From family circle to best party

on the way to Duzce

We left Istanbul on Wednesday by hitchhiking directly from center of Besikas. Our first destination was Düzce, Tony's hometown. We got there by five cars. Every driver was somehow interesting but one was unique. Truck driver who also invited us for tea.

He was so happy that he could communicate with us through Tony's mouth. It wasn't first time when he took hitchhikers but he doesn't know English and he was so sad that he couldn't share his stories with them. But this time he enjoyed it so much that he even left us some of his necklace which is used for praying. He was wearing it for 15 years! And I managed to lose it in two weeks when I was getting out from some car :(

It was fun when he showed us picture of circumcision of his son and other pictures of his family. He was so proud of them. That's the moment when you really see cultural differences. What is disgusting for one culture could be one of the most important milestones of a lifetime for another. After teatime we continued with him and close to turnoff to Duzce we got off from truck and there was another car waiting for us already. Driver saw that someone is leaving truck so he stopped, waited for us and took us to the city. Isn't it amazing? He drove us directly to the front of Tony's house. Later we met all Tony's family (regretting that our Deutsch ist kaputt) and tasted more Turkish hospitality. We were impressed by the whole family.

Duzce looks like all cities in Turkey. It was rebuilt after big earthquake in 90's, so most of buildings were new. We stayed there just one night for recovering and small shopping. My backpack was ready for trash-bin after two years and Tony didn't have any. So we were walking from one shop to another until we found something usable. Tony was bargaining with merchants for every price and we got it really cheap. I was so glad for his presence. He choose really small backpack for trip and I was wondering how will he be able to put everything in it. He was, but I wasn't. Later history proved that my choice was good..

One day in Duzce and we were so eager to start again. Standing next to road with camera and making some documentary we got company of public police. They started to ask what we were doing there and why we had a camera. It was close to bus station in non touristic city so maybe it wasn't a good idea. Anyway, after a few-minute talk they disappeared and we got ride. Our destination was Ankara, our presumable sleeping place technical university. It was so easy and faster than public bus. So after some hours we were walking through one entrance and even in campus got ride for some hundred meters. We arrived around evening, luckily just in time for big party. Local BEST group just organized leisure course and participants had a party there.
Party itself was like BBQ with lot of get-to-know games, dance music, liters of sangria and fun.
Main organizer was Cansu Birgen. She even let us go together with them to Fethiye, small city close to the coast in south-west part of Turkey. Of course with party bus and for free. We were so thankful to all organizers for it.

Inside of the party place there was science playground, the big size model of Turkish coast. It was used for wave experiments. Party was over after five hours and we were sitting inside and waiting for buses. We talked about our plans and why we wanted to visit Iran. In a meanwhile buses came. One was a party bus and the other for tired. With sound of live sax, singing for hours we got to Fethiye.