HELLO JUSTAS!

A traveller arrived to Kevin's place yesterday night. He had a red beard, a backpack, a smile...
Justas from Lithuania has been on the road for nearly two years now. He has not been home since our last meeting in Irkutsk and makes his living by juggling on the streets - a skill, he said, he had learned on the road:

"What do you do when there are no cars for six hours? -Read, or juggle..."

It was summer 2006. I was returning from Japan. I knew that Brandon whom I had travelled from Petersburg to Moscow with was hitchhiking in my direction. I knew that a traveller and a writer Anton Krotov had moved to Irkutsk in Siberia with a mission to promote hitchhiking life-style and welcoming all those on the road to his travellers' apartment.

I arrived in the morning to find Brandon already there. On the road, where everyone and everything is always new, it is an indescribably warm feeling to meet someone you already know and can share a memory with!

Brandon and I went to explore the town and get some food along the way when two big fellows with backpacks approached us.
"Do you know where we could find Internet?", asked one.
"Do you need a place to stay?" answered Brandon.
That is how travellers Justas and Marius from Lithuania also ended up in Anton Krotov's travellers' home. Many more people arrived in the evening to share tea and travelogues on the crossroad.
Later Justas parted from his friend, with whom he had travelled from Lithuania across Latvia and Russia. He continued alone to Mongolia, China, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar (Birma), India, Nepal, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan.

In the summer of 2007 Anton Krotov opened his travellers' home in Osh (Kyrgyzstan) where Justas met up with Brandon again...
Here is what Brandon writes about it in his Livejournal:

I got back to Anton's to see Justas from Lithuania! Talk about randomness. One year back, Carina and I were staying at Anton's in Irkutsk, watching the dom (a dom is a house) while everybody was at Baikal. While we were walking around the city, a guy with a rucksack asked where to find the Internet, after explaining, I invited him to stay at Anton's. Turned out he is an experienced traveller and a good person. One year has passed, both Justas and I have been travelling continually this whole time, and boom, we run to each other in Kyrgyzia!

2007-08-04 13:34:00

From there on Justas travelled back to China, then spent two months in South Korea, two months in Japan and yesterday he came back from Japan to Busan in South Korea and met me at Kevin's place. Small world!

"Now we are just missing Latvia," said Kevin and took a picture of us.