As Albanians continue to flock to the West, causing a ‘brain drain’, one family recounts a hair-raising tale of escape.


Fatjona Mejdini is a freelance journalist based in Tirana, Albania. She writes about the Balkans and previously has worked for Balkan Insight.
As Albanians continue to flock to the West, causing a ‘brain drain’, one family recounts a hair-raising tale of escape.

How shadows of past tensions between Macedonian majority and ethnic Albanian minority impede population registration.
![A man passes an ethnic Albanian mural in Skopje, North Macedonia, on October 1, 2018 [File:AP/Thanassis Stavrakis]](https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/AP18274378572722.jpg?resize=270%2C180&quality=80)
In the basement of an old museum in a village in Albania, a 78-year-old woman protects the last remnant of a dictator.
![Enver Hoxha - Albania feeature [Fatjona Mejdini]](https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/d2cec3c0120446e8a43e3e957f9495e1_18.jpeg?resize=270%2C180&quality=80)