Living in Eritrea | Asmara, the Italian-Built City Where Bicycles Rule | Travel Documentary

Living in Eritrea: how do people live in Asmara, a UNESCO-listed Italian-built capital where bicycles are part of everyday life? Travel documentary. Eritrea sits on the Red Sea in the Horn of Africa. Its capital, Asmara, stands about 2,300 meters above sea level and was built by Italians in the 1930s in Art Deco and Futurist style. Cars are scarce because of low salaries, high import taxes and fuel shortages, and bicycles are part of daily life, from repair shops on every street to the Tour of Eritrea and Tour de France stage winner Biniam Girmay. In this film you will learn how Asmara was built, why cycling became a national passion, how the Massawa railway climbs from the Red Sea to the highlands, how a 30-year war of independence shaped the country, what a traditional coffee ceremony looks like, and what independent organizations report about the harder side of life. Chapters: 00:00 Bicycles, Not Cars? 01:48 Mountains, Coast and Nine Peoples 04:12 Asmara: Little Rome in the Highlands 05:52 The Wings of Fiat Tagliero 07:50 How the Bicycle Arrived 09:42 The Tour of Eritrea 11:43 From Asmara to the Tour de France 13:49 The Railway and the Red Sea Port 16:05 Thirty Years of War 17:58 The Coffee Ceremony 20:03 The Harder Side of Life 22:12 So Why Do People Stay? Some visuals in this film are AI-generated illustrations and animations created to help tell the story. The narration is a synthetic voice. Sources: UNESCO World Heritage Centre, African Arguments, The Globe and Mail, New African Magazine, EF Pro Cycling, Apollo Magazine, Human Rights Watch World Report 2026, African Development Bank, Wikipedia, Britannica. Subscribe to Hidden Atlas for a new page in the atlas: remote islands, volcanoes and extreme places where people live. #Eritrea #Asmara #TravelDocumentary