and who followed his path with dignity. In 1943, using the pseudonym G. Maranaj, he wrote a work in German “Briefe an meine tote Frau” with the letters he wrote to his wife after she had passed away, weeping with the emotion of feeling. Almost 55 years later, the volume was published for the first time in 1998, translated by Petraq Kolevica with the title “Letter to my dead wife”. Meanwhile, Ardian Ndreca did an extraordinary translation exercise with literary Gheg (2017) and reprinted it with the title “Letter to my dead wife”. For the generation after the '90s, it was covered with the veil of “oblivion”. But dignity is always a reference. The engineer of the monumental bridge of Mat and the large bridge on the “Martyrs of the Nation” boulevard in the capital, has projects of over 75 of his engineering works, built in different regions of Albania, preserved in the fund of the Central Technical Construction Archive. His ambition was not to become evident in the exhausted Albania, because the loss of his wife and the raising of his son had already done so, but to work at high levels.
He is considered an engineer who successfully applied in Albania the most innovative and contemporary methods of bridge construction, as well as a great worker of science and a man of progress, whom his students and especially colleagues would remember for his dignity, the high level of technical-engineering requirements and his uncompromising stance in defense of freedom of thought and scientific truths. As is often the case, he could not escape the confrontation of ambition to obscure, hinder and above all to slander and avoid him. His credo remained: To do the best for your country, respecting the ethics of thought and the positive ambition for Albania! Identity, although considered abstract by many, is the part that intellectuals like him had shaped depending on respect for the contribution to the country.
Many years later, Eng. Skënder Kosturi would bring this to us by evoking the work on a bridge (Lana) that is one of the most functional in the capital and that we cross every day: “The bridge near the 'Dajti' hotel cannot be distinguished by its width, which in the calculation of such a bridge has little importance. The solution of embedding the heels of the stretched arch is interesting. Prof. Gjadri showed me about 50 years ago a publication or magazine that he kept in his office, on the third floor of the Ministry of Construction, where the reinforcement of this bridge was described in German, which I did not understand. I remember that the reinforcement sketches were made in white on a green background. The reason for this bridge being built about a century ago is that during the communist period, columns of tanks passed over it in military parades, so such an unusual load for the time. Today, the norms in force also foresee exposure to urban pollution that was unknown at that time. Even the cement of that time was much weaker than what is produced today. The professor liked the support of bridges on rock foundations and I would friendly tease him by mentioning this bridge built on ordinary soil foundations. The value of that bridge is because it is the creation of a prominent figure in Albanian engineering and beyond, for which there is also the corresponding target.
Many years before him, in an article by Mit'hat Frashëri from the study "To form character" (Revista "Pedagogjike", no., 6-11, year 1926) he would explain the phenomenon of ambition in the anthropological concept: "The Albanian has a highly developed personal ambition; this ambition is brother and sister with vanity. He seeks honor and glory for himself. Unfortunately, we have almost forgotten the nation and the nobility of the nation.
We need to awaken in students a national ambition, a spark of solidarity for everything that belongs to the nation, the race, the country of Albania. We can awaken this feeling by convincing the student that, only by honoring the nation, by praising Albania, by having every thing that belongs to Albania in good esteem and reputation, only then can every Albanian, every person be praised and honored as a person; in a word, he must put all his ambition and activity at the service of Albania, so that he himself may receive the largest and most desirable part.
Valuable lessons for a time, where taking over the country is "ownership" and not contributing to it is called "without your work". Eng. Gjadri had a goal and this was related to the ambition to see his country, Lady of ladies, and his work simply the obligation that every Albanian has for his country; while Frashëri, with his high cultural potential and as a statesman, tried to raise a little awareness for the nation, when Albania had just started its journey among civilized states, with the concern that we experience at every moment: The lack of ethics of ambition and the lack of self-esteem at the expense of the country. This comes to mind these days of March, when Gjadri counts 54 years in eternity (He left on March 13), and Mit'hat Frashëri has his birthday (March 25, 1880), both wanted to channel their ambition for a beautiful Albania. Unfortunately, we, the Albanians of today, are still far from their teachings, the true Renaissance men. (Homo Albanicus)
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