This Week:
- Doing touristy things – Turkish bakery, desserts, coffee
- Taking the ferry to Kadıköy and finding a digital nomad house.
- The food here in Kadıköy compared to the Europe side.
February 2025
| Su | M | T | W | Th | F | S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 2/1 |
| 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
| 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 |
| 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 |
| 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 3/1 |
Where In The World Was I?
- 🇹🇷 Istanbul, Turkey
- 🇹🇷 Kadıköy (still part of Istanbul)
Metrics From The Week
My body seemed to catch something on Saturday – poor sleep, stomach feeling a bit off. After all that boasting about my RHR last week 😂 The red looks back but it hasn’t been too bad.
Business Update
This week I fortunately got to use all the work that I put in last week on the topic modeling for the My Niche algorithm update.
I got the topic modeling working and added a couple other comparisons, added some filters, and got the My Niche results working a whole lot better! And I added a new toggle icon so that you can remove (or add) a channel in case you want to change the list.
Then I updated the Audience Explorer comment algorithm to run on not only your watchlist (usually 10-20) but all the channels in your niche (up to 75). So now you get to see more and more accurate questions/video ideas.
This week I also moved my CommentCompass.co website over to https://videohawk.co/find-audience-questions
This content is not ready to be made public yet.
Final Days On The Europe Side
I found this hole in the wall bakery. 20 lira ($0.56) per item. Those second bread loaves were insane, super soft and fluffy.
And I stopped by a dessert place to try some Turkish dessert.
And tried my first (and second) Turkish coffee. It had a similar (“dense”) consistency to espresso, but a lot darker.
And I realized you kind of have to let it settle or else you drink the actual coffee ground (kind of a “sandy” texture)
I didn’t take a picture but when I finished this, about a 1/3 of the cup was literally coffee ground “sludge” at the bottom 😂
⛴️ To Kadıköy
I had heard that you should take the ferry across to Kadıköy, so I thought I’d just head across for a couple days before flying out.
I didn’t know what to expect, so I braced myself for a bit more of a local area, fewer places to work, food not as modern/western, etc. That said, I had heard that the restaurants/food is “really good,” but that was about all the context I heard.
I ended up finding this co-living “digital nomad” house type of place, not really sure how to describe it. It’s not a shared dorm style, you have your own room, but the bottom floor is a co-working space and it’s more of a community with events and meetups and things.
Generosity
The people working there were super nice. They showed me a bunch of great restaurants around here. And when I went to finish my payment, the owner said their credit card terminal wasn’t working, but that I could pay via Wise, crypto (never heard that one before), or cash. I typed in my Wise but as we were reviewing the transaction (~$40), the transaction fee was $7 and she went “no no no that’s too much I don’t want you to have to pay $7 to Wise” and helped me find a bank ATM that I could use that didn’t have a transaction fee instead.
It’s a new place (couple years old) and the owners are young. It feels very “startup-y” and family-like. e.g. “Your total is 1413 lira? Just pay me 1400.”
It reminded me of last Sunday when I was writing my blog post from the previous cafe/hostel. These two (turkish) women sat down on the other side of the big table after saying hi.
After some time I started to pick up that they were learning a language together and what sounded like French.
They stopped to pull out a granola bar and split it between them. Then one of them stuck out her hand with the rest of the granola bar across the table and offered it to me. No other words spoken.
We ended up getting into a nice little conversation, talked about languages, travel, and places to visit in Istanbul. Very nice people. Later they offered me some “cologne” (which I would call hand sanitizer) and told me how it’s in the Turkish culture to clean your hands before/after eating.
The Food
So anyways, with a co-working space at the bottom of the place I’m staying, my own room, and being around other “digital nomads,” my interest was already piqued.
Then I started to find places to eat and oh boy…
- Falfool Vegan House – falafel & hummus
- Fit Mill – “healthy food” bowls and salads
- Getto Burger – burger and chicken wrap
- ForchettaPlus – pasta
- Village Coffee + Eatery – Turkish omelette and smoothie bowl
- Say Cheese – cheese wheel pasta
- Ewya Sebastian – san sebastian cheesecake (looks like a sugar bomb but sweetness was very mild, I was surprised)
- Meet Lab Coffee – french omelette, salad, croissant
- Mama Bowl Moda – smoothie bowl
And the prices have all been fairly reasonable. $9 for a chicken bowl, ~$10 for a burger/wrap, ~$9 for a smoothie bowl. So I’ve been doubling up.
The Gym
Then I found a gym literally two blocks away. $28 for 15 days.
Around Kadikoy
It’s been cold and rainy all week, 35-45ºF, sometimes hailing.
Off To SE Asia
So when it came time to decide where I should head next, I thought “man I’m excited to get back to SE Asia where I can…”
- Find a co-working space
- Be around other digital nomads
- Eat healthy food
- Find a gym to work out at
- Slow down my traveling
- And just lock in
… waaaaait 😂
So I extended my stay 😂
To be completely fair, I would say the food is still much cheaper in SE Asia and I think I resonate more with the types of people there than here, but I’m literally already here.
Thoughts From The Week
We all have the power to brighten someone’s day…
202502071417 We all have the power to brighten someone's day
#journal #socialskills
We all have the ability to brighten someone else's day.
We have the ability to make someone else smile, to make someone else feel good.
We could compliment someone or share something positive. And there's literally only upside. You feel good sharing the compliment. They feel good receiving it.
Huh.
## Context
So I went back to Fit Mill healthy food restaurant here in Kadikoy Istanbul for lunch (again). The food is fantastic, great portions, great taste, healthy, clean, and affordable prices (~$8-$9 per dish).
I got up to pay and was waiting for the guy (who I've now seen 3 times?) punch in the price. Silence.
He lifts up the terminal, I tap to pay.
I'm waiting for the receipt, then say "... your food is very good" and give him a thumbs up.
He looks up, smiles and says thank you.
I decline the receipt, say "teshekular" ("thank you") and walk out.
I've done this a couple times now recently, saying "very good" at a restaurant. But, it was this moment that this idea came to my head.
I dunno, for some reason this feels like a novel and interesting idea.
I just imagine how if the roles were reversed, I would feel so much better if I heard that. I'd probably go home and in my nightly [[202304250814 What's one story-worthy moment from today]] journal I'd write:
> For lunch today this foreigner guy came back. I recognized him. I think he's been here 3 or 4 times now. But today when he was paying he said "your food is very good" to me. That made me smile.
“But someone has already done that…”
202502071548 But someone has already done that
#journal #business #competition
- "Why don't you just use X"
- "Someone already did that"
- "Look at X they already solved that"
I keep hearing this and keep thinking, "yes, well sort of, but it's not that simple. There's room for both of us."
And also "no, they didn't solve what I wanted."
Sure VideoHawk isn't "successful" yet, but I have an idea how I want it differentiated from tools like 1of10. Just as an example, [creator] mentioned how no tools tells you WHY a video outperformed. Or my gripe, that I feel like too many channels are starting to look the same and not authentic anymore, because everyone is using the same recycled "outlier" videos.
I just want to capture this.
I remember used to thinking how I was terrified if someone "already did" my idea. But now, I see the nuance and details.
I remember in I think [[202211120934 The Millionaire Fastlane by MJ DeMarco]] him talking about what to do if someone "already did" your idea. There are still endless ways to succeed: niching down, making it cheaper, easier, etc. etc.
What’s Next?
Now I’m actually not sure 😂