A comfort zone is that space, both physical and mental, where you feel comfortable. It’s not the place where you feel happy per se, but it’s the place where happiness and joy are more likely. This can be a place near your family, friends, partner or anyone or anything you truly care about. Depending on your genetics and your upbringing, this comfort zone may extend far beyond the physical place where you were born in or where your family and friends live, like in the case when you’re living in a foreign country. Or it might be the town where you’ve grown up in. Each person has their own comfort zone, and their own limits of how much and how far they want to extend it.

In my case, my mission is to have the biggest comfort zone possible. That might sound brave to some, scary to others and downright awful to the rest. Whatever you think of it, at one point in my life, I created this mission and I tend to live by it. Check out this post about how I try to do that, but for now let’s focus on what it has done for me so far. Ever since I’ve left the Netherlands, first for India and then for Prague, I’ve discovered that not being in your comfort zone for a long time is not as easy as it sounds.

My initial assumption was that however long you’re out of your comfort zone, at some point in the future the situation that at first was uncomfortable will eventually become part of your comfort zone. So in the case of emigrating to a new country; no matter how long you’ll be living there, at one point everything will start to become normal. It will become the new standard, a new part of your comfort zone from which you can extend your comfort zone even further.

But after not having been in my comfort zone for the past nine months, I still don’t feel comfortable. Throughout these months, I’ve been suffering from anxiety in various degrees. Some days are really hard. Some days are easy. And yes, that’s basically life. But what I’ve noticed is that now that I’m not in my comfort zone, things that would usually cause a healthy amount of stress, like in my case flying, are now really hard. Like, really really hard. I’ve experienced multiple panic attacks on several flights over the past few months, whereas when I was living in Amsterdam – part of my comfort zone – I would feel nervous about flying somewhere, but it would never get to that peak stress-level where I would panic.

I’ve noticed that my mental state is relative to my comfort zone. This is not surprising, but actually experiencing how this affects how you feel is really interesting. For example, flying to Australia while living in Amsterdam last year was super easy. The long flight, being so far away from home; I had an anxious thought maybe once or twice, but they passed as I was enjoying the adventure. Experiencing a few hours of heavy turbulence on the way back was scary as hell, but it never affected me for longer than the experience lasted. As soon as the turbulence stopped, my stress levels returned to normal.

Now, however, being out of my comfort zone for such a long time, just thinking about being so far away from home immediately makes me feel anxious. The thought of having to be on a plane for 24 hours to get back home could make me panic here and now. And I think it’s because I don’t have the mental safe space right now, where I can watch those thoughts without clinging to it. If you feel safe and comfortable, internal ‘threads’, thoughts that cause anxiety, depression or panic, can be watched, accepted and disregarded as non-relevant. If you don’t feel safe or comfortable, these internal threads are hard to shake. You want to feel comfortable, but these thoughts make you feel stressed and anxious. So the default response is “I don’t want to have these thoughts“. You want them to go away; being outside of your comfort zone is already hard enough and having to deal with unwanted thoughts only worsens the problem. But fighting against your own thoughts is the main cause for more anxiety and ultimately, panic attacks.

Having spent the past week in The Netherlands has made me realise how important all of this is for your quality of life. In Prague, my mind is always on, always thinking. And not about anything relevant; it’s obsessively repeating the same things over and over again, stuck in a loop that causes waves of anxiety. Being with my friends and family in The Netherlands however made my mind stop. I experienced a quiet mind for the first time in a few months and it was amazing. I felt joy. I was able to completely wind down. I was happy.

Life is a series of experiments, and the one I’m currently running, living in Prague, has taught me a lot already: What works for me, how important family and friends are, what I like and don’t like about living in different countries. I’m not moving back soon and in fact, I know that I will move to other countries as well. Just because this experiment didn’t result in a happier life, doesn’t mean it failed. I’m still learning, everyday, and as long as I keep learning, any experiment is worth the effort.

We met up with two friends later that day and we hung out around the lake while drinking a couple of beers and enjoying our beautiful surroundings. Our plan was to do some hiking, but we were all so relaxed, chilling in the sun, that we ended up spending basically the whole day at the lake. We had our burned skins as proof. I finally took a dive into the lake, but only because our friend was there and we dared each other, and let’s be honest, boys will be boys. And man, that lake was cold.

We had a lovely Austrian dinner at a local brewery together before our friends headed off again. As the sun was setting, temperatures were dropping so Kirra and I quickly sneaked into our tent and slept 10 hours straight before waking up to an amazing view in the morning.

As the temperatures were slowly rising again, our cosy thermals made place for shorts, skirts and t-shirts and we ventured deeper into the Alps towards Hallstadt, a supposedly must-see destination. The drive to Hallstadt was way more impressive than the town itself; driving through the mountains and seeing the endlessly green pastures with snow topped mountains in the background was really amazing. Hallstadt was quite disappointing, as the calmness of the mountains was disturbed by busses and cars full of tourists with their cameras ready to take pictures of the town, the lake and the mountains. It’s kind of sad to see this huge gathering of tourists in this one place, just because it’s mentioned somewhere (actually, Hallstadt is mentioned in a lot of somewheres). Herd behaviour at its best.

After our lovely drive through the Alps we returned back to our campsite for a very active hike… from our tent to the lake, from the lake to the bar and from the bar back to the lake. Kirra had to study some more, and I was chilling at the lake, doing some reading and meditating while feeling the most relaxed I had felt in a long time.

During the evening, we cooked some food on our little camping stove and we fell asleep under a starlit sky. And in case you are wondering; yes it was cold during the night (+/- 4 degrees), but we have great camping gear for winter-ish conditions so we were all snugs and cosy in our tent.

We left the campsite on Sunday to drive back to Prague, but we took a different route than the one we took to get there. We drove through Germany, through a lovely town called Passau, and through Šumava National Park on the German/Czech border. That national park looked amazing with rolling hills and green forests. Not as impressive as the Alps, but closer to home and very pretty, so we might check that out some other time.

It’s so nice to be living this close to these beautiful lakes, mountains, forests and national parks, and especially now that we’re heading towards summer, we’re certain that we will be exploring way more soon!

To develop a bigger comfort zone is to learn. Discovering new places, meeting new people and trying new things. I don’t believe that just learning something new is enough to push your boundaries, rather I think that through learning you develop a new perspective; a new view on the world, on people and on yourself. In a way, you change your subjective reality. Something that previously made you worried, anxious, sad or angry is suddenly viewed from a different angle, changing the way you perceive it.

For me, travelling is a huge part of extending my comfort zone. I’ve learned so much about people, cultures, values, the world and myself by travelling to different places. For example, when I was travelling to Canada I was amazed by how nice and kind everyone was. A chat with a cashier totally made my day, just because we talked about some random stuff. As a Dutchie, I’d never experienced something like that before so consistently. In the Netherlands, chatting with the cashier will not only surprise the cashier, it will also annoy people waiting in line because everyone’s always in a rush (trust me, I tried to have chats with random people when I came back from Canada, but it’s just not part of the culture). I’m not saying either one of these situations is better than the other. I don’t want to judge these situations; I only want to observe and extract from it what aligns closest with my values and the person I want to be.

Travelling to India changed a lot of my feelings and thoughts on some big, deep subjects, like happiness. Seeing how people in the rural areas were incredibly proud of a new ‘house’ they had built was such a perspective-changer. Mainly because the ‘house’ that they showed us, was a little shack with some pots and pans. No running water, no toilet, no shower; not even a bed. The bed (or frame) was outside, in the sand. But still, these people were ever so proud of their houses.

It’s all about perspective.

You see, often times we don’t realise how stuck we are in our own way of thinking. And if you don’t do something new every now and then, even if it’s very small, you’ll forget why you think the way you think. In a way, you’re limited by your own thinking, even though you might not be aware of it. It’s all relative, and if you don’t put yourself out there, extend your comfort zone and push your boundaries, you’ll never fully realise what you have, what you don’t have and what you could do to change the way you feel, change the way you interact with others and change the person you are today to become a better person tomorrow.

I know for a fact that I wouldn’t be who I am today without the experiences I had while I travelled. Even now, having lived in the Czech Republic for only three months so far, has changed my view on a lot of things already. I hope that you also find, and will continue to find, whatever it is that helps you challenge your own boundaries and extend your comfort zone. Try to change your perspective, change your reality, by adding to it something that wasn’t there before and you will find that there is so much more to this life than you ever thought there was.

This referred to getting quick snacks here and there (usually covered in plastic and all kinds of packaging), ordering things online as time was limited to go shopping (comes in a bunch of packaging), buying groceries for only a day or two ahead (then ended up still buying too much of some things and throwing them away), or ordering takeout (packaging). Need I say more? You see the pattern I guess! I could literally go on. I was also getting tired and frustrated of having so much garbage that we were changing the trash can almost daily or best case, every second day. That is a LOT of rubbish!

The goal essentially is that, while we have decided to at least stay put for minimum 1 year here in Prague, it’s an ideal opportunity to start being much more mindful about how we live our every day life. The first thing I considered was where the most of our wastage was coming from. Immediately, it was very easy to see it was primarily coming from our groceries!

At the store, 90% of fruit and vegetables seem to come in plastic packaging, and we were often not planning ahead and only buying smaller packages with as close to the amount of what we needed for 1 or 2 meals. And after a couple of takeaway coffees here and there, some takeout lunch/dinner, it all builds up so much. And from my experience of the last few months, once you really start watching what you’re doing with wastage, you start frustrating yourself.

So basically, the first step we took, was to pick up a few containers and jars from IKEA, which I then took to a local waste free store called Bezobalu. We are super lucky actually that it’s so close to our house and so affordable! We are able to get all our grains, legumes, seeds, rice, lentils, oats, chickpeas and beans without any form of packaging. Basically a vegetarian’s delight! Anything else that we can’t get from Bezobalu, we still get from a regular supermarket and from a farmer’s market. (Yay for farm fresh fruit and vegetables, plus it’s fun to explore the local produce!).

Some general things I’ve learnt so far:
– When there is no other affordable/cheap option but to buy a product in packaging from the supermarket, glass should also be the first priority. If that’s not an option, then at least try to buy it in bulk and store it in another storage container if need be.
– As a couple, we can’t save the world, but if we can at least prevent our own wastage, bring awareness and help others, then we feel that we are doing our bit.
– Despite previously thinking you had to spend a lot of money to live waste free, it is actually a way to save money on a longer term basis and to be more clever about how you actually spend your money on a longer term basis
– It’s actually very easy to make a lot of products that we use all the time, such as stock, tomato of any type that we usually get from a can (crushed, puree, etc), hummus, pesto, muesli, etc.

Each week, we create a bit of a dinner menu for ourselves which also includes having leftovers from each meal for Maurice to take to lunch the following day. This has helped us to plan with ingredients that crossover and can be used a few times during the week. In turn we’re more effective with what we buy, which makes us more financially aware as well as ‘waste aware’.

I have also started to try making products instead of buying their packaged versions. So I recently tried making our own veggie stock from vegetable scraps – I simply just keep them all in a container in the freezer until it’s full enough to make a batch with, then I store the finished product again in the freezer until we need it. I’ve also made my own granola with products from the waste free store of course and with ingredients I could choose myself without the additives, so nice! And it’s often easier to buy a bigger batch of vegetables from the store due to packaging, so when we have some leftover from the dishes that we are making for the week, we cut them up and put them in a tub in the freezer for use later. I’ve also made other tasty treats like pesto and hummus which store really well too. I hope to continue this trend with some other products in the near future too!

What’s next for our waste free journey?
Ultimately to wipe out usage of any processed packaged products as much as possible, and the next focus will be on:
– visiting a farmers market more often for our fruit and veg (at least on a weekly basis)
– shampoo, conditioner, shower gel (potentially to try a few types of shampoo bars and maybe make our own shower gel)
– cleaning products such as surface spray, dishes cleaner, dishwasher tablets (to try making our own cleaning spray for sure, with the rest we are still trying to figure that out)
– I’ve started volunteering with a community garden project in our local neighbourhood, so hopefully once the permits and funding is all secured, we will also be able to grow some of our own produce there in the Summer!

If you’re interested in learning more about our waste free journey or have any advice for us, please do get in touch! We would love to discuss this more

I struggle with anxiety. I had my first panic attack five years ago, on a plane. Which is probably one of the worst places to have your first panic attack, but then again what do I know? You only have your first panic attack once.

PADAM TSS.

Anyway, ever since, I’ve been struggling with anxiety and panic attacks on a somewhat regular, almost yearly base. These periods of anxiety generally last for about two to three months and mostly occur during the darker (literally) periods of the year. I’ve come to accept it as part of my life; as a part of the person I am. Which is not as sad or bad as it sounds, better yet it actually helps me deal with these periods of anxiety better.

If you want to read more about my first panic attack and the subsequent periods of anxiety I experienced, I’ve re-uploaded a post that I wrote in 2016 here.

The best way to describe my anxiety is as an extreme form of impatientness. If you think about it, it makes sense. From an evolutionary perspective, seeing something dangerous (a snake) puts your brain in ‘fight or flight’-mode. This causes all kinds of physical reactions like an elevated heart rate, an altered view of reality and a rise in body temperature. In cases where ‘flight’ is more realistic than ‘fight’, getting out of the dangerous situation as quickly as possible gives you the highest possibility of survival. The body of a non-anxious person returns to a normal state as soon as the danger has been evaded and life goes on as if nothing happend. A person suffering from anxiety however, may remain in this ‘flight or fight’-state for days, weeks or even months in a row.

My extreme impatientness works as follows. When we travelled to India last October, I started feeling anxious pretty much in the first week of being there. I had never planned a trip as long as our India trip was going to be ever before. And I’m a milestone thinker (I could probably write another post about that). The reason this is relevant, is that it made me even more aware of the fact that I was going to be away from home for the longest time ever. Which by itself is not scary, or anxiety inducing. Or maybe it is, for some people. And maybe it was for me. Because what happened in that first week, is that I started thinking:

What if I cannot do it? Being away from home for this long, in a county so different then what I’m used to?

Which turned into:

What if I’ll feel unhappy here? I don’t want to give up and go back home so soon already!

Which, after some downward spiralling, turned into:

If I get a panic attack here, at this moment, I’m totally, utterly screwed.

Which caused, well, a panic attack.

See the pattern here? This is what I mean with extreme impatientness; instead of just waiting to see what happens and let life unfold, I get stuck in my head and all the ‘What-ifs’ start piling up, until it’s so much pressure that it forces my body in the ‘fight or flight’ mode. But fight against what? And flight? There’s literally nowhere I can run. I would have had to drive for two hours and be on a plane for another nine hours just to be home. But then what?

If I would go home now, I would feel like I failed. Like a gave up. And I really don’t want to go home, I want to help SEDS and travel and explore. Why do I feel like this, this is exactly what I wanted. But now I’m here. And if I would get a panic attack here, at this moment, I’m totally, utterly…

You get the point.

I panicked a bunch of times in India and struggled with anxiety when we came back to The Netherlands and when we subsequently travelled to the Balkans after that. The reason that I joined Kirra and Laura a week later than planned was because I needed that extra time to recover. And I’m still recovering. Because the annoying, frustrating and, if you’re not careful, depressing thing about anxiety and panic attacks is that it teaches your mind certain patterns that can invoke anxiety in different situations as well. When I was back in The Netherlands, I didn’t immediately feel anxiety free, because my brain was still in anxiety mode:

It’s dark outside. What if I wanted to be somewhere where the sun shines right now?

Which, after yet another round of downward spiralling, turned into:

If I have a panic attack now, at 9pm, while the sun comes up at 8am the next day, I’m totally, utterly…

And I’m stuck in the same loop again. Extreme impatientness causing extreme stress a.k.a. anxiety.

It’s hard man. There have been days where I felt really, really low. There have been days where I felt so far away from reality and everything felt like a dream from which I couldn’t wake up. There have been days where I was certain that this was going to be how I was going to feel the rest of my life and there have been days during which I was absolutely convinced that I was going to have to go a mental institution.

But guess what, I’m still here b*tches!

As I said before, I have accepted that I will probably never be anxiety-free. There may be periods, maybe even long periods, where I will be free from anxiety, but I’m pretty sure it will come back every now and then. And that’s okay. It’s the challenge I’ve been born with. Like, literally. Anxiety runs in my family and there’s a strong indication that anxiety is hereditary. But there’s good stuff caused by anxiety as well. It has actually forced me to think about some deep, deep existential stuff. It has pushed me to read a lot about buddhism. It has shattered my young self’s naive believe of being invincible, only to make me more humble. It has made me listen to other people struggling with mental issues without judging them. It might even have taught me how to help others. And as my struggle continues, I will learn more and more about the world, people and myself.

My aim for this post was to paint a more honest picture of what my life looks like and I feel like I succeeded somewhat in achieving that goal. I also feel like I could write more about this subject, especially on how I personally deal with anxiety. What helps, and what doesn’t? What are common triggers? Should you even be drinking caffeine? But for now, go outside, take a deep breath and listen to the birds chirping: spring is coming!

A lot has happened in the last 4 weeks since we posted…
Here’s a summary of what we’ve been up and where we’re at:

Basically after our trip in the Balkans, we headed back to the Netherlands for a week to restore, unpack, repack and say our goodbyes to our friends and Maurice’s family. We then arrived to Prague on the 14th of Jan and we’ve been living here ever since!

We had initially booked an Airbnb for our first 2 months as we had heard it usually takes a long time to find an apartment here, buuuut, after only a week of being here, we had already secured ourselves a place with 1 year lease! And we moved in a week later! This was actually kind of a scary moment (in particular for me), since we haven’t actually had our own lease (that is longer than 3 months), in a year, as we have been moving around quite a bit. So it’s a big deal for us to have signed on to be in this apartment for a year! The commitment-phobe in me is screaming!

Maurice had already secured a job with a really cool company called Productboard before we arrived, so a week after we arrived in Prague, he has started working there. And so far, all of his colleagues have been incredibly supportive and welcoming to both of us! More than we ever could have dreamed.

Meanwhile, I’m still hunting for the right job for me here! In between job hunting, I have been doing some freelance work content writing for a few different employers online, as well as having the time to really enjoy doing creative stuff like embroidery, watercolour painting and reading a looooot of books. (Yesterday we found a library and signed up for a membership – access to a bunch of English books for free? Uh, yes please!)

In our free time we have been trying to explore Prague’s tourism in small doses. We aren’t in a rush as we are going to be living here for a while though. Two weeks ago, we went to Prague Castle and to the Charles Bridge – the classics of Prague tourism. Both very beautiful and we enjoyed the old architecture and the scenic views a lot! I had been to these places when I was 15 on a Euro tour with a bunch of exchange students years ago, so it really brought back a lot of memories for me to be walking through there again.

We’ve been continuing to explore the city as much as we can, though primarily in our local neighbourhood. Our area is known for having a lot of cute cafes and bars so it’s been nice trying out those places. Funnily enough, we’ve even been to the same one 3 times in the last 10 days – I guess we’ve found our new ‘regular’ place! We’ve also become almost regulars at another bar that’s a little bit further away from home, which is a board game bar. For anyone that knows either of us – you know we’re a sucker for a good strategic game! This place has hundreds and there is always a ‘game expert’ on staff at the time of visit, and they are always more than eager to recommend games and teach you how to play! Really cool.

The thing that stands out to me about the architecture here is the colours of the buildings – they are mainly all in cute pastel colours and such tall buildings as well, so the streets wind up ward in colourful spirals. And the thing I’ve missed without properly realising it as well, has been hills! This city is so up and down, to walk around at all requires a climb of some kind. After living in Amsterdam for a few years, I had come to see the flatness as normal. But we now live halfway up a hill in our new apartment, so that means anytime we want to go anywhere (up or down) you know you’re going to have to climb there or back or in between. It’s a really nice regular form of exercise to appreciate the city and it’s streets.

And to add to the challenge of the constant climb, we experienced a huge snowfall last weekend. It happened so fast as well! Within 2 hours, the streets went from 0 to 20 cm of thick fluffy snow! It was so exciting, so we immediately went out for a walk to enjoy the fresh load before it got cleared from the roads and paths. Since then, it has snowed a few times minimally in the past week but now the paths are all a bit icy so it can be quite slippery in some areas from the snow/ice.

Basically, all in all, our first few weeks in Prague trying to live a more ‘stable’ life has been so far so good! We’re still learning new things every day about this city and it’s people. I’ve been working hard at consistently using Duolingo to learn Czech and we both have plans to take some Czech lessons in the near future to make it easier to get by here! Until next time…

We celebrated New Years in Skopje by going out for a couple of beers and having dinner in a Macedonian fastfood chain. We got into a club where everyone was dressed super fancy (dresses, suits, you name it) so we kind of felt like we didn’t fit in, in our unwashed trashy travel clothes. We left the club at 11:30, just in time for the massive firework show that was about to go down at Macedonian Square. It lasted for about 10 minutes and it was huge; the whole city lit up under all the fireworks. After that, we all felt tired and slowly made our way back to the hostel, but not before buying some sparklers! We didn’t go out with a bang, but at least we got a good night of sleep!

[wpvideo mM0OGEvZ ]

2019! We visited Matka Canyon, which is a 30 minute drive from Skopje. It’s a massive canyon in the middle of the mountain with a big lake in it. There’s boat services operating on the lake to take you to a monastery or to the Velko caves. We opted for the caves and after a boat ride of about 45 minutes we arrived at the massive Velko caves which were really impressive. The caves are basically huge domes and at the deepest part that we could reach we found an underground lake. The artificial lighting inside the cave took away some of it’s magic, but it was still very impressive.

On the second day of the new year we drove to Bitola, a city in the south east of Macedonia, near the Greece border. Again, we found ourselves driving through the beautiful mountains of Macedonia, which were sometimes covered in a thin layer of snow and other times seemed to radiate a beautiful yellow-green glow. Macedonian infrastructure is under heavy construction, as we’ve seen multiple construction sites next to the existing roads. The interesting part is that all the construction sites have signs near them stating that the infrastructure projects are funded by the European Union. After doing some research, we discovered that Macedonia is trying to become part of the EU and in return they’re receiving 1.3 billion euros development aid from the EU that is meant to go to projects like infrastructure and sustainability.

Fun fact: the Republic of Macedonia is officially called the Former Yugoslavic Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) due to Greece not wanting Macedonia to be called Macedonia. The most northern province of Greece, the part bordering Macedonia, is also called Macedonia and there have been multiple naming conflicts over time that have caused Greece to assert their veto over Macedonia’s accession into the EU. So even though Macedonia has been trying to become part of the EU ever since 2004 and actually met all the criteria in 2014, they’re still not part of the EU. However, in 2018 Macedonia agreed to being called The Republic of North Macedonia, which caused Greece to drop their veto and Macedonia’s accession into the EU can now finally begin [source]. Both countries also claim to be the official birth grounds of Alexander the Great, having prompted Macedonia to build a huge Alexander the Great statue in the middle of Skopje to, well, stick it to Greece.

During the night time it started snowing quite heavily in Bitola and when we woke up the next day we discovered a beautiful snow covered city. After breakfast we went to look for a car shop, as the road conditions required us to have snow chains with us. The guy at the car shop was incredibly friendly, sharing with us that he has friends in Amsterdam and relatives in Australia and how much of a coincidence that was given all of our nationalities. After showing us a video of how to put the snow chains on the car tires, we ventured off towards Ohrid, the city overlooking the huge lake with the same name. After driving for a while, we pulled over to put the snow chains on, as the roads were completely covered in snow. Both the video and the instruction manual showed different snow chains than the ones we’d bought however, causing us to stop another car to help us out. Two friendly Albanian Macedonians of similar age helped us out by putting the snow chains on. We continued our drive while there was more and more snow covering the roads up until the point that we saw police cars pulling over trucks. We stopped next to one of the trucks to ask one of the police officers about the road ahead. Laura was eating chocolate in the back of our car and the truck driver saw this, and all of a sudden he started yelling at us in Macedonian. We were quite confused for a second, before realising that the truck driver wanted some of our chocolate! He was probably going to be stuck in the snow for a while, so obviously we gave him some chocolate! Further down the road, we saw a car speeding up the snowy slope basically sideways, as their rear tires struggled to have a grip on the road. We also saw a car that was heavily damaged on one side, indicating that they probably slipped of the road and crashed into something. We, however, felt save in our small car, protected by our newly bought snow chains. After we crossed the highest point on the way, the roads started to clear and we decided to take the snow chains off, only to find that we had only one left! The snow chain on our right tire had magically disappeared :’). Fortunately, the car was undamaged and we drove on for another 45 minutes whilst enjoying the wintery scenery before arriving in Ohrid.

We spend the last two days of our Balkan adventures around lake Ohrid, taking in the magnificent views of the lake and the surrounding mountains. We visited the Ohrid Fort which offered some nice views of both the lake and the city, we had a super tasty diner at a place called Dr. Falafel, who, as you might have guessed, serves plates of falafel and we spend a lot of time reading/watching Friends/chilling as our trip was soon going to end. We had a late flight back from Tirana, Albania to Amsterdam on Saturday so we slowly made our way back towards Tirana that day. We took the cable car up mount Dajti in Tirana, which brought us to a height of 1050 meters, providing views over Tirana and it’s surrounding mountains. We stayed there until the sun had set, before finally driving to the airport and saying goodbye to our little rental car.

My main takeaway from this trip is that our history is way more recent, significant and deeply ingrained into us than I previously thought. The scars of the Balkan wars and communist regimes are clearly visible in its countries. And it all started because different ethnic groups with their own culture, language and history couldn’t be united (at least, not for a long period of time). But if you look further back in history, you can also clearly see traces of the Ottoman, Byzantine and Roman empires in the Balkans, not just in physical stuff like its architecture but also in the cultures of each ethnic group. I have never identified myself with a specific ethnic group, thinking that we’re all humans and history shouldn’t matter when you’re dealing with people in the presence, as long as everyone is treated equally. However, this is not the case for a majority of people, who still feel very strongly connected to their ethnic groups and their histories, up to a point that they think it’s a cause worth fighting for, as we’ve seen during the Balkan wars. I now better understand how relevant this is when governing countries, creating policies and dealing with people of different backgrounds.

Another main takeaway is that I really want to go hiking in the Balkan mountains in summer (to end this blog in a more light note!).

I hope you had a wonderful first week in 2019 and we’ll be back soon with new posts as we will be moving to Prague next week!

Our entrance to Bosnia was to Mostar. A ghost town on arrival at 8pm but the following day was a little more lively. Walking through the streets you could really feel how raw the town is still after the war just 23 years ago. Many of the buildings have evidence of the crime that occurred. From as ‘small’ as bullet holes in the buildings to bigger physical damage such as no walls or roof due to bombs or other types of explosives. Walking through Old Town and to the ‘Old Bridge’ felt confusing though, since we learnt that most of that was actually a recreation of the original since it was all completely destroyed. Just before our bus was due to arrive to take us to Sarajevo, we thought we would quickly duck into a cute looking authentic restaurant for Laura to get a sausage to take away. But 20 minutes later, we were both completely stuffed full and could barely move from eating too much. The restaurant owners were what we imagine typical Bosnian parents to be – forcing you to eat a lot and continuously more and more, to drink, to eat some more and so on. They even had a lot of vegetarian options so I couldn’t escape the forced eating cycle either! Though we needed to roll our way to the bus from being so full, it was without a doubt the best meal we have had all trip with the most flavors and heartiness to match the wintery weather.

The museum of crimes against humanity and genocide 1992-1995 was a very humanizing experience of the war time. I haven’t felt so touched by such a museum in a very long time. I think it was mainly because of the many many stories and snippets that were so very personal and the way that each one could be connected to in such a real way. They all (survivors and victims) have families, friends, hobbies, special possessions and dreams like we do. And they aren’t such ancient ones like we usually consider war to be but as if you are reading about someone we have passed on the street today as we explored the city, or even a friend, friend of a friend or family member. So close and so real. After reading the snippets and stories of the deceased or of the survivors of war, a war so recent and within my lifetime. I don’t feel safe in this world anymore as it feels like anything and anyone can be ripped from you so easily by another human at anytime.

On a more positive note, one of my favorite things about Bosnia has been the touching personal stories we have come across. From the museums with the many many personal accounts of their struggles during the recent war, to cafes with family histories imbedded into their foundation of the store. We stopped in at a cute looking cafe for a coffee on our second day in Sarajevo and it turned out to have belonged originally to the woman’s great grandfather who ran a shoe making business there. This skill and business was then passed down to the generations of her family of shoe makers until it got to her. Realizing that times have changed and it’s too hard to find a crafted shoe maker to work there or to make enough income to be sustainable in this current market, she decided to turn it into a cafe instead and has since decorated it with old shoe moulds and traditional Bosnian cloth in a super sweet way.

Andar Cafe in Sarajevo

My other favorite thing has been the sense of community that we have felt in the city of Sarajevo. Being the capital city, I would expect it to be a bit more of a hustle and bustle and for it to be a competitive market amongst shop owners, especially in Old Town where many of the tourist flock. But it felt very homey and cozy the whole time, and it was very sweet to see the cafe owners bringing coffee on trays with Turkish delight or a cookie to the other shop owners in the mornings. It was also really endearing with how much time the locals that we ran into at different times spent with us getting to know who we are and sharing small stories and conversations with us.

And also, it snowed on Christmas Day! So even though Christmas isn’t widely celebrated in Bosnia due to religion, it felt very charming and Christmassy to walk around as it snowed on us with fairy lights and wreaths decorating the streets. We had a really great time in Sarajevo and with Maurice joining us on our last night, it was also exciting to share with him the highlights of this city we had fallen in love with, including the mass amounts of delicious food that Bosnia has to offer.

The 3 of us headed onwards to Podgorica, Montenegro on Friday, known as the most boring city in Europe. After 36 hours in the city, I don’t think we can necessarily agree nor disagree with the statement. We were lucky I guess in that we were there at a festive time so there was a Winter carnival going on with a Christmas market and performances going on etc so there seemed to be life at least in Downtown (one of the main parts of town). The city itself is the capital of Montenegro but you wouldn’t really know it being here as it feels quite small. It is pretty in that wherever you are in the city, you can turn 360 degrees and still see mountains in all directions though which is super nice!

We also had a negative experience around 9pm walking in a very public well populated area after leaving a bar on Friday night, when we (mainly I) were confronted with a small group of around 6 gypsy kids who ‘attacked’ me by getting very close to me and feeling me all over to try and pickpocket me. I was somehow separated from Maurice and Laura by just a few steps as the kids swarmed me. Thankfully I had my hands in my pockets of my jacket which contained anything valuable so I was able to keep it all safe by clinging onto everything. Though it wasn’t a nice experience at all and it really makes you more aware of your surroundings and also of how fast it can happen even when you are in a very public place with people everywhere.

The big river that flows through the city center

Sunday was a perfect chill day after a bus ride of (again) beautiful scenery to Tirana, Albania where we spent the night.

We are now headed back to Skopje, Macedonia today to spend our last night of 2018 and our first week of 2019.

Also, Happy New Year everyone!

Our first impression of Tirana and of Albania was exactly what we expected, though we also had no expectations prior. And this opinion seemed to continue to be a trend for the coming week as well for everywhere that we went. We were immediately met by an unofficial taxi driver at the airport who told us about how his entire family works at the airport in many different roles and how he lives just around the corner and had for his entire life. Intrigued by his story and also just deciding on a whim that it could be an interesting drive, we agreed for him to take us to our hostel. The drive was a great introduction to the streets, the people, the driving and to get our bearings of the place. It turns out we had booked a hostel on the outskirts of town which wasn’t ideal for easy exploring, though both of us were still recovering from quite serious illnesses we had in the weeks prior and were eager for a quiet day/night anyway. To our delight, the social culture seems to be built around coffee which is exactly what we did very regularly for our first day and the days after.

Tuesday we decided that in order to fully explore and see Tirana, we should be in Tirana, so we moved to another hostel in town and enjoyed wandering around the city streets and the Christmas market. Both eager to understand some of the history of the area, we ducked into a bunker museum dedicated to explaining some of the troubles of the very recent war and suppression that had gone on. During our walk through, we were both shocked at how ignorant our knowledge is of the war and the conditions that were happening in this region only 15 years ago.

Our first experience with buses was on Wednesday morning when we tried to take one to Shköder, a town north of Tirana but still in Albania. We had been warned (through various blogs and online research) that the buses in Albania are unreliable and often late, but what we weren’t prepared for was being at the wrong bus stop at the correct location. After waiting 40 minutes and by some miracle finding our bus and chasing it, we actually made it on the bus and to our destination a few hours later. The entire journey on the bus between the two cities was incredible and well worth having a window seat each; with many roadside goats and shepherds to be spotted on the rocky mountain ranges and small villages of orange roofed houses. Shköder turned out to be a slightly smaller version of Tirana with beautiful landscapes surrounding the town of layered mountains and a stunning lake. We found our way up the mountain to Rozafa Castle for sunset which was a brilliant idea as it had a breathtaking view!

Feeling a lot more confident with how it all works, we jumped on another bus the following day toward Budva, in Montenegro. Being a coastal town, the drive toward Budva was equally stunning but in a different way than we’d seen so far. Winding rocky coastal cliffs, crazy steep mountains and the sparkling turquoise ocean. We wandered through the cobblestone tracks of the Old Town naming all of the well fed chubby kitties and taking in the charm of Budva. We treated ourselves to a lavish local seafood platter for dinner which was very worth it!

The journey continued the following afternoon to Dubrovnik, Croatia. Dubrovnik being a hyped place to go and a little less ‘off the beaten track’ than Albania and Montenegro, we kind of already thought we knew what to expect in terms of tourism and the sites. But we were pleasantly surprised at how ghostly the old town of Dubrovnik was and how peaceful the huge walls and the tiny passageways were. We were able to stroll aimlessly around at our own pace and even have some of the views and experiences to ourselves without needing to share.

After spending a buuuunch of money in Dubrovnik (and it’s cheaper in Winter than Summer – wow) we jumped on a bus to Mostar last night, excited for spending Christmas week in Bosnia & Herzegovina.

A few observations from this past week:

– I very much feel that I am ignorant to any of the recent wars that have happened in my lifetime and it has been an eye opening experience to see the evidence and physical wreckage of the war and turmoil that these people we walk between have been through. It really makes it more clear how war is not an ‘old’ word though I feel that I’ve been raised in my generation to understand it to be.

– Everyone we have come into contact with so far (except for our bus driver between Dubrovnik to Croatia) has appeared very hard and angry, however they have been very welcoming, friendly and helpful when needed. Looks can be deceiving!

– The bus rides in between cities have been as much a tourist attraction and possibly even more scenic/beautiful than the towns themselves.

– Everyone talks about the Swiss Alps, why is no one talking about the Alps in the Balkans?? No complaints here if it means we can continue travel so easily without the masses of tourists with us.

We started the week with yet another visit to the Mehrangarh fort in Jodhpur, before heading off towards Bikaner. On our way, the scenery slowly changed from a little bit deserty to proper desert as we were making our way into the Thar Desert. Sand dunes, shrubby bushes and lots of camels welcomed us. We stopped at the Karni Mata temple, otherwise known as the Rat Temple. The temple itself wasn’t that spectacular, but the thousands of rats running around were. We both felt a little bit grossed out and we pushed ourselves to stay a bit longer than what felt comfortable. I am still amazed by the amount of superstition, religiousness and worship that is part of the Indian culture. Whether it’s a magical bike or rats, everything here seems to have the potential to be turned into an object to be worshipped and prayed to.

Apart from the new scenery, Bikaner wasn’t super exciting. We visited Junagarh fort, which had some really impressive art work throughout the fort and we turned ourselves into the ultimate tourist by going on a two hour camel safari. The safari was a nice trek through the desert, where we were able to spot some eagles, buffalos and other wildlife. Kirra wasn’t too comfortable on the camel, mainly because of it’s height. I was actually shocked about the height of the camels, they’re so much bigger than I thought! We skipped the overnight camel safari that we planned in Jaisalmer due to our food poisoning in Mount Abu, and in hindsight I’m glad we did because two hours on a camel is more than enough, not only because it’s not really comfortable, but also because the camels seem to be in distress and our guides whipped them on multiple occasions. This wasn’t per se unexpected, we’re not that naive, but it was still very sad to see.

The next day we had one last drive with our driver for the last nine days to Jaipur. We arrived here a week and a half ago from Bangalore, but we hadn’t see anything of the Pink City yet. We arrived in the late afternoon and went out for dinner at a restaurant that we’d found on the internet. We hadn’t checked the usual suspects like TripAdvisor before going there, but as soon as we arrived we knew that the place must have had a high rating on TripAdvisor, as the restaurant was packed with white people. After being in India for 8,5 weeks, we both felt surprised about seeing so many white people together haha! It really shows the power of platforms like TripAdvisor and why everyone keeps asking us to rate their restaurant, hotel or service these sites.

The next day, we explored Jaipur by going into what is called The Pink City, the part of Jaipur where all the buildings are, well, pink. Jaipur’s nickname is The Pink City, but there’s a central old-town area which is the actual pink city. Anyway, we visited some palaces and went shopping for a change, because we cannot return to our friends and families empty handed of course! After two nights in Jaipur, we left for Agra; the second to last city we were planning to visited before flying back to Amsterdam.

On Friday however Kirra got a fever during the night. She barely slept that night and she still had a fever when she woke up on Saturday. I on the other hand experienced vertigo upon waking up; everytime I turned my head it felt as if my brain was slowly catching up to what my eyes already saw, making me feel light headed and dizzy. And there was a lot of smog, which basically caused us to feel out of breath just from climbing a couple of stairs. Not ideal! We visited the Taj Mahal regardless, which was really impressive, even though it was hard to enjoy its greatness due to how we felt. When we got back to the hostel in the afternoon, desperation crept into our moods. The smog wasn’t getting any better and it was supposed to be even worse in Delhi, our stop for the last two nights in India. Furthermore, Kirra kept feeling hot and cold and she kept shivering and my vertigo wasn’t getting better either. We decided to reach out to KLM, our flight operator, to see if it was possible to reschedule our flight. They were so helpful, within 10 minutes they rebooked us on a flight that would leave that same night, which was a direct flight instead of with a stopover in Paris like we originally supposed to have and they waived the costs for rebooking due to our health problems. We only had to pay for the ticket difference, which wasn’t that much. So all of a sudden we were on our way to the Delhi airport; on our way home after two months!

We arrived in Amsterdam on Sunday morning, where we immediately visited the hospital to make sure Kirra wasn’t suffering from malaria. Fortunately she wasn’t, but she was and still is (it’s Thursday today) suffering from dengue, another tropical virus. And by the looks of it, I also have it, so we’ve both been sick in bed ever since we came back. Our last weeks in India have been marked by health problems, including severe allergies (Kirra), constipation (Maurice), food poisoning (both) and now dengue fever (both, probably). But I’m still enormously appreciative of everything that we’ve experienced, in the South at SEDS and in the North on our roadtrip. India has pushed my limits and extended my comfort zone in so many ways:

• when almost everyone wants something from you (money, selfies, gifts) because of your skin color
• when having my first teaching experience when we were teaching the teachers and the students at SEDS
• when seeing and smelling all of the rubbish on the side of the road
• by being this for away from home for this long (I had never been away from home for more than 5 weeks)
• when seeing and smelling the open sewers in the cities
• when seeing people living in extreme poverty
• while driving on the highway
• when I found myself in uncomfortable situations because I couldn’t say ‘no’
• while experiencing hazardous smog conditions
• by having to spend 9 weeks straight, 24/7 with Kirra