BICYCLE ADVENTURE!

This is an interview with Alper Konali, great traveller, great person and great friend. He has been hitchhiking for 8 years all over the Europe and Turkey, but now he found a new way to travel. In a few days he is going on a bicycle from Croatia to Turkey! I met him in the funkiest hostel- Funk hostel in Zagreb!

Anja: Where are you going, how are you traveling and how long will it take?


Alper: I'm gonna go to Turkey. I think I'm gonna go to the coast from here, to the coast of Croatia and then i'll pass Bosnian border and then i'm going to Montenegro which will going to be so hard, it's the hardest part! And then i'm going to Kosovo, Macedonia, Bulgaria and then Turkey. I think it will take 30 days, well I have to rest somewhere for two or three days.

Anja: And you are going with your bike?

Alper: Yeah, I'm going with my bike!

Anja: Why bike, why not hitchhiking ?

Alper: I've been hitchhiking for three months (in one piece) and I've been hitchhiking for eight years now. I prefer hitchhiking while travelling, in Turkey and Europe I did a lot of hitchhiking. I like hitchhiking because you meet so many people on the road. During my last trip I had a lot of beautiful experiences. But now it is cold and I don't want to wait for people to go somewhere, that is why I decided to buy myself a bike and I decided to travel that way. In that way I'll go whenever I want to go, I'll move whenever I want to move, so that is why I'm doing that. And also because I want to have healthy life, I don't want to smoke these cigarettes, cause I'm going to need those lungs eventually!

Anja: Are you ready for it, physically and mentally?

Alper: Actually, I think that you are never ready for travelling. But every time that I've stayed in one place for two or tree days, my body gets used to this comfort and my physically and mentally conditions get used to that comfort, so before I'm going to hit the road i feel like I don't want to go. But as soon as I hit the road, step outside of a room or a place, I know I'm gonna do it! I'm not ready physically or mentally. It will be hard to ride a bike to Turkey, but I have to do it! When I'm on the road I feel I have to do it, my body is like... sometimes when you are scared your body gets adrenalin...and I'll survive any conditions because I get this adrenalin in my body.  "How will I do it, I'm not really strong guy?", sometimes I asked myself. But your body makes yourself prepared for these conditions and then you are going, it is going to be like that. I know it will be so cold, so hard, it is going to rain, it is going to snow and I'll be on the road trying to go home. And when I'm feeling like I'm freaking out, and I'm feeling like "I can't do it, I can't do it!", and then all of the sudden- " I can do it, no problem, I'm going to do that! I really want to do that!"

Anja: What do you think will be the hardest part for you?

Alper: Well, if it rains! I had experience this one time and I regretted travelling because of that. I was near Ljubljana, in Slovenia. I had to hitchhike somewhere during dark time, after 6-7 p.m. It started to rain, I was at the highway and there was no way I can go anywhere by walking! I had to put out my tent, because I knew that nobody would stop to take me at that time at the highway. And I put out my tent. Because of the rain I couldn't do it perfectly. I put everything in, my backpack, my stuff, I was trying to go to sleep so I can get up early in the morning. In my sleep, I woke up because of the sound of the wind, and the rain. My tent was shaking and I had to put my legs and bags and hands all over the tent to keep it together, because it was blowing so hard and raining so hard. And I thought, I wish I was in my bed. That was the first time I regretted my decision. And then I tried to go to sleep, I tried hard, I put earplugs in my ears so that I don't hear the rain. In the morning when I woke up I felt alive! I packed my tent, started to walk somewhere. While I was walking, two police officers stopped me and said " You can't walk on a highway!", I was like " Ok! Take me and drive me to the nearest town.". And then they were like " We can't take you but you can't walk on a highway!". I was like "WTF?!" So I think that if I'll have situation like this it would be the hardest thing, trying to sleep like that... If I try my best I can survive any condition and may regret my decision all the time or I can hate myself to have those kind of decisions, but eventually if I survived it becomes beautiful memory and beautiful experience!

Anja: Have you ever stayed longer than one month in one place?

Alper: Well, I stayed in this farm in France for more than three weeks. Here in Zagreb was the longest stay that I have done! Because I like it here, I love this place and the people! For me, it is the people, I don't love to go to the museums, historical places or other stuff, I don't like city tours. For me it is like, if I'll go to some city or some town I have to see the night life, I have to meet people, talk to them and see their aspects of life, to listen what they think. And that is also why I prefer to work in the hostels!

Anja: Have you ever had a bad experience hitchhiking?

Alper: Oh yeah! One was in Turkey! When I was trying to go back to Ankara from Istanbul, one guy asked me to have sex with him. He didn't really asked me, it was weird! He asked me why I hitchhike and I said that I enjoy it. Then, he asked me what else I enjoy. I said, " Lots of thing I enjoy, man!". He asked me, "Do you enjoy men?". I answered, "No, I prefer woman!". And then, he asked, "Do you enjoy behaving like a women?". "No man, I enjoy to have sex with them!", I said something like that, I went to that level. He asked me "where are you from?" and I said "I'm from Kocaeli " and I asked him back "Where are you from?". He said, "I'm from Erzurum." And than he said that all people from Erzurum are fagots. I said that I don't have an idea, that I have never been to Erzurum and that I don't know anybody from Erzurum. And then he asked me, " Haven't you ever sleept with a transvestite?" I was like, "No! I told you you man I'm doing it with girls!". And he was like "Wow! How can you do it?". And then I said to him to pull over, that I have to get out here so it would be easier for me to get to Ankara.

Anja: What are the best memories that you have from your trip?

Alper: I was trying to go to Berlin from Lausanne, Switzerland. I thought that I can get there by hitchhiking in one day but I couldn't, it took me three days. Second day, I met these amazing cousins and they were going to Würzburg. I have never heard anything about Würzburg. They said they are going to meet their family there and then they are going to some concert. They asked me "Would you like to come, because we have an extra ticket?". And I was like "OK, what kind of concert is that?" It was Mark Knopfler, Dire Straits! And I went to their parents' place and I have met their whole family and relatives because they were celebrating birthday. That was a gift for their father because they went there all together, family and relatives and I was there too with them! So who said that hitchhiking is dangerous?? :o)