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The Way Is The Goal

Category: Photography (Page 4 of 5)

Mill Hunting

October 24, 2007 / / 0 Comments

“Every week again I push my own borders”, says a lady who is cycling from Amsterdam to Abcoude, a tour of nearly 15 kilometer and who I just met. “Every week I change the route somewhat and I just try to cycle a bit more. Maybe one day I will go as far as you!”

The lady was impressed when I told her I came cycling from Huizen, my home-town, which is actually only twice as far as Abcoude. Even in Holland, where there are more bikes than people, you are apparantly looked upon when you travel ‘large distance’ by bike instead of by car or public transport.

In other words, traveling is so relative. I could have told her why I was here or about my travels in the past year, or about a friend who is touring the world on his bike, but the lady was more than impressed because of the small trip I made that day.

And similarly to traveling distance, will I be able to keep this way of searching and freshness as when traveling: to look in the same open way at those things that are familiar to me as towards what is new?

My Romanian bike-accident is already five weeks away and I am happy to be able to cycle longer distances again, and to discover new things in old places.

Never Enough Istanbul

September 2, 2007 / / 2 Comments

It would be impossible to summarise Istanbul. There are only impressions, feelings and thoughts. No matter how many different perspectives you would acquire, there are simply too many different paths and lives here, to give a conclusion so sound that its people find their own stories back in it.

A city this huge just makes you realise there is yet more to explore. Never enough, there is always another corner and another road, another family and another party. Life of the Istanbul wo/man seems never-ending and no words can really grasp what this city is about.

Highlights, this is one of the few things what you might be able to offer. I recently made one small effort for this purpose. With the photo-essay “Live it and you will love it” I offer a viewpoint of what Istanbul-life for me is about, how I perceived the city, and how I see the people and culture here. I hope it offers you a good snapshot of Istanbul.

I find this country and this city one of the most social I have been so far. People meet each other everywhere and nobody seems lonely. True, there is a lot of poverty and people who just try to survive but somehow they always receive a lot of support from each other. Here I see people interacting with each other continuously. Meeting on the street, a random passer-by, somebody who waits for a bus or sits next to you on the boat, they are all excuses for a conversation.

And when they find out you are not from here, they become very curious and want to know where you are from, what you are doing here and how you like it. Imagine that in a city such as London, Amsterdam, Paris or Barcelona. No way that someone would even show the slightest interest in your life or imagine people talking in the bus or whilst queuing!

Here, though, the person you start talking to will respond with genuine interest, without hesitation. Imagine how it feels to have the freedom just to talk to anyone you like. What therefore might be one of the biggest paradoxes of this massive town with more than fifteen million people: there are no strangers here, only people you still have to meet.

Breathing Istanbul

May 29, 2007 / / 6 Comments


Children playing everywhere, families in the parks eating fish that the men just caught in the Bosphorus strait, busy markets and streets, and smoke of waterpipes all around you. Istanbul is not only a very beautiful city, but foremost a very active one with a lively outdoor culture. It breathes life in every corner you find.

You don’t have to go far to discover this, to sense the Istanbul atmosphere. Its people are very alive pretty much everywhere. Within a minute that I walk out of the door of my new place I can easily find someone smiling, a shopkeeper saying hello to me or people speaking to each other. Children look very happy all the time and sometimes don’t stop laughing; so full of life they are.

Although things are not easy for all living here, the Istanbul atmosphere enables most to enjoy their lives and that of others fully. It is an incredible place with real life happening all over, people surviving from as little they have, and a touch of magic if you look deeper.

An easily accessible place with a lot of activity and magic is the Bosporus riverside. Here you’ll find many boats, people fishing, families barbecuing and big waves playing at the shore with children who scream joyfull back at the splashes of the water.

As I went for a long walk along the Bosphorus sea I observed how people here experience an ordinary Sunday afternoon. I have seen them taking one of the dozen ferries, relaxing in a small harbor and fishing all over the shore, barbecuing their fresly caught fish, and sitting on one of the many terrasses, enjoying their waterpipes, having some fruit and playing chess or backgammon.

Though, I am taking things fairly easy here as it is such a huge place that I can easily get lost and find myself too overcrowded with input and impulses. There is enough to do and extremely a lot to explore. No need to hurry at all, Istanbul has so amazingly much to offer that it would be a waste to race through it. Let’s first breath it.

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