20 Awesome Facts about Albania
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- Albania is a beautiful country located in southeastern Europe, with stunning sandy beaches along the Adriatic Sea.
- It shares a border with Montenegro to the northwest, Kosovo to the northeast, Macedonia to the east and to the south and southeast.
- It has an area of 11,100 square miles (28,748 square kilometres).
- The coordinates for Albania are 41.0000° N, 20.0000°
- Albania’s population was 2.9 million in 2015.
- Tirana is the capital city; it has an area of 16.1 square miles (41.8 square kilometres) and a population of 421,286 (2011).
- The terrain here is mostly mountainous and hilly, with large plains along the idyllic coastline.
- Interestingly, Albania is one of only three European countries that does not have a branch of McDonalds!
- Residents here enjoy a temperate climate with dry, hot summers and wet, cool winters. Perfect, we like it even more!
- Tirana’s international airport is named after Mother Teresa, who’s family were of Albanian descent.
- Weirdly, if you shake your head in Albania it will be taken to mean yes, and if you nod, it means no – that’ll take some getting used to!
- The average life expectancy here is 74 years.
- The currency of Albania is the Albanian Lek.
- Albania’s official language is… Albanian! Shocker, eh?!
- In the Albanian language the word ‘Albania’ is actually known as ‘Shqiperia’, whilst ‘no’ is ‘jo’ and yes is ‘po’.
- More than a third of Albania is forest, giving home to incredible wild animals including Lynx and Brown Bears.
- They grow fruits, corn, potatoes, wheat and vegetables, rear livestock and produce dairy products here.
- The country’s industry consists of food and tobacco products, textiles, lumber, oil, cement, mining and hydropower.
- Albania exports textiles, asphalt, metals, crude oil, vegetables, fruits and tobacco.
- The international dialling code for this often overlooked country is 00355. To find out how to make cheap calls to Albania, just click here