Pristina - A jubilant Kosovo celebrated its first birthday on February 17, with Pristina’s central pedestrian street gathering expectant crowds from early on in the day. The Republic of Kosovo declared its independence from Serbia on February 17 2008, following years of strained relations over the then-Serbian province’s status.

The only emotions evident on Tuesday in the country’s capital city, however, were joyful, benefiting from the day off and a reason to go out on the town, where the red of the Albanian flag - adopted by Kosovo as its national banner - and the blue of the Pristina region’s flag created an excited whirl of colour on the shoulders of youths and the roofs and rear windows of cars.

Street vendors, having set up cardboard boxes of goods on card tables, were selling, apart from the requisite American, Pristina region and Kosovar flags, scarves saying "Kosovo", t-shirts and, of course, cigarettes.

We ask one vendor what the most popular item has been. "The flags," he says, indicating their car-worthiness.

And yet it is not only vehicles that have flags flying from their antennae and taped into their bonnets: the road in from the border crossing with Macedonia is lined with flags on lamp poles; one whole bridge is red with the double-headed eagle standard of Albania - and, now, Kosovo.

When it became its own country, there were reportedly 500 proposals for a national flag; the only one that won approval in parliament was the emblem that became the flag of the Pristina region - Kosovo’s current national flag is the same as Albania’s because that was the only design that received sufficient consensus.

Pristina’s main pedestrian street, Rruga Nene Tereze, is the destination for many of the city’s 500 000-plus inhabitants; others choose to drive up and down Bill Clinton Boulevard in cars plastered with symbols of statehood, with passengers hanging out the windows, standing up through the sun roofs or sitting on the car bonnets, holding flags and screaming. The occasional police officer holds back traffic, and looks on.

The hooting of cars and shouts are accompanied by the random going-off of crackers and other fireworks in the street; walking down one boulevard, packed with couples of all generations, families and groups of young men, a vendor tosses a firecracker to the feet of his friend’s table of wares. When it explodes with a pop-pop-pop-pop of sparks, they all look bemused.

Earlier in the day, people had been passing out white plastic smocks that had an outline of the nation and a message of congratulations on them from the country’s government; by nightfall, most of them had been tossed aside, lining the footpaths with reminders of the fragility of conviction and pride.

Yet the overall emotion is positive. People are happy, positive, if not for their country’s independence, then for a reason to revel.
The day gives outlet to flag-thrusting youths wearing capes of red and blue, who shout out and bang city refuse bins with sticks. The sight of alcohol is strangely rare - though Kosovo is about 90 per cent Muslim, beer and other liquors are readily consumed - with more people preferring sandwiches of sausage and hot peppers, or pumpkin seeds bought from street vendors.

One year after its declaration of independence, Kosovo has been recognised by 54 countries - and all but four of the 28 countries in the European Union, which makes it somewhat ironic that the headlining band of Pristina’s festivities, Morandi, is from one of the countries that has not recognised eventual EU-aspirant Kosovo - Romania.

What is the future of Kosovo? Artan, in his mid-20s and working in the nation’s European integration office, says that in the past few years, much has changed, but there is still a long way to go, particularly as concerns citizen apathy towards the government and governmental apathy towards, well, governing. People have become more open-minded - for instance, it is ok to speak Serbian in Pristina, whereas a few years ago, to do so could have been risky - and are more realistic as to what their country can accomplish in the short-term.

"The key to our success is in unity," prime minister Hashim Thaci is reported by Reuters to have said. "We have made it together," he said in a message of congratulations published in a local newspaper.
This celebration of one year of independence, thus, is greeted with hope and joy, and the realisation that tomorrow, unemployment in Kosovo will still be nearly 50 per cent.

Correction (February 20 2009): The national flag of Kosovo is the blue flag with six stars; there were 933 design submissions received. The Sofia Echo is still unclear as to why it was told that the red Albanian flag had been adopted by Kosovo as its national flag, and apologises for the error.