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Our Second Trip In 2006
On returning from our around the world trip we stayed put for three years before heading off for our second bout of long term travelling, this time with the end goal of finding a new home. Every month we introduced each issue of JAB with a little of what we had been doing during the previous month.
Homeless
December 2005 to January 2006 – UK to Egypt
Hello. We’re off travelling again and, this time, we are looking for a home. On our return from our travels around the world a few years previously we were lucky to find somewhere to live in Wales, in my Dad’s newly bought two bedroom cottage. He needed a tenant and we needed a home without having to pay an expensive deposit so things worked out well for all of us. But, though he still worked and lived in Essex, we knew eventually he would want his home for himself.
We had been planning a trip to Central America but thought we had better find somewhere to live first – if only for somewhere to shove all our crap, as we call our furniture and belongings. We also did not want to bother my family again with storage issues and where to temporarily crash when we got back from our travels with no money or future prospects.
The idea of buying abroad has been forming in our minds for a while. Goa was mentioned, we browsed Brazil and Belize and considered the Cape Verde Islands.
Eventually we settled on eastern Europe. It wasn’t too far that we couldn’t get back home in an emergency to see our families and it was just possible we might be able to afford to buy and live there. Beyond that we didn’t have a clue what we wanted.
So to avoid all these awkward problems we thought we’d clear off to Egypt and do a bit of thinking in the sunshine. Or, even better, relax and forget about our problems completely for a month.
Dancing with the Touts
January and February 2006 – Egypt
Hello. It didn’t take long after landing in Cairo to realize we weren’t going to get much relaxation. This is the most hasslesom country we’ve ever been to. Almost the whole of Egypt seems to be involved in the hassle industry: taxi drivers, hotel touts, shop touts, restaurant touts, caleche touts, felucca touts, even toilet touts. I’m not kidding: “my toilet is the best, best toilet paper, very clean. That toilet over there, very bad, very bad people.”
The worst touts were the feluccas that ply their trade in Aswan and Luxor. Saying no all day started getting dull and I didn’t feel I was doing my part in the whole banter thing – some of the touts could be very amusing – so I’d resort to lying or taking the piss. “No thanks, I’m an aircraft carrier captain, your trip would be a bit of a busman’s holiday for me.” “Felucca? No, my foot’s fine. Sorry, thought you said Verruca.”
We could see from the faces of other tourists how wearisome they found their evening riverside stroll but using this method proved quite effective, even enjoyable and the touts, confused, started to leave us alone for a bit.
Not everyone liked it though; a few were offended. Some thought I was an arsehole and to be honest they were right. It was either that or placid victim and most touts put up with me in the same good humour that I took them.
Along with the offence I could cause, I would explode in temper once or twice a day – either someone had gone too far with their cheek or many small annoyances had built up through the day. The most notable temper tantrum was the f*ck me up the arse dance.
In an unsubtle attempt to convey through body language what I thought of a particularly ridiculous price for the local ferry to Elephantine Island – 20 times the official rate for locals, five times for foreigners, as displayed on the sign in front of me – I mimed pulling down my trousers to suggest I didn’t appreciate their attempt at a shafting. It was made more silly when two of the touts joined in and the three of us hopped and jumped loudly down the promenade looking like three big angry chickens. We got the official price.
One of the crew didn’t like that he didn’t get his kickback and made throat slitting motions towards me along with the suggestion he was going to dump me in the river. He was a little bit mad and his friends were trying to shut him up. The response was to smile, point at the river and mime: “yep, that’s me in a minute, dead and dumped in the river” and repeat, in response to his continued gestures, until we reached the opposite bank. Thankfully the journey was over in a couple of minutes.
On disembarking the small boat, we took a few steps and a man ran off the boat behind me. For a brief moment, I genuinely thought he was going to knife me in the back. But it wasn’t my wannabe murderer, it was just another passenger in a hurry.
Reading this you are probably thinking that we hated Egypt and the Egyptians. Not true. Quite the opposite, we loved the place and the people. During our time there the country seduced us both so much that we both agree Egypt is our favourite country in the world. We rarely agree on anything.
So did we take a Felluca ride? No, we thought we’d go for the cruise ship option instead.
Up the Nile with Norwegians
January and February 2006 – Egypt
Hello. Unable to hear the word ‘felucca’ without flinching we decided to take one of the small cruise ships that journey up and down the Nile between Aswan and Luxor.
Good little backpackers that we are we weren’t going to take the first price offered. There are scores of ships of varying comfort docked in Aswan and the easiest way to get a cheap trip is to walk on and ask. Walking the length of the corniche we asked the same question dozens of times: “How long is the trip? Where do you stop at? How much?”
The answers varied a little but typically the cruises were for three nights and two days, stopping briefly at Kom Ombo, Edfu and Esna. Our trip cost US$85 each including all meals.
Coming down from Cairo on the train had been an ordeal of broken seats and noisy swinging train doors, but going back up the Nile on that ship was fabulous. None of those clever sneaky buggers that wanted to empty our pockets could get on. The boat was mostly populated by Norwegians (or Danes?), also enjoying the seclusion a cruise ship could offer.
The Norwegians were enduring the unusual phenomenon, for Norwegians, of being hated across the land due to the controversy that resulted from the prophet being insulted in cartoons published in a Norwegian newspaper. They travelled with an armed guard and pretended to be from Iceland.
Reluctantly leaving the ship, we tramped around the spectacular sites that Luxor has to offer. Luxor Temple could be viewed from outside, the challenge in doing so was finding an angle without the McDonald’s sign in the background.
The massive Karnak complex is worth a couple of visits, by day and night, while the Thieving Metropolis, sorry, I mean Theban Necropolis, takes a couple of days to cover in full.
The cheapest and most flexible way to do this is by public transport and walking allowing you to decide how long you want to stay at each sight. After walking to and around the Valley of the Kings we were among the last to leave and missed the last bus. In the approaching dark, the taxi drivers outside told us we weren’t allowed to walk back. Yeah, yeah, nice try pal, heard it all before.
We walked for about two minutes before getting a big shock from the local police that the cabbies were actually telling the truth. In 1997 58 tourists and four guards were killed close by at the Deir el-Bahri temple near the Valley of the Kings. For our own safety, the twinkly eyed Major Taba gave us a lift in the cab of his police truck.
After a short while we picked up more policemen from their posts and gave up our seats to get in the back of the truck with around twenty policemen. I entertained them all with my ‘in handcuffs’ impression, which didn’t go down well.
The next day we saw the Major again at another temple and for a small sum were offered, without the Major’s knowledge or consent, an AK47 assault rifle by one of his policemen for a photo opportunity. The thought of how much of a prat I’d feel every time I would look at that photo led me to decline.
Before the Bombs
January and February 2006 – Egypt
Hello. We left the stress of Aswan and Luxor behind for the far more relaxed Dahab. Travelling via Hurghada. We lost our cool twice, once each, on the way to Dahab. Mine took place when buying the bus ticket and had found that a small sum had been added onto the price agreed. If you can’t even trust the bloody bus company, I thought, and actually stamped my foot like a ten year old in my efforts to get the extra fee waived.
It was such a silly amount too and I’m not proud of the foot stamping or for raising my fists in boxer style and offering all three of the middle aged ticket staff to step outside. They calmed me down by explaining what the fee was for and we all went away as friends.
Arriving in Hurghada we were pounced on by the hotel touts. One followed us up the road and onto a minibus. We’d had this done before. A tout follows us to a hotel, nips ahead at the last moment and bumps up the price of our accommodation.
This time Deirdre lost her head and ordered our current annoyance off the bus. The driver backed us up and the tout slunk off. Another two guys got on and she ordered them off too until I explained that we are on public transport and she couldn’t just throw everyone off. We’re not usually such aggressive or argumentative people but too long in Egypt seems to have made us so.
In Dahab it would take an hour to walk two hundred yards to a restaurant, having to inform the touts of our names, life history, and future eating plans. We could have been rude I suppose but the touts were polite, engaging and well educated. Many had degrees and a level of knowledge about British history and literature that we couldn’t match. Yet they could earn more by standing outside a restaurant for 12 hours a day rather than teaching or doing some other job appropriate to their education.
A couple of months after we left Dahab the resort was hit by a triple nail bomb attack. One was placed in one of the restaurants we had visited. Undoubtedly among the at least 23 dead and over 80 injured were some of the polite and educated touts we had got to know.
In Cairo we visited the Pyramids. Located in the suburbs of the city we got there by subway and local bus, and first saw the remaining wonder of the world poking over a wall. As we stopped and stared a local guy we’d been chatting to wondered why we had stopped talking, thinking perhaps we had seen a friend. Walking past the Pyramids everyday he was unawed by the sight.
We visited the Egyptian Antiquities Museum, ate cheap kushari, a mixture of noodles, lentils, rice and fried onions topped with spicy tomato sauce and, while exploring the city, played with the traffic.
We have already said that, despite the stress, we loved this country. What an Egyptian will try to take from you with one hand, he’ll give with the other. He will try to get your money any way possible but, after thousands of years as a tourist destination, seems to prefer time tested tricks and cunning rather than stooping to robbery. I felt, had the Cairo traffic claimed my life, the Egyptian finding my body would let out a terrible wail: “oh, my God, he’s dead and he’s still got money in his wallet”. He would then put the money back in my pocket and regret the lost opportunities.
On returning home to the UK, slightly traumatized by the sights, sounds and smells of the country I found it difficult to cope with a shop assistant in PC World. I just couldn’t manage the interaction of dealing with another human being and had to hide in the next aisle.
Trial Run
March and April 2006 – Bulgaria, Romania & UK
Hello, we came so close to finding a home. Done and dusted, we thought, so easy. After the mandatory row with the taxi driver we briefly explored Sofia, noting the plethora of porn shops, and headed into the mountains to the ski resort of Bansko.
There we got down to the business of finding somewhere to live, poking around the cobbled streets and drinking and eating in the Mehanas. Though I liked the town it was too small and Deirdre quickly got fed up walking around in the snow and slush.
We moved on to Plovdiv, a mix of modern city, attractive old town and Roman ruins spewing up from under the streets. It was here though that we started to notice that we didn’t really like the Bulgarians. A friendly ‘hello’ was usually ignored and frequently restaurant staff wouldn’t return with change preferring to believe we are in the habit of leaving 200% tips.
Perhaps we were being more critical of Bulgaria because we were looking for a home there and had to see both the good and the bad of the place in a way we wouldn’t have done if we were simply visiting. Or maybe Bulgaria had the bad luck to be our first destination after wonderful Egypt. Whereas the Egyptians could balance the hassle of a trip there with their charm and warmth, most Bulgarians didn’t seem to have any.
I thought I’d gone back to my usual placid self after Egypt but got fed up with people pushing in front of us. When it happened once too often to Deirdre I objected and started a row with the man who pushed ahead, though, to be honest, he was not any worse than anyone else. We both lost our tempers and started screaming at each other and threatening to call the police until we separated and walked off in different directions.
Each turning a couple of corners we saw each other a few minutes later. He said something, I wordlessly gestured ‘come on then’ and he shrugged off his wife and took the bait. At this point I should add he was at least in his mid fifties and after three or four failed attempts to punch me in the head I couldn’t bring myself to hit him. I’d also noticed we were making fools of ourselves in front of a crowded restaurant window.
On another occasion, again at a ‘Help desk!’ the clerk had to be restrained from attacking me with a pair of scissors by her colleague. She’d been rude and useless, I’d pointed that out to her, she said something back, I’d responded, she picked up the scissors and ran out the door at me.
We closed in on our potential new home in Veliko Tarnovo, the medieval capital of Bulgaria. Tarnovo is an attractive town split by a gorge and dominated by a ruined citadel. We chose our estate agents because they had a nice sign outside and offered us coffee. They were also professional and, unlike some of the larger agencies, offered the personal touch. We have never bought our own home before so they held our hands throughout the buying process.
We walked around the town looking at properties – we could have been driven about but felt we would learn more about the neighbourhoods and streets of the town by walking – and chose a new build, second floor, 80 square metre apartment, close to the centre of town, as having good potential. The price would be GBP£24,000.
We still hadn’t fully made up our minds if this was to be our new home but our visas were running out. Almost everywhere else on the face of planet Earth we would have hopped across a border and got a new one but in Bulgaria we would not be allowed back into the country for six months (three for Irish passport holders). To keep the option of buying the apartment alive we formed a company (at that time foreigners couldn’t own land) signed over power of attorney and headed to Romania to fly home and make our decision.
We didn’t buy that apartment. We needed somewhere to live now, not in six months. We would have preferred to be in the country overseeing the sale ourselves and the fact that we couldn’t was a poor sign as to how Bulgarian bureaucracy operates. There were some other smaller factors too but ultimately we just too nervous and while we were in another country our agents weren’t able to keep holding our hands and reassuring us everything would be fine. We considered this a practice run and next time we would know what we were doing.
Over the next few months waiting to be allowed back into Bulgaria, we talked of what we would do on our second attempt to buy a house. We never said anything particularly positive about the Bulgarians. Why should be want to live there?
Working Again
May, June and July 2006 – Greece
Hello, we started working again and relaunched the Jobs Abroad Bulletin, our monthly newsletter of job vacancies around the globe. A number of events – including family illness and bereavement, homelessness, and some serious computer, server and connection problems – knocked us a little bit wobbly and it took some time to get reorganised. We have been getting lots of work done on the website over the course of the past month as we have found accommodation with an ASDL connection.
We’ve never been able to connect in our room before on previous travels so we’re enjoying it while it lasts, listening to my favourite UK radio station while we work and keeping up to date with all the news from the World Cup.
Though the start of the football has slowed the work rate down somewhat – watching three games a day tends to do that – we will soon have finished a new issue of The Working Traveller (at long last) and will be able to add some new photos too.
We will also be adding an accommodation booking engine to the website, courtesy of Paul who helps out at the Sunrock Backpackers Resort on the other side of the island, above Pelekas beach.
Paul is a past advertiser in JAB and when he heard we were nearby he invited us down for free food and wine; something I would encourage all our advertisers to do. Another place we like is the Flamingo Bar in St Peters, near Kavos, owned by a Northern Irish/Greek couple Alana and Nicos, one of several such partnerships we met when we first arrived on the island.
Kavos is where we were sent when we first arrived on Corfu. We don’t normally do the package thing – we got a ‘no name’ deal – but it was the cheapest way to arrive here and included a weeks’ stay at the Sunrise Apartments in St Peters; a quieter resort than the noisy, lairy Britsville of Kavos.
If you are looking for work on Corfu that’s the place to head for: though a lot of the hiring was done last month we saw vacancies offered signs when we were back in the town for the England v T&T game a few days ago. The resort has around 100 bars and restaurants, give or take, and jobs mostly consist of cooking, bar staff and PRing.
It’s not for the faint hearted though – one PR mentioned he was shopping for a stun gun to defend himself when things get a little out of hand. Another was covered in bruises from a self inflicted injury after a turn in the ‘Dentist’s Chair’
We were offered a job ourselves in Benitses, between Corfu Town and Kavos. Before we decided Corfu Town was the place we wanted to stay – despite the higher prices – we nipped down to Benitses to check out some accommodation.
The vacancy was for a cook – I’ve never been offered a job before, most people instantly recognise I’m work shy, so if I can get one here anyone can.
The Albanians
August 2006 – Greece & Albania
Hello, we finally left beautiful Corfu Town and headed north to explore other parts of the island and then it was back to the roughty, toughty backpacker life, travelling to Albania.
Saranda is by the sea directly opposite Corfu, close enough for some brave Albanians to have swum the channel between the two countries looking for a better life. The town seemed to be experiencing a building boom and we momentarily considered the place as somewhere to live. Had we been looking for a long term investment it may have been an option but as a place to live we felt we didn’t have the experience to buy in a still developing market.
We also weren’t sure about Albania and the Albanians at first. The people had a tendency to stare and the food could be hit and miss. Once we got used to these two facts the country and its people started to grow on us.
One young waiter ignored all his other customers to tell us about the country and its customs and how the ‘knives will come out’ if you insult them. He continued for over an hour and a half telling us about vendettas, Skanderbeg, vendettas, the communists, vendettas, the mafia, knives and vendettas. Every now and again, when the eye of his boss fell his way, he’d shoot off to pretend to work, before continuing on his favourite topic.
We visited the ancient Greek city of Butrint before leaving Saranda and the coast for the first time in over three months, travelling through stunning mountain scenery to Gjirokastra. We explored the very steep streets of Gjirokastra, poking around the castle, a former prison of both the communists and the nazis, featuring a downed US military spy plane perched on the ramparts.
Gjirokastra is the birthplace of Enver Hoxha, the paranoid dictator responsible for the mushroom shaped bunkers that litter the countryside. We’d spotted plenty of them between Saranda and Gjirokastra. The engineer responsible for their construction was ordered to test his design by standing inside one while it was shelled by a tank. He emerged shaken but safe and an estimated 700,000 of the bunkers were built across the country.
The Family
September 2006 – Albania & Macedonia
Hello. As usual JAB always seems to fall on the day or day before we are moving but today Deirdre is unwell – our unwritten rule when one of us is sick is not to travel unless we absolutely have to. Otherwise we would be heading to Skopje today.
Last issue we were due to leave Gjirokastra the next day. We got up early, got a lift to the station from our helpful hotel owners and stood by the road waiting for the bus. The swine drove right past us all and in swooped the taxi drivers with their lies and extortions.
Dee hates taxi drivers so we tried hitching. Heading to Korca, reputed to be the cleanest town in Albania, we stood by the road looking for a KO number plate. After about an hour in the sun with no KOs we decided it might be an idea to start sticking our thumbs out and make a bit of an effort.
Though lots of cars stopped on the way to nearby towns, either from helpfulness or just to be a bit nosy, we wanted to go all the way to Korca without risking getting stuck in the middle of nowhere, so we fell back on the plan of going back to sleep and trying again tomorrow. The next day the bus actually did stop for passengers – and broke down in the middle of nowhere.
We were sorry to leave Albania, we’d grown very fond of the country and its people. In Korca we were invited for coffee by Alda and her mother, Florence. We don’t often do this – usually the invitation is an excuse to sell us trinkets and other rubbish but this time it was both genuine and typical of the Albanians.
We are now in Macedonia, by Lake Ohrid, and experiencing even more hospitality. The family from whom we are renting a room are magnificent. We owe special thanks to Anastase, Sonya, Kostadinka, Slobodanka, Ivo, Nene, Nina, Maria and Goran, to name just a few of them we’ve met over the past three weeks we’ve spent loafing around this lakeside town.
I have a favourite restaurant in Ohrid but find it difficult to go there because they keep feeding us. We’ve drunk endless cups of Turkish coffee, toasted each other in rakija (a fiery Balkan drink) many times and been spoilt rotten on both the special occasions we’ve had lately – a birthday and an anniversary.
Here are the details if you want to stay in their huge room with a great balcony and view of the fortress, or eat tomatoes or peppers from the lovely garden:
Family Tomanoska
Ul. Goce Delcev 158, Ohrid, Macedonia; tel +389 (0)46 271 729; email ktomanoska(at)yahoo.com
Another recommendation is their shop. I’d noticed it before I knew it belonged to the family as it sells good quality handmade copperware. This side of the family has been doing this for four generations and their products are a little different to most of the stuff you see in the town:
Marinov Kosta Abras br.48, 6000 Ohrid, Macedonia; tel +389 (0)7062 3939; email marinovamarija(at)hotmail.com
I’ve got to go now because it’s getting late. I’ve got to sneak past the family without getting into deep conversation or food shoved in my paw otherwise you won’t be seeing JAB today.
Homeowners
October to November 2006 – Turkey
Hello. We were unable to bring you an issue of JAB last month (our apologies) so we have combined two issues into one. The reason: we’ve been busy buying an apartment in Turkey and today we got the keys. So the thanks this issue go to Mike and Lutfi of The Right Move Abroad and to Turgay.
We have been enjoyably homeless for nearly a year and, at last, have a place to call our own and rest our heads between travels. Though until we can afford to buy some furniture we’ll be doing so on a bare floor. Still, the place is our first home so we don’t care that we don’t have a bed.
Last issue we were headed to Skopje and said goodbye to the lovely family we stayed with in Ohrid. We couldn’t find a cheap bed in the city so after wandering around until the 5am train arrived we moved on to Thessaloniki.
We arrived in Turkey via the UK , coming out for £20 with Parador Properties. Though they put us up in a fancy, if leaky, hotel and fed and watered us for five days we wanted to see more of the area before deciding if Turkey was for us.
We have since been congratulated many times for “escaping” and though we had fun with Parador we felt their apartments were overpriced and in the wrong end of town for us.
Didim (sometimes called Altinkum), our new home, is more package tourist than backpacker but it’s by the sea and the local Turks are friendly so we feel we can live here happily enough. Turkey seems to have a lot to offer and we are looking forward to exploring more of the country once we have fully set up home.
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