Aidan & Kemal
Our driver, Aidan, is a 33-year-old club general manager for a FitnesFirst location, having switched careers after he found working in insurance to be too depressing. Adam is a die-hard optimist, and his driving purpose in life is to create happiness for himself and others. He lives for new experiences - meeting new people, traveling to new places, learning new things. He laughs easily, has a positive outlook on every experience, and is very easy to get along with. His favorite car-sharing story? "I once had a guy who was a drug dealer. The police did a random check, and I think they were looking for him, because he went with them. It was funny, although he never paid me for the ride. [laughs]"
Aidan's friend Kemal is a 1st division football coach in Istanbul. His drivers are adrenaline, meeting challenges head-on, competition. He's traveled a lot as well and loves to get to know different people and cultures.
Aidan has Turkish parents while Kemal is Turkish-born but lived in Germany for 7 years; the two guys gave us some great insights about the difference between the Turkish and German cultures. Both feel, almost by blood, intricately tied to their communities; but both are quick to point out that the way that one expresses one's community ties are starkly different in the two nations. Germans, as Aidan points out, are quite closed-off. It's not so easy to meet them. So a community in Germany becomes your immediate circle of friends and perhaps the people you meet at work. Turkish people, on the other hand, are very open, very helpful, and make everyone feel welcome into their community. In that way the Germans have some things to learn from Turkish culture.
On the other hand, while in Turkey the divide between the rich in the poor is not only very clear but is something that the rich make an effort to display, in Germany, the divide is not so clear. Both guys unanimously agree that in this sense, Germany wins. They emphasize that ultimately, everyone is the same - everyone is human. Just because some people don't have the same opportunities as others doesn't mean that they should be treated differently.
Aidan believes that luxury is not about money, it's about what you do with your life -- living it to the fullest and getting the best experiences out of it is more important than having the most expensive things. Which is not to say that he doesn't like expensive things -- he easily admits that if it wasn't for his newborn baby, he would have bought a Porsche instead of his Mercedes. But he adds that the Porsche would have been for his enjoyment only, not something to throw in the faces of others. "I had a girlfriend when I lived in Melbourne who had a ridiculous amount of money. But she wasn't happy. That was the problem. Money is not important - having fun. That's wealth."
Kemal's idea of luxury is a yacht. Living in Istanbul, he has become accustomed to the idea that in order to be respected, you have to show that you have money. But the last thing you could call Kemal is pretentious -- for him, luxury products are almost a necessary evil. To him, luxury is not about exclusivity but purely about respect.
Both believe that we make an impact on the world by simply being ourselves. The microsphere of the car is a perfect example - we're all interacting with each other and influencing each other, which then has an influence on other people. The butterfly effect in action.
Lena
The third person in the car with us is Lena, a student from Berlin at the beginning of a long trip through Northern Europe.
Lena studies Psychology, travels as much as possible, and is very active in the couchsurfing community. Her favorite car-sharing story is getting a ride from a German couple, the man being twice the woman's age. The couple had apparently met while one was giving a ride to the other through Mitfahrgelegenheit.
Lena believes that luxury is a personally defined concept - it's how you feel, not how others feel about what you do or have. For her, luxury is "being able to decide what to do with your time". It's about freedom.
Lena believes, similarly to Aidan and Kemal's theory, that one person can have a significant impact on the world just through their personal choices. She's stopped eating meat; she buys products consciously, she donates some money to 4 different NGOs, she doesn't have her own car. "If everyone does what he or she can, the world is already a better place."
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