100 Days of Solitude

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Trip Start Oct 20, 2008 Previous
Entry Trip End Jan 31, 2009

  Istanbul, Turkey
Saturday, January 31, 2009

When my plane landed and classical Turkish art music began to play, I was on the verge of crying. Although my journey had been extremely rewarding, it had been lonely and challenging. I had missed my family.

The immigration officer asked what my job was. I told him that I had recently graduated with a B.A. in economics and that I didn't have a job yet. Another officer from the neighboring booth joined us. He told me that he had graduated in 2000, right into the 2001 economic crisis in Turkey. He was an econ major too. After searching for 6 years, he had become a police officer at the international airport. The moment the second officer joined the conversation spontaneously, I noticed for the first time that I was home. Loved it!

I was surprised to see my large backpack once again. It hadn't gotten lost once. Somehow, it hadn't gotten stolen on one of the Indian trains either. Even though the backpack was very dirty, it was still in good shape. We had gone a long way together...

The sliding doors opened. My Mum and Step Father were anxiously waiting for me. Mum hadn't had much sleep the previous night. She couldn't stop making up stories about my plane being hi-jacked. The past 100 days had been hard on her. I would like to apologize for that. But believe me, it had been tough on me too.

I was carrying my tortoise shell for the last time: large backpack on the back and the smaller one on the chest. Got into our car and drove away. Transport by private car... What a luxury...

As I had written on 06.11.2008, my objectives for this journey were: - beat your fear - try to understand the world - be spontaneous/take manageable risks - sort yourself out - live simply -read and write. I had accomplished every single one of these.

I had been scared so many times for so many different reasons in the past 100 days that I was now numb to the fundamental emotion. Let's hope that this state is long-lived...

My plan had always been no plan. Never thought about anything further than the day ahead and even tomorrow's schedule got tweaked several times along the way. This was a rigid person's exercise in flexibility. I believe that I have to combine the seemingly contrasting attitudes of rigid planning and fluid spontaneity in order to achieve success.

I had a lot of time to think about the life I want to lead. Let's start off with a cliche... I want to get married and have 2 kids. Money is most definitely not the most important thing in life, but I should have enough to be able to travel with my family once in a while. Life without risks is a life not worth living. I need to take everything calmly, because I know that everything can be brought to a satisfactory level, any time, as long as you are flexible with your expectations and you keep working your brain. For me, that's life in a nutshell...

I lived a simple life; spent little; wore the same clothes every day and stayed in neighborhoods that would be considered ghetto with respect to Istanbul standards. I am convinced that I am capable of adapting.

Finally, reading and writing have been as essential, as eating has been. I didn't only write what I learned about the countries I have visited, but also the most important issues that I have ruminated on. Most probably, I would have gotten severely depressed if I didn't have a pen and a piece of paper. Marquis de Sade would agree...

Still cannot believe that I neither got mugged nor had diarrhea.

I am convinced that the world is not as dangerous of a place as popular media would have us believe. If it were, then something would have happened to me in the past 100 days, be it petty crime or a traffic accident. Remember, I threw myself into the fire without any protection...

I am stronger than what I thought. This journey had been a major psychological, mental and physical challenge. Psychological because I had to manage my emotions constantly; mental because I had to develop my practical intelligence in order to solve travel-related problems and my analytical skills to attempt to decipher the world in a comparative fashion; and physical because had to carry 20 kgs on me for kms, lose sleep and weight, hike up mountains and cycle through villages. At times, I thought I wasn't going to make it back.

My self-confidence has been restored. I went through the mouth of the world and got out of its anus. All alone...

Today, I am less of a perfectionist as I had to keep screwing around with my expectations whenever a problem arose. And there have been quite a few problems, as you might have noticed...

I am in complete control of my psychology.

Nothing can scare me or demoralize me. No matter what happens, I will always stand up and keep going. I will be as strong as the steel in my Karra, the Sikh bangle that my Indian host family put on my right wrist.

Being back feels weird. I have been far far away from the luxury and the warmth that my family has always provided for me. The change that has taken place ever since I stepped off of the Turkish Airlines flight has been so dramatic that it feels as if my 100 days of solitude have been nothing but a vague dream...

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