Travel blog by Päivi & Santeri Kannisto

We stayed a couple of months in a Saharan oasis called Zagora. The place was beautiful, peaceful, and hassle-free, and there were an abundance of inexpensive dates, couscous, and awesome fresh vegetables and fruits available in the local market they call souk.

Drifting Sands Press has today published our first English language book, and also the first ever general interest non-fiction book about Global Nomads. For this book, we had the pleasure of interviewing thirty global nomads from all over the world. They are professional travelers who wander the world without a permanent job or home, they are modern-day adventurers and vagrants, no one’s property. The new book describes what perpetual traveling is like, how to make a living on the road, and it explores wheather the traveling life means a liberated and happier existence.

We had not visited any of the Balkan countries before and we experienced a really nice surprise. People were friendly and honest, and they seemed genuinely pleased to see foreigners around.

From Finland to the Balkans (Q3/2012)

Our travel through East European countries—Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Hungary—towards the South were filled with havoc and horror. Some of the things Santeri accidentally broke were minor and material, others somewhat bigger and more serious.

We visited Finland for the first time in six years. It was a short combined business and tourist trip. Our publisher Atena Kustannus invited us over for the book launch of Päivi’s newest book Elämäni nomadina (My Life as a Nomad).

We started our journey through India from medieval feeling Kolkata watching beggars and bare-feet men draw rickshaws, and we smelled the stench of urine and learned to dodge numerous human droppings on the streets. In Kolkata’s backpacker ghetto in Sudder Street, we also got to know the two main types of travellers that are drawn to India: drug addicts and spiritual travellers. For us the big question our journey evoked was: can there be spirituality without love?

With English subtitles.

Great news! India grants free 6-month visas to everyone who applies for a visa on their web site today. After your application is approved, the free visa will be waiting for you at the airport upon your arrival.

We arrived in Myanmar thinking about travelling a bit around, visiting some temples, and enjoying similar kind of vegetarian delicacies like in Buddhist Laos. After resting three weeks in Yangon, we are happy to leave and continue our travels.

Visiting a Western country after a while was like a nice little holiday. We had potable tap water, a functional public transportation that was almost never late, relatively clean streets, sidewalks, and public toilets that had toilet paper.