My name is Sulejman, but here I am Thanasis

When Sulejman secretly crossed the Greek-Albanian border in 1991 and reached Katerini, he didn’t speak a word of Greek. However, he was determined not to return home, at least not without having saved some money to help his family and to later build his life in the new Albanian reality. He worked hard and honestly in the fields of Pieria and there were indeed many times when he was blatantly wronged by certain locals, who believed that even giving an Albanian a piece of bread “was more than enough.”

However, he was patient, gradually learned the language, and when the state began issuing residence permits to Albanian immigrants, he rushed to apply. However, he didn’t have documents from Albania to prove his identity, just like thousands of his fellow countrymen who crossed the forests and ravines of Mt Grammos and Mt Mourgana, barefoot and ragged, seeking a better life in Greece.

Therefore, when he was asked to fill out the relevant forms, he was registered simply as “Thanasis…” without the clerk asking for proof of identity, because he knew that it was likely that Sulejman wouldn’t have documents – as was, in fact, the case.

Sulejman did what almost all Albanians working in Greece did who met certain conditions for obtaining a residence permit. They ‘Hellenized’ their names, hoping for greater acceptance in daily life

Sulejman did what almost all Albanians working in Greece did who met certain conditions for obtaining a residence permit. They “Hellenized” their names, hoping for greater acceptance in daily life, without the Greek state requiring them to prove they were who they claimed to be.

Of course, many were registered with their proper Albanian names and were given residence permits, if they were entitled to them. For example, Xena and Antonis came illegally to Greece in the early 1990s and are recorded in their official documents as Gjine and Selami.

Why do I recall all this at a time when Albanian immigrants have integrated into Greek society and are thriving as a community? It was a recent speech by Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama in Italy. Addressing a gathering of Albanian migrants in Milan, he said: “You, the Albanians in Italy, did not change your names, perforce and widely, as thousands of our brothers and sisters tragically did in Greece.” He went on to characterize Greece as a “stain of shame in the history of democratic Europe.”

This column has previously commented that the Albanian leader has a marked tendency to become ecstatic and veer off track when in front of television cameras or a large audience. For some reason, not necessarily political, he seems to believe that the entire planet revolves around him. That’s his right, but in this case, he was caught either uninformed or lying, adding another drop of poison to the relations between the two neighboring peoples.