Istanbul, Turkey

I was supposed to travel through Turkey with Sally for two weeks.  When I received the bad news, I wanted to cancel my flight entirely.  Unfortunately, that wasn’t possible.  But with my Schengen zone allowance running out and Istanbul being a good hub city to go anywhere, I eventually decided to take the flight anyway and completely restructured the rest of my trip to re-allot the non-Schengen days I was to spend in Turkey to other countries I hadn’t planned on going to.

I think that Sally probably would’ve wanted me to continue travelling Turkey.  But I knew I wouldn’t be able to handle it – and I think my short stay in Istanbul only confirmed that.  I did do some sight seeing, met some people, had a nice time…but the whole time, I couldn’t help thinking of who was missing.  One day, another year, I’ll come back and do Turkey some justice, see it with a better mindset. Continue reading

Marrakesh, Morocco

“Japon! Japon! Korea? China? Indonesia?”

Yeah…walking around the souks in Marrakech wasn’t my idea of fun, especially after Fes.  Sadly enough, I did not buy anything but a postcard (which I didn’t have to bargain for), let alone wander into more than 3 or 4 shops, in my entire stay in Morocco.  And those shop-wanderings were mostly in Chefchaouen!  I cannot stand being hassled, and I ended up not even trying to buy anything.  So much as a sideways glance at an item would have someone chasing me down the street calling me Japan or even yelling at me in Japanese. Continue reading

Fes, Morocco

Bit of an early start – over breakfast with Inara and Leiko, I found out that for the past few days, I had my watch set wrong!  Morocco is one hour behind Spain and no one told me, nor did I glance at any clocks…so I woke up a little bit too early for my bus.  Well, at least it wasn’t the other way around! Continue reading