My First Travelversary

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

That's right, it's my first anniverary on the road. June 25, one year ago I left Calgary to start this thing and here I am, June 25th again.

It feels strange, my life is moving fast now. Nine more days in Saudi and then it's back to Turkey where I'll get married and make the next big change in my life. I'm looking forward to it.

I've always kind of felt like since I graduated high school in 2000 I've let my life kind of plateau without making any forward movement. Even though I got a university degree, went to SE Asia and fell in love for the first time, I always felt like I was standing still.

But as of a year ago, I'm moving forward again. I've traveled a lot, and in that travel I've managed to make a lot of (in my view) much needed changes in the way I think of myself and run my life. I feel more confident these days, and I've started trying to affect my future instead of just looking forward to it. I still struggle with some things, but the forward momentum is back and I feel good about that.

So what does the next year hold? Well obviously there's marriage. The plan is to work the next school year in Istanbul to save some money. Saudi has helped get all my accounts back into black, but I still don't have a whole lot of extra cash to work with. I think I found a well-paying job in Turkey so 10 months of that should put me in pretty good shape to travel a bit more with Sadife and then take the next step forward and move to Vancouver to finally start my career in film.

That's the plan as it stands right now anyway. My plans have been pretty fluid though since this trip started so I'm not really sure if they'll be the same one year (or one month) from now, but I feel pretty good about them. We'll see what happens.

As for the immediate plan, I am off to a place called Mada'in Saleh tomorrow. It's an ancient city carved into mountains much like Petra. In fact, it was made by the same civilization. It looks pretty spectacular and it's the one thing I'm excited to do before I leave Saudi. I will take lots of pictures!

So I think that's it for me today. I'm looking forward to seeing a few of you guys in Istanbul for my wedding and the rest of you I'll see in another year or so when I get back to Canada!

The next step.

Izmir, Turkey



Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you are all having a great holiday season! Thank you all for all the donations to my travelling cause. They really came as a surprise! They have alleviated things quite a bit here and my stress levels have dropped back down!

Also with Christmas comes my 6 month travelling anniversery. I've been gone half a year now. With this day comes two firsts: It's my first Christmas spent away from family, and it's the longest I've ever been outside of Calgary (Well, since I was 3 years old anyway). I wasn't sure what to expect. I wasn't sure if I'd be sad, crushed or quite content. As it turns out, I'm somewhere inbetween. I miss all of you people back home, especially over the last few days. But I have some great friends here that have made things much easier. I guess it just goes to show, no matter where you go, you'll always have friends and family, even if not connected by blood.



Anyway, I realize I haven't been writing on here regularly but as I'm sure you have figured, things have more or less been in a holding pattern the last few months. Now things are starting to get moving again.

Since my money has been running so low lately I have finally accepted a teaching position, although not in China as I first expected. No, I will be teaching in Saudia Arabia. I'm not sure which city yet, as I understand it, it will be one of four. Should be a pretty amazing experience! The pay is good (about 3000 USD/month) and everything but food is paid for. Free accomodations, insurance, travel stipend, etc etc. It means I should be able to bank all of it and have enough money for the rest of this trip!

On a writing front things are going well there too. I have a few more papers interested in looking at my work and they are going over it now. I hope to have another publication or two to announce after the holidays. I will keep you all posted!

I will be spending New Years in Istanbul with Sadife. After that I'm coming back to Izmir for a week or so and then off to Saudi. I plan to post from Istanbul. I'll let you know what New Years is like in Turkey!

Later, all!

Anyone want to buy my shoes?

Fetiye, Turkey



I finally got pictures to work. I am going to China in a couple weeks so when there I will catch up all the old ones. For now, here are some from Turkey and one from Estonia.


I don't have much to say about Estonia. It seemed very blah after seeing Riga and Klapeida and all these other wonderful places in neighboring countries. However, I did get a chance to shoot a bow. My first shot hit the center of the target! But I couldn't duplicate that unfortunately. I hit the target on at least half my shots though! Here is my epic photo with wrist protector and cape. That's right, I'm wearing a cape.

Shooting a bow in Estonia

I spent a week in Istanbul before coming here to Fetiye and it was a hell of an experience. I mean... Bangkok felt big but Istanbul is HUGE! It has 4 million more people than Bangkok in about the same amount of space. The nicest area is called Taksim and no, it is not the place that has the palace, or the blue mosque, or Aya Sofia. That section is Sultenamhet. Taksim is just one neighbourhood north of Sultenahmet across a stretch of water called the Golden Horn. Taksim is a bit of an amalgamation kind of like Istanbul itself. You can buy stuffed muscles and 'wet hamburgers' (actually really delicious) on the street and if you keep walking you find bars, shops and a tourist haven without all the tourists. There is one street with about 30 small pubs and restaurants where another Canadian told me 'eventually if you sit here long enough you will meet everyone you know on this street.' I think it's not too far from the truth.

Istanbul - Foreground is Taksim, water is The Golden Horn and background is Sultenahmet

Taksim


Looking at Sultenahmet across the Golden Horn

Sultanahmet has some beautiful buildings but is a little too crowded with tourists. And not normal tollerable tourists, but the ones who are holding maps, looking at the sky, wandering in all directions and snapping photos whenever possible. You know, the ones where if you sit in the corner where there is nothing interesting with the hopes of taking a break from them, they all come over to you because they think you're looking at something that's not in their guidebooks... grrr... Still, like I said, the places are beautiful.

The Blue Mosque

Inside the Blue Mosque


Aya Sofia - 1500 year old church turned to Mosque turned to museum

Me at the Palace and the Asian side of the city in the background

So where does the title of this blog come in? Well I was sitting in a park across the street from the tourist zone and a local guy comes up beside me and sits down on the bench. He lights up a cigarette and asks me if I smoke. I say no so he asks me if I want to buy some marijuana. I say no again and we make small talk for a few minutes before he mentions he owns a carpet shop in one of the bazaars. He wants me to go with him to see it and buy a carpet. The next few minutes passed with me trying fruitlessly to explain to this guy that I have no use for a carpet and that I can hardly carry it around on the top of my backpack for the next year while travelling the world. Eventually though he does let it drop and we make some more small talk. I tell him I'm staying with a girl in a neighbourhood called Fulya and he promptly asks if we can have a threesome... 'No,' I say, trying to keep a straight face. 'I don't think that's a good idea.' So he spends the next few minutes talking about the tightness of various bodily orafices and then looks down to notice my shoes. 'Those are nice' he says. I agree, thankful to change the subject. 'Can I have them?' I laugh. 'No, you can't have my shoes.' 'Why not?' 'Because I need them for walking.' He thinks for a minute and says 'Can I buy them?' he sees the look on my face and says 'Okay, I'll give you 30 Liras and my shoes if you give me yours.' I tell him no again. By this point I'm getting tired of new experiences and conversation with the locals so I say I have to go. He asks me for an email address and I get out a pen to give him mine, thinking he'll never write me anyway. 'No,' he says, 'I want an email for some Canadian girls.' I leave.

Fetiye is a beautiful place. Very different from Istanbul. It's on the coast of the Mediteranian next to a small area called Ölüdemiz which translates to 'The Dead Sea.' It's not the same famous one that you have heard of from Jordan but it is a beautiful area. I've been swimming there twice now and today in Butterfly valley, a place only accessible by boat or a long steep clımb down a cliff, I met a Chinese girl from Shanghai. You remember what I said about the universe working out if you put yourself out there enough? Well Shanghai is where I plan to teach in a couple weeks so she has agreed to meet up with me when I arrive and show me around a bit and help me get settled. The universe rocks.

2300 year old Lycian tomb in Fetiye

Butterfly Valley

Ölüdemiz - The Dead Sea

Something to Remember

Istanbul, Turkey

I wrote this in my journal while flying above the black sea feelıng a little sentimental. Thought I'd copy it here:

I want to wrıte about somethıng that I think is important.

Often when hearing about humans and our affect on the earth, we hear about our contribution to global warming, or increased extinction rates, or nuclear power, or water pollution, or the destruction of forests to build cities and farms, or, well, you get the idea. And these are important issues. More than important. And they're not being given as much consideration as they warrent or require and I thınk as a species, in our attempt to increase awareness with all these things and in some meaningful way try to repair the damage we have done, we become focused on the negative. On only the faultsö or what we have taken away from the planet. And maybe this is necessary too ın order to incite change at a faster rate. But I think despite all that, it's occasionally just as important to look at what we've added to the planet, lest we forget our magnificence while remembering only our faults.

Right now I'm sittıng in a plane, in the window seat lookıng out over the northern coast of the black seaç The moon is at half, and the earth is nearly as dark as the sea by which ıt rests, mınus of course for a strıng of a million tiny yellow lights, outlining the coast like fireflys all travelling in a lıne until they bunch up, denser and denser into a cıty. The lights twinkle like stars brought down from the sky, marking the land where humankınd had decided to settle.

Behind me, further back in the airplane, people are clapping rhythmically and laughing, as one teenager plucs at a sort of mini-guitar while others dance in the aisle. They're forced to stop as the plane begins to descend but suddenly there is a greater cheer in the fuselage. Others are laughing and talkıng with more vigor and soul.

These are things we've given the planet. These are things that shouldn't be ignored or overshadowed by the threat of global warmıng, because just as we've created pollution, we've also created lıght. And it's damn beautiful.