Most memorable journeys

Kicki Pallin is a publisher, author, editor and artist. At Pallin Publishing, she looks for miracles around her every day, and lets them inspire her work, her live and her art. At the Global Woman Club, she is a project manager and helps women turn into bestselling authors, and she is a journalist at the Global Woman Magazine.

Her book ”East, the Long-Trunked Elephant” has travelled to all corners of the world, and it is part of her mission to do all she can to make the world a better place for future generations. She wrote the book about East to teach small children that even though we're all different, we can all find self-love, compassion and kindness on this journey called life. Both for ourselves and others. We are more alike than different ... and our perceived weaknesses can turn out to be our greatest gifts.

As a host of "Most Memorable Journeys" I was especially interested in Kicki the Regional Manager of Trans World Airlines when she was a young woman and how travelling was different then. Tune in and find out how people were chosen for an upgrade to business class.

Kicki is a very warmhearted and caring woman who's dream it is to one day have an orphanage, and we all know that dreams come true when we really believe in them.

https://www.pallinpublishing.se/

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I met Eden Dema on Facebook and I had never met anyone from Bhutan before. I was immediately intrigued by her posts, talking about nature, culture and cooking and I wanted to find out more.

Eden has a Bachelors Degree of Arts (Economics and Mathematics) and she did a Masters Degree in Economics in Paris and she loves France. Through her work for the Central Bank of Bhutan she got to travel the world and told me about her favorite places and how my home country Switzerland made her feel a little bit like her home country Bhutan. We also talked about how her dad saved money all year to take the family on a yearly holiday to India.

Eden and her family love cooking, local and international dishes and once more I realise that no matter where we come from, we have so many things in common.

Bhutan is a fascinating country in the Himalayas and according to the latest report from the World Population Survey on the happiest countries in the world. Tune in and find out.

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Miranda Tringis is a Dutch-born entrepreneur and herbalist, living in Cyprus for 30 years now. She studied Traditional Western Herbalism and French Aromatherapy.

Miranda and her husband Adamos are the founders of Cyherbia Botanical Park in Cyprus, where visitors can learn about the herbs of Cyprus in 9 themed herb gardens, witness the extraction of essential oil in the distillation room and go on a green adventure in the maze and woodland walk around Cyprus. In the woodland, there is a fairy village to discover, and a witch’s cottage where the door to childhood imagination is opened once again.

The Cyherbia project started out as a wild dream, turning a barren field into a green oasis where many bird species find refuge. The park opened in 2012 and has been growing ever since. Miranda is a regular guest on Cyprus TV shows, where she shares her herbal knowledge with the public. She teaches seminars and workshops at the park and at conferences and leads a research program at a local university. She has created educational programs for schools through which children learn in a playful way about the benefits of local plants and how to nurture and care for the natural world.

Miranda has created a large variety of organic herbal products at Cyherbia, ranging from tea blends to essential oils, tinctures, and cosmetics, available at the botanical park and online. Cyherbia now employs 8 staff and has won several business and environmental awards.

https://www.cyherbia.com/

In August 1994, we had driven our green Range Rover from England via Switzerland to Cyprus and I had moved in permanently with my then-not-yet husband.

I started working as a Sales Executive at the Sheraton Hotel in Limassol and luckily also got to do a little traveling for this job which otherwise I didn't like and decided to give up after not even a year. I was 35 years old and partly ready to settle down and on the other side terrified to commit to anything "forever" because I hadn't lived anywhere for more than 2 years in one stretch since I had left home at the age of 18.

I needed a little time to think and decided to get in touch with the tour operator which I had worked for and asked to be assigned to a round trip in the US and was offered a tour that started in Boston and ended in Toronto. Little did I know that I was already pregnant when I left Cyprus.

My then not yet husband joined me at the end of the round trip in Toronto and I broke the news to him on the 34th floor in a downtown Sheraton.

He nearly fainted but got used to the thought after spending some time in New York and Boston before we both went back to Cyprus.

Long story short, two years later, me, the globetrotting party girl was a mother of two babies.... tune in and smile.

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If you want to support me, buy one of my products, here's the website:

https://thesoulkit.com/shop-now/

Dr Anna Grichting is a Swiss architect, urbanist and musician who’s spent her career using arts and design to create a more beautiful, biodiverse and sustainable world, through co-creative, interdisciplinary and holistic approaches to design projects - especially at the city level.

Dr Anna has lived, practiced and studied in England, Ireland, Switzerland, the USA, and the Gulf region, and conducted research in Cyprus, Korea, Berlin and Qatar. She is interested in holistic and systems approaches to Design and her academic experience includes teaching at the Universities of Geneva, Harvard and Qatar, developing an Education Initiative for the Aga Khan Award for Architecture and teaching the Balkans Peace Parks Academic Expedition Summer Course.

She’s also an accomplished jazz singer and recording artist who has worked with musicians all over the world, incorporating different spiritual traditions. During lockdown, she entertained her neighbours with her songs from the balcony.

https://www.annagrichting.com/

Vakis Papanastassiou graduated from the University of Manchester and obtained the title of a special Neurosurgeon from Oxford University / Royal College of Surgeons. He's also a part-time clinical professor at the University of Nicosia but I was less interested in Vakis the doctor but much more in Vakis the multifaceted human.

He was bitten by the travel bug as a young boy when his family loaded their car on a ferry to Greece and took him on road trips through Greece and Italy and ex Yugoslavia. I was fascinated by the fact that he has visited both the Arctic and Antarctic and during the interview I also found out that he climbed Kilimanjaro.

He loves watching nature and taking photographs and has published a book called "The birds of Evretou Dam" and talks about what nature can teach us about life.

Prof Papanastassiou isn't only a brilliant neurosurgeon but a man with a wonderful worldview and a love for nature, food, and wine.

I was immediately impressed by Adamos' personality, a gentleman and true aviator of the highest class. I met him to talk about the last landing at Nicosia Airport but then I got so much more than I had hoped for. He was born to a family of 8 children and told me that his dream was from a very young age to become a pilot because he was fascinated by anything that flies. He talks about how he got to England to learn how to fly and how he found work as a pilot and how he ended becoming chief pilot at Cyprus Airways.

On July 15,1974, a military coup took place in Cyprus instigated by the junta in Athens, giving Turkey the pretext to invade five days later.The plotters overthrew the President of the Republic of Cyprus Archbishop Makarios and installed a “marionette” government under journalist Nikos Samson.

Their aim was to unify the island with Greece, the Union being a nationalist ideal for some Greeks and Cypriots as well. Five days later, the Turkish army invaded Cyprus and their occupying forces remain on the northern part of the island to this day.

Adamos' story did not finish at the airport during that morning of July 20th 1974. He was also very lucky to survive the next couple of days and then continued working out of Larnaca airport which was hastily developed towards the end of 1974 after Nicosia was forced to close and opened in February 1975.

He ended his fascinating aviation career as the personal pilot to HM The Sultan of Brunei and is now retired.

Ever since their adventures have been broadcasted on Swiss Television SRF DOK, Markus and Sabrina Blum are well known throughout Switzerland.

In this podcast, Markus Blum talks with pleasure and much enthusiasm about their impressive adventures in the wilderness of Canada and the Outback of Australia but also about how it all began and how he met Sabrina in Australia.

Which real outdoor fan does not dream of the legendary wilderness of Canada! Sabrina and Markus Blum have fulfilled this dream. Inspired by the world bestseller “The Snow Child” by the adventurer Nicolas Vanier, the Swiss family goes on a great journey and follows the traces of the snow child to his homeland.

On a farm they learn the vital handling of riding- and pack horses. Together with their 18-month-old daughter and five newly purchased horses, they ride through the magnificent mountain world of British Columbia, without meeting a single person. Despite the heavily loaded horses and the food they carry, the family is dependent on feeding on nature. Their food often consists of what they have caught or hunted: Fish, grouse and ptarmigan.

On their way they experience countless adventures until they finally find the dreamlike little log cabin at Lake Thukada. In recent years, the family has lived not only in summer and autumn, but also in deep winter and high-risk spring in the Cassiar Mountains of western Canada, and also spent many months in the log cabin at Lake Thukada.

After their trips to Canada, Markus and Sabrina Blum wanted to set off for another horse adventure with their two daughters. But a new idea had to be born when their youngest daughter suddenly got a horse allergy. Their new plan: Crossing the Australian Outback with camels and a wagon. Six months of preparation on site and a three-month trip through impressive desert landscapes follow.

In November 2016, the Blum family leaves for Australia. While the children Amira and Naira go to school in the small South Australian village of Hawker, Sabrina and Markus start training untamed camels coming directly from the desert. Dealing with the still wild, stubborn animals and temperatures up to 50° Celsius demanded everything from them. After six months of hard work, great persistence and many setbacks,

Markus and Sabrina harness the camels in front of the wagon they have built especially for this purpose and travel with their children through the impressive desert areas of Australia for three months. On this journey they trust in themselves and in the reliability of the animals, far away from the rhythm of everyday life.

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I had tried to live a "normal" life back in my home country Switzerland after 11 years of living and working all over the world but somehow I realised that I wasn't cut out for "normal".

In August 1994, I decided to take a leap of faith and move to Cyprus where I had lived and worked 6 summers as a tour guide but this time, I was moving there to stay, forever as they say. We had decided with Hector, my husband to be to give it a shot and move in together after we had known each other for 10 years but never actually lived together.

I decided to exchange my bright red sexy sports car with a boring green Range Rover and it had to be bought in England because we were going to drive it to Cyprus where they also drive on the "wrong side of the road" or the left hand side.

In this episode I am talking about how we drove from England to Switzerland, filled the Range Rover to the brim with my belongings and went on through Italy, via ferry to Patras in Greece, across the Peloponnese Peninsula to Piraeus and on another ferry to Limassol, Cyprus where I have been living happily ever after since then.

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Dominick Domasky is an inspirational author, storyteller and founder of the inspiration sharing and publishing platform Motivation Champs.

Dominick is the author of the inspirational books, The Journey of a Grunt, How to Write a Book in 2020, and creator and co-author of the hit book Go

Ask Your Dad.

His greatest accomplishments are his two children, and he aspires to be the best husband father he can be. Dominick and Motivation

Champs share inspiration, smiles, and positivity 24/7 and help others do the same. This mission is accomplished through publishing, screenwriting, a large social media footprint, in person events and work with nonprofits.

My Name is Sharon, the newest book by Dominick chronicles the pain a family feels when their mother's advanced memory loss collides with a global pandemic. This timeless love story attempts to put a face on Alzheimer's Disease and explain the grief and guilt felt by the families

quietly mourning the loss of the living. The loss of a loved one is never easy; however, we attempt to find comfort in the special memories we shared together. My Name Is Sharon is a journey through a collection of precious family memories. We uncover the deep bond between mother and son and learn Sharon will be remembered as far more than a victim of disease.

Dominick’s inspirational book The Journey of a Grunt was not written from a pedestal, but from the trenches of digging ditches, picking up cigarette butts and overcoming countless failures. The Journey of a Grunt is a positive, humorous story that takes us from adolescence to adulthood

and tackles life’s teaching moments along the way. This book look is a pop culture, modern-day look into the meaning behind each job, task, and chore. Its pages will make you laugh, smile, reflect, and most of all inspire.

Go Ask Your Dad was conceived by Dominick be a tool for fathers and caregivers to refer to in times of triumph or turbulence. Domasky admits he is not a perfect father; so, he enlisted the help of twenty-one passionate fathers from across the globe to answer the questions of

fatherhood. The dads who co-author Go Ask Your Dad are from different faiths, cultures, and upbringings and come together to create a tool that will help today’s father succeed in an ever-changing world. Today’s fathers must be prepared to navigate the subjects of broken homes, teen

pregnancy, social media updates, and drug addiction, but be strong enough to understand that true fatherhood is all about unconditional love and raising your children to be the best that they can be.

Mr. Domasky is not a gold medalist or business titan, and he’ll be the first to admit he’s just a guy who has failed, been benched, suffered setbacks, lawsuits, punches to the face, and got up and brushed himself off. Dominick has no ill will of the past but looks back and finds humor and

strength. As the old saying goes, “That which does not kill us only makes us stronger!”

Dominick can be contacted for events, speaking engagements, or publishing opportunities at www.motivationchamps.com He can be found daily at Motivation Champs across most social media platforms sharing smiles, positivity and messages of inspiration.

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