first day at butterfly valley.

The bus ride was quite exhausting, many stops and a very uncomfortable seat resulting in little sleep and weird dreams. Arrived in Fethie, Jam explains me how to get to what might be my first stop along the coast. After a stop in an internet cafe, I give a try hitchhiking but as no one stops, i jump onto the first passing dolmus (dolmouch, small buses). It seems like as long as buses are running, you have little chances of getting a ride. The Bus drops me of on the famous Ölüdeniz beach. This area is full of English tourists, big beer belly (or jellow belly :), pinkish red face, shorts and sunglasses. Many invest in this region like they invest in Spain or in the French alps and buy ridiculously big and modern houses.

From there i walk on to the butterfly valley. As i dont have the guide book or a map, i miss the official lycian path and walk along the coastal road. I get a short ride from a slightly drunk, fast driving turk. The coastal view is beautiful, the place is calm, the air is warm and i feel on holiday again. The turquoise waters are calling me for a swim, the sun is still worm despite it is end of October.
I walk in the village sitting above the butterfly valley. Her the lycia markings can be clearly seen and a big billboard indicates the way down to the butterfly valley. I pass Georges pension ask for direction and am pointed to red dotted stones leading down a steep but safe path into the valley. Before engaging on the path, i have the pleasure to read the warnings, first one about prices, Accommodation is NOT free... Ohh shit i was expecting something not too pricey :) And the other sign warning about the path down, not dangerous but do not engage with kids or older people, leave your backpack... Well it turns out it is steep but very ok and parts are equipped with ropes to deescalate the steep cliff like rocks.
Once in the valley, passed the fence, i discover the messy gardens, not really what i would have expected from a hippy community as it was presented to me by micheal jackson in Sarajevo... Things are overgrown, no one has taken care of these parcels in a while. i follow th sounds of yelling men and get to the beach where i am welcomed by two huge barking dogs. Three girls sit there by the beach, a couple men are unloading stuff from a boat and pulling a zodiak out of the sea. After a rapid chat with the three Israeli girls, i figure out who is in charge and start chatting with him, starting by sending the greeting from our common friends Jam.
His name is Aple and he first tells me I should have to pay 25 lira a night including food but that because i am a friend of Jams he will charge me only 10. connexions connexions :) i shoot a couple pictures dip in my stinky feet that have not breathed for more almost 24 hours... I soon meet Ancy and Kieran from Norway and New Zeland. They have been around for a couple days, staying for free in exchange for some work. I join in when they start disassembling on off the wooden houses. Actually not the whole house, just the bottom floor. A sort of storage house closed by simple wood plates. Removing those plates and cleaning everything in there leaves a couple pillars and the top floor. This is no longer a building I am told. Because the reason we are doing this is the legal problems the people of butterfly valley are having. The Turkish government leases the ground of the butterfly valley to a group of people. Because the valley is a national park, these people have to respect some rules and are not entiteled to construct anything. But they need some sort of buildings to host the turists coming overnight, some to have a bar and restaurant for those coming by boat for the afternoon. So they build bungalow, which are all right and not considered as buildings. Same goes for the bar which is a tree house with no walls. But the kitchen was build with rocks and mortar so they teared it down to go by the law (to build an other one, that part i did not understand...).
Later, after a big and tasty dinner, we have long chats around the fire on the beach. I am tiered from the previous night and go to sleep early.

Of to the south!

The bus for Fethie is in the evening, at 8 so in the meantime, i get a map, a couple useful thing, leave the rest at Marion's and in the stress, i forget to contact any couch surfers in Antalya or Ankara. My bag is quite light and even with some added weight for food and water i should be able to carry it for kilometers.

Today is a turkish national holiday and the streets are full of people, flags, and on Istiklal, the comunist party is doing a propagenda action :) Loads of young people are standing and hold a news paper in their hands. They are standing amongst the flow of people and are trying to sell the paper. Excpt me and a couple older weird looking people, i have seen no one stop by to chat or let alone buy a print of the paper...
On the Taksim square, a scene was put up and djs are performing... loud house and techno altered with turquish sounds to satify everyone are banging and people standing under the “attack” of flashing laser and light shows... It is funny how the context influences my view of things, the light show is more or less the same than back in serbia at that small techno party in an arena but the mood seems quite different. Or maybe it does not only seem but is after all, mixed ages, mixed origin, national holiday, it cant be the same mood than a party full of drunk (and drug'd) youngsters. I rapidly ass as my bus is leaving soon.
In fact, its good i didnt take too much time because the servis bus taking me to the main bus station leaves just as i step in... at the bus station i have to wait a good half hour before the luxurious bus arrives. Looks new, all white and clean, tainted windows... And it is pretty new inside as well, big seats with seat belts (??). The seats are numbered and there is a hostess (no sexy young lady, rather a stinky, uptight young men...) to make sure you sit in the right spot. So despite an almost empty bus, i have to sit with someone. Fortunately, amongst the average age of 40, he is the only other young guy on the bus. And we start chating.
Jam (yep like pearl Jam or the glass of jam, thats his name) is a cook on big cargo ships. He is about to go home to Fetyie after 2 years away... Being cook on such a big ship consist mostly of being board and frustrated. No women, nothing to do except get drunk, play play station and watch movies. he tells me about his room and the times he shared it wit his brother, a captain. A big room with big tv, a lot of technology and comfort but no women and no where to go for weeks until they finally hit a harbor. He used to work on cruise ships, a bit more work but far better since there are always new people to talk to. On a cargo they are just some 20 crew people and not much alternative. He earned good money and now he just wants to get home an rest, just lay down without feeling any movement and take it easy, enjoy the beach, the sun, the house and family. Speaking of family, he is part of the butterfly family and tells me to great everyone when i get there.
The bs rides in turkey are something very special, you understand the point of that button that you always see above you with a hostes pictured on it. Never wondered what the hell this is for and who it calls?? Well in france or switzerland most certainly no one, especially if you sit on your school bus. But here, you can call for water anytime you want, there are a couple tea or coffee services and you even get a small piece of cake. An other notable thing is that the bus stopes sevral times, in big road houses for about 30 minuts, time to go for a piss, smoke a couple cigaretts (yep the turks love their smoke!) or get something warm to eat... In our case, it is time enough to smoke a big joint before getting back on the bus :) a funny scene those stops, the buses get washed (no wonder they look so new...) the people walk around... and the atmosphere is so mysty, foggy, dark and cold.
Back on the bus, impossible to sleep, to many thoughts from my stoned mind, too many stops, light on, people moving around... At least i finally get some space, the watchdog stopped forbidding us to sit on empty seats and i have two seats for myself. Does not help me get any sleep before 4 am... and then the sun rises...

Planning south and one more party.

The weather is not really getting better and I am no longer wanting to stay months in Istanbul, i plan and prepare my trip south. A bit of the Lycian way (a 500kms treck) and surely Capadocia and the rest will be surprises (for me). I also get a little back into work in those days... My colegue back in Lausanne needs support, Unfortunately i will not manage to help him out, at least not before mid November. So i blog in order to lighten up my bag a kilo and get this off my mind for three weeks (i wont manage and still take the eee with me). I prepare a lighter, much lighter bag and count my money... i have only the money Judith left me for the 3 weeks until Laura comes to visit and brings me my new credit card.

On tuesday night, it is the birth day of one of Marions longer time friends. We meet again at the same bar were the last party was and have a couple drinks. We meet some interesting people tonight, more than at the last couchsurfing party. Melani is a canadian girl who came back after enjoying it so much this summer and found a job as an English teacher. There is also that american girl who is in a relationship with a nice turquish dude. She loves to speak french and most of the time we acctualy do. the only guy around not speaking french being her boyfriend...
The birthday boy is over 40 and still looks so young, i hear he is a science fiction writter living of his parents money and that he still goes out with the craziest girls and grows and smokes pot on a regular basis. What storries people can tell... Anyway from what i talked to him and have seen of him on the dance floor, he seems to enjoy life and not care to much about anything (who does when you have no need to work??).

Tourist Istanbul!

In the next week, we will spend a lot of time, me and Judith, visiting, exploring, walking trough and eating in Istanbul. There are not many thing to your interest that i could say. So the next posts will be mostly pictures. Anyway most of it is none of your business!

O there was that one strange event, as we were walking up Istiklal, the main walking street of Istanbul were so much happens at night, in a glance to my right, i recognized a familiar face. And as i looked back, a little longer, i recognized Brice, the dude i met on a street in Bitola, a couple of week ago! So we joined for a chat.
i could also mention that the weather got worse and worse on the last days and that as Judith left, it was pooring down like i had rarely seen it before for non stop hours and that as a result, Marions roof was dripping...

Waiting for Judith

Here i am sitting at a cafe, drinkng tee, two tea to be precise since in my good intention of practicing turquish, i ordered iki Caj, wtich means not one (bir) but two teas... I feel ashamed but i think the waiter is as well, after trying to check, in turkish and little english if he understood well. i am sure of my skills (...), or rather unaware of my mistake and just say evet (yes).

So a minut later he brigs two tees, probably thinking someone will join me. But he soon realizes something is wrong. He comes back and tells me it will be cold. If i want an other one. I try to say no but he brings a fresh one anyway. Thats turkish politness. Not at all the picture some painted of it. Probably, once again, being a couple or a single man makes a difference. and also being unesay with the language and trying hard ads a plus. So he come back with a hot tea and looking at my camera askes if i am a photograph. I say yes with a slight shake of the head to signify a not quite :) and he sits down and starts talking a lot. I dont understand a word but hey, it is a pleasure to feel treated normaly. Must say that i am not in the most turistic part of Istanbul, at a quiet terrase.
Thats for the setting, the place i wait for Judith, wait to be notified of what comes next. And in fact i have no idea, just that she passed vienna some time ago and that she will send a message whit further instructions... What sort of game did she prepare. I have though about it quite a couple times in the last weeks. A Treasure hunt? some kind of surprise?? Or maybe she will mke m walk around just for the pleasure of following me until i notice? or guide me hint after hint to a secrete place of hers (she was in Istanbul once...) Maybe for a good dinner?
I cant wait whatever it will be! As i am still waiting and writting, a girl shows up touches my shoulder and says very nice... i am a bit surprised and my brain thinks it has something to do with Judith, but she aint here and i still have no message... And the girl is talking about the small cat... And she sits down, takes of her glasses, very sexily and asks me if i am superman... am wearing that t shirt again. She must be supergirl since she flies of as fast as she flew in...
And then i got that first message, sending me on a quest!

Never get influenced by the pessimistic ones!

I go out early today to try finding an apartment for rent or a nice hostel for a week. I have sort of decided that since Judith comes only for a week, it would be nice to stay somewhere with a minimum of privacy and a good location, close to what we will do. But what will we do?? I guess we will be looking at the touristic sights, Mosques, Bazaar etc... So i head for Sultanahmet, a place south of the golden horn, concentrating all those sights.

I decide to walk there since i have seen almost nothing of Istanbul so far except bars and clubs
First i get through a couple cheap hostels, with ridiculous double rooms where the bed covered with a kitch, used,old fashioned and probably full of flees rug takes all the space available. The shared showers are lousy. The perfect place for a backpacker :) Of course the price is low, less than 20 euro a night for two. The owners are telling me they will make a special price for me only, if i pay cash and in advance... Welcome to the east, unlike in the Balkans, here you trade, negotiate and get ripped of :) hehe. An other noticeable characteristic of those sells man (putting themselves as nice devoted hostel runners) is that they will tell you everything is full, this is the cheapest price you will get, the other part of town is packed etc... And no it is not low season yet, its full season. C’mon, there is space in almost every place i knocked at and the winter is clearly kicking in temperatures falling and the tourist place are crowded with eastern people rather than wester Europeans. Yes but it is the time of couples and groups, double beds are all booked!
Anyway, this place s a little to cheap and i will look for something else after finding three times the same price and many available rooms on the same street. Further, hostels are getting classier, more expensive of course. Price doubles but rooms include private shower and toilet, the interior is clearly better. I try to negotiate and manage to get a nice room for 35 euro. But then i find the Anzec wooden house. The owner is present and a lot more friendly. He shows me a double room with 3 beds and tells me he will give it to me for 29. And i should come up for a tea. A common aspect of Turkish hospitality i finally get a taste of after a couple days around. We drink tea on the terrace, on the roof with view on the Bosforous. He tells me there is a huge barbecue tonight, i should come over with my friends if i like! He looks like a bit of a drinker, glassy eyes and tiered face so when he tells me it will be a big party as well and that there will be Rake and beer i believe him!
So i sort of made my decision but still think a private house would be better. Of course, a place with a locked door, a kitchen, no owner around, its own bathroom and a feeling of home would be better. So i call back Aycin, the couchsurfer who posted on the flatmate group announcing a space in her apartment. Of course i can visit! it is always opened! After walking a lot more and being turned away from visiting the university (hidden behind huge walls, the green gardens with trees and statues were attractive but unaccessible) i find the house. It is on the music street, full of shops selling ll sorts of instruments. Again i see a great shot but have no camera. Two old men are sitting in their shop with a big broad smile, listening to music, shaking themselves and some sparkling ribbons.
As i find the house, i first have to walk through a shop selling all sorts of old goods and as i talk to the owner i am taken upstairs to visit. The living room is full of people and bikes, talks and lots of laughter announce a great atmosphere! But the room is tiny. As i say there will be two of us and i need a double bed i am taken downstairs. One of the couple living there is moving out. The double room is free and it is really nice but i wont get it if i stay a week only. Too expensive for a month, it is a bit of a disappointment. It would have been a lot cheaper and a lot more like a home Even though i figure it would be realy cold soon and that the place is full of flees. I still sit down for a while to chat with the remaining couple. They are from Melbourne, sipping beer and telling me they will stay in this place three more weeks at least before they get something really nice to spend the winter in. The men looks like a bit of an artist cliché, wild hair, broad smile and sparkling eyes. His friend also has sparkling eyes and is completely passionate about everything happening or said. Remembers me a lot about Micheal in Sarajevo. And we talk a bit about Sarajevo, they want to go in the Balkans next. They are very warm and nice people and will change a bit the balance of what has been said about Istanbul. They have been here only a week or two but love it already. The Turkish friendliness, the huge city and everything going with it.
After an hour or two of talk with them, i have a couple more addresses to check out and i am already changing my mind about staying is Istanbul for longer. They have a very different opinion about working in Istanbul, positively sure they will find something, actually the girl found something already. And the men could be lecturing philosophy at university next semester...
From the three places i was told about and visited, one had a room, the manager is young and friendly, the place is called Chill Out :) the living room is filled with friendly, smart looking people. Not smart in a serious way but rather in a simple and social way. I am invited to come for tea if we don't decide to stay. As i walk out this hostel where i was again told i could get an apartment for a month for 600 lira (about 300 euro), i regret i didn't look for my own flat. I probably would have found something easily for 400 or 500 lira in a nice spot. Something like a studio. Even if i stayed less then a month, it would have been worth it compared to the 400 lira we will pay for the Hostel. Because no chance i find an apartment in less than 24 hours.
So in the end i find myself walking the street and regretting that i listened to those bad opininon about Istanbul and that in stead of looking through couchsurfing, i didn't look up a privat apartment straight away. Will have to do this later now. I realize that what people have told me and the easiness of finding a shared flat with english speaking turks has brought me away from my original goal. I wanted to find a private place to rest, a place for myself, a place called home, not share a couch for a month rather than a couple days, i wanted to be able to host and invite friends over: Judith for starters of course, then Laura, Goce from Skopje, maybe other friends taking a cheap easyjet flight over here and maybe Tonin and his company for new years eve...
Plus it is getting cold so i don't really want to be moving and sleeping outside anymore and rather stay here as i planed, get a small job and wait for the Turkish and Lebanese mountains to be full of snow!
Anyway to late for this now, i will look for a flat next week if i don't change my mind again! As i am getting really tired and walk to the metro station, i meet Ada and Javier on the street! Even in Istanbul this is possible! We go for a traditional dinner, a very good thing since today i had only nuts and water... Delicious lentil soup, tasty meat rolled in Eggplant and toped with half a tomato. The spicy meal heats up my mouth and the yogurt comes in handy to chill out all these flavors. Since we all feel like sweets, we continue and taste a speciality for desert. Pudding! yes yes this aint strictly English and i must say they have at least as much varity when it comes to it. But the consistency remains strange and not so much my taste.

Saturday in Istanbul

After tow nights of party, i am tired (hey, i am no longer use to this rhythm) and today, except eating, we do nothing at Marion's place but talking about education. I can not remember how this subject started, maybe with the Balkans. Yes i think that was it, the Balkans being so divided because they had no unifying ideals. And that is what is provided by education. If it is not the first goal of education, next to intellectual stimulation. So we talk about how limited history lessons will always be, how one sided, how stupid it is to read Zola (because you dont understand) when you are 15 all this for the sake of a unified nation and a national identity. But how important it is that these things are brought to you for future use.
A passionating subject i don't feel like writing more about right now, sitting in the shade of a tree on a warm, slightly windy, November day on the south coast of Turkey.

Friday in istanbul

Again, i was lazy, have not posted for some days bu the end of my trip is comming close and i enjoy my time in Istanbul... I will fly home soon for the winter. A lot of skiing, time with my family and friends but next year, i will resume my journey. The rest of the trip will be up in the next days and some of my winter time too probably.



So back to Istanbul, more than a month ago. All i can remember from that friday is the evening, a welcome back party for one of Istanbul's couch surfing ambassadors. Before going to that nice party, i finally meet my host and get to chat a little with her. She tells me i should not expect to much from a flat, from a job or from anything in turkey as a matter of fact. Writing this, almost a month later, i realize why she thinks so about turkey...
She is a funny girl and we have a good time and laugh as we head to the party. Most present couch surfers are Turkish men. A bit later, i meet two guys, Davin from Zahir and Nicolas from Austria. There are both already quite drunk and having a very good time. But, there are not enough girls around and the music is pretty shitty, will i agree on that last point but it is mostly the first one that is driving Davin. He drags his mate out and start talking about Turkish women :) Or more accurately about the Turkish men, who wont let their woman go with foreigners, he says they are jealous of his success and carefully keep all their women under their protection. It is a pleasure to speak with him and i have to smile a lot, both at what he says and the way he sais it, with such conviction and such a strong accent :) I however soon will realize that he is much closer to reality than what i would have imagined. Nicolas also understands French quit well so we go on talking in French, a language less people would understand on the streets...
We try to get into Babylon where Sayag Jazz machine is playing but it is already sold out... I was really looking forward to that concert and i am a bit disappointed, never mind i have my two new friends to joke around with. As i talk with Nicolas, i first realize he is from Vienna, then that he know IDA, Lena's club and that he played there. But wait a minute, he starts looking familiar now, and he is! He is the dude from scrape goat i talked with at the end of the concert there, about 6 month ago! Small small world... While i was traveling around, he got married to a Turkish women and is now living in Istanbul. i have a great night with those two crazy fellows and when we get into Riddim, a big hip-hop and rnb club, i cant help making fun of the people in disguises around and their fake attitude... seems like we are in an MTV movie clip. Nicolas leaves us and we soon catch a cab home too.

Discovering Istanbul

Sorry for this short break...

On my first day in Istanbul, i look for a flat, i decided to start with the couchsurfing faltmate groupe and contact 4 or 5 people. Then, i have the chance to read in my mailbox that there is a couchsurfing meeting at 2 pm. I join what starts with a couple cay (tch-eye), talking about politics, turkey, foods etc... The turish cs girl tells me she does not like Turkey because of womens position, the italian Cser tells me how much he loves it, the spanish Cser is discovering something new as i am and is rather happy about it. Different experiences different points of view, as always :)



We then start to drink a couple beer on one of istiklals small side streets. The typical type of streets you find in Taksim, walking only, narrow, full of people and full of terasses, half of them cafes, half restaurants. The restaurants display great ice tables full of fish, the waiters want to invite us in... The traffic is intense and the population very mixed, this is on of the things that strike me, unlike in the Balkan where it is pretty straight forward to spot a foreigner (ok i still cant recognize Albanians from Croatians or Serbian but i think this is impossible anyway), here i am puzzled by the variety of hair and skin colors, figures traits and eye colors. In the end in Istanbul i could look Turkish...
So we sit and sip our beers, the Turkish girl sitting opposite me, Eva, slams them down one after the other, i have two, the Italian dude one while she had 3... It turns out she did a year exchange in Check republic. That explains things! Later, two more people join us, they confirming the impression i just mentioned, both Turkish and yet one has chocolate skin, a round face and an American accent, and the girl has freckles, dark curly hair, also a very round face and i would have said she is German. After they join us, we head for some food, finally, i had nothing but beer to eat today. The food is nothing special and Eva gets all excited that out Turkish specialty is not served properly. An eggplant puree with some meat pieces, covered with melted yellow cheese. It is ok for me anyway.
As i sip my glass of red wine, one of the eventual flatmates i found shows up, he does not like this place so we move a bit further. Still in taksim, he and his girlfriend take me to a small alley, into a building, in the elevator and up the the last floor. There, we are welcomed by chill out music and a nice atmosphere. The Balkoon bar offers both a roof terrace and a roof greenhouse. It is too cold outside, we make ourselves comfortable at a large table. Soon three more girls join us and we start a lot more chatting about Turkish society. They paint a very unequal repartition of wealth, few people are extraordinary rich and spent a week end shopping in Dubai or a week flying around the world from Istanbul, to Dubai, Paris, London new-york Sydney and home, while many people are extremely poor... As i picture a depressed France where many people are on prosac to my neighbor, she tells me that she is as well... I meet some very nice people and a sweet place where i will come again but the cohabitation is not going to be possible, he looks for a longer therm flatmate...
Later, we all leave and i join the second potetial flat mate. She listens and sings hxc, Hard core music. Yeaaah!! She looks for someone temporary before choosing “the perfect match”. I can visit tomorrow. We understand each other pretty well in this Arsen Lupin bar, playing a lot of rock, hard rock and metal classics.
It is past two in the morning, i am exhausted and head home. On my way i find out i now live in a city, a big city with all the stuff that comes with it. Prostitutes, transvestites, drugs, violence and verbal aggressions... For the first time in 6 month i feel slightly unsafe. Mmmhh dont care, just want to get home, and i do, fast.

broken ass, birthdays and a little break

Yep i broke my ass... a nice, adrenalin full 15 meters freefall into the purple waters of Olympos left me with a nice souvenir. 5 days later, every time i sit i can recall this endless moment. "Me ass is so sore mate". I picked up a bit on that aussie accent again traveling with me mate Dave. My ass hurts, my back is all messed up but no worries, i will get an massage from Angel. No not that type of massage and not that type of Angel you sick mind...

It s Chills birthday, Angel and Brice are coming over from Istanbul, it will be a nice parteee.

I dont realy feel like posting about the past today... present and future! Yas i am in Ankara and i will be home soon! i booked a flight home for xmas, family, friends and the snow!

More about Istanbul, the beautiful south coast and friendly turcs soon!

Take Care!
Andre

Road to Istanbul! Finally in Asia!

So i wake earlier with my friend and we go for a coffee... We are right next to a big coal mine so there are many truck driving to Istanbul and i should get a ride easy. But it is damn cold and i cant wait outside so i stay in the petrol station cafe and read a bit. And anyway nobody sees me yet, it is foggy and dark... Buses pass, full of workers, the cafe is full of smoke...
An hour or so later i get out and get a ride with a fisherman, he tells me again about the huge fish. not tasty, especially the skin part, you need to remove it. And even then he prefer smaller ones. He drops me further on, where the trucks pass... A paved street, i can not believe it, something mystical with the remaining fog, i believe i am somewhere in the north of France... And a 4 wheel drive stops to bring me closer to the border at the place where the roads to Greece and France split. he works for Peugeot, speaks good French. He drops me and soon a truck driver pulls up. Long time in no truck, plus it is a Turkish one! He speaks no english, little Bulgarian, impossible to communicate. A couple kilometers later he is stopped by the highway control. They check his speed and driving hours in the past 4 hour... he tries to blackmail and fails, he has to stop and i have to find an other ride... i am now a couple kilometers from the Turkish boarder and the next car while bring me there fast.

I pass the 6 or 7 boarder check by foot, get a 15 euro visa and there i am, welcome to Turkey! Soon as i walk a bit, a truck picks me up and will bring me to Istanbul! No englsih so i communicate with basic gestures and learn to count in Turkish. He is a Kurde and drives on and on through eastern Europa wish i would learn more but i am tired and really in a hurry to get to Istanbul. We make a stop to eat and drink tea in a small highway restaurant. Musaka and tea, delicious and very welcome i had nothing to eat today!
As we get closer to Istanbul, 20 kilometers from the center, huge building are being constructed everywhere. I immediately have the impression of a growing, rapidly expanding city. Who will live here? so far from the city?? probably no rich people... Workers? factory workers? i will try to figure out...
I pass the bridge over the bosphorus under the rain and then get of at the next pay toll. I have to cross the 30 lanes of the paytoll to get to the other side and ge back into the center... It is not so hard one by one i make t to the other side. A car is stopped just after the toll counter, i ask for a ride, he is a little surprised but accepts. He is general manager in a drop by drop water irrigation system. This represent 60 % water saving and is an important business in turkey at the time. He brings me to the center.
As usual i go for a sim card, a new phone since mine is lost in the macedonian trains. But i find non cheap enough and soon realize i cant buy anything anyway, i have lost my credit card... I go to an internet cafe and use skype to call the couple numbers i have in Istanbul. Marion is ok to host me!
I rush to her place before she leaves. She meets her boyfriend so she hands me the keys, apologies for not welcoming me properly and tells e i should do as if i was home. So I take a shower and go to sleep :)

From Sofia to ...

I wake up, pack my stuff and go to the center with my host Zdravko who needs to sort out some administrative stuff. Meanwhile i check out the hot water springs on a central square of Sofia, the oldest market hall and a couple surrounding streets, it is a very short stay in Sofia and i wish i did not have to get to Istanbul and had time to visit a little more, check out how things look at night, have a couple beers and meet some young Sofiots.
But we head back of and i have to make it further. Zdravko drops me at a petrol station and i ask very car that doesn't have Sofia plates if they go to Plovdiv or to the boarder. Finally a young kind Bulgarian smiles and says yes. He has a funny voice, a little belly and looks a little like Winnie the Pue to me, cute, smiling and round (not fat). We talk about economic situation, fishing huge over sized old fishes, electrical plants and jobs.

His old golf takes us to destination but first we need to make a pertrol stop. In these regions, people never tank up a full tank, they always go little by little as they need it Money is always low... we need to make a stop on a building sit, my driver rents cherry picker. I have long though these were machines to pick cherries but after a couple confusions, i am explained they are used on construction sites to reach high places, fix electrical lines etc... So we need to go and see one of his machine that is not working anymore on a building sit. he is stressed, hoping it is nothing bad. The business is already difficult to run like this. Fortunately nothing bad, just small electronic issue. We go home and as night is falling he proposes i can sleep at his guest house for 5 euros and be ready tomorrow early. Good idea, we go for some nice qofte, delicious meet balls served with a salad for a very modest price. Before going to sleep i write, he has to sort out some administrative work, fill out his accountability... ahh Europe's bureaucratic obligations... it was not always like this in Bulgaria. Now he even needs a certificate for his cherry pickers... of course they are old and even passing the examination would be to expensive so he needs to make a fake...

Visiting suroundings and goinf to Sofia.

After good rest today, we check ou the souroundings and visit the place were the most famous medium of bulgaria and maybe europe raised a church after her death. A nice place next to a hot sulfurous spring. I am a little to hangover to bath in them, i regret a little would have done me good.
Goce goes for more shopping, Electronics for home. Later we visite the young bride once more before everyone heads of. Separation after about a week of excellent time together... But we will see again in Istanbul! I head of a bit late, the sun is setting and i have to get to Sofia or Plovdiv tonight... And i am lucky to be picked up by a young dude real happy to speak a little german again. he drops me further were i have to walk to a petrol station to find a spot that is not comletely in the dark. I dont like hitchhiking in the night but tonight i will get the best ride of Bulgaria!

A 4 wheel drive pulls up and stops, i open, large guy all smilling and a strong smell of vine. At first i am a little suspicious... Drink and drive on Bulgarian highways, not a good idea... But the dude has clear eyes and seems like a good man! So i step in, we comunicate in basis of german and serbain, funny times. After about 100 meter he asks me if i like vine... Ahhh of course. He pulls over and step out to fill me a small bottle of water with some house vine. He has about 400 litters in the back and want me to taste i am from france after all :)
I test him and propose some. He refuses, he stopped drinking since he had a bad accident and now does yoga. Plus he is driving... I tast, it is good! local production, completely natural, no chemicals, no selling, just for him and his friends. AS we tlk he wanders where i go and where i sleep. Soon he invites me home and to do the small delivery he has to do before driving home. Of course i accept. So we deliver 300 liters in the middle of nowhere. A house in the nature, his friends young “maitresse” cute and smart. And lots of vine, i get to taste the different vines, more or less ready. Delicious! Simple and not very fine but good!
We drive back of and as e arrive hoem, he wakes his wife for a dinner. a very simpel man but he seems to be the major of this suburb of sofia. He is always smilling and gives a very “ rural” and simple impression. He hosts and gives work to 2 men with no family or relations, we bring them vine and check on the goats. They build a house for hi, slowly but shurly. Good man! We share our evening meel, eggs, tomatoes, ognions, fresh cheese from his goass and vine of course!
i fall a sleep fast in my simple hoe, the house next too his house... in renovation, somaire mais connfortable.

Batman and Superman at the Marriage!

Today is a long day of ceremonies, but before we still have time to buy a couple things, i need a proper pair of pants for the marriage (i will buy jeans! but that is ok me and Goce are special superhero guests!) and Goce needs to satisfy his shopohoicness :) he buys toaster, pans, socks, slippers... and much more :)
We then go relax in the water of the thermal pool, warm and good for your health, though it smells a little to much like chlore to be healthy, it is nice and relaxing. Water massage, bubbles, relxation! The whole thing is in a grat hotel, the marriage buffet will take place here later. Slightly communist, mostly modern, this place is comfortable.

As we get out, we go for more shopping (Goce!!!!) and then go get shaver and dressed. I am superman, Goce is Batman! nice dress, the parents react in a very decontracted and positive way. I cant believe, this is the first marriage i attend n a loooong time, and i am dressed as superman!
The whole ceremony starts as the future husband comes up and picks up the bride from her parents house. There the shafer (Goce) has to keep him from coming in for a while. Then he finally walks in with all his friends and family and gets into the room of the bride where he asks for permission to the father (i think, i dind quite get this part...) and gives a pair of shoes. Very nice tradition, everyone is happy, laughing and drinking of course!
After this episode, we join the first ceremony, a melancholic, stoned sounding voice pronounces the union for the first time at the majors house after a lot of walking (drive for the bride :) trough the city. Then a second ceremony takes place at the Church, full of symbols and traditional protocol.
Then we walk to the hotel for the banquet! A nice banker with very nice vine. It gos lat into the night and i have the pleasure to meet many great people. Dancing, eating, drinking and a little singing go on and on...

Hecktick day, but Goce stays cool

I will write short more note like posts for the next days since as i am posting for the next 20 days were i will be off in the nature of south Turkey. I have not written these before and might make more mistakes...

So first of all, i forgot to mention Goce knows Sandra the swearing juggler and he makes fire wings for her. Today, after a needed night of rest, we go out for a hecktick day, first we go pick up the vine at his grandmothers place, as i said Goce is a trader and he bought 100 bottle of a 0 year old vine. He promises an excellent vine, and hopes to make a good deal out of it. So we bike to here place(without any cops stopping us this time). And guess were she lives? 100 meters from aurelise flat, in Avtokomanda! How funny it is to be in these strets again.
I meet Goces cousin, hangover, in bed after a long party night. He is over 2 meter and supposedly a very good basketball player. next we rush to the train station check for my phone. e go pick up stuff at the post office but it is closed, so we go to the market, try to find a new phone to replace the one Goce lost on the train. So i want something simple and cheap, so the guys try to rip me of :) I am not stupid try the phone, no speaker... as i mention the problem, the seller sazs ma nema problema and put on the loudspeaker... hehe no way!
Fuck it is past 3 pm, e need to be home and ready in 10 minuts.
So we cycle, fast! And pack, fast! but we are still 3 minutes late for the bus to the south eat of Macedonia. We get into a taxi but the ride is announcing like a big rip off so we get out after 5 minutes, Goce and Elena his girlfreind get all fired up at the fcking driver... So we sit down in the grass and chill, wait for the next Bus. Bus comes, we get on, then on a taxi to the Macedonian boarder.
The boarder we pass by foot and t is almost a catastrophe, Goce misses a paper, he has a group visa but this is not valid without the paper from the hosting hotel... Fortunately we joke a little in French and the fact that he is the Shafer at the marriage helps... O forgot to mention, or didnt i??? We are going to a marriage! A Bulgarian Marriage! hehe Goce is the shafer, something traditional i will explain tomorrow for his cousin.
After the boarder a cousin comes to pick us up to bring us to the cousin house for a small snack and a couple rakis :) We then o out for billiard, tomorrow is the great day for the 22 young people !

The end of a 40 hours day.

The pictures of the end of that day first...


As we get into Gozes flat, it is already 7am, we both need to do many things, first of all wash and eat. I am still a bit drunk from that night in Bitola and on the train. Emails folow the food break and i am surprised to be able to keep my eyes open long enough to wright a couple emails. I take a nap, probably less then an hour and we then get ready to meat our friends from the train at 11h15 (who choses this stupid time?? hehe) in the center.
My eyes are a little shut but the promise of a good Turkish tea keeps them open and as soon as we get on bike to head of, the wind wakes me up and i am back! I d better be since the traffic in Skopje and the drivers are not quite that in Lausanne. I stick to Goze who is ridding as a madman in front of me. I keep following as we pass a red light. A red light on an empty road and about to turn to green. Still a red light and the police car that is parked right there does not oversee that. We get a horn. don't care but soon someone is yelling something, as i turn my head, i see the police man waving a sign to me and asking me to stop, i slow down and say i dont understand shit and i cant loose my friend. I point to him and they go for him. Locky for us they are in a traffic jam, i pass them and as join Goze he tells me. “The police? So what! it is Macedonian police, there are fuckers, cant catch us anyway, they are to layz to get out of their car! lets go!” Ok sure why not! In the end it avoid us some useless trouble and probably a crazy fine, gave me a small adrenaline rush and woke me up.
We get to the square and of course no one is around. pretty obvious they got to sleep and unlike us crazy two stayed in bed. We still go for the promised Caj and order some lahmajdun. Turkish specialty, better than in turkey! They are a deliciously tasty flamenkuch like dish with a bit of salad and lemon juice. We get back on our bike to hit the big bazar, get me a used phone since mine stayed on the train... One more thing i dropped somewhere. but who cares, i didn't loose my sim card and i guess this phone will be useful to someone else. We don't buy it straight away and keep looking for more stuff. Goze is a compulsive buyer, he spreads his money buying loads of stuff. After all that is his job :) buying and selling. He shows me around, the bazar, the finest handcraft man in Skopje, the cheapest pita and yogurt, the art faculty and all his friends around...
In the afternoon we get home to take a nap. I use the internet connection to post blogs and do a couple skype calls. After a month i finally speak with my family again. i should do this more often. I tried to call you Foinfoin but i could only hear a baby crying and on the other side they could not hear me... i get the good surprise to get a call from Nono, back in Alsace! Not so interesting day except for the short police chase and some more sights into the city.

A damn long day!

It starts with an early wake up in the islands church. Despite the 6 am alarm clock we will not see the complete sunrise on the lake. We get to the old roman cistern and sit down to enjoy the sunrise and meditate a bit. Yoga breathing and a couple aom. This does not calm down Goze so much and we go through the woods for the dead side of the island. This promised paradise is intriguing me and i cant wait to see it but first, as we walk through the woods, we stumble on one more ruin. Roman house probably says Goze. Next to it are laying numerous ceramic pieces and we start digging around a bit, only the first couple centimeters and still we are finding lots of ceramics. Parts of bigger and smaller pots, jars etc... We leave it there and go for the paradise. We are now walking with my compass, don't want to get lost again :) Soon it starts to smell, we are getting close. Amongst the gray ground, Goze notices one more mante religieuse, quite aggressive this one.
Then the grass starts to get higher and greener. The color is accentuated by the contrast with everything else that is white and dead and with the bluest sky. Goze is half astonished half disappointed, he never came at this time of the year and he has always seen it all white and dead. As promised, the trees have crazy shapes, are white and dead, no more leaves here for some time. It is truly unreal and magic. Some more pictures and a stop at his spot later, we get back to our shelter.
We have a dejeuner sur l herbe without naked women, make more jokes, talk more apu and enjoy the sun. I believe it is already eleven and this food will be enough as we get back to the church, we realize it is only 9. The fishermen will pick us up at 1pm, plenty of time until then. So we decide to pack and spend the rest of the time by the beach. As we packed everything, we realize the floor is real dirty and grab the balais and start cleaning. It was really needed and this will be a far better deed than leaving money. We chill in the sun, Goze goes for a swim, i sun bade.
Soon the fisherman arrive, luckily at the same time than the police which will therefor not bother us. We load the stuff and head back to the land. The fisherman have caught 2 small trouts, they still seem pretty big to me and we decide to buy them, they will make a proper meal after all this bread, cheese and bad pasteta. As we arrive on land, drink tea with the fishermen, Goze talks business, and negotiates the price of fish and a ride to Ressen. 1000 dennars for fish and ride plus the usual 2000 for the boat ride. My money is going lower and lower faster than ever. Before leaving the village, we visit the house Goze plans to buy to make his home. He left his soul here as he says and has to come back all the time so he will buy this ruin and make it his home. It is the only house in the village located a bit higher and the view on the lake is amazing. There is a lot of work needed on the house but it is worth it. Our driver knows the owners, they live in Ressen and he will drop us there so that Goze can talk business.
After bringing coffee and chocolate, he talks a bit with the present old lady about the house and we head for the bus station. Again no hitchhiking. Is Goze scared? for sure not! lazy? maybe a bit but it is mainly because we are starving for fish and need to be in Bitola for the train to Skopje. As i mentioned before, the train is much cheaper then the bus in Macedonia. So this time we take an illegal taxi, a Turkish man is going to Bitola and is filling up his car. 4 in the back, we are a bit squeezed but who cares, it makes it all cheaper for everyone. The trunk does not close but it does not matter, the old bike tire is there to close it somehow. And off we go in the old,fully loaded and coughing lada! Goze is once again talking a lot, i don't mind, i even would enjoy it if he wouldn't yell in my ears. But he nows it, he is full of energy and cannot help it :) My other neighbor went to Austria, Germany and the Switzerland to work. 8 years long. He speaks perfect German and we talk a bit about humanity, religion and Macedonia. The whole care except us (Goze is learning, i know 2 words) speaks Turkish and has a great familiarity with Turks. If the Macedonians hate Greek and some Bulgarians, they love the turks just as much. So we speak a bit about Turkey and everyone agrees how great it is there!

Pictures of the frst part of the day:


In Bitola, after missing the street, a hundred dennars extra get the driver to turn around and drop us right in front of a friend of Gozes house, he is a junky he says, but a good guy. And as we get in we find 2 of his friends but he rushed of. There is a Canadian, he was chased out of Canada as he explains and his family have a house here in the mountains where he stays. The other one is Macedonian. Goze goes out to get some bread and lemon to go with the fish. Meanwhile i start cleaning the fish properly and wash a couple pans and plates. The two guys are sitting close enough for me to hear their conversation. A real junky conversation, they are talking about what the doctor says about the scares and never healing injection spots on their body, about the fact that they do to much and then about how horses (heroine) is the best drug ever. How all the others give you paranoia and how many great people do this drug. That it is better than sex (ooo trainspoting). That the only bad thing about it are the crises, that they should be able to change their blood. Then, probably speaking about the bad looks and xxxx they are victim of, they say how bad all the people are out there. I have to think about my friend i met in Croatia and who is a drug counselor... these people are in an other world and to get of this drug you have to take that decision. But in their conversation i feel they try to comfort themselves and i really sense there is a heavy addiction here and that they know this very well. I do not intervene however and just learn from this conversation and scene how relative things are (once again) and who dangerously great and addictive that drug is. I think again about what that man said giving me a ride a couple days ago, how many of his friends switched to heroine and died of it. And as Goze says once again, all the people hooked on H are great, the all had some problle in their life and escape with this. To the reader thinkng “pfff, this is no excuse, you gave to fight, turn to your family and friends blablabla...” I ask them to think again, and consider my “pfff, your life is sooooo easy and you are a lucky bastard!”
Goze comes back, he takes over the cooking, not satisfied with my preparation of the fish. And he is probaby right since he cooks us the best fish ever. Even Emerson, the Canadian guy who said he would not eat fish because he does not like it joins us in this feasting. There are now just the tree of us and we are drinking white, eating and talking like completely normal people. Eerson is realty a great guy and i feel he needs help, counseling or something similar, probably simply love and attention. he gets an petit bonhomme, a pink and orange girly. Later Pero comes back and he tells us no way there is a train at 10pm. Thats the train from Skopje not to Skopje. Ok great and when is the next one. at 3.30 am... Ok nema problema, lets go out! We have 500 left if we take out the train ticket. We catch a cab, get the youngest driver in Bitola, he just got 18! And as we walked 50 meters on the main walking street, the giro, we see a couple young guys and girls playing guitar and singing for money. This is where our road stops, we sit down and enjoy great conversations and a lot of laughter. Some of them ar acedonians, some from Bitola, some from Skopje, some are Turkish and there is the other French bitch. Some of them where at Rainbow, some sing great improvised songs with great voice, some drink beer, some vine with honey, some prefer eating a cheap version of nutela with their fingers. We sit there for hours and at one point everyone, even the ones who wanted to stay, decide to go for Skopj. They had a great day, people where generous and the collected money will pay for the night train!

Long ride south again.

We wake up at 6 am to be able to catch the bus south, to Ressen at 8h45. After a tea, a small piece of bread with some tasty home made jam and a couple of those filled chocolate harts we head off. The sun is rising on the mountains as we start walking down. On our way, pieces of century years old clay, fountains and sometimes remains of an ancient paved road. In our hurry, we get off the path in an attempt to make it shorter. But we soon find it again and come across three gypsy's on horse back walking up the mountain. Goze explains that they go up to collect wood and chop down the couple remaining trees, all young and sparse already, the vegetation is shrinking. He tells them not to cut the small ones but is well aware this will make no difference. Foreign companies bought the electrical plants around and since the prices of electricity kept raising until people could not afford to heat on electricity and switched back to wood. Creating a huge demand for wood in this region. Remembers me of French companies privatizing water in south America, paying French loans to their French employees and thus rising the water price.
We are talking a lt and time passes, we are late. Very late. We start running as we get in the bottom of the valley on flat roads. Goze asks everybody for a phone to call a taxi, but this is a gypsy settlement and no one has a phone. We finally find a house with a phone but we are already on the asphalt road and wild taxis are parked there. We get to the station about 0 minutes late but we are lucky, the bus didn't pass through, it is coming from Skopje and is a bit late because of road constructions. Goze is really relieved that we did not miss it, his mother but a special cream on the bus. Giving the driver something to bring to an other destination is very common and i think i mentioned it already. He gets a special herbal cream from a very special person he calls his Oracle, she is an alternative doctor. Her story is very interesting, she was a medical student, the best in school and as she had passed her final exams, she was diagnosed with lung cancer and given 5 more month to live. She decided to live those last month and go travel. In Moscow, she heard of a special medical institute and there she was told that in 5 month she would be healed. And she did. So she decided to be taught there, not classic medicine but alternative medicine with magnetic fields, lights, herbs etc... And she soon became the right to practice and a certificate from that institution. She is now practicing for some years and has sent him a magical cream for hemorrhoids. This solves the problem in a couple days instead of a long week for the classical remedies.
As we talk a lot about alternative medicine and how it is not always the best solution, Goze constantly states how much he lost confidence in modern medicine. He give me the example of his cousin, the ones wedding he is going on this weekend, well she had multiple sclerosis and was curred by the Oracle.
On the bus we are a little sleepy and hungry, as we are dropped in Ressen, we are starving and go look for chorba, but not any, the bes soup ever with intestines... Not really my sort of food but i will taste. After walking around we finally find a restaurant serving it. It is the restaurant of a former communist hotel now pretty much abandoned since no tourist comes to Ressen. The soup is tasty in deed and fills our hunger. We get some food for our expedition, 2 loafs of bred, some pastete, cheese and chocolate of course! We still need to get a couple kilometers further to get closer to our remote destination before walking the last 8kms. No hitchhiking, we would loose to much time, we get a cab, he brings us there for a good price.

After a stopover to get Gozes phone, we are in the last village connected by asphalt road. After drinking a bit we head for the last village, i can not tell where this is since i promised to keep it secrete :) Here we try to get in touch with th authority to signal our destination, but the first office sends us to the police with tells us the responsible guy is not here we should check his home. We do and have no success finding him since he is not home. His wife cannot do anything for us she does not know the procedure. We just have to leave our id details. She cant do this... ok This is balkan! When you want to get paperwork done it is impossible but once you are in infraction, then everything is done without problem, they stop being lazy. We take the longer way, along the shore, trough stones and sand. After a long walk and some beautiful setting like these low, red plants on a white beach of dead shells, we arrive in the village. Goze finds our boat driver and w stop for a while at hs house. We are offered to taste the freshly made Ajvar. Bright red slightly orange paste made of mainly red peppers is so good and tastes slightly different in every house. This one is sweet and delicious. We head of for the mini island. The sky is dramatic again and when we approach the island, we make a little noise and hundreds of cormorans fly out the trees. Normally there are also loads of pelicans and snakes. The first migrated already and the second is hibernating. We step on this magical island an soon i find what i was told, green magical setting. We walk up some stairs and find the little church that is still standing there. We set camp here and after a good meal, we go for a little exploration. The night is falling and the environment becomes more mystical. We walk trough thees woods where many trees are hundreds of years old. They have magical shapes and often a huge base that died of a couple times. some trees are dead, some well alive but all have these curves and hooks. The ground is green and moist low growing grass and every now and then we can see a rabbit hole.
As we walk the path that was put there some time ago by archaeologist who started excavating here, we find remains of basilicas and houses dating from the Roman period and sometimes built on a Hellenistic base. We stop for a while in a basilica where the ground has been almost entirely conserved, probably from the roman period my guide says. He has studied a bi of archeology but is mainly a photographer and proposes to do an artist shot here. i stand in the basilica and he draws an archangels wings around my body with his torch. The result is pretty amazing.
It then starts to be more adventurous and get better as we get of the track and loose ourselves in this old forest. We find other excavation spots with pieces of huge jars, probably more than a meter wide. They are covered with little green mousse and sometimes a couple centimeters of earth. The buildings and remains have not been buried very deep on this island and a lot can be seen. We find the cistern, build right on the top of a cliff, sit there admiring the moon and the calm waters around.
Finding our way back to the church is not easy, we are slightly lost in those woods but the island is so small that we soon find the path and follow it. This does not get us home however, we are completely disoriented from circling around in those woods without outside orientation point and walk the wrong path. It takes us a while to find our way but no problem, we get there!

We light a couple candles in the church, this creates a magical environment where we go to sleep on the rugs of carpet and blankets we were borrowed by the fisherman's wife.

On the top of the mountain i meet my way.

Once again it is not me who decides where i will head next, rather it is chance. Or maybe i should say God since i am in a sacred place. What now is a monastery once was a temple to Apollo the a sanctuary, then a settlement and a monastery. It had a very special history and was destroyed and rebuilt many times.

After getting up, i sit on a rock, the leg of the lion. From the window of my room i could see this huge rock with a lions shape. Maybe 20 meter high it is an impressive sculpture of mother nature. I sit there, look at the rising sun and read a bit when i get a hone call from my good friend Vlad! How mice to hear a friends voice again! And specially in this amazing setting! I look down on the valley, can see a little bit of Prilep in the distance and the surrounding mountains. Right bellow me, before getting into the valley there is a smaller falter place with trees and very green grass. I guess there is a spring there and the trees probably carry fruits and nuts for the monastery.
However nice it s to be alone on a mountain, i go back to the monastery to sk for the way to the top. Goze knows the way, he has been here a couple of times and wants to go up today. So we start this short walk up. As we pass some whole in the rocks, Goze explains they are tombs, he also explains about a little bit of the local history of this place. it is a century old history and right as we are talking we pass a bunch of people excavating loads of earth to uncover ruins. Goze is slightly made because these people have no archaeological formation and even though they have only very good intentions, they might just destroy things. This is the beginning of a lot of talking, storytelling and project making. Goze is a photographer-sculpture-archaeologist from Skopje who earns his money trading with computers and digital slr cameras. He is here to get a little bit of rest and get away from his busy, full of projects life. But since he met me, he speaks about all this projects all the time. About the purchase of land in the south where he left his soul and in Turkey, th small resort he would like to make, the good deals on cameras, the art gallery project in Skopje... Very interesting active man i met today.
His knowledge about photography is useful to me, i learn a little more about it, namely the dynamic range... i was wandering what this BKT button was for... So you shoot several times the same picture and the use photoshop to put them together and get the right exposition on every part of the picture, lets say the bright morning sky and the kids playing in the shade of a house for example. Photoshop is everywhere, enhance contrasts, get some nice effects...
Soon we start speaking about the hidden beauties of Macedonia. There is a whole book about it and apparently i have already been to some, this place, the Trascavic monastery, the black dream in Sv. Naum, the Ohrid beaches, the Galicica national park... but i miss his favorite, number one spot. He makes me promise not to tell every one about this spot so you wont know where it is :) It is a magical place where the forest is centuries old and makes you think you are in snow white, where the ground is soft and where a part of the place is completely white and dead. Mmmm it would be nice to see this place! Well maybe we can go together! He has to get close to there to pick up something, we could use it to check it out quickly. Tomorrow we leave early in the morning? Deal! I can handle one more detour.
We walk back down and get into the monastery for a cup of tea and to clean up the big pot that as used to make Ajvar. What a tasty paste this is! Soon, supper is served, i share the evening supper with the future Monk Caliste, his mother and 5 other guests. A delicious soup with a couple roasted peppers. After supper, me and two other guests meet Kaliste for a historical tour of the Monastery. He starts the history around 4 centuries before Christ when this place was a sanctuary dedicated to Apollo, the piece remaining from this time is the hotel used for sacrifices. It has writings carved in it but these were not translated yet. Soon experts will come and clarify this. Some parts of the church are big white stones, these are from ancient times and were used as construction materials, so you can see a torso of what once was a Creek statue used to build the wall alongside other big, white carved rocks. These parts can be found in an exotic mix of local stone and bricks. Kalist explains that this is due to the numerous destructions of the church. Be it the Turkish invasion or a fire due to lightning, it was destroyed many times but always reconstructed by the faithful local people of Prilep. In the 18th century, every craftsmanship of Prilep had the responsibility to rebuild one room and after it burned down again in the 1990s, it was all reconstructed despite the low living standards at this time. Some people went around houses and gathered money in these difficult years in the former Yugoslav countries and collected enough to reconstruct the whole monastery.
I go to sleep early, i am tired and want to rest. The night is cold again but I think my head got used to it and i dont bother anymore to have it in the cold cold night.

Walking up Trescavic.

After a late awakening, I pack and head out with Tonin for morning coffee and small breakfast. I call the French volunteer from Skopje to ask about this monastery, he was there this week end and explains me how to gt up. As we sip the coffee on a terrace in the center i realize i don't know anymore where i put my reserve 55 euros... I start searching trough my bag. Damn Raki, that was on the first night, we had a couple raki and i took that money out of my wallet so i don't loose or spend it. I remember sliding into something but what and where is it??? After saying goodbye to Tonin, I head back to the flat to look for it. Cant find it, it must be in my bag... and it is.
So i am ready to go finally, it is already past twelve, i have at least 2 or 3 hours to Prilep from where i must then walk up 2 hours. The sun is setting earlier and i should hurry a little if i don't want to be caught by darkness.

So off i go, say goodbye once more to Eric and stick y thumb out. First care stops, the judge for the area of Struga. He is driving a modest car and we start speaking (in English) about local crime :) He tells me that when he first started working, he was giving very high punishments but that his colleagues called him and asked him to be more gentle. He though about it and as he went through the past of Struga crime and found out that only 8% of criminals have been convicted twice or more. He concludes that he should be less firm on the first conviction since most people seem to realize they have been doing something wrong but harsher on the second sentence. He slowly drives me to Ohrid as we speak about France and the problems in big cities.
In Ohrid, i will have to wait a little bit before Zoran stops his van to pick me up. Zoran tells me about this Macedonian heavy weight lifter who started a sekt preaching peace and good nutrition. He has opened many healthy food stores and has a product line present in mot supermarkets (that same one i have bought from i will learn in the next days). We speak a ot about spirituality but mostly about life choices. A majority of people are scared and don't make the right choices in their lives, staying suck i what they do not really want: their job, which if you think is actually not their job since they work for someone else. Of course some people don't really have the choice. He choose to be a driver because once the small truck is loaded, he drives, nobody is here to tell him what to do, he just drives to his destination, listening to music and smoking cigarettes. It used to be better when there was no gps, now his company knows when he stops and who fast he drives. Less freedom... His younger brother seems to have made the right choice and found what he wants, he works as a waiter for some private yacht owner and is traveling the 7 seas around the world. He comes home once in a while for a couple month and then he just enjoys himself.
The next thing we speak about are drugs of course you could say. We are two sorta hippies, speak about politics, easy going life and of course at one point weed comes up in the discussion. He to used to smoke a lot and still does a bit but now it is much harder, it seems that in whole Europe it has become easier to find cocaine or heroin that grass. He tells me the local, Bitola version. Here there was a time where they was strictly no weed to be found and that many of his pot head friends who really needed something, well they switched to heroin. It is amazingly cheap and of course of really bad quality, it is mixed with plater or some other white or brown stuff. It has become a really common thing to take heroin and he has lost many friend from this affliction. Once again, and it is not the last time, i discover how affected Macedonian youth i by the drugs. There seems to be a real lack of prevention, understanding and help to the needing people.
We speak about nice subjects as well, the beautiful nature and low population of this area of Macedonia, half a man per square kilometer! He owns a small house (or two , cant remember) in a calm village and he is the proof that for those who want to work and get something, it is possible (even if you smoke Ganja :) He drops me as we pass Bitola, was really nice talking to him and i feel full of energy and ready to go!
Soon a truck comes up, it is the same truck that we met at our water stop in the mountains. We stopped to drink some pure spring water (amazing how in my childhood i naively though this was a unique Evian-Volvic thing but who springs are all over the place in this area) and there was a truck stopped there, we saluted him before heading back off. And now he is there and stops to pick me up. He does whoever not speak English and the communication is not so easy. He transports flour thats for sure :) He drops me in Prilep, the town of dolphins as Zoran told me. Not the animal but the ecstasy, everyone in this town is happy because they produce the best ecstasy of Macedonia... And being told this, next to all the tobacco leaves drying around here i do notice a lot of smiling faces but i believe it is rather because of the returning summer. I stop over for little food, i have to be going on budget, i have only about 10 euros left to gt out of Macedonia. Fortunately i will sleep at the monastery tonight and can leave whatever i feel like. So i buy a little bread, chocolate and apples and make my way up.
First i have to go through the whole town, see smiling kids and elders, smell the fresh Ajvar and ask for my way a couple times. I find the stoned road leading up to Trescavic and start my ascension in the evening light. Beautiful colors on the rocks and vegetation. This seems to me like a bouldering paradise, to bad i have no more shoes to tackle a couple blocks. There are in all shapes in every place around. Mostly rounded shapes with nice cracks for climbing. I will see more and more all along the way up. The place is magical, i get lost a little and am told the right way buy a peasant with his horses. He speak Macedonian but i understand everything he tells me about the way to go. I realize this later as i pass a spot with a rope to help you climb, i though i had understood something like that but didn't believe it until i saw it.
After passing a couple fountains and a beautiful picnic spot, i reach the top of the mountain just in time to catch the sunset. And what a beautiful sunset! These monks knew where to build the monastery! I walk in, are welcomed in the kitchen by Kaliste, the future monk, Goze and a couple others. After dropping my stuff in my room, I get some hot bread with cheese and assist to a very politicized discussion. There is the small, young, maniac Macedonian patriot who wanted me to touch his hard muscles, the wise, calm Serb and one other balancing Macedonian. I don't understand every word and i wish i would because i do understand they speak about Yugoslavia, fucking Greeks and Bulgarians and then the young one is full of contradiction i wish i could point out. Fortunately, Kalistes mother comes in and the discussion switches subject :)
Soon i am exhausted and to cold and go to sleep. This will be a very cold night, the coldest in a long time. I think it must have had a couple degrees under 0. On top of my sleeping bag i put 2 thick blankets and can still feel the cold. I cover my head which is freezing. But after 1 hour of heating the bed and blankets, i am comfortable and fall asleep.

Massive party and one more day in Struga

My computer corrupted the text file i saved this storry in so unless i find the bckup i did you will have only wild pictures today.





Have a nice day!

litl' extra

i am sitting in a small cafe in south turkey and my Tommy is all perturbated by the bio food and well water. is it too late, do i have stomach cancer??? :) No joking, this might have to be taken seriously...



So eat healthy!!

Looking for mushrooms.

We were supposed to go visit the monastery today, join Aurelie, Yohan and one or two other volunteers from Skopje but Aurelie sent us a message, she is still a little sick and prefers to rest. Anyway we were a little to late for the monastery. So since the weather is not so bad, we decide to go looking for mushrooms in the nearby mountains. It has been raining for quite a while and the sun came out yesterday and today again, ideal weather for mushrooms! Eric, the Swedish roommate and video project collaborator joins in. While they all get ready, i go ask for a good spot at the small store right in front of their building. I could mention that there is one of those small shop in, in front of or right next to each building around here. They all propose a restricted but different (from store to store) set of articles and fresh products. So luckily, the young women behind the counter is speaking fluently english and even has good notions of French. She recommend a village, not seeming to sure of herself but who cares, we just need a goal.
And in fact we will not even go for that village or the bus she indicated. We rather walk all the way tho the mountains, after all we can see them, they can not be so far. So we walk, passively attempting to hitchhike once in a while. The roadside is really surprising, between the field and the road, where a European would expect to find a grass or stone or some other wildly overgrown ditch, there are huge good looking pumpkins growing. One of them is even hanging from a tree. Next to pumpkins, we find plum trees, berry bushes and nuts. The fields a bit further are once yellow of dying corn, once green and red from the apple trees (huge red dots in a sea of pale green).
We take a shortcut over a dirt road and get closer to the mountain. Green paturages pastries, goats, old woman with a hat and a cane, huge cows, grape fields, corn plants growing on the boarders of the fields, an old men picking the corn and trowing it on his wooden carriage while the pulling horse is peacefully eating grass. And at our feet, plastic shoes, tin cans, old woolen shirts or scarfs are growing out of the muddy road. We get into what first seems like a ghost town. Deserted streets and abandoned looking flats. But w find a shop and as we walk inside, all heads turn and check us out. i am used to this and don't worry, especially when i have company. Eric however prfers waiting outside and observing the scene and faces as i ask for a knife... We just figured we forgot to take knifes and that they would be good to pick the mushrooms and cut our picnic. But the faces straighten as i ask for the picnic first and then for a knife explaining in my basic words that we will need it to cut the salami. They smile and offer us the knife. One of those small Chinese fruit knifes that will do a perfect job for what we need it for. We still need water and wont find any... all the stores here only sell coke, lemonades or gas water. We get a bottle of the later, empty it and fill it at the main squares fountain. The main square is overlooked buy a building that could be the majors house and on the faced a huge Albanian flag is painted. Albanian flags a dancing in the wind above our heads and Albanian is the local language. I use my even more restricted vocabulary to great people. As we pass a couple houses on our way to the now very close mountains, we can smell once again the peppers being grilled and peeled in preparation of this winters ajvar reserves. As the road gets steeper, we find white chunks on the floor smelling like mushroom, it aint a complete mushroom and we imagine the huge size of the smashed mushroom. This is announcing as a good mushroom day!

So we walk in the woods, make stupid jokes, play and fool around but don't find much. Blue, sticky and shiny ones. Tiny brown ones, those with a long millimeter thin stem and a small hat. Bigger, round one with no stem, brown outside, white inside with a marshmallow softness... Too bad, we spent our time making pictures and fooling around with sticks. A kids day out. We are now quite hungry and stop for lunch. The salami is actually mortadela and everyone gets disgusted by the consistent of it and its lack of taste.
As we are attempting to get higher and maybe still find some mushroom, i get a very unexpected and pleasing call from my friend Remy in Australia. He is sitting in a pub in kings cross as he tells me about his freakin great life in Sydney. What a pleasure to talk to him. He lives just a couple blocks from where i used to live, in south Maroubra. As is sit down to talk with my mate, it soon start to rain a little and then a little bit more. We head back down but not trough the woods this time, rather on the dirt road. We are stupid kids today, playing, laughing farting and pulling silly jokes on each other. The dirt road is soon way to boring for us so we cross through the forest, into the steep part of it. Partly sliding, partly running we get down much faster the we went up and not really thinking where we are going we find ourselves fighting a way trough mean plants and rocky terrain before getting back on a path. It is now raining heavier and we are back close to the village. As we get in there, we get a fresh beer and start walking home, screw the bus, we can walk it and it will be a lot more fun. It is in deed, we talk more stupid stuff (the zombie, Peter Jackson talk when we where coming the other way make no comparison). And as we get back on the road, Eric and Tonin start a water fight. Not with water guns or balloons, they use their soaked shoes and the flques on the road to get each other wetter than wet.
We finally arrive in the flat, exhausted and wet to the bones. We are all already sick so it cant get worse :) still we have a hot tea with a piece of cake before cheering with another beer. Tonight there is a concert in the other great bar of Struga (not that of the first night). A rock concert and we get there just in time for the last song. Tonight I take my camera with me. Not so sure this is a great idea right then, but it will turn out to be. After a couple drinks here with Eric young friends, we all hit the only club in town. The mood here is quiet, nobody dances or seems to have a good time at all... I try to make jokes with a couple of Erics friends and get a couple (or maybe just one...) smiles out of them. I give it up and me and Tonin start stupid routines on the dance floor(stand floor tonight). The band is making poor covers of poor songs... We still manage to have a good time and get acquainted with a bunch of youngsters.
As we walk out the club it is pretty late and we are quite drunk as we hit the only opened burger house in Struga. actually i am most probably the most drunk and annoying on judging on the crazy amount of pictures i took of Tonin and Erik in that moment and their faces as took more and more. To bad there is no sound, i am pretty sure i was making a fool out of myself. We get home safe as daylight kicks in. Good morning!

Sunny day in Struga

We walk up not so early, it seems in Skopje i got into that party rhythm again and can not get up and out of the house before 8 anymore. Me and Tonin get out in the sun, finally a nice sunny day again. After yesterdays long showers on the roadsides a bit of warm sunshine is good for the mood. So w walk a bit along this side of the Ohrid lake i have not seen so far. The light is great for pictures and we start a series of petit bonhomme picture.Check out the beautiful lakeside...

It gets grayer and we get thirstier as we pass in front of a university building. We walk up to the reception and ask for toilets. As we drink our thirst there, we can hear music coming up from the windows of a half underground cafeteria. We check it out and find pool tables and fuss ball tables. Two young guys let us the pool table and serve us two fresh beers. Our skills of pool table players are pretty poor but how cares we have our bit of fun. Soon we a re chatting a bit with two teachers having their coffee, about the school, the youth of Struga and a slice of politics. We return to our game and then finish of with a bit of fuss ball sipping an original Check Budveiser. As we get back into daylight, the sun is back and the light si great for a couple nice shots.

We meet a young medical student on the peer, start chatting a bit, she is shy and wondering who the hell those two guys are and what they are doing around here. We chat a bit, are about to offer our model to here, the petit bonhomme, but as we were both not watching him, he jump of the peer. he maybe though he could escape the anatomy sessions of the medical student but forgot he was mainly made of steel and drowned in the clear waters of the Ohrid lake. She got an other on anyway. The phone then started ringing, that is the sign, Eric wants us to get back. So we walk back, not realizing how far we had gotten, it takes us a long time to get back, time enough for Eric to call three times :)
Tonight we sip a couple more beers, I try to blog a bit and get as much as possible uploaded while we watch the Dark night, the last sequel of Batman, a pretty surprisingly good movie where the joker is making an amazing good job. I am told by Eric i look exactly like him. The actor not the joker. Peace to his soul.
It is 2 am, everyone snores and i am posting blog. See what i am getting trough for you resigning on the little sleep i could get :)


more from Tonin :)

Hitching to Struga

I decide to finally leave Skopje. I is late, i pack my bag, it is even later, i get on the bus it is to late to get started but who cares, i will make it. It is about 1pm when i am on the bus and see this very familiar face... I know i have had beers and stupid talk with this man but it takes me a little while until i remember it was back in Switzerland at sat. He is doing an internship here for two month now and is also having a great time, traveling around a little bit. Thinking back about it now i remember i was not agreeing on everything with him and well, i still don't do :) but it is a pleasure to meet him and talk for a couple minutes on this bus in Skopje!
I get of my bus right at the edge of the city, a real good spot to hitchhike. And soon a car stops, an apprentice cop speaking perfect German picks me up as it start to rain more and more. Guess where he learn German? on tv once again. Subtitled series (Derrick?? hehe) and action movies make a much better job than teachers in France. He s speaking about how shitty corruption is in this country, how bad his pay is and the usual stuff. I got it already but hearing it once more sort of has the opposite effect. Maybe these guy are really not so unlucky, they are just complaining a lot. Anyway, it is late now as i am writing this and i wont say to much about this. It is something i talked about a lot with Goze in the mountains (in the next days). don't get me wrong, i am not saying everyone in the Balkan is lazy, nor am i saying that their life is easy. About what he says about corruption, i have to laugh when he tells me his friends with lower position are all nice and honest but only the big guys are bad. I try to explain to him that there all sorts of levels of corruption at all sorts of hierarchical levels. I am lucky he presents me an Excellent example. As we get to the toll, he puts on his police jacket and puts the police sign on his arm to be seen by the man at the counter. He is not even a cop yet and even cops have to pay the toll. It is just that the cashier has understanding and lets him pass. Is that not a form of corruption?
He drops me a the next pay toll and there i only have to wait a couple pumpkin nuts before getting picked up. This sometimes is my time measure in the Balkans, how many nuts can i crack and at between two rides... Well the next ride is also a cop :) H drives me down south quite a while to a place where i will have the time to finish my nuts... I will even have the time to get soaking wet and upset in Kisevo. Even see the night fall. Fortunately as i resign and decide to take the bus, i meet an other dude waiting for a bus. We both get wet together and even though he does not talk much, it is good to have him next to me. There is no way to know if a bus will come, so we wait. And we get wet. A taxi driver proposes us a ride. it is 200 one the bus and 200 in the taxi if it is full so 400 if there are only two people. There are no third or forth person around so we wait a little longer. After a while the young computer scientist decides to give up and take tomorrows bus. I did not know if there would be a bus later and did relay not want to get stuck here in the rain so i offered to pay 500 leaving him with 300 to pay. He accepted. So there i am in Struga, completely wet and without saving a penny, the ride from Skopje being 500 dennars... Never mind, a hot grog will warm me up and Tonin is soon in the bar. i just left French speaking Aurlie but i am so happy to meet Tonin after just a couple hours on the road and start speaking French again! We go for his home, drop my bag, eat pasta, his the home specialty, pasta with butter. Damn it was nice living with Tonin and Eric, the mess and the food made me think about the good old student times.

We then go out for a couple beer at “the Place” a nice white small bar playing good rock and hard rock. We sip the beers make stupid pictures and i start to know Eric, the Swedish colleague with whom Tonin will be making his propaganda movies (for European Volunteer Service).

Walk to the cross.

First thing today, i shave, sick of that beard.(yea i know, who cares...) I have my baby skin again :) Then though yesterday i decided to go there this morning, I head of for the cross at about 2pm. I take a couple shots on the way, walk trough some small streets of Skopje and find the end of the road coming down from the cross. I start my walk up. it will be a nice but o so long walk up. After 2 and something hours i arrive at the red cross located at the end of the public part of the asphalt road. Here there is a big parking and restaurant for the lazy and the rest of th road is restricted to bikers, walkers and official cars.
I am walking and figuring i will be there soon but it takes me at least one more hour. Damn cross always seems to be so close but it never gets closer :) It is so big (said to be 80 meters but even when i got there i could not believe that) that it seems you are right there all the time.
As i make it to the top, after a beautiful view over a green, orange and red autumn forest, it is already past 6pm. The sun is setting on the mountains, a slight wind is blowing and i am to tired and cold to walk back down. I can see the workers working on the mobile phone antenna and thinking it might be Natasas friend from para gliding, i walk in their direction. It turns out not to be him but i still salute them, leave them to their job and walk down. After passing a military base and taking a couple shortcuts trough the woods, i make it back on the road just in time to be picked up by the workers driving down!

I make it back to the city in time for tonights short film session at the film festival but Aurelie is sick and staying home tonight so i give up on it, don't feel like going to the movies alone. So i walk back, and guess who is honking at the red light. Well i don't know either, until i get closer and can see through the windows of a black Mercedes, the dudes who brought me to Skopje the first time! Small world once again...
I make it to Aurelie place, we cook a nice hot dish of pasta with mushrooms, a pity they don't taste that much and are just releasing a lot of water... Hihi and a friend of hers join us for couple hours and some nice chats. Se says her nose is getting badder again, i know it is in her head that it is getting badder, not for real and joke “it is because you didn't see me in too long time” It sure has been a long time since the last party.