"Albania Fair" for the 30th anniversary

About 30 years ago, the "Albanienhilfe Weilheim" began with the first aid transports.

The 30th anniversary will be celebrated on Sunday, May 9th, with a thanksgiving service, during which, among other things, the “Albania Mass” will be performed.

Weilheim

- The story of how it began for Albania with help from Weilheim has been told many times. And somehow this incident stands for the history of “Albanienhilfe Weilheim”: A small thing became something big. It started with a television report that the founder of "Albanienhilfe Weilheim", Fritz Sommer, saw more than 30 years ago. It was an account of the country, tormented by the long and crushing rule of Enver Hoxha, which was considered the poor house of Europe. Fritz Sommer moved these images in such a way that he spontaneously decided to organize aid transports that set off from the parking lot of the Weilheim Hardt School for Albania. He was supported by the Weilheim Kolping family. Fritz Sommer's daughter Evelyn also went on one of the first transports,who was the first chairman of Albania Aid for around 17 years after his death.

The small association “Albanienhilfe Weilheim” has been providing humanitarian, future-oriented aid for 30 years now. In addition to the transport of aid, there was soon the establishment of soup kitchens and various "help for self-help programs" such as a kindergarten in Kallmet, a craftsman's yard with a bakery, shoemaking, carpentry and tailoring as well as a stonemasonry, in Pogradec, a polyclinic and es two primary schools were renovated and established.

From the year 2000, one of the most beautiful and well-known social centers in all of Albania was built in Elbasan, an island for children and young people, which was also created with financial support from “Sternstunden” and “Renovabis”. Over the years a kindergarten, a children's home, a girls' dormitory with a training center as well as “assisted living for boys” and an “apartment for young women” have been built there.

In the still poorer north of Albania, Albania Aid provides substantial financial support for a soup kitchen with a training center and a kindergarten run by nuns. The poverty there is so extreme that the nuns go to the families in the huts and dwellings to bring medicines and basic food. The way to the soup kitchen is too far to go for the sick and needy.

The “Albanienhilfe Weilheim” celebrates its 30th anniversary this coming Sunday, May 9th, at 9.30 am with a thanksgiving service in the parish church “Mariae Himmelfahrt”. The service will be organized by a group of musicians who will perform the "Albania Mass" composed by Karl-Heinz Werner and by the church musician Jürgen Geiger from Weilheim. Many years ago the former pastor Hans Appel wrote texts about it.

Even after 30 years the association continues to help: “We started many years ago to support the poorest of the poor.

Now we have almost 45 protégés in Elbasan, whom we take care of every day, offer them schooling, training opportunities and future prospects.

We mustn't let them down and send them back on the streets!

Please help us to master this task, which is not always easy, ”writes the chairman of Albanienhilfe, Claus Nitzinger.

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Bank details: Sparkasse Oberland, Albanienhilfe Weilheim eV, IBAN: DE38 7035 1030 0000 0253 61, BIC: BYLADEM1WHM.

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