Corner Office Anywhere

I keep going back to Albania, and not just because it’s one of the few remaining European nations outside the Schengen visa area. The beautiful Mediterranean climate, warm hospitality, proximity of both mountains and sea from each of its major city centers, and its central location as a hub for exploring other Balkan countries make it a great stop for anyone ready to go off the beaten path in Europe. Here are my recommendations for staying in Tirana as a digital nomad.

Where to Stay

Anywhere within the old Tirana ‘ring road’  is generally walkable and safe, with good access to the buses and taxi service. The ring road is highlighted in the map below for your reference. You can walk across the entire diameter of the circle in about an hour, so it’s quite a manageable size. Keep in mind that even in tiny Tirana, parts of the ring road are now elevated highway, but areas outside the ring quickly become less developed. Some of it is suburb, but you’ll also find more unpaved roads, lower-income neighborhoods, and less services generally. The Blloku neighborhood is the center of nightlife, and conveniently adjacent to the beautiful and sprawling Tirana Park, therefore the most popular place for expats and tourists. However, you’ll find the neighborhoods just north of the river that runs East/West through the center of town to be just as nice, quieter, and perhaps more convenient for navigating the city.

Where to Work

If you prefer or need a coworking space in Tirana, I can recommend Coolab or Destil. You might also check out Innospace.

Where to Shop

Grocery shopping in Tirana can be a bit of a hodge-podge affair for my American sensibility. There are modern supermarkets where you can find packaged and convenience goods, such as Spar, Conad, Xhangoli, Big Market. These types of goods are expensive relative to the cost of living everywhere in Tirana, and for staples it will be no more expensive to rely on your closest corner market for these items, though you’ll have a smaller selection. You’ll find the produce, meat, and bakery selections to be very sad in these locations, even for a European supermarket. For produce, I would strongly recommend hitting up the outdoor produce stand you will find in any residential neighborhood. The grocery store produce is 5-10 times more expensive and much poorer quality. Your produce guy will most likely not speak English but you will get along fine. Similarly, the only place to get a decent meat selection will be in a butcher, and ditto on bread from a bakery. You’ll need cash for these establishments. Luckily you’ll find these stores to be even more prevalent than the supermarkets, so the inconvenience of going to four places for your weekly shop is minimized.

For a fun traditional market experience, you can head to the Old P’sar in the city center. The selection trends towards touristy here.

Toptani is a convenient shopping mall in the city-center. If you have a little more time, Tirana East Gate is a 15 minute car ride from the city center and has many more stores, including many popular international brands.

Getting Around

Tirana has a an inexpensive and reliable bus system, but I usually get around the compact city center on foot. Tirana is open late and you’ll find it well-populated and generally safe pretty late into the night. You’ll need small change for the bus. You can also easily hail a taxi on the street (you will need to pay in cash). Please note that people smoke on public transportation in Albania. When I want to go further afield or across town, I tend to rely on Blue Taxi or Green Taxi. You can hail these comfortable, smoke-free SUVs by location via WhatsApp, book ahead, and Blue Taxi will (usually) allow you to pay by credit card.

Money Matters

Credit cards are accepted more and more widely throughout Albania and especially in Tirana. However, this country is still mainly a cash economy, and you will save money if you arrive with enough cash to operate with for your everyday spending. Both Euro and USD can be changed to Albanian LEK at very favorable and non-commissioned rates at exchange shops that can be found on what seems like every corner of Tirana center. Many locals exchange foreign cash on a regular basis, which is why there are so many of them. Of course, you can pull LEK from a cash machine with your foreign card, just expect to pay high exchange fees compared to cash exchange, in addition to the ATM fee.

A Note on Smoking

If most of your travels have been in the Americas and Europe in the last two decades, then you might be surprised to find that smoking indoors is still the norm here in most venues, and not just outside or in bars. Albanians love their small pleasures and can be found with a coffee or cigarette (or both) in hand for as much of the day as they can manage. Expect anywhere you might be in close quarters with other people will smell strongly of cigarettes, even if no one is currently smoking. Needless to stay, it is easy to make a quick friend over a shared cigarette here, if that’s something that you’re into.

Albanian spring, summer and fall weather is lovely and there are so many places to be in the open air that I manage fine most of the time, even with my allergy to cigarettes. The supermarkets, shopping-malls, museums and cinemas are all smoke-free places. I’ve made notes on smoke-free restaurants and transportation below. Occasionally, I do have to unexpectedly bail on a plan because the space is not breathing-friendly for me. And if you want a smoke-free hotel room you’ll need to go out of your way to do that but will find options in all the touristic centers.

Café Culture

Albanians are absolute champions at lingering over a cup of coffee and a cigarette, an everyday pastime for them. The two chains Mulliri and Mon Cheri are ubiquitous and serve specialty coffee in addition to light fare. Its okay to do work or take a few calls from these chain establishments. More commonly your corner café will only serve espresso or Balkan-style (basically the same as Turkish) coffee for less than $1 a cup, soft drinks, perhaps a few snacks, and will be happy to host you for an hour with a single cup. This is a social affair, so laptops I think would be a rude addition in these smaller establishments even if they do have Wi-Fi. Hospitality is super important to Albanians, so they are likely to share the password with you if its available, even if they would really prefer you not to set up work camp and I urge you not to take advantage of this hospitality. Also, please be patient with your server as they are most likely not going to understand your custom coffee order in any of these cafes, though they may try to accommodate you.

Join me next time for some notes on exploring Tirana and the surrounding area! If you want to get these updates to your inbox, please subscribe to my newsletter below!