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Leaving Won’t Get Easier

Published on by Mika1 Comment

I originally wrote this piece on March 13th, 2019 for my application to the 2019 World Nomads Travel Writing Scholarship — hence the capital i’s 😉 I’m crossposting it here with some photos, which weren’t included in the original submission.

Back on the road, I broke into tears — again.

“Why does it matter so much to me? I’ve only known them for five minutes! Is it always going to be like this!?”

That’s what I asked myself, copiously crying while pedaling away from Tania, Natasha, and Valia.

This meaningful event took place in the otherwise inconspicuous town of Kiliya, located half-the-way between the better-known Izmail and Vylkove on the Ukrainian segment of the Danube Delta. I was a little over a month into a cycle tour that had started in Serbia, taking me along the Danube through Romania and into Ukraine. The tour would continue for another four months around Eastern Europe and Scandinavia. I was traveling alone. Or was I?

Saying goodbye started getting difficult a few weeks before at a gas station in Romania where I had stopped to borrow the Internet. On my way out, I noticed the owner Martin shed a tear.

“Why are you crying?”

“Because I just started getting to know you, and now you are leaving.”

That watered my own eyes. I was only able to hold it for long enough to get out of Martin, and his brother Florin’s sight and then surrendered to the first weeping episode of the series leading to the peak one in Kiliya.

I had entered the shop where I met Tania, Natasha, and Valia only to buy bread. But I couldn’t contain their excitement. And it built further up as I explained that I was a traveler originally from Brazil, cycling my way across Eastern Europe, with the loose goal of eventually reaching North Cape, in Norway.

As I was leaving, it hit me hard that I might never see any of the countless people I meet along my way ever again. I felt lonely and insecure. I naively wanted all those seeds to develop into lasting connections.

A little later, I ran into a large group of cycle travelers on holiday. As usual, I stopped to share some bike-touring camaraderie. They were traveling in the opposite direction towards Izmail, starting from Odessa. We traded information about our respective roads ahead, took some photos, exchanged a few hugs, and wished each other a happy ride. They gave me the map they didn’t need anymore, which I later passed down to another traveler when I didn’t need it either.

“Oh, just one more thing — you’ll probably pass by a store called Mahazyn Kashtan. If you need any food, please buy it there, and tell Tania, Natasha, and Valia that Mika from Brazil says hi!”

I don’t know if they did. But that’s what I decided to ask every party of bike travelers I met riding in the opposite direction during those few days between Izmail and Odessa. This scenic ride along the Ukrainian side of the Danube River and the Black Sea turned out to be a popular cycling holiday destination for Ukrainians.

A few days later, I was refilling my water bottles at a roadside restaurant in the village of Zatoka when I heard an excited call, “Brazilia!” When I looked back, another two-wheeled traveler approached me, pointing to my bicycle, and repeating, “Brazilia!”

That’s what “Brazil” sounds like in Slavic languages. But how could he have known?

His name was Zhenya, and it turns out he had been to Mahazyn Kashtan a day after me. The owner showed him photos of my cycle-touring rig, which he recognized by the distinct yellow and red panniers.

Whether or not the other riders were heeding my request to visit the ladies in Kiliya, I felt like our brief encounter had not been insignificant to them either.

When Zhenya caught up with me, we were 60km away from Odessa. We agreed to ride those together. We parted ways shortly after our arrival — I wanted a hot shower at my host’s in the city, and he wanted one last cold dip in the Black Sea before catching a train back home.

The overarching journey is ultimately mine. But it can still be shared with others whenever and for however long it intersects with theirs. I travel solo, not alone. And I’ll cry if I have to.

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Featured photo: Tania, Natasha, and Valia (May ’17)

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Trelograms: inspiration; cycle touring; Romania, Ukraine

Trelograms #28 — Beware of People in [Fill in Your Next Country]

Published on by MikaLeave a comment

Speaking of borders, i was recently watching long-term traveler Tomislav Perko’s stimulating TEDxTUHH talk. His remarks towards the end resonated with something i’ve experienced myself traveling overland across international borders:

Incidentally, i first remember experiencing that when crossing from Croatia to Serbia as well — i was warned by one of my acquaintances that Serbians are xenophobes to be approached with caution.

Passing from Serbia to Romania, i was advised (at least twice that i can clearly remember) to keep my possessions always within sight, and be very watchful of the sneaky Gypsies, who will take any opportunity to rob me — “they believe they have been cursed, and have no other choice but to live like that,” said one of my acquaintances.

Leaving Romania into Ukraine, i was discouraged by the border officer to proceed into a country at war.

In Ukraine, i was then warned by another host to expect rampant corruption from authorities in Belarus — and so the anecdotes continued . . .

Granted, the Croatia-Serbia-Romania-Ukraine-Belarus outline above was the longest border-to-border streak i can account for. I also don’t know what percentage of the underlying populations is represented by each of these anecdotes — these are just notes and memories from some of the occasional conversations i manage to have at length and in clear English on my way.

If you’ve been following me, you know that my experience has been dramatically different — some Serbians have become my warmest friends from the road, and Romanians have actually offered me money (cash) on the road at a greater rate (times per days traveled) than anywhere else i’ve traveled — that must be the exact opposite of being robbed!

I have also felt safer from violence in West Ukraine than in just about any other place i’ve lived before (except Denmark), and i haven’t had to pay any bribes into, in or out of Belarus, at least not so far.

Just a couple of generations ago, Germany invaded Poland marking what is widely held in the West as the beginning of World War II. I felt especially joyful being able to cross the (now open) border between the two nations along a cycle path and a beach where Germans, Poles and any other affiliations around may refresh themselves without even knowing in which side of that imaginary line they might be peeing.

I hope more controlled borders between nation states will also become beaches, parks, monuments or museums across which nobody feels pressed to give travelers any nationally charged warnings.

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Featured photo: cycle touring across the Polish-German border from Swinoujscie to Ahlbeck (Summer ’16)

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‘Trelograms’ is a wordplay between ‘telegram’ and ‘trélos’ (Greek for ‘mad’)

Trelograms: inspiration; cycle touring, hitchhiking; worldwide

It Begins Again!

Published on by Mika5 Comments

One of the questions i got after my Ossobuco presentation last year was, “how do you begin preparing for such long journeys!?”

With a map on the wall!

That’s where preparations for all my months-long cycle touring or hitchhiking journeys so far have started — a map on the wall.

It’s no different this time around — my partner Nastia and i are planning a tour de Ukraine for this coming Spring/Summer, and we started by pasting a map of the country on our living room wall. Now every time one of us hears about or remembers a place we’d like to see, we pin it on the map, then take a few moments to stare and point at it, fantasizing — we have made no commitments whatsoever yet — just gradually installing a qualitative map of Ukraine and its immediate surroundings in our imagination!

There’s this saying that goes something like, “if you want to make your dreams come true, then you must first wake up.” Subsumed in this saying is the fact that the zeroth thing you have to do is to dream — what would you wake up to otherwise!? And “maps are fail-proof fuel for wanderlust,” as self-unemployed creative explorer Tom Allen notes in #4 of his 15 Unorthodox Ways to Train for Cycle Touring & Bikepacking (Bicycle Optional) — if my memory serves me well, that’s where i got the inspiration for this practice.

I don’t mean to neglect or oversimplify other aspects of the preparation — although the same Tom has another great piece on why you should probably disregard most of it. There’s a lot more we need to do until we’re ready for our departure, including the crucial (even by Tom’s standards) bit of getting a bicycle for Nastia! I just see the rest of the preparation as quite circumstantial, and it would be pointless for me to tell you what else to do other than ask yourself some questions and factor in your own constrains.

For instance, i want to be able to have deeper conversations with locals than i’ve had in my travels before, so i’ve been studying Ukrainian for a couple of hours every day — you might not have to do that — i’ve traveled myself in places where i didn’t even know how to say hi in their language upon my arrival, and that constituted at the time its own, duly contextualized and valuable experience.

There’s one other thing i would personally like to try this time around — what would you ask somebody who just came back from a few months traveling by bicycle around Ukraine? Where would you go? What would you pay attention to?

Comment below or send me a message. I promise to pin all your cues on our map — learning what may have value to you will be of great value to me 🙂

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Featured photo: map of Ukraine on our living room wall (February ’19)

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Trelograms #27 — Speaking of Water . . .

Published on by Mika4 Comments

When i was little, i’d often leave the tap running while brushing my teeth. If Grandpa noticed, he’d poke me — “did you buy the Descoberto River?” — that’s where most of the water used in my hometown (Brasília) comes from.

I didn’t really understand what he meant back then — water comes from the tap! I even remember crossing the Descoberto River in a car, reading the name on the sign before the bridge, and just feeling further confused . . .

It wasn’t until i started cycle touring that i began to make a more mindful connection between the water from my tap and the sources and bodies of water around or underneath us — and it seems like i still have a long way to go establishing this connection.

I started writing this piece with the observation that i only need about 7 liters of water per day when i’m cycle touring for drinking, cooking and bathing — seven liters! Although i’ve only traveled so far in places where water is relatively abundant and clean, just having to look for water several times a day and carry all of it on me has already taught me a lot.

I felt pretty smug. I wanted to share this powerful lesson from the road and my water collection/consumption protocol with all of you.

Now i’m embarrassed that, upon further reflection, things might not be so simple — i’m still alienated from how much water goes into the meat i eat a lot more often when i’m on the road than when i’m not, or the laundry i’ll still do the “conventional” way at a host’s every one or two weeks, or just the infrastructure in general i benefit from (for “free”) during my travels.

And even that is just the beginning of hydro-ethical considerations.

Still as a kid, i was once thirsty walking back home on a hot day, and asked a landscaper if i could have some of the water he was working with — “of course, denying someone water is a sin,” said the man. I shared that exchange with Grandpa when i got home, adding that water should be free for everybody — “sure, but who’s going to pay for it?“

Maybe Grandpa was onto something — maybe i did feel and act like i owned the Descoberto River — and didn’t have to share it with anybody else.

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Featured photo: drawing water from a well in Moldovan countryside ( May ’17 )

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‘Trelograms’ is a wordplay between ‘telegram’ and ‘trélos’ (Greek for ‘mad’)

Trelograms: inspiration

Trelograms #26 — “Don’t Forget to Shower”

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— “you may even want to use some soap,” said my partner the other day, just before heading out.

Anybody who knows me will attest that i don’t normally like to shower any more than i enjoy doing the dishes — it’s a largely instrumental procedure. Perhaps for that same reason, bathing when i’m on the road is a priority — i do it every evening, with very rare exceptions!

“And how/where the hell do you do it,” people interested in my process will often ask?

My partner especially loves to bathe — she’ll actually soak in the bathtub for at least half an hour almost every morning — this is one of her greatest sources of apprehension about our upcoming journey later this year. Even if i don’t care that much about a shower at the end of a whole day sitting in front of the computer, a whole day on the road has always been a whole other story — the uncertainty of an evening bath was also one of my greatest sources of apprehension until i got used to the wealth of solutions available out there.

In hindsight, there’s actually nothing exceptionally creative or unusual about them. Besides the occasional “standard” showers you’ll still find at some of your hosts’, you’ll also find lots of lakes, creeks, rivers, waterfalls, beaches, buckets and ladles (photo below), public restroom sinks, rest stops, locker rooms at the local public pool or whatever, portable camping showers (photo below) — plus all the variations and inconspicuous implementations therein — and counting.

I’ll add that, no matter how cold the water is, it’s totally worth it — and i’ve bathed from glacial streams in Iceland to a partially frozen lake in the Romanian Carpathians — “freezing cold” was not an understatement in either of those cases!

Even if none of that is available, or if you don’t have access to much water or it’s polluted (i always ask the locals), i will still take a “surgical” bath with my water bottle (use your imagination) — just about half a liter of water has turned out to be plenty.

By the way, i also change and wash my underwear every day. If there’s not enough water for that where i stopped for the night, i’ll just do it at the first gas station along my way next morning, and then hang it to dry throughout the day on my rear rack 🙂

So, if you want to clean up at the end of the day, you will find a way — many ways — you might even wonder whether it isn’t that shower back home which is the most unusual and counterintuitive of all methods?

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Featured photo: A skinny dip in the Neman River, Lithuania ( Summer ’17 )

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‘Trelograms’ is a wordplay between ‘telegram’ and ‘trélos’ (Greek for ‘mad’)

Trelograms: inspiration; cycle touring, hitchhiking, hiking; worldwide