Rome...wine, pasta and other cliches.

It was nice and everything you get to hear about it is true. A marvellous city with a lot of culture and unfriendly italians; well at least one of the receptionists at the B&B Hotel Trastevere and the fat lady at the ticket counter at the bus station and the bearded woman at the kiosk next to the hotel..come to think of it..all of them were women..! So I assume my comment requires some further analysis. However, the city itself is full of tourists that are attracted by the Hollywood propaganda that it is a romantic city...with hot italians..my ass! Forget about that crap. Although it is a beautiful city with splendid samples of architechture that men ever built it is also a very expensive city with slick italians that try to screw you at every possibility they can. Paid fifty euros for two tiramisus, three coffee and one bottle of water at a Restaurant called Sabatini near the Viale di Trastevere. Stay away from that place! No tip for you sir, hell no! But of course it was my fault..should have asked for the prices in the first place. Been to more than 40 countries and 150 cities worldwide and still there are times when you act like a simple 'guiri'. *

But not all was bad..the bar next to the hotel offers nice coffee for fair prices and free internet. The hotel was also very clean and good located. Fair pricing here too. I could write some more about this city but you'd probably heard or read all of it somewhere else. One warning I have to make anyway: Be careful of pick pockets as the city is full of stories. One German lady warned us at the hotel claiming that her camera was stolen..what can you do? Just be careful and always negotiate!  Oh by the way..screw 'Eat, Pray and Love'! 

* Wonderful spanish street slang for tourist. 

Catalunya...along the Costa Brava

This is a shot I took when I was visiting some friends in Barcelona. We made a  trip with our families along the Costa Brava and the villages there are some of the most beautiful places I've seen in my whole life. The region has so many things to offer..museums, natural parks, art, beaches, wine and food, history etc. I won't go into further detail since such info is everywhere available on the net. We went to Cadaques, Begur, Blanes, Tossa, Palafrugell, Lloret de Mar, Girona, Pals and some other places that I cannot remember.They were all splendidly beautiful but I liked Begur and Cadaques the best. I think the picture was taken at the Sa Tuna beach in Begur ( I'm not so sure though).
If you want to party you can go to Blanes or Lloret de Mar but be prepared for the hordes of English, Dutch and German tourists on top of each other. Hey, I am not judging..if this is your thing you can find it there too. I prefer the company of friends and family, un bon café amb llet, sound of waves crashing on the beach..what else can you ask for?

Sarajevo..too many graves!

I stayed at Hotel Europe while I was there for my business trip and the first thing that caught my attention looking from my room's window was the number of white graves on top of the hills. When the war in Yugoslavia took place I was doing my vocational training in Germany and frankly spoken I wasn't really aware of the cruelties that were happening at that time in that part of Europe. Sure, I had friends who had escaped from war..Croats, Bosniaks or even Serbs with whom I shared a classroom but still I didn't pay any attention to their tragedies. I was caught in my own small world. Now almost 20 years later I've got to see Belgrade, Skopje and now Sarajevo and I started to think about this war that was in the heart of Europe. Most fightings took place in Sarajevo and that is clearly visible..still..you can see houses and buildings with damages and holes caused by artillery or machine guns. I took a taxi from the airport, which is reeeaaallly small, to the hotel and chatted as usual with the taxi driver. Friendly guy who spoke quite well English. We chatted about football, the high unemployment rate in Bosnia, economic crisis and ended up again with football.
The hotel itself was situated next to the old Ottoman-market and it was quite nice. No complaints here. Food was great. I visited some possible customers but as it is everywhere you have to compete with Chinese products or in my case with Italian brands. In my line of business, which is the HVAC (heating, ventilation, air conditioning) branch quality is of course quite important; however if you can offer quality products with competitive prices than you probably have a good shot to sell your stuff. Of course,often it is not that simple as there are other factors involved in the sale process: maybe a competitor has a good personal relationship with the client or maybe you don't speak the same language and the client has a hard time explaning himself. Or the client thinks you don't have enough technical knowledge and you won't be able to help him when he's having technical problems..etc. So many factors. Well, the Italian brands have good products and competitive prices so it was hard for me to convince the buyer why he should buy a German product that is produced in Turkey when it has the same quality and is about 10% higher in price. Part of my sales strategy is to be completely honest with the client. Of course you can buy the cheaper product with the same quality level but the 10% you'd pay is not for the quality of the product: it is for my service because I will be at your disposal 24/7; there will never be a moment where you try to reach me or my assistant for any matter that is important to you and we won't be there. This will not happen. You will always get the truth.
So this strategy worked almost always for me as I was lucky; of course there are times where you cannot convince everbody but being honest is in my humble opinion one of the strongest tools in sales. You don't want to rip-off your client; no sir, you want to grow together and support each other. Then it will be really hard for competitors to get in between with you and your customer/partner. But hey, if you have time go see Sarajevo..it is still a nice city with nice people..

(view from the Europa Hotel)

Tbilisi Revisited

So again it is Tbilisi. It's been almost a year that I was here the last time and I arrived exactly one day after their elections in Georgia. Sakashvili claimed that he won and wouldn't give up his chair, on the other side Ivanishvili said his party the Georgian Dream was the winner of the elections..so business as usual..nothing new! When I spoke to people I noticed that most of them voted for a change. They were not happy anymore with how the things were running here. Despite the fact that Georgia is a safer place now than it used to be 9 years ago when Sakahsvili came to power, people think that many innocent people, oppositions, landed in jail during his regime. I don't know if that is true..but I do know that one of my friends had to do some jail time because of a tax issue. That was a bit harsh I think. But I have no idea how a Russian-backed billionaire will come up with a solution for these good people of Georgia. But I do know that some things have to change. Too many beggars on the streets, especially small kids that break my heart. Yeahh..I know I became a softy after becoming a father of a beautiful daugthter. But believe me, there were less beggars in Arbil than here.Which maybe isn't so unlogical but still..
I ended up at the hotel Sharden Villa, which is situated at the entrance of the Leselidze street that leads to the nice cafes and restaurants. Right next to the Freedom Square. It is a three star hotel but it was clean and nice. Breakfast was okay and staff was friendly. Price was maybe a bit expensive for its class. I paid 360 GEL for two nights, which is like 210 USD but everything else was sold out. So I didn't want to stay back at Betsy's like the last time.
I don't know what it is but I seem to attract the dumbest taxi drivers all around the world. In Arbil I had the pleasure to share a taxi with a dancing driver..where the music was so loud that you couldn't tell the guy where you were driving to. Here I was blessed with the dumb ones. I wanted to visit a customer at Tsereteli Ave. House number was 126. I gave the driver the address and he told me he knew where it was. No problem then. After we started our drive I told the driver that I wanted to visit first another customer who happened to be on the same street just a few blocks further at house number 140. When I told him this..I swear the god, the guy reacted liked I asked him the hardest math question and he pulled the car aside and started thinking...!!!! He looked around and started to ask people..dude..- it's just a few blocks further..I thought you knew the freaking address???? Are you tripping or what?
But other than that..it was nice here..the city is beautiful and they have nice restaurants and cool jazz cafes with amazing jazz musicians. But three days is enough and I need to get back home already.

The Arbil Experience...

After six days of dusty and sandy joy life in Arbil I was sort of fed up and just wanted to get back home but it appeared that getting out was harder than getting in. But I will tell about it later..

Arbil was not that bad actually..we went out with friends at night..to restaurants, malls and hotel bars. We drank almost every night..it was fun. Nonetheless you have to be careful with what you wear or where you go. One of our Iraqui friends took me and a friend of mine to a restaurant that used to be one of those places  visited by Saddam when he was in Arbil. You couldn't tell from the outside that it was a restaurant because there were just walls surrounding the building and no sign that said 'Please, welcome in'..There was some sort of reception and you had to get yourself registered at the entrance before getting in..apparaently there was also a dress code that I wasn't aware of because I had my baggy shorts on and a plain T-shirt. The guy at the reception wouldn't let me in telling our friend that I was not dressed accordingly. He wasn't yelling or anything but wasn't friendly either. As in all places around the world the rule wouldn't change here: money opens every door and voila...I could go in..shorts or no shorts...! That being said..the food was great. Kebab without end..but it was good meat. No regrets there. The Iraqui friend drank Johnny Walker and I had a Miller beer or maybe two. After the restaurant we went to my hotel where we crashed at the hotel bar and had some more beers and enjoyed a good Champions League match.

Actually I think we got lucky with the hotel which isn't maybe the cleanest in Erbil but still it was ok because from what I heard from other friends they had no bar or liquor at all in their hotel. So lucky us! 

And it was cheap..we could smoke and drink at the hotel..no one cared..

So the last day we went to this Mall called Family Mall and ate at the Lebanese restaurant where the food was okay but nothing really exciting. But the Mall was nice with all kinds of shops..mostly Turkish brands. We had a really late flight and we decided to go a bit earlier to the airport and I'm glad that we did so because the security was tight there and we had to stand in cue.

(That's how I felt when they didn't let me in!!)

 The taxi took us to airport entrance, which is like 1 km away from the airport hall where you get checked first. Luggage control and body check..the whole nine yards. I was so lucky because I had some valves in my luggage and each time I ran through the x-ray scanner they took me aside and asked me to open the bag. So much fuuuuuunnnnn!! NOT! Happened to me three times the same night and after the third time I was sick of explaining to the security guy what a ball valve is. Once we got to the airport hall we proceeded to the passport booths and the guy looked at my passport for like 5 minutes..finger prints included..Dude..enough already..just let me get back HOME!! But other than that..I will miss the friendly security with their Kalashnikovs and the hairy, smelly customer..scratching between his toes while talking to us..and the friendly Kurdish receptionist trying to explain me that they will fuck me .oopps...I mean charge me 3% of interest if I wanted to pay with my credit card..bye, bye Arbil..I hope we never meet again!