First heard online, “Ho visto un paese bianco bianco”, Giulia Morucchio & Irene Rossini & the Department of the Eagles, 2006. Retold in Rijeka, 2022.
After the separation of the Albanian Communist Party from the rest of the European Soviet block in 1969, all television sets were made in the factory Uzina e Radio-Televizorëve (URT), which was owned and controlled directly by the State. The TVs were assembled in a way that made it technically impossible to receive any frequency other than the Albanian ones.
But people in Albania liked to secretly watch Italian television, the RAI. So they invented the kanoçe (KA-NO-CHE), or “cans”. These were small homemade devices made of waste materials and electronic components, and containing a structure that could transform UHF signal into VHF—in other words, they translated the RAI frequency into the Albanian ones. They were sold through the black market: a network would connect a buyer with an engineer able to make and install the device. It is unclear how kanoçe originated. The modified can contained a pattern of resistors and amplifiers that may have followed a scheme found in Russian magazines illegally imported into the country.
Of course, the production of these antennas was illegal. Watching RAI signal was tolerated by the Communist Party up until 1973, the year of the Fourth Plenum, when the State assumed stricter control over radio and television production and programs, and over the whole telecommunications system. After that time, owning a kanoçe or being caught watching Italian television could lead to severe punishment. Yet, virtually everyone in Albania had one or knew someone who had one.