Istanbul

these are my sponsors along the way. they have given us food, meal, lodging, warmness and endless of friendship.

sorry friends. we r enjoying much along the road of turkey and neglected about blogging and updating. we have been travelling along the Mediterranean coast and camping all the way. we camp at shores, beaches, petrol kiosk.... so far.
i have noticed that the camping site here is not cheap. for usage of our own tent, we have to pay about s$20+ for both of us to use their land and toilet and washing facilities.
cannot compare lahhh... camping in turkey is more expensive than hotel in pakistan n india. somemore below our groundsheet is small rocks that is too much to clear and we will wake up with a free overnight massage.

unbelievable istanbul is a party place. when we reach this city and looking for a particular lodging recommanded by fellow travellers, we met a Harley Davison rider on his cruise. altho he is not very sure of the exect location, he brought me around and help me asked the local. this is how friendly they are. though we did not understand each other's language, i thank him much and we exchanged our namecard. he was Mr Nurettin. i guess from his namecard that he was a general manager of a company.

sorry folks. i would not give u report on how beautiful the blue mosque is or how old is that palace or how wonderful is the stone is. we are not very intrested in such stuff at the moment. we would like to meet beautiful people, kind hearted folks, tricky touts, surprising policeman and all the people that we met. it is more intresting to know how they think and what they do.

people and guide book tell me about the policeman in Turkey, that they will find fault in you and ask for some part time income. so far so good after travelling almost 80% of our turkey route, i told myself that im very lucky until we reached Mamaris, i was stopped by a stationary police car with 2 policeman idling and doing nothing. there were no people along that road so i guess the policeman can do anything to us 'un-shamelessly'.
they saw my dirty number plate and wanted to see our driving licence. i pretended alot to not knowing what is he trying to say. he checked my international driving licence (our 1st time usage) and asked me for my marker. all he wanted was to sign good luck and his name on Hope Too.

we met Ralph and family from Germany. they have converted a '5 tonner' truck into a caraven. Ralph and wife were at Niabia (afrcia) for 9 years in the tourism industry. they had an adopted child, John, from Niabia. they self taught their children. now they are going to south america, as the same route with us. knowing this family is something new to us. their travel and upbringing of the children is very special.

in the camping site, most caravan that came here are the retiress old folks from europe. we seldom have common topics but to share and exchange food with each other as they were very intrested to see asian in their community also! imagine u see a westerner couple wearing shorts and singlet sitting at the neighbourhood of Clementi drinking coffee and eating chicken rice. would u have a glance at them for a second? at Kas, we met the Holland couple, on their 1981 caraven. Stijn was a freelance journalist for some football magazine and his girlfriend, Hanneke. we had a great chat and hoping to see each other again. guessing each other would be at the same destination tomorrow. again, we met along the way. just for a hi/bye because we were on the road. again we met again, at Mamaris, when we were about to leave the clubbing sence, Hanneke ran to us and we were shocked for a moment and rejoiced! we were really happy to see each other again! there we sat down and have a beer and had more chat!

though the room in Istanbul is terribly small and noisy, we are paying S$30 + for a night. Hope

Too is sleeping by the street. Hope Too tells me that he is safe on the street because he saw other Honda XRVs, BMW GSs, big cruiser and big brothers sleeping on the street like him. i just gave Hope Too a tent to conceal himself to avoid any extra look.