Surdulli’s future vision of Pristina includes buildings with more space between them and less stories. He described residential buildings with walls the color of blue, red and yellow intermixed with historic and governmental buildings made of stone rather than cheap metal or glass façades.

The Department of Culture divides its budget into two categories. The first category goes to professional institutions that are directly administered by the Ministry of Culture. Those institutions received 1.94 million euros in funding this year. The second category is for funding individual artists and NGOs, and is about 900,000 euros less, at 1.02 million euros.

Every Wednesday in Fushë Kosovë, four women sit in a room adorned with the crayon drawings and school work of their children, making beads from recycled paper. In another brightly decorated room, five more women scrape and smooth cream-colored bars of flower-shaped soap.

“We are ready to work with the LGBTI community, but in the end it must be the people of Kosovo who lead the effort. This is an opportunity for Kosovo to demonstrate to the world that it is an inclusive and diverse society.”

Vera Remškar sat at the conference table in the white room of the FTK office. She looked wistfully out of the fingerprint-smudged window.

Blerim dug his lime green shoes into the matching colored mat, relaxed his shoulders and slowly exhaled. It gave him the relaxed and ready feeling he loves so much— the feeling that he can’t go without for a week, and that feeds his addiction.

Foster parents face challenges in raising their foster children, like health issues the baby may have when they arrive or not knowing the full identity of the child, but the biggest challenge for Trashe is parting with her foster children.

Zeke Çeku sat in the brightest room of hotel, enjoying the slits of sunlight that played across his face from the window. He sipped an espresso slowly, keeping it warm in his hands —one of the few espressos the hotel’s cafe would sell that day.

Shpresa Sefedini’s eyes light up when she smiles. And she smiles a lot—she smiles as she talks about her studies, her family and her plans for the future. She smiles while walking around Prishtina, stopping to hug and catch up with her friends in between her many exams and church meetings. And she has a lasting smile from the recent wedding of a close friend.

Kassandra paced back and forth in her new enclosure, her shoulders bulging with each padded step. She clawed at the ground as she stopped and sniffed the grass, before she slid into her concrete pool to cool herself from the midday heat. In that moment, she looked content as Afrim Mahmuti, Four Paws site manager at the Bear Sanctuary Pristina, approached. He introduced her as “the first bear we rescued from captivity.” When Four Paws found Kassandra, she was in a 6-square-meter cage by the side of a mountain road, neglected, undernourished, and forgotten by her previous owners.

Tucked away, just off one of the stone streets of Prizren, sits the DokuFest office. The energy brewing in the office seeps through its white walls, as the staff is bustling about, preparing for Saturday, when the film festival begins eight days of screening documentary movies.

Violeta Mulaj meticulously flipped through her portfolio booklet of handicrafts and tailoring works. An old sewing table and machine sat in the corner, and its creations hung from every spare space and ledge.