The Polo Diaries Book 3

Before Roxy found herself “Single in Buenos Aires,” she was a single girl in London in search of true love. The third installment of The Polo Diaries series takes us back to that time, and we follow Roxy as she hires a love coach to help her navigate the dating scene. But the love coach comes up with an unexpected assignment: reconnect to a long-forgotten passion. For Roxy this means horses. Within weeks, she finds herself playing polo, thanks to a series of unforeseen events.

Torn between her desire to become the best polo player she can be and the dream of falling in love, Roxy steps fully into the exciting and demanding world of polo, where injury and recovery mix with hard training, and where celebrating the victory of a tournament comes at a high price. Will Roxy eventually become the polo player she dreams to be? And with polo being such a demanding sport, can there be any space left for love?

 

 

Guest Post

A Kiss on the Cheek

I’ve travelled to many places in my life. In my teenage years, I travelled all over Europe. In my twenties, it was Africa. I joined two others in a car and we crossed Africa from North to South travelling though more than 20 countries along the way. In my thirties I become more settled. Adventure travel was replaced by business travel and social engagements. And so I moved from the offices of Silicone Valley to those of Moscow and attended weddings and social events from Denmark to Jordan.

By the time I turned 35 I had travelled to more than a third of the countries of the world. And then, I travelled to one more country. One early morning I landed in Argentina.

Its magic hit me from the first moment I stepped out of the plane. The sun was shining with an intensity I didn’t remember from anywhere else. I tried to tell myself that it was normal I felt that way. After all, November is a month of spring in Argentina while back in England, where I was coming from, November is the dullest and darkest month of the year. And yet there was something else, something hard to explain that hit me with the same intensity as the sunlight. I felt I had landed home.

I didn’t know anyone in that country. I had a friend who was there on a business trip and who promised to meet me for dinner. I had two other email addresses of some friends of friends back home. I had come there to play polo and I knew it would be easy enough to find some polo farms or estancias as they call them there. I had a one way ticket, a huge polo gear bag and I was eager to get going with my polo games.

But Argentina taught me that things are not always going to go according to plan. And the more the plan fails, the better life gets.

I did play polo as I intended. I went to polo estancias and played games and tournaments. It was fun and I told myself I made a good choice. But this was only the beginning. Argentina had a lot more wonders in store for me.

I started to meet people and soon became accustomed to their ways of social interaction. I had noticed pretty early that in Argentina, in order to say hi you give a kiss on the cheek – the right cheek to be more precise – to everyone you meet. And when I say everyone, it’s really everyone. Need to see a doctor? Kiss him on the right cheek. Dentist? Same. Meeting friends? The kiss is a must. Getting introduced to friends of friends? You kiss again. Going to a party with two hundred people? You’re expected to kiss all of them on the right cheek when you get there, and again before you leave. I was almost starting to kiss taxi drivers until a friend told me that I can stop there – taxi drivers and shop attendants were an exception from the ever-present kiss rule.

Soon, I realised I had a circle of friends there. It all started with the two email addresses of the friends of my friends in London. I got invited to their homes. I got introduced to their friends, who gave me a kiss on the cheek and invited me to social events, meals, parties and barbeques and introduced me to their friends. More kisses on the cheek. More invites. I went to the hairdresser and got kissed on the cheek and before I knew it I became friends with the hairdresser. She invited me out and I met her friends too. I started studying Spanish and training with a personal trainer and I became friends with these people too. It must have been due to the ever present kiss on the cheek rule. Soon, my number of friends and social life in Argentina greatly surpassed that of my own home country.

And then I went to play polo with a family who owned a farm outside Buenos Aires and this is where Argentina showed me the next level from the kiss on the cheek quick friendship. We played polo together and then they invited me to stay for Christmas. I met the whole family at the Christmas party, there were about one hundred people. I gave a kiss on the cheek to all of them. And then, a few days later, I hurt my back riding and they invited me to stay with them until I recovered. And I did.

I left but I came back soon. And then I came back again. And again. I kept on coming back to my adoptive Argentine family until I realised one thing: I could never fully leave. This was not just another country that I travelled to. It was a lot more. It may have started with a kiss on the cheek but as I came back time and time again I finally got it: I have become one of them.

And this was the most precious and unexpected gift Argentina had in store for me.

And if you want to know more about how a polo girl got to know Argentina, read The Polo Diaries Series!

Thank you, Roxana Valea and Rachel’s Random Resources

 

About the author

Roxana Valea was born in Romania and lived in Italy, Switzerland, England and Argentina before settling in Spain. She has a BA in journalism and an MBA degree. She spent more than twenty years in the business world as an entrepreneur, manager and management consultant working for top companies like Apple, eBay, and Sony. She is also a Reiki Master and shamanic energy medicine practitioner.

As an author, Roxana writes books inspired by real events. Her memoir Through Dust and Dreams is a faithful account of a trip she took at the age of twenty-eight across Africa by car in the company of two strangers she met over the internet. Her following book, Personal Power: Mindfulness Techniques for the Corporate Word is a nonfiction book filled with personal anecdotes from her consulting years. The Polo Diaries series is inspired by her experiences as a female polo player–traveling to Argentina, falling in love, and surviving the highs and lows of this dangerous sport.

Roxana lives with her husband between England and Spain, and splits her time between writing, coaching and therapy work, but her first passion remains writing.

 

Author Links

Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/RoxanaValeaAuthor/

Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/roxanavalea_author/

Twitter – https://twitter.com/roxana_valea

 

 

Book Links

UK – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Seven-Half-Minutes-Polo-Diaries-ebook/dp/B083KB87KG/

US – https://www.amazon.com/Seven-Half-Minutes-Polo-Diaries-ebook/dp/B083KB87KG/

 

 

 

 

 

The Story of an African Adventure

At a crossroads in her life, Roxana decides to take a ten-day safari trip to Africa. In Namibia, she meets a local guide who talks about “the courage to become who you are” and tells her that “the world belongs to those who dream.” Her holiday over, Roxana still carries the spell of his words within her soul. Six months later she quits her job and searches for a way to fulfil an old dream: crossing Africa from north to south. Teaming up with Richard and Peter, two total strangers she meets over the Internet, Roxana starts a journey that will take her and her companions from Morocco to Namibia, crossing desserts and war-torn countries and surviving threats from corrupt officials and tensions within their own group. Through Dust and Dreams is the story of their journey: a story of courage and friendship, of daring to ask questions and search for answers, and of self-discovery on a long, dusty road south. 

 

 

 

Extract

Crossing the Sahara, Roxana and her travel mates hire a local Touareg guide and start a 7 day tip into the heart of the dessert. But do they fully realise the risks they are about to take?

The music was on and we had been driving for a while. I didn’t know if I should speak to him; if I should try to wake him up from his trance. I drove on in silence, trying to concentrate on the path ahead. Peter was on the back seat, too far away to speak to, Richard had gone in the other car that was following us, and Ibrahim on my right seemed to be lost in his own thoughts.

His palms came up slowly towards his face, and when he wiped them all around his forehead and cheeks I knew he had been praying and this was the end of it. He opened his eyes and seemed to have come back.

“Were you praying?” I asked him. I knew he was. And I also knew that a devout Muslim would pray before starting anything, like a trip into the desert for instance.

“Yes,” he said.

“What were you praying for?” I went on.

“That we would come back. That the desert gives us back.”

I suddenly didn’t feel like asking anything else. I looked around. The landscape was more rocky than sandy, but there was sand in the air and sand on the horizon. It looked like we were about to lose ourselves in an ocean of sand.

“What is the biggest danger? That we lose our direction? That we can’t find the way back?” I asked after a while, not managing to get my mind off his earlier comment.

“This, too, happens sometimes,” he admitted. By now he was smiling, though, and I knew he was not too worried about this possibility.

“But you know the way. You said you’ve been here thousands of times.”

“It is not the same. It is never the same. The desert moves. It changes. The dunes move, they change their shapes and their place. Everything changes.”

We might have trouble finding the way, but I still didn’t think this was the biggest problem we had. In the past month, 32 European tourists had disappeared from nearby Algeria. They still hadn’t been found. We knew about it from the Internet news sites we used to check frantically every time we had the chance to go online. We also knew that the Tuaregs used to highjack cars from tourists not very long ago, and it happened even in the middle of the towns.

Agadez was also another hotspot on the Tuareg rebellion map in the mid-1990s. If in Mali the Tuaregs were demanding an independent state, here they only wanted an autonomous region in a federal country. They were as unsuccessful here as they were in Mali. And in both countries the central governments had sent troops against them and there were battles and blood. More than 100 people, Tuareg rebels, civilians and armed forces, died here following the beginning of the rebellion in 1990. At the height of the conflict, in 1992 Agadez became a closed city and the borders with Algeria were closed as well.

A peace treaty was finally signed in 1995, but it didn’t make the region any safer. Banditry and sporadic violence were still reported, and some tourists had lost their cars around here. Some others had lost their lives, too, and right now all we were thinking about were the 32 people missing just over the border in Algeria, somewhere in the Sahara. This, I thought, was a bigger problem than the dunes that kept on moving.

“Do you think we’ll have problems with the bandits?”

“Not really. Otherwise I wouldn’t take you here, would I?” His eyes were sparkling with amusement. It was a dumb question. But if so, why was he praying?

“The desert takes us now and I prayed that the desert would give us back. May Allah’s will be done,” he concluded.

Then he told me a bit more about the Tuareg rebellion in Agadez a few years before.

“They were crazy people. They were driving around the town in their 4×4 cars armed with their rifles and they were talking of war. Madness. They scared all the tourists away. It was a very bad time for business.”

“What did they want?”

“Autonomy and independence and all these kind of things. Stupid people. They should have known this would never happen. Not in this country,” he said, with bitterness in his voice.

“But what do you think?” I insisted. “Do you think you should have an independent Tuareg state?”

“I don’t know. I don’t care. All I care about is my business and those people scared away my tourists,” he said, as if he was avoiding answering.

“I think what they wanted was impossible. And you don’t need all that shooting and killing to find out. You see, we’re just too many tribes in this country; the Hausa, the Fula, us, the Tuaregs. Too many people; too different.”

Maybe all conflicts were about one and the same thing in the end.

 “Anyway, I was happy when it was all over,” he said after a while. “And we could go back to our business and take tourists around once more. It’s reasonably safe now.”

Reasonably safe. I had heard this before. This was what the websites said. This was what he told us as we struck the deal, when we asked him if it was safe to go there. This was what we told ourselves as we decided to go on and have a tour in the Ténéré, the desert of deserts, the most beautiful place in the Sahara; reasonably safe. What did this mean anyway?

Thank you, Roxana Valea and Rachel’s Random Resources

 

About the author

Roxana Valea was born in Romania and lived in Italy, Switzerland, England and Argentina before settling in Spain. She has a BA in journalism and an MBA degree. She spent more than twenty years in the business world as an entrepreneur, manager and management consultant working for top companies like Apple, eBay, and Sony. She is also a Reiki Master and shamanic energy medicine practitioner.

As an author, Roxana writes books inspired by real events. Her memoir Through Dust and Dreams is a faithful account of a trip she took at the age of twenty-eight across Africa by car in the company of two strangers she met over the internet. Her following book, Personal Power: Mindfulness Techniques for the Corporate World is a nonfiction book filled with personal anecdotes from her consulting years. The Polo Diaries series is inspired by her experiences as a female polo player–traveling to Argentina, falling in love, and surviving the highs and lows of this dangerous sport.

Roxana lives with her husband in Mallorca, Spain, where she writes, coaches, and does energy therapies, but her first passion remains writing.

 

Author Links

Website – https://www.roxanavaleaauthor.com

https://www.facebook.com/RoxanaValeaAuthor/

https://www.instagram.com/roxanavalea_author/

https://twitter.com/roxana_valea?lang=en

 

 

Book Link

Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Through-Dust-Dreams-African-Adventure-ebook/dp/B00QZDP394/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=through+dust+and+dreams+roxana+valea&qid=1587398560&s=digital-text&sr=1-1

 

 

Single in Buenos Aires

The Polo Diaries Book 1

Roxy plays polo… but dreams of love.
Forty-one-year-old polo player Roxy arrives in Argentina with

a to-do list that includes healing from a polo injury and falling in love with a handsome Argentine. From polo boots to tango shoes, the adrenaline of riding horses to glamorous after-game parties, Roxy learns to navigate this unfamiliar landscape with the help of new friends who teach her to take life as it comes. But will she find true love? Over three months in Buenos Aires, nothing goes according to plan, and yet, all the items on her list mysteriously get ticked off in the end. Just not the way she had imagined.

Fans of the Bridget Jones series will love the blend of humor, travel, and romantic comedy at the heart of Single in Buenos Aires, all topped off with the unforgettable flavor of life in one of the most sensual and passionate cities in the world.

 

 

Book Links

UK – https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07T8C3TN6/

US – https://www.amazon.com/Single-Buenos-Aires-Polo-Diaries-ebook/dp/B07T8C3TN6/

 

A Horse Called Bicycle

The Polo Diaries Book 2

Roxy found love . . . but is it enough?
In the second installment of the Polo Diaries series, polo player

Roxy goes back to Argentina a year after the events in Single in Buenos Aires, filled with dreams of settling down with the man she loves. This time, once again, Argentina is full of surprises and things are not what they appear to be. Or maybe they’re exactly what they’re meant to be, as a fortune-teller informs her.

Roxy takes a leap of faith and follows her dreams once again. She spends time at glamorous party venues of Buenos Aires and travels to the rough and wild pampas. Along the way, Roxy’s friends support and champion her quest for love, but when things get out of hand, Roxy realizes she needs to listen to her own inner voice and must make a hard choice. Two paths open in front of her, each one with far-reaching consequences. Which will she choose?

 

 

Book Links

UK – https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B082P34YPF/

US – https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B082P34YPF/

 

 

Q&A

When and where do you prefer to write?

I write when it comes wherever I am. Single in Buenos Aires was written in 3 weeks in an apartment rented on Airbnb in Mallorca. It was October and it rained almost every single day. I was writing all day long.

I started writing ‘A Horse Called Bicycle’ in Argentina, in a flat also rented on Airbnb. I was there for a couple of months and I wrote a bit every day. Then I went to India – to the Ayurveda retreat mentioned in the book – and I continued writing there. I finished the book at a bar overlooking the Lamai beach on the Island of Ko Samui in Thailand. I wrote at that bar every day for a week, each day for about 5-6 hours. The last two days there was a huge storm, the waiters were trying to protect the terrace with plastic sheets and  and I was pretty much the only customer there.. writing non stop under the raging storm.

• Do you have a certain ritual?

Yes I meditate and connect to the book I am writing. I ask the book to come, I dialogue with it as if it were a person. I ask it what it is about, what it needs from me. I visualise the end product finished, I clean and ground it. I also keep a journal. The journal of a book for each book that I am writing. When I’m out of inspiration I turn to the journal and I keep on writing – pretty much everything that comes to my mind about that book – fragments of the book, soul searching, questions I have and for which I have not received answers yet. Ideas for marketing. Brainstorming. Anything. I just write it all in the journal.

• Is there a drink of some food that keeps you company while you write?

Not necessarily food but I like to keep well hydrated. I have a glass of water on my desk always.

• What is your favourite book?

The Alchemist by Paulo Cohelo.

• Do you consider writing a different genre in the future?

I write what comes to me. I wrote a travel memoir (Through Dust and Dreams), a self help non fiction book (Personal Power – Mindfulness Techniques for the Corporate World), a trilogy of contemporary woman’s fiction (The Polo Diaries) and I’m now working on a novel (The Boyfriend Experience).

• Do you sometimes base your characters on people you know?

Yes. AlwaysJ That’s why I always add ‘Inspired by a true story’ even on my fiction books. Because they are.

• Do you take a notebook everywhere in order to write down ideas that pop up?

No I just let myself absorb the moment. Then, if I’m present enough the setting and dialogues and ideas will be engraved in my mind and my soul and easily retrievable when I start writing. I found that I could retrieve from my mind whole dialogues I had with various people just because their words though me deeply. When a fragment of a new book comes to me I usually have to sit down and write them pretty quickly – otherwise they go. These fragments when they come have a melodic quality and this is how I now I have to pay attention and really write them down. I write directly on my computer though not on a notebook.

• Which genre do you not like at all?

I would never write horror. I have troubles imaging writing Sci-Fi or erotica.

• If you had the chance to co-write a book. Whom would it be with?

With my husband! He’s a writer as well and we’re discussing writing a children’s book together.

• If you should travel to a foreign country to do research, which one would you chose and why?

I’ve already travelled extensively to foreign countries. My trips to Argentina were used as a basis for The Polo Diaries. And my trip across Africa was the basis of my travel memoir – Through Dust and Dreams.

Thank you, Roxana Valea and Rachel’s Random Resources

 

About the author

Roxana Valea was born in Romania and lived in Italy, Switzerland, England and Argentina before settling in Spain. She has a BA in journalism and an MBA degree. She spent more than twenty years in the business world as an entrepreneur, manager and management consultant working for top companies like Apple, eBay, and Sony. She is also a Reiki Master and shamanic energy medicine practitioner.

As an author, Roxana writes books inspired by real events. Her memoir Through Dust and Dreams is a faithful account of a trip she took at the age of twenty-eight across Africa by car in the company of two strangers she met over the internet. Her following book, Personal Power: Mindfulness Techniques for the Corporate World is a nonfiction book filled with personal anecdotes from her consulting years. The Polo Diaries series is inspired by her experiences as a female polo player–traveling to Argentina, falling in love, and surviving the highs and lows of this dangerous sport.

Roxana lives with her husband in Mallorca, Spain, where she writes, coaches, and does energy therapies, but her first passion remains writing.

 

Author Links

Website – https://www.roxanavaleaauthor.com

https://www.facebook.com/RoxanaValeaAuthor/

https://www.instagram.com/roxanavalea_author/

https://twitter.com/roxana_valea?lang=en