With Salim Despite being a dozen years younger than myself, I connected with him like a friend of my age. His thoughtfulness, maturity and inquisitiveness kept me in a comfortable and fun environment all the while we were exploring the Southern part of the country, and the experience will be remembered for a long time …
with Danilo and Nevena It was already a coincidence when we crossed paths in Plovdiv, Bulgaria two years ago. And what are the odds that I was sighted on the street in their home country? This has to be called pure luck! Meeting people again is a special experience for me, and it is even …
with Sibel and Ozlem Last time it was summer and they were travelers, and now it is winter and they are locals. By coincidence, we reunited on a very cold day in Istanbul, and for some time we had to cover our faces as we walked because pieces of snow were getting into our eyes. …
Some Turkish friends strongly recommended a fish sandwich place in town. I was happy to learn that the place was only two minutes from where I stay, but from the outside, the popularity seemed overwhelming – the queue for placing orders was long, and there was another queue for the people who wanted to get …
Bike riders On the first two days in Turkey, I met bike travelers each day. Some of it must have been by coincidence and other could have been due to my desperate energy to meet other people, after a long break in Georgia. The two groups of riders had things in common. They both started …
Family with love It was only my second evening in Armenia but it already felt like it had been a lot. The first day I had to drive for hours at night on unpaved roads trying to find a guesthouse that is still open during the off-season, only relying on offline maps. The second day, …
In general, I try to keep distance from using the word ‘hospitable’ when describing people of a country or a region. It’s not because hospitality is an undesirable value by any means. I just feel that accepting to use the word encourages me to subconsciously believe that I am in the position to evaluate different …
Lesson on a sad day Sometimes people ask if or when I get lonely on the road. Since I have been traveling for almost two years, it seems to be fair curiosity. But when I think about it, I realize that it hardly happens. Yes, there were demanding situations where things could have been solved …