With one leg in Europe and the other one in Asia, Turkey sure knows how to welcome its visitors. Passing through the cosmopolitan Istanbul, through Konya and ancient Cappadocia, down to Antiochia from the “other” Turkey which has no 5 stars tourist resorts, no yachts or swimming pools, where tourists don't venture and nobody speaks English, people are just as eager to communicate. Turkey is so alive. Everything is spectacular and immense but, despite this, the feeling of being at home everywhere is enveloping. I got lost on the crowded and confusing streets on the banks of the blue Bosporus, I saw the whirling dervishes that carry their grave stones in their hats, I walked to where religion, nature and history have created one of the most impressive wonders of the world. The first feeling: fabulous country where everything gave me the feeling of primordial freedom. People make places come alive and trade makes for the sparkling atmosphere. Black fabric clad women always walking a step behind their men, elderly men in traditional Turkish pants and red hats wearing the high nose slippers, shoeblackers lined on the side of bazaars filled with oriental spices. Museums, churches, palaces, mosques, bazaars and natural sites build up an endless world. The red flag with the crescent moon is everywhere. Turkey always knew how to negotiate and survive during centuries of political, philosophic and cultural revolutions. Reconciliation between conflicting goals, the ongoing confrontation between East and West, traditional and modern is at the end of the day the great challenge that this fascinating nation is facing right now.