DUBAI: A young couple who turned nomads wandering the globe on motorcycle found themselves stranded in Dubai this week.
Italians Thomas Ferrari and Agata Invernizzi arrived last Thursday for bike repairs but were held back till Tuesday due to delay in delivery of spare parts.
They arrived by boat from Iran after rough Georgian terrain damaged the 1991 Honda Transalp’s bearings. The original plan was to enter Pakistan from Iran.
However, the extended Dubai detour meant their Pakistan visa would soon expire so they instead caught a flight to Pakistan. The battered 600cc bike was sent there by air.
Ferrari quit his comfy college teacher job and sold his house and belongings in Milan about a year ago to hunt for “the best place in the world”.
The 33-year-old said: “Society’s losing its values. I and my girlfriend packed our lives in about 300kg – the weight of the bike, some bags and us – and left. I had to convince my mum, but she understood this is what makes me happy.”
With no satellite navigation for guidance, the duo has ridden across Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, Macedonia, Greece, Turkey, Georgia, Armenia, and Iran. The couple plans to cross Pakistan, India, Myanmar, South East Asia, Australia and South America.
They update friends and family over internet chats whenever possible, working odd jobs for money and sleeping rough. The couple has also started a blog, www.300kg.eu.
“We are neither rich nor stupid… We left because we don’t believe in the values of the consumer society that we were living in,” their blog says.
“We left because we don’t believe in the public welfare. We left because we want to have time to live and not to have to carve it out between work and one appointment or another.
“We set ourselves free from the weight of all our belongings... We are trying to find the best place of the world. And when we’ll find it, it will be our secret.”
