Araz Gholami

These days Turkey is completely on holiday for Eid al-Adha, and almost everyone at the company has gone back to their hometowns, except for one person who is naturally from Istanbul and doesn’t have family to visit. I wake up in the morning, come to the office, and work alone until evening. In the evenings, I go to the gym, run for two hours, and once I’m sure I’m too exhausted to think nonsense, I return home and sleep.

Less than 15 days remain until my residence visa interview, and I’m a bit stressed. The worst-case scenario would be a temporary return to Iran for one or two months, but it would still be much better if I can apply from here.

Kadir finally opened up to me and explained the reason for his divorce. As I suspected—and he admitted himself—he messed things up. Then he said he can’t believe he did all of this. His wife also couldn’t believe he could extract $3 million from her fortune—but he did.

Samad and I are considering joining one of the hiking groups so we can at least go out into nature once a week and escape the city’s mechanical life. I really need to see the open road for a while.