Tournée in China (1972)

Today I want to do a jump to the past…in 1972.

At that time I was attending the Tirana Opera and Theatre Ballet Academy.

Albanian and Chinese Government were very close friend at that time, and to get this friendship stronger and to spread the Albanian National Repertoire (the one that better represented the communist realism) we were invited to do a big Tournée in China.

Beijing 1st July 1972 with "comrade" Go Chin Sen (worker at the Beijing Film Studio)

The whole Ballet Troupe, some student of the Academy as me, soloist opera singers, the entire orchestra and some politicians of the party went to China for this big event.

Oh! I was almost forgetting to mention that there were also people in charge for “security”. Their responsibility was to check that no one could have the brilliant idea to run away.

I was so excited, it was my first journey abroad…and I was only 14!

We left at the end of April 1972 and of course “security” men withdrew all passports to “keep them safe”.

We were flying with 2 airplanes Ilyushin 62 (half of them crashed!). We were more than 160 people.

First stop was in Bucharest, the second one in Karachi (Pakistan) and last stop Beijing Airport.

Once we got to the airport, the Chinese government had organized a welcome parade to honor our arrival.

The journey by coach from the airport to the city was almost one hour and our Chinese “comrade” thought that was a good idea to teach us how to say numbers in Chinese (yī, èr, sān, sì, wǔ, liù, qī, bā…).

We were staying in Beijing Qianmen hotel (I found out that it still exists). It was a luxury hotel for that time, and for us (still children) it was like a dream.

The tournée was supposed to last more than two months.

With me there were also my brother Dashnor (he was a dancer too) and the person that today is my wife. Her name is Tania.

My wife Tania during an exursion on the Great Wall.

We stayed the first two weeks in Beijing having class every day with the dancers of the Beijing Theatre. Before starting barre work, we were supposed to wait that Mao Tse-Tung (毛泽东 - Pinyin: Máo Zédōng) writings were read to us.

Every single moment of our days were filmed in order to produce a propaganda reportage/documentary. This was a very important event for the last two real communist country.

To show us the greatness of China we were brought to see their steel industries  but also important cultural places such as the Great Wall and other important temples and gardens.

The language was not a problem because the government provided us professional Chinese-Albanian interpreters. Among them there were also people in incognito; they pretended not to understand a word in Albanian language but their aim was to listen all the “unofficial” things we were talking about.

This journey brought me a huge passion in knowing new people, cultures and countries.

It is true that time changed a lot…

The ballet troupe in Shanghai. I'm the one with curly hair on the left corner.

The ballet troupe on the Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge.

Picture taken the 28th of June 1972. Behind the picture it is written:
"ALBANIAN BALLET TROUPE IN CHINA: Little artistes of the Albanian Ballet Troup together with members of the Little Red Soldiers' Propaganda Team in Nanking. (HSI HUA NEWS AGENCY)"

End of a performance. Please note on the background the two portraits: on the left the albanian dictator Enver
Hoxha and on the right the one of Mao Tse-Tung.

 

(per leggere il post in italiano clicca sulla bandierina)