Albania Winter 2000

February 21

    I wished outside Tima's gate I could write and hang the sign, "House of Smiles."  From my very first visit, this extraordinary feature about her and her family still abounds. The daughters glow like mom and have inherited a smile that circles and makes waves all over their faces, an expression that goes out like from the place you throw a stone in a pond.
    I have to admit something. Albanians are very hospitable, very curious, a very sharing people. But for the most part they are not always the happiest you will meet because their past has taken its toll. When you look closely at some faces, you see people adrift in life, not even searching the direction they are going. Others look purely superficial, waiting for the verdict of their life to be pronounced. The saddest are the faces that are wasted and colorless! With nothing left to withdraw from life's bank of joy, these have a negative account balance of smiles. 
    On the other hand, there is a tangible quality about a beautiful round face with a smiling expression. What a wonderful fascination there is about a face that telegraphs his or her expression of something deep, something sincere, something loving. It is like a visible and conscious fingerprint, unique and telling.
    Tima and her family are not unusual in their living standards or in their income. Half an acre, one cow and nine people; by the world's standards they have little happiness. But they are unique in the fact they have a joy and a peace, "that passes all understanding." Philippians 4:7.

    Winter 2000 Index