Explorer Mikael Strandberg

Antalya has 9 million visitors per year, which is amazing. Still you do get ripped off too often when wanting to sit down at a café or eat food. Unnecessary.

Right now I am in Antalya at an International Symposium for Travel Writers, great set of people, great contacs for the future, and during a lecture a few days ago I was asked to talk about connecting cultures. So I wrote these ten tips as a base for my lecture. As below: (I thought maybe, in this stress to get things together for another lecture, I´d like to share it with you readers.)

1. You need to travel, visit other countries, smell them, feel them.
2. But don´t travel with your own country men, find ways to travel to meet local people on their terms, motorized vehicles do not help.
3. Remember you are a guest, if you don´t like what you see, go home.
4. 

   My old friend from Cyprus, Kemal Darbaz, turned up and made life very enjoyable in Antalya! He´s got the best olive oil on earth!

   When you don´t understand, ask and try to see things from their perspective.

5. Listen more than talk. But be curios.
6. Humour and don´t take yourself to seriously.
7. Don´t judge, have an open mind, what you see might not be the truth.
8. Communication, Try to learn the language, if not try to communicate.
9. Inform your self. Read and research a lot, but keep an open mind, read authors from that country. Remember objectivness doesn´t exist.
10. Write, document and talk about your experiences, we need to inform others. Ignorance is dangerous.

Turkish Biggest Daily English Newspaper, Todays Zamam, published this article yesterday.

Interviewed at Göremes Open Air Museum in Cappadocia. Interest, media wise have been surprisingly high, during the Turkish visit. All due to my friend Dogan Tilics work.