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Showing posts from April, 2013

The Strife and Exhortation in the European Capital of Culture: Istanbul,Turkey

October 20- 27 and 29-30, 2012 The wind blew colder around 5 in the morning than in Thessaloniki, Greece when we arrived in bus station (otogar), Istanbul. We were waiting for the sun to go up. I could see the roaming people busy going in and out of the buses. “Where are we going now?” I asked. I still felt like dried leaves that any time I am going to fall. I felt so tired and I wanted to catch more sleep. I need to snap out of these worries. I am worried on what happen again in this unfamiliar place. We always follow our instincts and trust our map. Up the road across the terminal, at the bus station we looked for Taksim. There was a guy who sold bus stubs for 7 TL, and he never gave us the tickets. I think we were being tricked. One thing I learned in Istanbul, be cautious and alert. You can't trust anyone.  I am sucked with this unpredictable experience in every city in Europe. But, I know it is going to be fun. We didn't know the language and

Lessons from Bad Experiences

Tibi and Che went for a long European journey last year. They found that all the inconvenience, desperation and unexpected troubles happened during the trip were  lessons to reflect upon. 1. Expect the unexpected. Be prepared always. It's true that it is risky to travel. When you put yourself in danger or maybe things don't work out as planned, you put yourself at risk. On their trip to Nice, France, they thought they could catch the bus to Austria, but unfortunately, it was fully booked and they had to book a rude for the next scheduled departure on Sunday. Therefore, they had to stay two nights in an expensive city. They didn't have that much money to spend for another two nights’ accommodation, so they had to sleep in the temporary bus terminal on their last night and in the bushes in Monaco. It’s a good thing they brought their sleeping bags. The same thing happened when they went to Paris. They were supposed to leave on the late departure  however, it wa