BACK IN SWITZERLAND
The biggest culture shock I got after coming home. So my theory, that traveling by my own force being conscious all along the way, really made it easier to adapt to continuous changes as opposed to abrupt changes when getting out of a plane.
There are some of major variables; topography, climate, flora and fauna. For myself, my own species the humans and their language are of particular interest... luckily because I was barely able to avoid my own kind all the way. The language being the key to the culture and the food, next to religion, is probably one of the most important aspects of it.
So while I crossed planes, hills, valleys, natural frontiers like mountains or big rivers and then the man made frontiers, the borders, a lot of things would change but there were always some variables that would remain similar. While I traveled through the Slavic countries the climate changed often and so did the topography, but there were similarities in the languages and the food. When crossing to Turkey I realized that some customs of the merchants, are similar to those of the Turkman people, the Buzuki resembles a Sas and the melodies sang reach all the way to India. The flat bread comes in all variations throughout eastern countries.
Only when a human frontier coincides with a strong natural frontier all of these variables change at once and there are only so many of this particular kind.
The strongest frontiers I've seen are the Alpes, the Caucasus, the Himalaya and of course the oceans. When it comes to the human frontiers, as I menitioned the strong ones usually coincide with natural ones, but there was another one that is quite overwhelming: the Iron Curtain. The believe of so many people in this division dug a deep cut between us, that is easily recognized by the overlap of the second and third languages that are spoken in the respective countries. Where people from countries of one side of that curtain share often one language of their repertoire, people from different sides of the curtain probably don't. This is changing now but slowly enough that the cut is still visible.
Jumping back from the developing country India to Switzerland was a huge contrast. There I finally realized how far I travelled by bike.
The pulping life in the streets and people approaching me with their natural spontaneous curiosity were suddenly gone. No more trash lying around, all cars looking new and shiny and the people seeming like cut out from a fashion-magazine, very distant to any human struggle of survival.
The infrastructure back here struck me as amazing, things run incredibly smooth. On the downside timetables and a thousand rules replaced human interaction. There is a lot to get used to again.
I heard this so many times that Switzerland is a privileged country from my parents, my teachers and many others in different contexts. I heard it so often that I started suspecting it to be wicked propaganda (As a teenager I was struggling alright!). But I was amazed that most of the people I encountered on my journey knew about my small country and that they often joined in chanting the praises and bashing on clichés. They also appeared to know about our banks and sometimes I wondered why they are not angry with me for being part of a country that provides a financial infrastructure where financial acrobats and dictators stash away fortunes sometimes worth a nations budget on anonymous accounts. Well, we must have done something right. My compatriotes that came through before me were referred to as very nice people and I myself felt never unwelcome.
Another thing I want to mention is a religious aspect: In the "west" people seem to become more and more afraid of Islam. I think the Minaret Initiative in Switzerland stands as a good example for this. During my trip however I experienced no thread from muslims. Hospitality is one of the five pillars of Islam and in Turkey and Iran people appeared to take this quite seriously. I was told that a traveller in their eyes is sent from god and that christians are considered brothers (in this context the Migration to Axumm was mentioned to me). This was yet another lesson about the discrepancy between the people going about their daily lives and the politics propagated through the media.
PLANET INDIA
India is though to wrap your head around. I was quite overwhelmed by pulsing life that is everywhere and so was I perplexed by the disparity between poor and rich. James Bond stunts are pulled on daily bases; people riding on footboard on the back of trucks.
With India I don't really know where to start and where to end. You got to see it for yourself.
UNITED ARABIAN EMIRATES
Well that was not planed at all. I saw myself cycling through central Asia days before and I arrived in mourning about a shattered dream in this country. So I treated myself with the luxury of that country to take my head of things.
It was quite funny to find the Dirham coins in my hands again. In my parents house in the kitchen there was always this glass with coins from foreign countries and I remember vividly playing with them as a child, looking through them as an adolescent... There was a feeling of home when I hold this coin in my hand again, in that hot, super modern desert city, thousand kilometers from that kitchen, the heart of what I still call home. Aha... here is where these coins came from. The stories that I heard from my father as a child about Saudi Arabia and the Emirates let my mind draw quite different images from the ones that I saw when I came to the country myself. Instead of Beduine tents and Camels in an oasis I found a city full of sky scrapers, the most impressive skyline I've seen so far.
After Iran it was weird to see yet another Muslim country where the women even veil themselves but without a law forcing all of them to do so. Emiraties are a minority within their own country and the Indian population is the most dominant among the many expats communities, which makes it quite a "colorful" country.
Learning that most of city has been built in the last twenty years and that constructions are so frequent and fast, that google maps is outdated all the time was astonishing. Indeed the city feels brand new, like freshly out of the box. I wished I could see the memories of the city from my father.
For cycling it is definitely too hot in summer and most of the country did not really appeal to me for this kind of adventure. It was a transit destination, but it was brilliant to mingle a bit with the Canadian/American expats here and enjoy hanging out.
IRAN
...was a tough one. After ideal cycling conditions in Armenia, traffic got more intense again, drivers would be more aggressive and exhaust fumes would replace the perfumes of spring. I anticipated visiting this country for a long time and my preconceived impressions definitely got in my way. So many strong things are said about this land and its inhabitants; They are so hospitable, they're all terrorists, they are oppressed, Iran is a totalitarian state, there is a lot of censuring, no freedom of speech, they are an ancient people, it's a rather closed country and the list goes on and on and on. Sure Some of these proved true form me after first hand experience, but there is always a BUT to it. So in the end the trip to this country was little about landscapes and cycling, although the ride from Khalkhal to Asalem was very impressive indeed. This country was all about people, culture and politics.
The way I was approached by people was very intense, all of them were well intended but sometimes it was very imposing and thus became quickly too much for me. People would say hi, stand next to me lay a hand around my shoulder and got their picture taken by their friend, without asking, without any introduction nothing. Or I would be ordered to take off my sunglasses, or cars would cut me off the road to get their picture taken. This made me feel like a toy, an attraction to be consumed and it was not long before I got very angry about that. But I also soon realized, that raising the voice and showing the anger was not the way to go (since this would not scare them away), patience and a graceful politeness would be much more efficient. I got to hear a lot of self-criticism from Iranians and worried questions about how we see them.
The experience with the military police, that would just keep you for hours, asking the same questions many times, and going through all your private affairs (phone, notebooks, purse, ...) and making more the impression of looking at it out of curiosity than of necessity was shocking. It was shocking to know that you are at the mercy of bored idiots who can take away your freedom and do not have to respect your privacy.
To finish all of I run into the hammer of bureaucracy. Instead of extending a bloody tourist visa for thirty days, what usually should be common practice and on which I depended to be able to organize the following visas, they gave me just time enough to fuck off. And since they inquired about every detail of my traveling plans before in the special security deportment, they could as well just have smacked me in the face. Well thank you very much! instead of cycling through the desert I saw it through the window of a train. I severed my line severely and lost my beloved continuity in traveling, one of the main reasons that makes me doing this.
I left the country in a haste wanting not to risk having to deal again with Iranian authorities because of visa stuff and looking forward to shake off this constant burdensome felling of making a faux-pas or just being at the wrong moment at the wrong place.
It pains me rereading these lines above, because this time my ignorance and me trying to tackle this country happy-go-lucky-style spoiled my experience here quite a bit. Its a huge shadow over the things that were good and amazing. Meeting the Persian Cats, Mareza and his friends was really super cool and I do not want to miss it.
I saw a lot to like in Iran, but the shadow cast all over it by to damn bureaucracy was hard to deal with. The wrong people got to feel my disappointment and anger. I want apologize for that.
ARMENIA
I thought it would be such a short time riding through that country that I decided not to bother with the language. Big mistake. For some strange reason I had problem connecting with people all of a sudden. Well, that was an experiment not to be repeated.
The land is amazing though. In the south the mountains reminded me a lot of the Alps. Compared to the mountains up on the plateau that reaches from the center of Turkey into Georgia and Armenia, the valleys are dug deeper (500m instead of bottom line being 1200+). This gives the mountains an even more impressive look. Also the valleys were very complex with little canyon and side valleys dug by the many torrents and rivers, all very green. I arrived there in the middle of Spring and it was definitely one of the highlights.
Here I could avoid the traffic and the fact that many cars run on gas makes a huge difference. I did not expect any of this, thought of Armenia as a transit country and then had just amazing and challenging rides. Loved it.
GEORGIA
It sometimes felt like there is a strong tie to this land. I admire its topography and its hearty and brave people. The Caucasus mountains have an incredible strength and they are bound to draw me back into the Land of Kartvelians. There was a weird connection I felt with this place, that was a bit spooky.
Staying with Alex hist family and Kendra was just perfect. After having gathered some impressions riding more than two weeks through the country I could get background information, learn about the experiences of an expat and get a couple of lessons about history, geography and the animal kingdom.
My story with these lands, I'm sure has not came to a closure yet.
TURKEY
Cycling wise it was not a highlight, there were few really beautiful stretches and I found myself a bit too often on the four lane roads with gravalt (rough surface) sniffing the lines of badly combusted petrol, drawn by of of the many trucks that past me.
Now when it comes to the country and its people it was amazing. I've developed a great interest in the Turkish language, which has a grammar that is too good to be true and a sound that appeals to me. I met a great deal of beautiful people, like with Cengis, Dursun, Dagli, Alkim, Mehmet and Cagatay to name a few. I also came across a horde of cyclists, which completely burst my assumption being the only crazy lad crossing Turkey in the middle of winter. So the hardest part was the most beautiful in the end. While crossing from along the north-south axis in central Turkey from Mersin to Trabzon, I saw landscapes that engraved themselves into my memory. The snow would slow me down a lot. I had to wait here and there, but since I had time I could pick the few ridable days in that last hard winter, and the snow would make it all the more special. Riding my first 2000+ passes through the snow was quite an adventure, that I probably would never had undertaken if I'd known what I'm getting myself into (si j'avais su, je ne serais pas venu), a bit of ignorance gave me the chance for a little bravery.
Three months is time enough to take a closer look at a countries culture and most of what I saw I likes. There is something very gentle in the way people approach you here (except in the very touristic places, but even there I see it now as more playful than aggressive). I spent a lot of good moments sharing a tea with strangers, sometimes talking little, sometimes a lot sometimes in silence. I very rarely felt embattled and most of the time I felt so safe that I sometimes forgot to lock my bike in front of a shop.
Turkey surely is rich in culture, but it also appeared to me as somewhat dis-rooted. It is not a long time ago since the last nomads were forced to settle in this country, there are fascinating things as Sufism, of which I heard the first time from my father, and I painted this image in my head that went all the way down in mysticism. But when asking around, talking to calligraphers and friends, I was always a bit disappointed with their answers. I'm not sure if Sufism is so entrenched in daily life here, that sparse information given to me was due to the the fact that Turks approached on that topic must have thought; "just look around you" or if this chapter closed now and not continued to be written thus slowly disappearing in the mist of distant memories. Or maybe I just went looking for its traces in the wrong places. The attempt to start a conversation about nomads also did not go very far most of the time. You can buy nomad bags for horses/bikes in tourist shop, but apart from the fact that these bags were used by nomads only some three generations ago was everything I got out from the guy that sells them. This seams the price to pay if you take a leap into what the westerners call modern life.
Now when it gets to politics it gets very tricky and then I start to think that the propaganda people in Turkey do an excellent job. I avoided the topics of Armenia and Kurdistan, but when it came up (outside of Istanbul), just the fact that it came up was already putting the Turks in the defensive, and counter attacks usually followed.
At some point I grew also a bit tired of the portraits and status of Ataturk staring at me with his intense glare from every fourth wall and every square.
GREECE
It was rattling in the memory box quite a bit, since my family had a strong connection to Greece because of my father having taken a job in Athens for a couple of years.
I forgot about the nice sound of the Greek language. I was chatted up all the time by people and I was surprised how many of them spoke German. This one spent one decade there and the next one maybe two or so...
There are a lot of cars on the many large streets with a lot of gas-stations along them. I saw quite a bit of industry and Greece is famous for tourism. So why are they in such a crisis again?
BULGARIA
... opened the door wide for me. Here I had my first couch surfing experience. I had a good time there with my three different hosts.
The landscapes are pretty impressive but winter is not the best season to travel here by bicycle. The cold gave me a rather hard time and I still was lucky that the sun came out on every day I spent there. I shudder when imagining having to cycle on a cloudy day, when you could not even defrost once around midday.
There was a culinary cut. Fast food habits of Bulgarians are a bit hard to get used to. Taking a slice of pizza and pouring a ton of ketchup, tartar-sauce and other stuff on it definitely does not raise my spirits.
Gypsies were discussed very often. I saw them also in other countries here and there, most of the time taking care of similar tasks (recycling, small mobile workshops for this and that). In Bulgaria the cities I visited had hole ghettos of them. Furthermore I noticed for the first time what people also refer to as stereotypical russian-communist architecture in the cityscapes of Bulgaria.
EX-JUGOSLAVIA
For me it was good to travel through the lands from which I knew only indirectly from the echoes of the war. I was a teenager at the time and did not really comprehend, but I felt that the adults being seriously worried when they mentioned that the war is rather close this time. It was also the war that drove refugees into our small 2000 soul village. There where so many refugees, that they had to distribute them on villages around the cities to shelter them in the bomb shelters of the schools. That was also how the my school class came about the first foreigner. The difference in cultures and the whole story about why they had to come here was adding quit a bit of tension to the situation.
My mother was giving them quite some credit for their situation and often took their side in conflicts within the community. It was very important to me to see now for myself that she was right in doing so.
I was hoping a bit before travelling the countries of Ex-Jugoslavia to find out about the whys of the war. By now I can say, that getting a first hand impression on the geopolitics and the few discussions I had with people helped me find out about some justifications of the war. But I soon I figured that looking for the cause of the war in the nature of the people would not let me find anything. All good people. Why did look there in the first place? I don't really know in retrospective... preconceptions formed by our media?
One explanation I found myself came from a direction I did not really expect. In Serbia most of the cars are of the brand Yugo. In Bosnia you have more German and French cars and in Croatia is is hard to find any Yugo anymore. Anyone who lives up to the western life style and was to show status drives Mercedes, BMW or VW. But the automobile industries of the countries that intervened in that war was not the only branch of economy that were flooded with the "libarators" products. You can find a lot of Lidl and Aldi and Carrefours. Why in goods name would you eat the shit of the western food industry if your land provides you with a lot of high quality stuff? Would you open your frontiers without a fight so that a huge corporations can destroy your local economy with dumping prices for products that look like food.
I would even go as far as to make our economy partially responsible for all the trash that lies around in many parts of Ex-Jugoslavia. When you look at the trash a bit more closely, a lot of it turns out to be packaging of modern food industry (Nestle, Coca Cola...). So you sell new products that generate a lot of trash but the people don't have the means to deal with it and in this case we don't see our selves obliged to "help" anymore".
I really was under the impression that Western-Europe had essentially a peace keeper role in that conflict. I thought that it is an exclusively American thing to proceed according to the shock doctrine. Now I will have to wipe away the "halo of a saint" from the image of Central-Europe.
MACEDONIA
I got my first impressions of Macedonia in Skopje. A modern city with a pompous center. I was told that there is a controversy about the administration spending a lot of money to stamp some historical monuments out of the ground. Yeah, their working hard to make it a Disneyland. In the very center there is a huge statue of Alexander on his horse. I was wondering; wasn't Alexander Greek? The question was answered with stern looking faces. The most attractive area for me was the bazaar. It was the biggest I have seen so far on my journey. I learned, that most of the business there is run by Albanians, they seem to be known for having a hand to run small enterprises. You could find almost anything there; bike parts, cloths, food, you name it...
The second impression was not so modern anymore once I left the city. The difference between rich/middleclass and poor was very striking here. The ride through the country was not so spectacular. Here in Macedonia it was already winter, the country was dominated by brown colors. Only towards the frontier, in the mountains it became more exciting.
KOSOVO
My stay there was short and intense. The first day, on my way to Prizeren, was rather though. The traffic was insane and I did not find a way to escape it. But arriving in Prizeren was great. It is a beautiful city, quite different from what I expected. The ride through the mountains towards the southern frontier of Kosovo the following day was great.
Often people told me that here and in Albania are the same people. When I only compared the driving style in the two countries it was kind of hard to believe. Also I found that life follows a quite different pace in Kosovo.
One thing was very surreal though. They had some vehicles on four wheels, with two seats and without a cabin. They looked a bit like these race carts, only with bigger wheels. And now comes the thing, they had a mortising machine to cut wood mounted on the back Sometimes there were a few around on the street on the same time and I started to wonder if they are not shooting another Mad Max movie here.
ALBANIA
...was one of the highlights. It ist still apparent, that this country had shut itself off for until recently. I loved this ancient city Shkoder and most of all the mountains in the north. Some kids cheered while I was passing, others threw stones. I was very careful, avoided any camping.
I had only few opportunities to talk with Albanians about their country and its history. And the only time the Kanun was discussed was with two Austrian guys. Some find it just atrocious, I on the other hand was fascinated by the amount of responsibility each member of that society was given and the fact that murderers only can put themselves in prison (hide in the tower of the guard of the Kanun to avoid vendetta from the family).
But I felt that the people where very proud of their country, even if economy is bad and life is rather hard. I think I understood their pride. The land is old and its power manifests itself when you contemplate the country, the hills, mountains... Many of the young people appeared to have traveled a lot, before returning.
There was quite some drinking going on. In the bars, already in the morning, what looked like a glass of water accompanying the espresso often turned out to be schnapps.
MONTENEGRO
The Gulf of Kotor was beautiful. I then was under the illusion, that all the country would be 'untouched' like this, but the rest of the coast was in the firm grip of real estate speculants, that would not stop before they have got out some money of the last inch of land. Unfortunately I did not make the detour away from the coast into the mountains, that were described to me as a wild area.
CROATIA
...was a real treat cycling wise. The mountains, the laces of plitwicka, and the dalmatian coast were very beautiful. At the coast the weather was nice and for a change I was in the perfect season: good conditions and less tourists. In Croatia there were not many signs of a recent war, less uncleared mine fields, no facades with bullet holes, nor did the economy seem to suffer from post war problems. No trash... not good for one of the main industries, the one of tourism.
BOSNIA
Bosnia was half half. The first half, the weather was very rainy and my choice of roads was not any good. But after Doboj I got luckey and the ride through the mountains was great. The discussions with Vladimir were very important to me. He spoke freely and hey gave me deeper insights into the political situation of his country. So I learned that Serbians make officially not quite half of the Bosnian population. So it appears, that a lot of Bosnian people do not consider themselves as such. Furthermore he mentioned that each sub-ethnos is tied to a church (orthodox, catholic and islamic) and thus to a religion. When war started people fled into regions where their church ist predominant, causing precise frontier to appear between cultures that where intertwined. He also recited a piece of conversation that stuck in my head. Its goes like this: 'Rabbi, what is democracy?' Rabbi: 'Democracy is if I stand on top of a minaret and piss on your head and you, standing on the ground, have the right to piss back.
SERBIA
The good memories of Serbia are mostly connected with people that spontaneously chatted me up. This ended most of the time in a small bar where we then had discussions over coffee. Good people...
From a cyclist perspective it was not so nice. A lot of smoke and trash and smoking trash. Only one stretch shortly before Novi Sad, that took me along the Danube was nice. I only stayed a couple of days though.
HUNGARY
What, how are they speaking? Without understanding a word I liked it, and time was too short to given it a try myself. Here I met the Duna, an impressive river. Budapest was mindblowing. It must have played an important role in probably every great empire the geographic europe has seen. I love things that persist through time and so Budapest left me no choice but to adore it. Budapest has also a lot of cyclists, with stylish bikes, their right biking is cool.
SLOVAKIA
A lot of forests, a lot of mountains, I loved it. My friend Milan said, the industry of Czechoslovakia, is in todays Czech republic. Yes, bit the mountains are in Slovakia, I thought. Of what I saw, there is a bit of agriculture, a bit of forestry and a bit of industry. Most off all there is no hurry. Often I found myself surrounded by silence, which I appreciated a lot.
POLAND
Poland surprised me in many ways. First I thought that such a big country has also its wild spots. I heard of the ancient forests in the Masure, but then winter drove me south before I could get deep enough into the eastern part of the country. The coast at the baltic sea was rather touristic, but I liked it. in the late season, though I'm not sure if I, would during summer. The central part of poland was densly populated, all couple of km you cross a village and often the sign indicating the end of one village is accompanied by a sign of the next village one the other side of the road. It's nice and flat... If you like flat. The country has a lot of agriculture, which is manifested everywhere by people on the field, trucks and cows. But still its does not as the most industrial agriculture. The food has high quality. And then in the south the Tatra, jumping out of the flatness. Even a lot of tourism will not completely tame this area.
The cities Szczecin and Gdansk left a very strong impression one me. It just felt very good to be there.
I experienced the people as friendly, docile and helpful. But they would very rarely approach me spontaneously, even after starring with intense curiosity.
One thing that touched me was to see their beautiful graveyards. Of what I understood of the history of Polands last century, its was tough. For me seeing this beauty aroud the death felt like a strong power of healing. Look that's life completing cycles, it's beautiful, look
GERMANY
I've lived more than four years in Dresden before leaving and riding along the Neisse and Oder. So please let me refer you to my unpublished and unwritten book about Dresden ;-)
