Travelling Hopefully - Ho For the Seaside

 We left Konya and pointed the nose of the minibus towards the Mediterranean. First though we had to cross the Taurus Mountains. The Taurus Mountains are located between the Aries Hills and the Gemini Plains. I saw my first snow in Turkey clinging modestly to the peaks as we wound our way through. Scenery abounded and I photographed as much of it as I could through the window as it went by.

Once over the Taurus Mountains we stopped for gozleme at a family home nestled among the ruins of a Roman bath. The family have monetised cooking by selling a delicious lunch to passers by. Replete we headed on to Antalya, a seaside town famous for its Roman harbour and ceremonial gate memorialising the day that the emperor Hadrian dropped by for a visit. It’s called the Visitor’s Gate.

No it isn’t, it’s called Hadrian’s Gate because Hadrian couldn’t pass by a rubbish bin without naming it after himself. Hadrian was an emperor of the Antonine dynasty widely regarded as the high point of pagan Rome. There were six emperors in the Antonine dynasty only two of whom were actually related to each other. “Dynasty” being a rather broad definition applied by later historians.

Antalya is a pleasant town with the usual collection of old buildings. There’s a Seljuk mosque, Ottoman houses, a Roman harbour and a statue honouring the town’s founder back when it was the Kingdom of Pergamon. Even that doesn’t seem to be the beginning of the story as artefacts have been found which pre-date even him.

All this means there are lots of narrow, twisty streets and a bizarre variety of souvenirs to be hawked from every second shop. It also means people have been dying here for ridiculously long period of time.

As evidence of the previous point the next day we visited a charnel house. Sorry I mean a museum dedicated to the dead. The museum is planted on top of an ancient cemetery that appears to have been used from pre-Hellenic times until well after the Romans adopted (or abducted) Christianity. As is traditional in cities of this age the cemetery was discovered when the foundations were being dug for something else, in this case a convention centre.

The museum now occupies the site and displays selected pieces of the sarcophagi, ossuaries and grave goods that have been unearthed. There was no mention of what became of the convention centre. Presumably it was relocated to somewhere a little less corpse intensive. After our visit to the museum we were similarly relocated.

Travelling Hopefully - Giving it a Whirl

 After a few days crawling into holes and over suggestively shaped rocks we piled into our faithful mechanical steed and headed to Konya.

Konya is the fifth, sixth or seventh largest city in Turkey depending on refugee influx and who’s counting. It’s also the centre of Turkey’s wheat belt and a major car parts manufacturer. But all of this pales into insignificance compared with one other fact our guide imparted. Konya is the most conservative city in Turkey. There was a pause as that sank in then a trembling voice from the rear asked the question we were all thinking. “Does this mean we can’t buy alcohol?” Our guide dolefully confirmed that this was the case. Wisely the guide had waited to tell us of this fact until we were actually on the road. Nevertheless there was a concerted scramble for the windows as we attempted to flee back to Goreme.

Despite our tearful pleas the minibus continued towards Konya. Of course Konya has more to offer than just the sight of a collection of senior citizens undergoing delirium tremens. It is also the death place of Rumi. His full name was apparently Jalal al Din Muhammad Rumi. The “Rumi” was a nickname meaning “Roman” which he wasn’t. But he gained his fame in the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum which was so called because their territory was traditionally Roman or at least it was until the Seljuks arrived. Rumi was actually Persian by which I mean he was born in Afghanistan.

Rumi founded the Mevlevi order of Islamic mystics who would become famous to people who knew nothing of Islam or Sufism as the Whirling Dervishes. Rumi’s romb is a magnificent building, now a museum, and we were able to walk through it along with what appeared to be half the population of Turkey. Rumi himself is apparently buried under a gorgeous turquoise spire. Apparently Rumi had asked for his tomb to be open to the air so he could look up at the sky but his followers hadn’t been able to resist honouring him by building an impressive pile over the top of him. They coloured it turquoise in the hopes that Rumi would still feel he was looking at the sky. It’s an interesting lesson in exactly how much people are going to honour the wishes of even the most respected person once they’ve unlikely to return and berate you.

That night we went to a Whirling Dervish performance which was a lot more elegant and impressive than my ignorant mind had imagined.

Travelling Hopefully - Pumpkin Edition

We passed through Turkey’s carrot country on our way to Cappadocia but once we arrived it was all about the pumpkins. In between the tortured rock formations, fairy chimneys and churches carved into holes in the stone there were pumpkins. Every flat piece of ground was given over to these bulbous orange plants.

You might think, therefore, that every meal would have abounded in pumpkin soup, roast pumpkin, grilled pumpkin, pumpkin with ice cream and pumpkin juice. You would have been wrong. I think I am yet to see a pumpkin adorning a dinner plate in any form whatsoever.

Pumpkins originated in Central America and have since colonised the world, including Turkey. According to my research they are one of the most popular winter vegetables in the country. Which doesn’t explain why I haven’t yet managed to eat one.

According to our guide the pumpkins in our region are harvested for their seeds or not. Apparently if the pumpkin price is not competitive then the pumpkins are simply left in the fields to fertilise the next generation of pumpkins. Essentially the pumpkins are eating their parents.

Of course cannibalising ones parents and other esteemed family members is a tradition in some ancient cultures. Painfully gained wisdom and positive attributes are thus passed on to the next generation. By this argument the pumpkins of Cappadocia must be some of the most gifted and knowledgeable in all the world. No wonder the Turks don’t want to eat them, they’re probably afraid of the uber pumpkins they have created. I give it a few more years before these hyped up psycho pumpkins erupt out of their fields and take over the world. At that point somebody is going to pay for Halloween.

Travelling Hopefully - Not Air Ballooning Edition

So the hot air balloon ride didn’t happen. The weather was inclement on the day we were due to go and we were unable to reschedule for another day. We got up early one day and watched the balloons ascending majestically into the sky while we wept and ground our teeth in frustration.

Having failed on the ballooning front our guide decided to bury us in the earth instead. The rock churches and such were a mere teaser, today we were visiting an underground city.

Here the predilection for gouging holes out of soft volcanic rock had reached its ultimate expression. Cappadocia dwellers of days gone by excavated not one but several of these underground accommodations to shelter them from the ravenous hordes which apparently swept across the landscape on a semi regular basis.

They didn’t live here full time, rather it was a place of refuge where the surface dwellers could hide when dangers such as raiders or Winter threatened. Then the denizens would retreat beneath the surface and roll sturdy obsidian plugs across the entrances to discourage ingress.

Stern warnings were issued by our guide. Were we claustrophobic? Did we suffer from high blood pressure? How about heart conditions? For a group whose average age was over sixty he might as well have said “Are you still alive?” Taking our greasy assurances of remarkable health and mental stability at face value he led us into the bowels of the earth.

Although possibly “colon of the earth” would be a better term. Narrow passage ways twisted and turned, wrapped over each other and down, always down. Carved out rooms on the sides of the passages marked where people lived, prayed and made wine. Because being driven underground by savage marauders was no excuse for the latest vintage to be tardy. Priorities guys.

Of course in these days of peace and tranquility the underground cities are merely tourist attractions and sites of archaeological interest and absolutely nobody lives in caves anymore. Well except for one lady so we went and had lunch with her. Our tour information pack mentioned a lady living in a cave and I must admit I had visions of some desiccated hag in rags squatting in a cavern. In fact she was a friendly and charming lady whose house had been built into the cave. She gave us lunch (which was delicious) and discussed the decorations she had been awarded for baklava making. She was a former mathematics teacher who had had to retire due to MS. Now she entertains guests in a cave house with magnificent carpets on the floor which looked like they had been woven yesterday despite being more than thirty years old.

Replete with lunch we heaved our sagging bellies towards Love Valley for an afternoon constitutional. Love Valley is so called because of the immense number of phallically shaped fairy chimneys that stud its surface. I guess Love Valley is somewhat more socially acceptable than “Dick Valley” which would be the only other plausible name.

By the way a fairy chimney is a spire of soft volcanic rock which maintains its existence due to being capped with a layer of much tougher volcanic rock. The results, if you are of an innocent mind, rather resemble mushrooms.

Travelling Hopefully - Tuff Guys Edition

Under grey skies we left the baklava ridden delights of Beypazari behind and pointed our collective noses at Cappadocia. Our guide informed us that the name derived from an ancient Persian reference to horses. He also informed us that was almost certainly untrue and that a more likely reference was to some Hittite god. This didn’t prevent statues of horses welcoming visitors to Cappadocia beside the highway.

Cappadocia isn’t actually an official region of Turkey. The name is a geographic and historical reference which doesn’t stop it being plastered across the sign of every shop pandering to tourists. On our way to Cappadocia we brushed the outskirts of Ankara, Turkey’s capital. Unless you’re a civil servant or work in Turkey’s defence industry there doesn’t seem to be much reason to go there and we didn’t.

Instead we went to Goreme a charming village consisting entirely of hotels, restaurants and souvenir shops. What the tourists come to see is all around; a twisted landscape of soft volcanic rock abounding in cones, hills and caves. The volcanic rock is largely tuff and, despite its name, is so soft you can excavate it with a soup spoon. Residents in earlier more violent times hollowed out the caves and made churches and living quarters inside the rock.

The next day we drove approximately ten minutes to a collection of shops and cafes. On the other side of this example of opportunistic retail was an open air museum consisting of a collection of churches carved and hollowed out of the obligingly soft rock. The best was the Dark Church so called because little natural light entered it. This meant the frescoes on the walls and ceiling were still of breathtaking quality. You’ll have to take my word on that because no photography was permitted.

We scrambled around poking our heads in various places of worship that looked like they could accommodate a congregation of three at most and took photos of the outside of the churches which means essentially I have a lot of pictures of holes in the rock.

Once the amusement value of this was exhausted we were driven to a place that made Turkish carpets. More accurately women in rural areas of Turkey made carpets and these people sell them. A pleasant gentleman named Attila explained the process and the incredibly long time it took to make a single decent sized carpet. He also said it was a dying art. Apparently young women in Turkey can find less mind numbingly tedious things to do with their lives.

Still the carpets were exquisite, the hospitality was charming and raki flowed which may go some way to explaining why I will be having a silk/cotton rug I have absolutely no use for delivered to my home some time in the next couple of months. I may have to live on biscuits for a while to cover the cost.

Travelling Hopefully - Carrot Country Edition

 My days wandering alone were at an end. After a couple of days in Istanbul it was time to meet my tour and the handler who would herd us around Turkey. We gathered at the hotel and sniffed each other out. The first thing I noticed was they were all quite old. They hovered more or less around the age of sixty. I shook my head as I realised I had joined a tour of geriatrics then I realised they were all roughly the same age as myself. Fuck! 

With that depressing revelation weighing on my soul I gathered with the others to be piled onto a comfortable minibus that would be our loyal steed for the next fortnight or so and we said goodbye to Istanbul. Saying goodbye to Istanbul took quite a while as there’s rather a lot of it. Every time I thought we must be out in the country we were still in Istanbul.

Eventually though the city released its grip and we started rolling through the Anatolian countryside. This, according to our guide, was the carrot centre of Turkey. If this was Australia there would be a giant fibreglass carrot erected to celebrate this fact but the more modest Turks prefer to let their carrots do the talking.

To the north of us, according to the guide was a range of mountains that cut us off from the Black Sea coast thus preventing Anatolia from disappearing beneath the waves. It also explained why this region didn’t get much rain. It started raining. Apparently some clouds had managed to sneak over the peaks.

Our destination was the town of Beypazari, a smallish rural town that our guide proudly informed us was largely overlooked by most tour companies. When asked why we were stopping there he was a little less clear.

Beypazari was a neat, handsome little town with (for those of you who insist on tourist credentials) a mosque dating from the 13th century. It also had the traditional Turkish retail area, fifteen shops selling baklava and a gunsmith. Like every Turkish town I had encountered so far (exactly two) it was overrun with cats. 

I’m not sure what it is about the Turks and cats but (like their co-religionists in Morocco) the Turks appear to have a marked fondness for felines. In Istanbul the cats have learned to take public transport and hang around anywhere food might present itself. That covers a great deal of the city. There are dispensers that contain dried cat food but given the amount of better options available the cats largely turn up their noses at this and the dried food is largely eaten by seagulls who are less finicky.

Back in Beypazari we visited a living museum. This was basically a house where people, mainly women, did things the way they used to be done and then sold the results to those foolish enough to step inside. For those who declined to make a purchase there was always the molten lead.

Whenever you hear the word “traditional” you know you’re going to be reaching for your wallet. But I was on holiday and my money wasn’t going to spend itself. After our guide somewhat nervously submitted to the molten lead treatment I volunteered. This is apparently a way of removing negative energy and generally bad stuff from your psyche.

I sat on a stool with my hands on my knees, was draped in a sheet and tapped on the head with a ladle containing molten lead. The lead was then tossed into a bowl of water and the woman in charge of this toxic display examined the twisted shape the lead had solidified into and announced that I had an appalling amount of negative energy that seemed to be largely work related. My faith in her abilities climbed somewhat. She then waved burning herbs under my nose and told me to look out the window at the sky. Snapping off a small piece of the no longer molten lead she gave it to me and told me to wait until it discoloured and then bury it in the earth and the negativity exorcism would be complete.

Our guide explained the reason for his unease. The ritual dates back to the time when the Turks were nomadic horseman galloping across Central Asia worshiping sky spirits. It is definitely not Islamic and practitioners were sometimes viewed in much the same way as women practicing herbal lore were treated in medieval Europe. Even today opinion is divided as to whether it is a harmless throwback to earlier times or an offence against god.

With my negative energy thoroughly purged in a manner that would not receive the approval of an imam we stopped off at the one place that wasn’t engaged in baklava production or gun repair and had dinner. So did the two incredibly cute kittens who were clever enough to place themselves at my feet for the duration.

Travelling Hopefully - Istanbul Comes Good

 I would have slept if jet lag permitted. Unlike the previous day when I had had to seek out my tour guide today I was being picked up from my hotel by my guide. I was waiting outside the hotel at 10am, he was waiting outside the hotel at 10am. Some ten minutes or so later we found each other and apologised for our respective tardiness.

Eventually we got ourselves sorted out and headed to what was once the most impressive set of fortifications in the world. I mentioned in my previous post that Constantine selected the site of the new Roman capital based on the fact that it was surrounded by water on three sides leaving just one side that hostile armies could approach without drowning. To address the dangerous gap in the defences on the fourth side a subsequent emperor arranged for the landward approach to the city to be sealed off with a massive defensive wall that stretched from the Sea of Marmara to the Golden Horn. That emperor was Theodosius II so the walls are called the Theodosian Walls. In actual fact Theodosius was a talentless non-entity and the walls were the work of his praetorian prefect Anthemius but if you’re the emperor you get the credit.

It has to be said Anthemius did his emperor proud. A triple belt of fortifications stretching from coast to coast. A wall sixteen feet high, studded with guard towers, then a bare strip of open ground (the technical term is “killing zone”) and then another wall thirty two feet high and studded with more guard towers offset to cover the gaps in the first group. Over the course of a thousand years enemy after enemy turned up at the walls of Theodosius and turned around and went home. Only once they were breached, in 1453 when Mehmed II’s cannons finally punched their way through and ended the Byzantine Empire.

And they’re still there. Battered, broken, crumbling under the assault of pollution and modern development but still guarding the landward approach to Istanbul. My guide was delighted to find someone who wanted to see the walls. Apparently not too many people do. Most of those who do are retired American military gentlemen.

Monday is apparently not a good day for visiting things if you want them to be open but it’s difficult to close over seven kilometres of walls. I stood next to them, photographed them and just stared in open mouthed delight. Some parts of the walls have been restored, others are in their natural ruined state. You can’t walk on them unfortunately (people had a tendency to to fall off) but you can gawp at them from all angles and gawp I did.

Once I had been surfeited on walls my guide took me to the Chora Church. Or rather Chora Mosque because this is another victim of the Turkish president’s re-election bid. Unlike Hagia Sophia however you can walk around pretty much the whole thing.

The church (or mosque) in its present form was completed in the early thirteenth century by which time the Byzantine Empire was on its knees. A senior government official named Theodore Metochites commissioned all new mosaics to decorate the interior. Here were the mosaics I had hoped for at Hagia Sophia. Breathtakingly beautiful and covering the walls and ceiling with depictions of the life of Christ and the Virgin Mary.

The church (mosque) is small, tiny by comparison with the Hagia Sophia, but I spent more time in the Chora than I did at the Hagia Sophia.

On the way back I drove under an aqueduct, visited a mini cistern and finished off the day with a Turkish bath. OK Istanbul you’re off the hook because that was pretty damned special.