The Week Everything Broke Before the Trip
I’ve tried to write this piece at least a dozen times—if getting sidetracked by a dusty shelf I never use, a WhatsApp group chat about full-moon meditations I will never attend, and a random YouTube commentary about a celebrity I don’t even follow counts as trying. I wasn’t avoiding the writing. I sat down. I meant business. I did the whole ritual: laptop open, serious face, “today I’m a writer” posture. And still, without fail, my brain slipped away like a child who pretends to go to bed and then quietly rebuilds a Lego city at 2 a.m.
Now, finally, I’m here. Fingers on keys, sparkling water fizz still tickling my throat, trying to pin these words down before another half-meaningful distraction sneaks in through the back door of my attention and turns my day into confetti again.
Coming back to Dubai wasn’t a transition so much as a headfirst dive into a to-do list someone had scribbled in the dark with their non-dominant hand. First order of business: the still-missing security deposit. The landlord—a man fluent in bank transfers and avoidance—had already made himself scarce, replying to messages like they cost him oxygen. Naturally, he outsourced the disappearing act to his chosen real estate agent, a woman who treated follow-up the way some people treat flossing: technically advisable, emotionally optional.
At first, she didn’t fully vanish. She gave me the drip-feed of “I’ll check” replies, each one as useful as a chocolate teapot. Then came the ghosting. By the time she stopped answering altogether, I was already neck-deep in unfinished tasks and running on that thin, brittle energy that makes you both productive and one bad email away from crying in a Viva Supermarket aisle. So I went back to the landlord and spelt it out, very calmly, with the kind of politeness that carries teeth: either he gets involved, or I loop in RERA, and we’ll see how expensive avoidance becomes once it’s legally itemised.
To his credit—or out of fear—I finally saw movement. Slow. Reluctant. Still annoying. But movement. Enough to keep me from going full Karen in public. For now.
And while I was chasing my own money just to keep a roof over my head, I was also clocking in—twice. Two jobs, both still in their awkward toddler phase: crawling when I need them to sprint. Paying in vague promises, polite emojis, and just enough to keep my phone from being disconnected. I nodded. I smiled. I over-delivered. Because I keep telling myself maybe this is what building looks like in real time: messy, underpaid, and held together by optimism and caffeine.
I also keep telling myself that one day I’ll be the one calling the shots. Choosing which projects to take and which messages to ignore. Not grinding in circles with a “professional tone” while my soul drags behind me in slippers. I want freedom. Not the aesthetic version people sell in Instagram captions. The real one—the kind where your effort actually turns into something stable, fair, and worth the stress it costs you.
The last straw is always hard to identify because it arrives disguised as “just one more thing.” Maybe it was the client from Job #1 who made me race around town for the perfect ready unit—urgent, non-negotiable—then vanished the second I delivered. No thanks. No reply. Not even a thumbs-down emoji. Or maybe it was Job #2, where my boss gaslit me about a “new website” supposedly up and running while I stared at the same prehistoric version as always. He wouldn’t send a screenshot. He just kept repeating that on his screen it looked different. As if I was hallucinating. As if I had time to play tech support on top of everything else.
That’s where something in me slumped. Not dramatically. Not in a cinematic breakdown. More like a slow, quiet exhale. A surrender that didn’t ask for attention. The kind that happens when you realise you’ve been holding your breath for weeks and you didn’t even notice.
And my brain—loyal in its escapism—did what it always does when reality starts tasting like metal. It slid straight to the only place that had felt good in months.
The holiday.
The one Mo and I fought over and planned anyway.
The one I poured my energy into—routes, bookings, backup plans like I was building a bunker.
The one that changed our lives.
Let me start there.
Blueprints and Meltdowns
Mo and I started planning this trip about six months before it happened, and naturally, it came seasoned with drama—misunderstandings, arguments, the whole performance. Two headstrong people with wildly different communication styles are trying to map out a joint European escape without accidentally killing each other in the process.
I told him what I needed with the clarity of someone who was running out of patience for her own burnout: nature, stillness, somewhere my nervous system could unclench. A landscape that didn’t demand anything from me. Water and trees and silence that feels like permission. He nodded—understanding, or pretending to—and a few days later, he dropped his dream lineup like a man announcing a world tour: Monaco. Paris. Amsterdam. Barcelona. Ibiza.
Ibiza.
The one place he remembered fondly from his last boys’ trip, and the same one I went to when I was seventeen and foolish. I’m thirty-one now, allergic to overpriced cocktails and forced euphoria. I didn’t want escapism. I wanted quiet. And his suggestion—tone-deaf and soaked in déjà vu—landed like a small erasure. Like I’d spoken clearly and he’d translated it into something that suited him better.
We fought. In circles. In loops. Raised voices and lowered hopes. But eventually, we reached an agreement that made sense because it leaned into our natural roles: I would be the Chief Architect of the Adventure. The planner. The booking agent. The logistical mastermind. And so I did what I do when handed control and left unsupervised—I orchestrated the whole thing. Itinerary. Transport. Activities. Flights. A currency exchange plan so we wouldn’t get robbed by airport rates. All of it.
Then came the airline hiccup—one cancelled flight, and suddenly I’m playing UN peace negotiator between logic and Mo’s meltdown. He wanted to rework the entire itinerary from scratch, like one disruption meant the universe was rejecting us. I begged him to breathe and let me work. And somehow—miraculously—I pulled off a refund on a non-refundable fare.
People hate a Karen until they need one. Didn’t I already tell you I’m that Karen? You’re welcome.
The refund should’ve been the end of the drama. A little win. A “fine, I handled it” moment.
But what stuck with me wasn’t the refund. It was the feeling underneath all that planning — the quiet, physical unrest that shows up when something big is loading in the background, and you don’t have the full file yet. Not panic. Not prophecy. Just that vertigo you get on a rollercoaster right before the drop, when your stomach lifts and your legs feel weightless for half a second, and your brain goes blank because it can’t see what’s coming fast enough. You’re not even sure what you’re reacting to. You only know your body is already reacting.
That’s why this trip didn’t register as “just a holiday,” even when I was doing what I always do — turning uncertainty into routes, backups, and control. Planning was the leash I held so I wouldn’t get dragged by whatever was moving inside me.
And I’ve felt that exact emotional weather before. Not often. Only twice. Both times, right before I left for something that ended up changing my life in ways I couldn’t predict at the time.
The first was the U.S. The second was China. I’m not going to unpack those stories properly here, because if I open that drawer, we’ll never come back to the road trip — but the short version is: the U.S. wasn’t a “trip,” it was an escape, and China wasn’t a reset, it was me carrying the same turmoil into a different country and watching it follow me like hand luggage. Same unsettled energy, same self-sabotage habits, same looping in my head, same sense that I was running without arriving. China didn’t save me. It clarified something instead: if I didn’t change direction, I was going to lose myself completely.
After that, life took me the long way around the globe. Somewhere between countries and years, I left pieces of that chaos behind — not in one dramatic moment, but gradually, like you do when you finally start growing up without making a speech about it. By the time I reached the UAE, I was more stable. By the time I met Mo, I was a calmer version of myself, not perfect, but no longer actively on fire.
So when that same vertigo showed up again before this road trip, it wasn’t because Europe was “life-changing” on paper. It was because the trip wasn’t really about Europe.
It was about us.
I needed clarity. Not the kind you get in a calm conversation over dinner. The kind you get when there’s nowhere to hide — no workday buffers, no Dubai noise, no quick exits, no going home to cool off. Two people in a campervan, forced into the same rhythm, forced to see each other clearly. I needed to know if Mo and I were actually building the same life, or if we were just passengers on the same train for now — comfortable, close, but eventually getting off at different stations.
And there was also something else — harder to name without sounding like I’m trying to be poetic on purpose — a sense that the trip was carrying more weight than it should. Like something was waiting. Not necessarily bad. Just… significant.
Two weeks. One campervan. No escape routes.
One chance to find out what was real.
Light Luggage, Lighter Heart
And then it happened: months of stress and anxiety finally made space for reality—the one that had kept me going through the headaches and the breakdown-adjacent weeks. And yes, the turmoil wasn’t only waiting after the holiday; it had been building before it, too. I’d left one job, remodelled another, started a new one (the ones that are giving me headaches now… you already know how that is going!), fought a major cockroach infestation in my overpriced studio apartment, and had a major fight with Mo that almost tipped into a breakup right before we were supposed to leave. The usual instability that comes when life is unsettled, and you’re trying to act normal anyway.
When I landed in Italy five days before Mo, I swear I could breathe again—like I’d locked all the Dubai noise inside my shoebox studio and left it there, padlocked. I was carrying both our luggage, stuffing every corner of one heavy suitcase with his clothes and mine to save a few dirhams on checked bags, but it felt light. Feather-light. I wasn’t dragging myself across airports; I was floating on anticipation.
There were things to do, of course: check-ups to squeeze in, my mom’s campervan to prep for the road, favours to run, friends and family to catch up with in a rushed montage, plus the usual backseat family politics that come free with Italian life. And still, through all of it, I felt strangely at peace—like I’d stepped into a warm stream and let it carry me.
Mo was present even through the screen, grounding me from far away. We were apart for those five days, but his voice was always there, checking in, keeping me steady. When he landed in Barcelona for his quick solo layover before meeting me in Italy, he didn’t exactly fall in love with the city. He found it… meh. Mo is a people person: he thrives in company, in shared jokes, in spontaneous plans. Solo adventures for him are like watching a comedy alone—possible, but slightly pointless. He wandered around unimpressed and underwhelmed, waiting for the part of the trip that mattered. Me. (Or at least that’s what I like to tell myself, and I’m not ready to retire that narrative yet.)
I, on the other hand, adore solo time. I used to live on it—quiet Sundays filled with books, playlists, long walks, and food made exactly the way I like it. I don’t fear being alone; I need it. Mo doesn’t. He treats solitude like a glitch. He visits family, calls friends, stays in orbit around people the way Google stays in orbit around Earth.
Then, finally, he landed in Bergamo—and don’t get me started on how they label it Milan-Bergamo, as if we’re a Milan side hustle. No. We’re a whole province with our own soul, thank you. (Excuse the rant, but I hate this promotional branding strategy. Milan is not even that pretty. Bergamo is.) I saw him at arrivals, and my brain stalled for a second. He was there. In my land. In the place that shaped me. None of the men I’d dated since leaving Italy had ever crossed the border for me. And there he was—Mo—luggage in hand, heart on sleeve, ready.
My mom and her friend offered to drive us. We picked him up and stopped at a local bar for an expensive-but-worth-it Italian breakfast: cappuccino with milk so fresh you can practically hear the cow’s sigh, cornetti filled with tangy homemade berry jam. Mo isn’t a sweet-in-the-morning person. Dessert doesn’t excite him, especially at breakfast. And yet, something about that flaky pastry, the bold espresso, the creamy foam won him over. Italy has a quiet way of converting people.
Back at my mom’s friend’s place, the campervan was waiting like an obedient beast. We brewed another coffee, packed the last items, and loaded everything. In the garage: the Vespa I bought at fifteen, my dumbbells, and a handful of other necessities. Fridge stocked. Pantry full. Tank filled. We were ready.
Mo insisted on driving because he associates driving with masculinity, and I let him because I’m occasionally brave in a way that borders on irresponsible. He had zero experience with manual vehicles—even less with a bulky campervan—so I held my breath and prayed my way through the first five kilometres, winding through medieval alleyways barely wide enough for a wheelbarrow, let alone our mechanical beast. A Syrian man raised on Dubai highways was now navigating northern Italian goat paths. The anxiety was… alive.
Still, he did it. He got us through Veneto and Friuli-Venezia Giulia smoothly and fast, and close to the Slovenian border, I took the wheel. The fuel must’ve been dodgy because it barely got us 350 km, but Slovenia had lower prices, so we refilled and aimed for Predjama Castle.
Two Helmets, One Vespa
We reached the village just before golden hour and parked the campervan in a quiet spot I’d found on Park4Night—my favourite little cheat code for anyone who loves freedom but hates roadside drama and overpriced tourist traps. We stretched, shuffled bags, and did our usual transformation: from “home on wheels” to “two idiots on a Vespa.” Out came my Vespa—the same one that has travelled through cousins like an inherited teenage vice, the kind of vehicle that carries entire summers in its scratches. The side still wore the marks of minor accidents, the handlebars were held together by lime-green cable ties, the rear mirror was basically decorative (and mostly there to satisfy the law), and the seat had a heroic cut that no one ever truly fixed. The electric ignition had died ages ago, so we were living on kick-start faith, and because she loved to stall at the worst moments, you had to keep the engine running even at traffic lights—gentle acceleration, like a nervous tic. Old, battered, stubborn. And still performing. Honestly, the €2,500 investment made back in 2009 had been squeezed dry in the best way possible.
The road to Predjama felt like Slovenia was showing off without trying too hard. Soft hills, hay bales, forests layered in every shade of green, crooked fences that looked like they’d been there since the Middle Ages out of pure habit. The air smelled faintly of farms and warm grass. Even the cows looked cinematic, as if someone had placed them there on purpose.
At what looked like an improvised parking area, a few young boys directed us toward a spot “suitable” for a Vespa. They joked immediately—how much for the scooter? Would we sell it? Would we trade it for something cooler? We told them we had no way to continue the road trip without it. Their faces changed into disbelief. In full shock, they asked if we’d driven from Italy on a Vespa. We let them sit with that fantasy for a second—just long enough to enjoy their admiration—then explained we’d arrived with the campervan. We laughed, locked the Vespa, and as we walked away, we joked (too loudly, apparently) about them stealing it while we toured the castle. They stopped smiling and turned their backs. Fair. Some jokes only land when you’re not the one being accused.
Then Predjama appeared—not placed on the mountain, but pulled out of it. Built directly into the cliffside, it blended into the limestone with an eerie kind of logic, like nature had decided to build itself a fortress. It had that calm confidence of something that has watched centuries of human drama unfold and never once felt the need to comment. My brain immediately started time-travelling—imagining life there in the 1200s, then in the centuries that followed, when it was destroyed, rebuilt, reshaped, and still stood. How many habits, betrayals, loves, and small daily routines must those walls have absorbed?
Mo, of course, saved me from getting too poetic by asking me to take pictures of him sitting on a cannon with his legs spread, pretending it was… well. You got it. He has a talent for dragging me back to earth using the most childish, harmless nonsense. It works every time.
We’d paid close to €90 for a combo ticket that included both Predjama Castle and the Postojna caves, and I hadn’t realised they weren’t exactly neighbours—a rookie mistake that still annoys me when I think about it. By the time we finished wandering through towers and dungeons, the cave tour wasn’t happening unless we stayed the night nearby. Not in the plan. Not in the budget. My frugal side took the hit with stiff dignity, sulked for a minute, then forced a reset. Slovenia was already giving us so much—there was no point bleeding over one logistical miscalculation.
On the ride back, the same winding road looked softer, the sun lower, everything warmed into that honey-and-flame colour palette that makes you feel sentimental against your will. Somewhere along a quiet stretch of gravel, we spotted two horses behind a crooked fence. Mo pulled over, and we approached slowly. They came right up to us—soft muzzles, warm breath, eyes the colour of melted chocolate. We fed them grass and wildflowers, our palms tickled by velvet mouths, and I felt that ridiculous ache you get when something is too gentle, and you don’t want to leave it behind.
Then we returned to the campervan and met the day’s small disaster.
Getting the Vespa out had been easy. Getting it back in was where pride became dangerous. Mo—brimming with confidence, and following what had been my “brilliant” idea—accelerated up the narrow ramp we’d bought specifically to make this part smoother. I stood inside the garage, ready to “receive” the scooter like a supportive partner. Instead, the Vespa launched forward like a rocket and nearly took me out. I screamed so loudly I’m fairly sure it echoed off every cliff in Slovenia. Tires squealed. My heart tried to exit my body. Then we realised we were both fine and started laughing in that hysterical, shaky way that happens when adrenaline needs somewhere to go.
After a cooling shower, we ate dinner: a cold rice salad my mother had packed before we left. A classic early-2000s survival meal—rice, oil, tuna, pickled vegetables—practical love disguised as food. One bite and a memory cracked open: summer evenings on a balcony, my dad’s sandals dragging on tile, mosquitoes buzzing, the sun turning everything amber. And there I was, decades later, eating the same taste inside a campervan across the border, with the man I loved watching me like I was the main course. I had to blink hard so the moment wouldn’t spill everywhere.
Water tank refilled. Bellies full. Bodies finally lose. We pointed the wheels toward Ljubljana, and an hour later we landed in an industrial corner of the capital—nothing pretty, just a patch of pavement near a warehouse, quiet enough to sleep without feeling watched. We curled into each other like puzzle pieces and let the day dissolve.
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