If you are in our forum or follow me on social media you might know that I have been on the road for the past few weeks. 

So far I have been to Turkey, Rome, and Cyprus (both the Northern Turkish-controlled side and the European side).

And tomorrow I head to Lebanon for a few days then back to Turkey and then home to Panama.

I am actually not here for vacation, although I have had a chance to do a bit of sightseeing on this trip.

It’s a work trip. I stacked all my meetings together, back to back, that I had in this part of the world into one big trip. 

Also, I am doing a lot of research for my work and for my clients who are asking about the situation over here, especially in Turkey.

I would love to tell you everything I have learned on this trip and share as many insights as I possibly can, and I will, but it’s too much for one email today.

Just know there are some really excellent and exciting things I am in the process of negotiating for my clients and subscribers. 

One quick story for you while I am thinking about it though…

So my assistant rented me an apartment right at the center square at the Typewriter (Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II). It was supposed to be a hotel but it ended up being pretty much an Airbnb.

Anyways, I got to Rome a few days early before my meetings so I could take a look around the city. After 7 or 8 hours of walking the area and seeing lots of incredible historical places, I headed back to my apartment (that was supposed to be a hotel) to shower, change, and get ready to meet some friends for dinner.

Well, when I got back, the little white box that you type your code into on the front of the street didn’t work, I tried a dozen times, and nothing worked.

I had the WhatsApp number of the hotel (not a hotel), and they gave me a new code, it also didn’t work, they tried to reset it, but nope, nothing.

A couple from Mexico arrived, they have all their bags and they also thought this was supposed to be a hotel, they tried their codes but nothing.

Then another family comes up, again, nothing.

Then a van pulls up with a group who was just arriving from the airport, these guys looked like they had come off a really long trip, they tried, again nothing.

Time is ticking by, I am going back and forth with the staff via Whatsapp and they keep reassuring me someone is coming to help. If this had actually been a hotel as they advertised then there would have been staff on site, they blamed covid for having self-checkin.

So no one is there and no one comes to help.

At this point, if I get angry I will just lose it, and there are kids and families around, so I do my best to make a game out of it and entertain them by telling jokes to the kids and making them laugh. 

Three hours go by, it’s 10 at night, and finally, they call another guest and send them to go manually open the door and we all get in.

I had totally missed my dinner plans with my friend by this point, I actually didn’t get dinner at all because I was too nervous about leaving the premises because I might not get back in again and would be sleeping on the street or something.

You see, this businesses one point of failure was this one stupid little white digital box on the side of the road that displaced nearly 15 patrons (the Mexican couple ended up leaving eventually and cancelled their reservations, so they actually ended up losing money too).

Now, I am not against technology, I actually like it, but a metal key is also technology even though a lot of people might not think of it as such, it is just a really reliable piece of technology.

Then I started to think about it. You are in Rome, the birthplace of democracy, which was such a mess (if you have been there you know what I am talking about), and you have technocrats trying to take over the world and transhumanism and socialism and so many weird things happening that are sprouting out of Europe, and we have so much of our lives dependent on technology that doesn’t work and people want more and more of this stuff and they keep handing over more and more control, but in reality, it doesn’t work.

And then it’s like… democracy is dying all over the world and it is being replaced by technology that is rotten in the center.

And no one wants to take responsibility for their lives, everyone wants to offload it onto someone, or something else.

I don’t know, maybe I am just getting crotchety as I get older but this is all a terrible idea.

I will go back to Latin America where life is 20 or 30 years behind. We still have technology but our entire lives are not dependent on it, if it breaks, we will not be sleeping on the streets. 

Going back in time feels like a good idea right about now.

Well, anyways, we are putting out a ton of new articles on the blog talking about the immigration process for safer countries where you can have a real life abroad. 

I suggest visiting the website and bookmarking it. There are new things coming out pretty much daily at this point, so lots of good stuff to help you there:

https://expatmoney.com/blog

Speak soon,

Mikkel

PS. Here are some photos of us stuck on the side of the road lol