The Internet Cafe

February 2003

Tonight we go out for coffee with our internet cafe brothers.  They are live here and speak English (although more conceptual or abstract stuff is difficult sometimes).  The younger brother, Arton, owns the internet cafe we patronize.  Funds came from his brother in Germany.  He is young, maybe 20, and very smart.  He keeps the machines running smooth and does great user support with his customers.  Someone who knows "customer service." ;-)  Yahoo!

He stayed with his father, cousins and uncles during the war, up in the mountains over looking their town.  The women went to Macedonia. They are not originally from Prishtina. Arton and his cousin would sneak down to town at night and get bread or other food to bring back into the hiding spot.  Their houses were looted and then burned.  Some of the neighbors got caught and all were killed.  Luckily, his family survived in the mountains.   His older brother, Zekim, was in prison for 2 years while a student during the uprisings.  He currently works for a Swiss NGO that deals with agriculture.  Don't know much more about him yet.  Of course, mom, dad, grandma and a sister, all live together with them and want to meet us.  So, I am sure we will be with the whole family sometime soon.  They also have another two sisters: one in Germany and one in Italy.

March 2003

Zekim will be a father in June and his wife is growing day by day.  We haven’t connected much with the family considering that all of our training gigs have kept us very busy.  We have been impressed with Arton, Zekim, and their sister Marita's (also a student) abilities to keep an internet café open 24 hours day!  They have only one other employee, Flurim.  

Photos coming soon!