I travelled to Prizren in May 2019 to photograph a ceremony in the city's Terzi neighbourhood, where members of the Roma community were to carry a flag through the streets accompanied by music. Eddy had told me about this tradition and helped me prepare for the visit. I arrived a day early, hoping to understand the route and the people involved before the event began. Instead, Eddy came running with unexpected news: the procession was already taking place. We hurried through the streets and reached it only near the end. I saw people dancing and the flag standing nearby, but I had missed the procession itself. Documentary work does not always unfold according to a carefully prepared plan; sometimes what remains is a fragment and the story of how one reached it.
I was told that the flag had been presented to the Roma community by an Ottoman sultan. Participants described a practice of praying and drinking water beneath it at the conclusion of the ceremony. I record this as a local account rather than a verified historical origin. The ritual interested me not only for its music and movement but also for what a shared symbol can mean to a community. At the time I wondered whether publicly carrying the flag was also a way of affirming collective identity and dignity in a society where Roma people have often faced exclusion. That was my interpretation, not an explanation offered on behalf of the participants.
Prizren itself has long been a meeting place of languages, religions and communities. The city lies below a hilltop fortress, beside the river commonly known as the Lumbardhi or Bistrica. Its history includes Byzantine, medieval Serbian and Ottoman periods, each leaving traces in the urban landscape. Under Ottoman rule, mosques, bridges, markets and religious institutions helped shape the town that can still be recognised today. The old stone streets and the river crossing give Prizren a scale that invites walking rather than hurried sightseeing. During my visit I often heard Turkish spoken, a reminder of the city's continuing linguistic diversity alongside Albanian, Bosnian, Romani and other community traditions.
The city's layered history also includes the League of Prizren, founded in 1878, a pivotal episode in the development of the Albanian national movement. I visited the museum associated with the League, as well as two functioning dervish lodges connected with the Bektashi and Melami traditions. These visits added another dimension to my impressions of Prizren. The lodges belong to a much wider history of Sufi religious and social life in the Balkans, while the museum speaks to the political transformations that reshaped the region during the decline of Ottoman authority. In Prizren, such histories are not isolated chapters: their buildings and memories remain close to one another in the same streets.
My work also took me back to people I had met earlier on the journey. Together with Eddy, I visited Necip Menekşe at Radio Romano Avazo, a Roma radio station, and we discussed possible future projects. I had met Necip in Kumanovo; his willingness to share contacts and ideas helped me see beyond the formal programme of my trip. Sadly, he died about a year later. While we were together, we also visited Roma blacksmiths in their workshops. I photographed them at work, drawn to the relationship between hands, tools, materials and the knowledge carried from one generation to another. Those encounters are among the most personal memories I brought back from Prizren.
I was in the city during Ramadan. On my final evening, Eddy invited me to an iftar meal with his family and relatives. After days spent moving between ceremonies, workshops, monuments and meetings, sitting down at a family table offered a different way of understanding the city. I could observe the warmth of the gathering and the connections between generations without the distance of a formal visit. Looking back, my Prizren photographs are not simply a record of its historic streets. They are the traces of a journey shaped by a missed procession, unexpected meetings, skilled craftspeople, religious traditions and an invitation to share a meal.