“The Master” is the latest book offering a compelling look at the success of the highly valued Peja-born coach Driton Kuka, an acclaimed world and Olympic record holder in judo, who was invited to the Centre for Openness and Dialogue (COD) at the Prime Minister’s office today, along with the Olympic champions he has trained, including Majlinda Kelmendi, Nora Gjakova and Distria Krasniqi, also characters in the new book.
“The Master” was presented by the Prime Minister Edi Rama during an open discussion about the master coach’s long journey in sports, with the Premier describing the book not simply as a sports story, but also “an incredible story of ambition, passion and perseverance to accomplish the unimaginable.”
The government head shared with the participants his impressions and the emotions he felt after reading the book in a dialogue with Driton about the most interesting moments described in the book.
* * *
PM Edi Rama: Good evening everyone and thank you very much for granting us the privilege to promote the book entitled “The Master” and moreover for having the book’s characters here with us, because the master is of course the main protagonist, but his mastership would be incomprehensible without other characters.
In my view, this story is not merely a narration of sports, but a lot more than that; it is an exceptional story of passion, ambition and perseverance to pull off the unimaginable, for the sake of truth, because I think it has been originally in Driton’s mind only the ambition to bring Olympic Games gold medals to Kosovo and such ambition was then cultivated in a few number of people to later and finally explode in an extraordinary success and I can no longer claim he is unique due to the fact that another added value to this success is the fact that it represents the power of an example that will definitely inspire many others and will definitely, at some point, bring off more success as a result of the true fact that nothing is impossible for a dreamer and a passionate individual with the courage and readiness to pursue his or her dreams by daring all the sacrifices, pain and sufferings, the pitfall and disappointment to eventually succeed.
The last impression about this book is that after you read about Driton and then Majlinda, two new champions show up and this is a part of the story we all know. But another male champion is also described in the book. The book also contains the names of five more little-known sportsmen and sportswomen, namely Laura, Flaka, Erza, Shpati and Erdani, and interestingly enough the story goes on with more “envious” sportsmen who add up and eye more medals. This made me think that if we agree together with Driton and other involved individuals and officials, I think time is high to collaborate with the Ministry of Education and Sports, as well as with the Ministry of Culture, and the Ministry of Defense to fund a documentary, not only for the local public, but also as a entry in international documentary film festivals. And the reason I mentioned the three ministries is because the three are part of this story.
