What people forget too often about Amazon

 

It's always the same, and at a certain time of the year, the boycott of Amazon is populating social media.

The reason for that boycott is almost always the same and I presume has just a small percentage of truth. What people don't get when they say "Let's boycott Amazon so that Bezos will lose the money and will get perspective of a fair treatment" or "Boycott Amazon and buy from small businesses," is that they do exactly the opposite.

There are a few things people should keep in mind:

1. Amazon gives the chance to small businesses to earn money, because:

    a. they don't have enough funds to pay for a rental and the delivery chain to run a physical store.

    b. They're starting up and need a place that offers them tools to increase visibility and help with the distribution.

    c. They're indie authors who can't have their books in bookstores, libraries, and physical stores.

    d. and so on...

2. Boycotting Amazon will hardly affect Bezos' financial stability. He could even close the whole thing down and retire.

For these reasons (and many more) boycotting Amazon will literally kill all the small businesses that will have to find a new marketplace. 

While some will be lucky to find a substitute distribution channel, others will be forced to close down on their dreams and hopes.

As an indie author, I am extremely thankful for the services offered by Amazon. Without that marketplace, I would have never had the chance to publish my books or to give them the wide visibility they have now. 

Of course, there are other places where I could publish them, but would they give the same wide visibility to them? If there are, I haven't yet found one that gives the same chance as Amazon.

Perhaps should I start searching for it?

I don't know, but in the meantime, I'll have to stick to them, on my website, on the subscribers of my newsletter, and like for everything in this world to a pinch of luck, without which nothing is possible.

With this, I hope I haven't bored you and offered you a different perspective to peek into the life of an independent author and a small business owner. 

Sri Lanka and its people

 As promised in the previous post, here is the second part of my journey to Sri Lanka. After our trip to Sigiriya, the stone fortress, we felt so much let down by our tour operator that we decided to go the same way as we usually do, by ourselves.

It was by a stroke of luck that one day as we were strolling the city streets we decided to call a tuk-tuk. The driver who stopped at our request was an elderly man with a bright smile and a few teeth left. He spoke good English, and during our journey to the hotel, we asked a few questions about the country and culture. Generally, the drivers do not have a taximeter and tend to charge according to what they think you can afford. 

In those cases, to avoid bad surprises, you must agree to the price beforehand and try to bargain a bit.

When we asked the price the driver pointed at the taximeter. "I don't make up prices," he smiled.

We asked his name. "Everybody calls me Lucky."

And so we agreed with Lucky that for the rest of our holiday, he would have been our driver. We exchanged telephone numbers and from the following day on we explored the city and the surroundings with him.

Thinking about all the things we could see in the whole country, we understood we didn't have enough time for everything. Yet, I wanted absolutely to visit with the due calm and time the national parks. The best solution was the Sinharaja forest reserve.

Lucky helped us in this case too, acting as a tour guide, and with a couple of calls, he arranged us a driver to the park and back.

From driver he'd become our fixer, wherever we needed to go, whatever we needed to have, he could arrange it.

In the end, he said he was Lucky, but in reality, we were the lucky ones to find him.

A few days later, we left and headed for the park. We were told that we needed special socks to protect us from leaches, and we purchased them, although we were wondering about the environment we were going to visit, to need such protection.

But let me give you a few information about the park. 

Sinharaja is a forest reserve and because of its wide biodiversity, it has been designated a Biosphere Reserve and World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

Sinharaja's importance grew over the years as it became the country's last viable area of primary tropical rainforest. Over 60% of the trees are endemic, and many of them are considered rare. It is home to 50% of Sri Lankan's endemic species of animals including birds.

The hilly virgin rainforest, part of the Sri Lanka lowland rain forests ecoregion, was saved from the worst of commercial logging by its inaccessibility and was designated a World Biosphere Reserve in 1978 and a World Heritage Site in 1988.

With this in mind, you can understand why we wanted to visit it, and let's the images talk for themselves:

You might wonder about whether the protection for the leeches was necessary. The answer is: yes, we came back to the entrance with a couple of those little bugs attached to the protections we were wearing.

I can't recommend enough visiting Sri Lanka, it's such a beautiful country with an amazing natural environment that will for sure enchant whoever reaches it.

There have been many times my memory wandered back to the forest or along the beaches. Maybe one day I'll be back, and with this gorgeous sunset over the sea, I give you an appointment for the next adventure.

Sri Lanka: is this the return of the Wandering Writer? (part one)

Whether this might be the first signal of the return of the Wandering Writer, I mostly consider it a return to blogging after a series of mishaps on the road.

But as stated in the title, this isn't the time I'll go through those mishaps. This is the time to tell something about another fantastic country to fall in love with.

Explaining Sri Lanka in one blog it's a hard task, and it won't give justice to such a colorful and beautiful country. That's why I'll divide it into two parts, so enjoy the ride with this first taste of this island.

We went to visit Colombo in November. That corresponds to the wet season in Sri Lanka, but as I found out later, this didn't really affect the quality of our journey.

One peculiarity of the rainy season was that from 5:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., the weather was perfect the sky was blue, and the Sun blessed every step we took in the city and the beaches. It was raining from 7:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. as the sky was opening.

Now, at my age, I'm no longer interested in the nightlife, and for me, it was more than enough to explore the city and the country during the day.

My previous travels around the world have taught me that you'll need always to keep your eyes open to the people who will approach you on the street. Most of them will try to sell you tourist services highly overpriced. 

So, understanding this, we took the first day a tuk-tuk to have a round of the main sightseeing of the city. We asked the price beforehand and, after a good deal of bargaining, we jumped in and started our first round.

Colombo isn't a big city and you might reach every place by walking or, at least using the tuk-tuk for short distances.

The first idea, which was also confirmed during our entire stay was that Colombo, and generally Sri Lanka is a very well-kept city. Everything works as it should and the level of safety is high. One thing you'll fall in love with the country is the friendliness of the people. Regardless of the reason why you approach them, they will always welcome you with a smile.

The second is the amazing natural environment and the stunning beaches. Not knowing where to start from, we took the chance to book one journey from a tourist agency to reach farther sites on the island.

The plan was to reach Sigiriya, an ancient rock fortress located in the northern Matale District. Considering the distance from Colombo (about 178 km), our tour guide proposed to us also to have a visit to the Elephant Foundation and an Ayurveda garden. We were supposed to arrive at our final destination by 3:00 p.m., to have the chance to visit the whole site.

Unfortunately, nothing went as it was supposed to, but let's go step by step, shall we?

Our first destination was the Millennium Elephant Foundation (MEF), a family-run organization and charity set up to rescue and care for captive Asian elephants in Sri Lanka. The foundation is situated on a 15-acre estate by the name of Samaragiri, which is located 10 km northwest of Kegalle, within the Sabaragamuwa Province of Sri Lanka. This is a sort of sanctuary to rescue those gentle giants where we had the pleasure of interacting with them by feeding and spending some time together.

The second stop was the visit to the Ayurveda garden, which was something I wanted personally to add to the tour. I'm a fan of natural medicine and since Sri Lanka is the home of Ayurveda, I couldn't skip this chance. 

In the garden, I've learned something more about natural self-care and I did some shopping (of course).

Time passed by and our driver didn't seem to have any hurry, as if he was on a Sunday trip with the family.

Useless were all our recommendations to drive a little faster, and the scheduled time of arrival stretched from 3:00 p.m. to 6:55 p.m. Just in time to enter the park, five minutes later and they wouldn't have allowed us to enter.

Useless to say that at that time we couldn't visit the entire site, so we headed for the rock fortress:

Yes, that meant climbing 1200 steps to reach the top, and we didn't have much time left. We made it a mission and we started at the fastest pace we could because soon the sun would have set and at least that, was something we didn't want to miss. So we started our journey:

With the first steps...

... followed by other steps, we didn't give up...

And steps that seemed to be endless to climb, yet we were at the point of no return. Up to the top!

Just a few steps more and...

Finally, we reached the top to witness the sunset from something that felt like the roof of the world.

They say that to climb the stairs it might require an average of about two hours. We didn't have that luxury and we had to manage it within forty-five minutes. I'm not sure we set a record; probably not, but one thing was sure, that marathon gave us a bitter taste.

We were supposed to see the entire site, and going there for a second time was out of the question with all the things to be seen in Sri Lanka.

Tired but happy we returned to our hotel room where we simply dropped almost dead to the bed waiting for new adventures to unfold the following days.

Stay tuned because there are more interesting things and facts about Sri Lanka I need to tell you, and I'll do so with the next blog post coming up very soon. :-) 

The long road of writing a book.

Publishing a book is a journey on a rocky path that involves several stages, from writing and pre-editing to editing, formatting, selecting the right cover, and marketing. While the process can be daunting, knowing what to expect at each stage can help ease the stress and make the journey more enjoyable. Let’s go through all the different steps involved in publishing a book.

Writing

The first step in publishing a book is writing it. This is the part where you put your ideas on paper and create a draft of your novel. It is important to have a clear idea of what you want to achieve with your book, such as the theme, genre, and target audience. This is probably the fun and pleasant part, as you don’t care about the style, typos, or plot holes. Here you just listen to your characters and follow their lead. 

Pre-editing.

Now, here is where you start crying. Once you have a draft of your book, the next step is to pre-edit it. I suggest leaving your manuscript aside for one or two weeks before starting this process. This involves reviewing your manuscript to check for inconsistencies or plot holes. What during the phase of writing seemed great now sounds ridiculous. You will feel like your novel is nothing but rubbish, and the imposter syndrome will strike. In this phase, keep calm and see how you can improve it. So you delete, add, change, and polish. Only after this phase, when you no longer think you have failed in writing a good novel, you can ask friends or beta readers to give you feedback on your book.

Editing

After pre-editing, the next step is to edit your book. This involves checking for grammatical errors, spelling mistakes, and typos. This is crucial, and you need to hire a professional editor to look at it and give suggestions on how to improve the plot, characterization, style, and much more. This brings to a new level of depression, but even in this case, remember that everything can be fixed, and by polishing your novel, you will have a jewel in your hands.

Formatting

Once your book is edited, the next step is formatting it. This involves choosing the right font, spacing, and layout for your book. You can either do the formatting yourself or hire a professional formatter.

Choosing the right cover

The cover of your book is the first thing that readers will see. Therefore, choosing the right cover that will grab their attention and entice them to read your book is important. I strongly suggest hiring a professional. This is a critical step; your book cover should align with your audience’s expectations. Good knowledge of your genre is a must and requires a lot of research. This doesn’t stop at the first book because the trends are evolving, and your cover should develop accordingly. 

Marketing

The final step in publishing a book is marketing it. This involves creating a marketing plan and promoting your book through various channels such as social media, book signings, and interviews. It is important to have a marketing strategy to ensure your book reaches its target audience. This is also a very important step, and as a self-published author, you must do a lot of research. Some research tools are available for free, while others need to be purchased. There are several platforms where to market your book, but the most successful are offered by Amazon ads and Facebook.

During your career, you will be approached by thousands of people who are ready to take your money for five minutes of visibility. Don’t rush; join one of the many writer’s communities to ask their opinion whenever you get offers. You will find more precious information this way than by spending money uselessly.

In conclusion, publishing a book is lengthy, steep, and draining. By knowing what to expect at each stage, you can make this journey more enjoyable and successful. I hope you have enjoyed this blog. Take care and stay tuned.

One week in Erbil

 It finally happened, and it's official. My wanderings will resume as they used before.

We decided to resume precisely from where we interrupted two years ago: the trip to Iraq. The original program was quite different, including not just Iraqi Kurdistan but the whole country and also Egypt. 

So let's start with some information about Kurdistan. It is a geo-cultural territory in western Asia, where the Kurds represent most of the population. The borders are roughly defined, and although the Kurds have constantly asked to have their territory also politically and internationally recognized, it never happened. 

The boundaries stretch into four regions: Southeastern Turkey (Northern Kurdistan), Northern Iraq (Southern Kurdistan), northwestern Iran (Eastern Kurdistan), and northern Syria (Western Kurdistan).

That said, let's dig into Erbil, the capital of Southern Kurdistan. Getting the visa is as easy as possible and can be purchased at the airport before passport control. That was a relief because we arrived at destination after a roughly ten hours flight via Doha from Helsinki at 03:20 in the morning. All we wanted was to reach the hotel and sleep for as long as needed.

The first thing I noticed coming out of the airport was crickets singing. That meant something I thought was lost for the next six months: Summer.

The following day started, the quest to discover the city. Not knowing whether I was supposed to even wear a scarf in Kurdistan, I brought one with me. However, I kept it first on my shoulders, then on my hand, and for the rest of the day and holiday, as a decoration for my camera bag :-).

The lifestyle is easy, the people are friendly, and I've felt far safer than in many other holiday destinations. Not to mention the food is an experience impossible to forget. However, it takes a bit of time to discover the places where you can have more food choices than kebabs. 

The first two days, we practically lived off Kebab, but the crispness on the outer part of the meat and the juiciness of the inside made me forget the existence of other food.

The heart of the city is the  Erbil Citadel, locally called Qelat. It is a tell or occupied mound and the historical city center of Erbil. It has been inscribed on the World Heritage List since 21 June 2014.

The earliest evidence for the occupation of the citadel mound dates to the 5th millennium BC and possibly earlier.

The citadel is nowadays uninhabited, and it's going under reconstruction to bring back the old shine that characterized it in the far past. For this reason, many of the areas weren't accessible, but it was enough to appreciate its beauty.

From the southern gate, you can enjoy the view of the main square and the Bazaar on the right side.

The Bazaar is the center of social life in Erbil. There beats its very heart in a vibrancy of colors, scents, and tastes; you find everything you need and even more for your everyday life, from food to house appliances to house decor, clothing...you name it.

And that's why we lost ourselves in its endless alleys, first discovering it all, then searching for something to bring home.

After a long day of walking, we ended up at a cafeteria on the Citadel with a stunning view of the main square.

The city isn't located within any natural attraction, but the presence of the many parks offers the soul a place to rest and enjoy beauty.

Yet, also the chance to remember what is the most essential things in life at the memorial Sami Abdulrahman park:

The dustiness of the semi-desertic environment isn't something that really disturbs you. When the evening comes, after extremely long walks that will bring you to discover new corners of this fascinating and vibrant city, you will sit on a terrace, at a bar in the crowded food streets, or in a cafeteria surrounded by quiet and harmony.

There, sipping tea, you will find yourself indulging in one of the most spectacular events in nature: the Sunset!

For the moment, that's all, and remember to keep yourself safe and entertained!

Stay tuned,

The Wandering Writer

Some news from the Wandering Writer

 

Yes, I can finally say that from this year on, my wandering can resume!

And isn't this just wonderful? I have been waiting for this moment for more than two years. First, the pandemic that closed all the borders, then the problems connected with the pandemic, which was a stagnation of the general economy. As if this wasn't enough, there had been health issues and (last but not least) the war in Ukraine.

Now it's time, and I'm ready to hit the road at any cost. If you have followed my previous travels, you can imagine I'm not going to head toward a typical tourist destination. Yet, it will be one of the most interesting for its history, political situation, and heritage.

I'm talking about Iraqi Kurdistan, and I'm going to visit the city of Erbil.

So, here is short info about the place I'm going to visit:

Kurdistan isn't a geographically or politically defined country. However, its population keeps fighting to be recognized as such and obtain the status of a political nation with defined boundaries and autonomous government.

It's mostly a geo-cultural territory stretching between southeastern Turkey, northern Iraq, northwest Iran, and northern Syria.

Iraqi Kurdistan, in particular, obtained autonomous status in 1970 with an agreement with the Iraqi government, which was also reconfirmed in 2005 as the Autonomous Kurdistan Region. 

As a population, the Kurds have an indo-iranian origin, and their own language derived from the Iranian is known as Kurdish. Their culture has been shaped by the combination of different ancient heritages, and like the language, it is closest to the Iranian.

Kurdish weaving is renowned worldwide, so I expect to return home with rugs to change the ones that have deteriorated with use and time.

For the rest, I expect to return home with a deeper knowledge of these proud and interesting people.

The departure time is set for the 15th of next month, so a little more than one month, and I am already super excited, as I know this will bring inspiration for my writings.

My only hope is that for the period I'll be visiting, I won't be trapped within the crossed fire of any terrorist organization.

So stay tuned because the wandering writer is back!

Take care!