Tirana, Albania
On November 28, Albania celebrated the 100th anniversary of its independence from the Ottoman Empire. The small and enigmatic republic had an atrocious history of strict isolation, after World War II, under the Communist dictatorship of Enver Hoxha. Its population of three million is described typically as 35 percent Sunni Muslim, 35 percent spiritual Bektashi Sufis, whose creed is derived from Shia Islam, 20 percent Christian Orthodox, and 10 percent Catholic.

The office and bookstore of the official Islamic Community of Albania, representing the Sunnis, are located in the capital, Tirana, on a main street named for George W. Bush. Albanians see no irony in that. They love Bush, who recognized the independence of Kosovo when it was proclaimed in 2008, just as they love Presidents Woodrow Wilson and Bill Clinton. Since the middle of 2011, the village of Fushe-Kruje, which Bush visited in 2007, has been adorned with a monument depicting Bush him in rolled-up sleeves, waving as if to a crowd. (Pristina, the Kosovo capital, named a street for him in 2008.)