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« t was after the war with Turkey. It was when Turkey occupied the country and ruled for five hundred years. This person Skenderbej was a hero then for Albania - if you have heard of him. He fought then for twenty-five years and prevented Turkey from advancing into Europe and from turning it upside down. They were saved by us. But they don’t recognize this fact in public. Nowadays they say it. I think only Austria and Italy say it. They say "Thanks to the Albanians we have this culture today. Thanks to the Albanians who kept the Turk out." And now, as I’ve heard, they’ve already made a film about it. »
« At Kruja - you haven’t been there -there is this man that we call Skenderbej. The statue of Skenderbej. He fought very hard for Albania against Turkey. His name was Gjergi, Yorgos in Greek. And they called him Gjergi. And when the Turks got him and wanted to turn him into a Turk, they changed his name. His name was Gjergi. Gjergi Kastrioti. And they named him Skenderbej. And he was a great man. He didn’t want to be a Turk, and he left and came to Albania and he fought very hard until he kicked the Turks out of Albania. And you can find all that written down in the history of Albania: everything. About what Skenderbej did and what he didn’t do. Those kind of books we had. In order to know what happened and all that. But everything we know about Greece is what our mother and father told us. How else would we know what happened in Greece? Isn’t that right? »
Myths and heroes
