About

Hi,

My name is Max Forlani, and together with my wife Darria we are the main author of this blog. I’m in the prime of my life, just like Darria. I was born and raised in a European country significantly smaller in size than Turkey.

Before moving to Istanbul, my life mainly consisted of work and sports. The first put a roof over my head; the latter kept my body in shape and resulted in an extensive social network. Therefore, beside my relatives, I also left a fair amount of friends behind.

To provide them with light hearted commentaries on aspects of life in Istanbul/Turkey, reviews on my sight-seeing excursions and updates about my well-being, I set up a modest private (password protected) weblog at the time. But after a while, I started to receive more and more e-mails with enquiries about Istanbul, with questions ranging from “Can you recommend me a good hotel?” , “What is the best area to stay in?” , “Do I need a visa and how can I get it?” to even “What is the current rate of the Turkish Lira?”

Setting up a blog

I of course understood that friends and people that actually don’t know me but somehow found out I live in Istanbul, asked me these questions to be well-prepared for their city trip. In order to share my Istanbul experiences with the world to make the life of future tourists, expats or immigrants easier, I therefore created Istanbul Trails in January 2008.

At first I also used it to keep my friends and family updated about our well-being. But after six months I realised that mixing the two was not only inappropriate, but also confusing. I got caught in the middle between people asking for more information about Istanbul on one end, and friends asking for more and quicker updates on our personal lives on the other hand.

The Forlanis

So I discussed this with Darria, and we decided to create The Forlanis, where we will focus on our daily lives in Istanbul, our well-being and our biggest adventure to date – our first kid. And Istanbul Trails will from now on focus on any information a visitor to Istanbul may need to make the most of the city.

To ensure a minimum of privacy, we won’t reveal our real names; neither will we put pictures of ourselves or our house online. Max Forlani and Darria are completely fictitious names. There is of course a small history behind the choice of our blog names, but that is covered in one of the Blast from the Past posts.

But don’t let this scare you. Apart from our names, all the experiences, anecdotes and information we share with you, here and on Istanbul Trails , is 100% genuine and is intended to help, inform and/or entertain you. Therefore, people that have been a part of our lives for a long time and who may stumble upon this site will of course recognize us (and God knows themselves). Others will gradually get to know us through our Istanbul adventures, as the Forlanis.

The First 3,5 Years

As you know by now, this blog is a spin-off of Istanbul Trails. Since The Forlanis is so new and to keep things in perspective, I decided to start with a series of 30 posts about my first 3,5 years in Istanbul: how I ended up here, how I found my wife, our marriage, etc. And I backdated these posts with the original date these events took place.

So, if you want to catch-up on our past before reading about the most recent (often hilarious) developments, check out the following articles:

Also, don’t forget to subscribe via RSS or mail so from now on you don’t miss a thing!

I hope you will all enjoy The Forlanis.

Max

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