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report: January 2009 |
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Between Prishtina and Graz – A European EncounterVisar Geci, born in Prishtina, is a student of architecture in Graz (since 1997 he has also been an Austrian citizen), a barkeeper with his own television show, and the owner of a fitness studio – furthermore, Geci describes himself as a Kosovar patriot who would do anything for the development of Kosovo. Kai Vöckler describes for “Report” his encounter with the convinced European, who has discovered an (unusual) way of living between Graz and Prishtina.It was in 2005 that I first met Visar Geci, today 33 years old, an architect, who was born in Prishtina, Kosovo, but has been an Austrian citizen since 2007, at a conference about urban development in eastern Europe, held at the Technical University of Graz. In the coffee break, the Kosovo-Albanian student at the Faculty of Architecture showed me some photographs of his hometown, Prishtina, which quite simply bowled me over. The photographs documented impressive buildings and architectural structures, and indeed, following the intervention of the NATO troops in 1999, a wave or unregulated building activity seems to have broken out in this city of a kind and an intensity that surpassed anything I had previously known. Even at the first glance, it became clear to me that it must have something to do with a special form of what is known as “informal” settlement activity. In conversation with Visar Geci and his friend Gezim Kastrati, my first impression was confirmed: wide circles of Kosovo-Albanian society were involved in this building activity, from migrants from the country to the ministers of the provisional self-government, from Albanian refugees repatriated from the EU or Switzerland, to old-established families. Without being able to go into more detail here about the complicated political situation, under the new conditions in Kosovo, other segments of the population, such as the Kosovo-Serbs, were less interested in investing in the future in the form of property.Particularly frustrating from an architectural and planning point of view was the fact that the existing urban structure had been largely destroyed, those who erected buildings almost entirely failed to take advantage of professional expertise, and those people who were politically responsible, the UN administration and the provisional government, just looked on at what was happening without doing anything about it. My interest in the matter being thus aroused, I spontaneously offered to come to Prishtina in the summer. I booked a flight to Prishtina and in August 2005 I found myself in the waiting area of Vienna airport, together with extended families of Kosovo-Albanians, uniformed members of the KFOR (Kosovo Force) from a wide variety of countries in the world, and the usual men in suits travelling on political business. What it meant to travel to a country administered by the UN first became clear to me when at passport control I saw the UNMIK passports of the Kosovo-Albanians issued by the interim administration set up in Kosovo by the United Nations and in Prishtina met some Austrian border guards on the airfield, an Indian member of KFOR checked my passport, and at baggage reclaim I encountered Italian carabinieri who were in charge there. Outside the airport, I was greeted by one of the KFOR’s armoured surveillance vehicles and was cordially received by Visar Geci and Gezim Kastrati in the midst of a crowd of people waiting for their relatives. Even the journey into the city displayed, in an impressive way, the rapid changes that had taken place over the past few years since the end of the war. To the left and right there were half-finished houses, along the streets rows of little kiosks and behind them shops, the upper storeys of which were usually inhabited, in between there were warehouses for construction materials, and petrol stations, and then shortly before Prishtina itself, on the right, were the concrete walls of the UN compound. The closer we got to Prishtina, the greater the traffic and the density of development. On the edge of the city there were Yugoslavian apartment houses to which one or two extra storeys had been added. A huge poster hung from one of the facades with a laughing and waving Bill Clinton, welcoming visitors as they arrived – the avenue that runs from the airport into the city has also been named after him. Flying everywhere were the flags of the USA, Great Britain, Germany and NATO, in some places also the EU, proclaiming the close alliance between the Kosovo-Albanian majority and the KFOR troops. The whole city seemed to be in state of permanent change, building sites were evident everywhere, buildings were being demolished and there were half-finished reinforced concrete structures all over the place. Every free corner was occupied by a small shop, usually a simple steel structure with metal walls. In still incomplete houses, from which the upper storeys rose in the form of reinforced concrete skeleton frames, the lower storeys were already being used, with blue or green reflective glass facades indicating office space and shops, while washing had been hung out to dry from the unplastered balconies of the upper storeys: people had already begun to use this provisional space. And the nearer one came to the centre, the more striking was the clash of opposites – mosques contrasting with the newly constructed glass palaces of banks and companies, buildings dating from Yugoslavian modernism contrasting with rapidly constructed multi-storey residential apartments and office blocks, and in-between isolated, square single-storey traditional Albanian houses still crouched. An enormous confusion, radiating an impressive energy. During our forays into the city it was Visar Geci’s profound humour that contributed most to my understanding of even the most peculiar formations. Only with time did I begin to understand, with his help, the power of this unregulated building activity, how under unclarified legal conditions and economically uncertain life circumstances the Albanian inhabitants of Prishtina had begun to design their future with great optimism in the face of the changed political situation. This was all the more astonishing on account of the fact that Kosovo has the worst economic situation of the region and an unemployment rate of more than 40 per cent. In fact, Kosovo is only able to survive through the aid provided by family members working, legally or illegally, in the EU or other wealthy countries, who send money home. Estimates indicate that about a fifth of the inhabitants of Kosovo live in Austria, Switzerland and Germany. There, they are also being increasingly driven into illegality, since one of the declared aims of the EU (and also of Switzerland, which is linked to it) is to send migrants back to their home countries – absurd, when one considers the fact that, at the same time, billions are being spent by the EU on development aid for Kosovo. In contrast, Visar Geci has managed to bring off the feat of reversing the economic situation and of earning his own money to study architecture in Graz in Kosovo. However, at the start, everything was against him. He first tried to begin his further education Kosovo in 1994, studying graphic design in Prishtina under the most adverse conditions – since the imposition of martial law by Milošević’s Serbian government in 1989, a policy of apartheid had been carried out against the Albanians, in reality banning them from all public institutions and to a large extent from important areas of business, outlawing their language and forcing them to create illegal structures, for example in the educational sector. Teaching was carried out in private homes, and every month the location had to be changed. Anyone who was caught could expect blows from the Serbian militia and the teachers were arrested. Under these circumstances, Visar Geci took up the offer to continue his studies in Austria in 1995. After successfully passing his preparatory course and language test, he was able to start studying architecture. The only problem was: what should he live from? As a student he was legally allowed to work, but his still insufficient language skills made it impossible to do any qualified work. In winter he shovelled snow, at night worked at a sausage stand and in between distributed sales leaflets. He shared his room at the students’ hostel with his friend Gezim, and they shared the PC and the television too. The turning-point came when he got a part-time job in “Poco Loco” in Graz. He was only employed to collect the glasses, but Visar Geci was fascinated by the cocktail mixes, by the show that the bartenders presented as they juggled with the bottles. That didn’t exist in Kosovo. He learned the tricks of the trade from the barkeepers and in the summer of 2002 began to work in a bar in the centre of Prishtina, together with Gezim. They did the night-shift, organising everything, even the barmen and got 20 per cent of the turnover. It was a great success, Prishtina had never seen anything like it. In the summer of 2003, the owner of QMI approached them – they were asked to set up a temporary bar in the unused basement level of this shopping centre that lay 12 kilometres outside of the city. The concept worked and three times a week they had up to one thousand visitors. Encouraged by this, another temporary bar was set up in Prishtina during the semester holidays in 2004, in a new building. This time, they retained half of the profits. The two had by now become the talk of the town. The private television channel KTV asked Visar Geci, if he would like to do a cocktail show for television. The first programme was broadcast in 2005 – without any payment, but nevertheless with the best advertising for the bar. What was special about the cocktail show was that he turned it into a programme of political satire, in which he would often say things in public that no-one else dared to say. Which did not please everybody of course, in particular the local politicians. Their massive success, with viewer ratings of more than 80 per cent, proved him right – and helped his bar. In the car park of the “Hiper Market” on the periphery of the city, he put up an improvised bar, to which several thousand people flocked three times a week, partying until the early hours of the morning. The social model was so successful that it paid the rent for the room in Graz and the living costs for a whole year, as well as for a new laptop and a motorbike – “and the rest I gave to my parents, my parents have always been good to me, and now I can give them something back”. In the summer of 2006, the successful concept was repeated – and at the same time a professional fitness studio was also set up in Prishtina. There, the employees of the UN administration, as also former UCK-fighters (the Kosovo-Albanian Liberation Army), civil servants at ministries and members of KFOR all go to work out. However, Visar Geci sees himself as an architect, and in the first place wants to be involved in the construction of Kosovo. For him, it is very important that Kosovo-Serbs are also members of his fitness studio. He has also received his first architectural project in Prishtina. The only thing that is still missing is his degree from Graz. In the meantime, he has received Austrian citizenship (2007), which was immediately followed by six months military service. For Visar Geci that is not a problem, since he is very grateful to Austria for having been accepted here at the time. His latest project in Prishtina has been the founding, together with colleagues (and the support of the international architectural magazine “Archis/Volume”), of a local non-governmental organisation – Archis Interventions / Prishtina – designed to intervene in the present process of urban development and use its professional expertise to try to improve the chaotic direction taken by that urban development. With great success, as is already being seen – a television programme of his on the problem of illegal construction is now being prepared. However, he still has to finish his degree in Graz, even if the work of constructing the future of Kosovo is already underway. Kai Vöckler, was born in 1961. He is a free-lance urban researcher and journalist in Berlin. He has written many publications on urban themes and has been a visiting curator at several European cultural institutions. He has worked for many years on projects with architects and town planners. Vöckler is a founding member of Archis Interventions, a NGO that, in collaboration with local initiatives, examines problems of urban development in post-conflict situations. Archis Interventions is currently engaged in projects in Prishtina, Mostar, Beirut and Kabul. The publication “Prishtina is everywhere. Turbo-Urbanismus als Resultat einer Krise” by Kai Vöckler will appear in October 2008. He is also the curator of the exhibition “Balkanology. Neue Architektur und urbane Phänomene in Südosteuropa” in the Swiss Architecture Museum in Basel that will open on October 3. At present Vöckler is building up a network of independant urbanistic interventions in south-east Europe. www.kai.voeckler.de Vöckler’s research work is substantially supported by the ERSTE Foundation. www.erstestiftung.org External links: www.kai.voeckler.de,
www.erstestiftung.org
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