Sejfi Protopapa, a superb intellectual and a great man - By Arben Kallamata

Arben Kallamata

When a friend suggested that I write something about Sejfi Protopapa (1923-2014) for a web page dedicated to famous people from Korça, I really hesitated, because there is not a direct link between him and the region.

Sejfi was born in Berat; however, his family, as the name indicates, originates from a village in Korça named Protopapa. I believe, it would be an honor for the people of Korça, too, to claim that great intellectual and patriot as their own.

Upon graduating from Vlora Trade School, Sejfi Protopapa became actively involved in the anti-fascist movement as part of the Balli Kombëtar. He was the President of the Party Youth organization and commander of one of its units.

Towards the end of the war he left Albania and went Italy, where he studied finance at the University of Perugia. He later moved to the United States of America and continued his studies at New York University and majored in Physics. After that he had a spectacular career, especially for an immigrant who had moved to America in his twenties.

First, Sejfi worked for the Satellite Communication Sector of the Department of Transportation at the famous Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico, and then for NASA. It takes a brilliant mind, excellent scientific knowledge, and a special talent to be able to achieve what he did.

I consider myself lucky and privileged to have had the honor of personally meeting that great man. I was impressed by his intelligence and character. He was one of the few Albanians who would not let emotions come in the way of his reasoning, who argued with facts and with the calm logic of a physicist.

He was never shy of expressing his opinion openly, even when he was well aware that others around might not like what he was saying. He was concerned more with the truth than with being liked. His analytical powers were amazing, but you could never say that he lacked in emotions.

I cannot forget an episode he once told me. He was working in New Mexico, at Los Alamos and one of the things he missed most was Albanian - listening to the sound of the language. There were no Albanians around, so Sejfi had to take a plane and fly to LA, where he knew a bar frequented by Albanians.

He would go there, sit alone in a corner, not letting anyone know who he was, and listen to people around him speak his language. He did not tell this story to bring tears in your eyes. He just told it as an example of the idea that everyone needs and misses his or her own language.

When I first met him he had been away from Albania for more than fifty years; he did not have very strong links with other Albanians in the Boston area; he was married to a non-Albanian, and yet, he spoke a perfect Albanian, free of any English, Turkish, or other traces. It was so flawless that you felt embarrassed with your inability to equal it.

Sejfi Protopapa was one of best experts in the history of the Independent Albanian Orthodox Church. He considered it to be essential to the foundation and the survival of the independent Albanian state. When I first met him I was kind of emotional. I had heard about him and knew a lot about him. And I was very well aware that I was going to meet a man who, during the war had been fighting on the other side of the front-line from where my father fought.

How were we going to feel about one another? But once I met him, I realized that it was impossible not to respect and like him and his steel logic. At some point, I directly told him what I thought - that both sides in that war had been wrong. I also added that I blamed neither him, nor my father. They had both been too young and inexperienced to be judged.

Sejfi was not upset at all. He found a nice way to turn it into a joke. Precise and unambiguous as he was in his judgment on the role of communists during World War Two in Albania, he was able to separate the way he saw history, from the spirit of tolerance and understanding that should exist between Albanians of all orientations today. He did not have the slightest trace of revenge or desire for vindication in his mind.

Sejfi will always be remembered as a superb intellectual and a great man.

© Arben Kallamata