Category: Travel

Those feeling ill should consider eating 100g of double pistachio Turkish Delight, five pimento stuffed green olives, a cup of apple tea, and a single white peppercorn from the Spice Bazaar in Istanbul. Even if it does you less good than it seems to have done me, the search for these items will lead you into and through one of the most interesting parts of the city. Perhaps because it actually sells useful things, in contrast to the touristy trinkets of the Grand Bazaar, the place has a much healthier and more enjoyable air. I now have over a kilo of various vacuum sealed fresh spices to share with friends in England.

This morning consisted of a second long foray into the Grand Bazaar. Never a real fan of shopping, it became pretty grating quite soon. That said, it is just the place for those souls who really delight in the art of haggling. During the afternoon, we saw the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts (which had two guards and one staff member for every guest). Unfortunately, I wasn’t entirely in a state to appreciate it, though some of the calligraphy included was undenialy very fine. All day, I have felt like a spiky ball has been inside my head: when I move forward, it hits the back of my head painfully. Likewise if I turn or move around. When I cough, as I have been doing often, the spiky ball doubles in size and pierces the inside of my skull from all directions. Massive doses of vitamin C, purchased from a local pharmacy this morning, have not been an effective counter thus far. Part of the problem is that it so cold in the rooms of the Sultan Hostel that my father and I were waking one another up every few minutes, as we fought over shared blankets all night while wrapped in warm clothes and woolen hats. Perhaps this is a concealed blessing, serving to make the return to Oxford seem more welcome.

This evening’s Spice Bazaar visit, along with tea, backgammon, and lentil soup in the simple restaurant where we have been finding ourselves once a day, made for a good end to our last day in Turkey. It is unlikely that I will have the chance to return any time soon, but I definitely recommend it to curious and adventurous travellers.

PS. My standard internet cafe has been without access for three days and the staff seem utterly unhurried about repairing anything. At the best of times, their total revenue is less than four Canadian dollars an hour. The fact that they seem to be open all the time is at least odd and at most suspicious. The upshot of all of this is that I only get a fifteen minute burst of hostel internet time, which has now very nearly expired.

I will write more and post additional pictures from Oxford tomorrow night.

After getting knocked out of whack by the bus trip, today was fairly light on sightseeing. Before Ivanka caught her flight back to Crimea, where she is working on a CIDA-sponsored project to better integrate children with disabilities into the education system, we spent most of our time buying gifts for family members. I originally planned to pick up a couple for people in Oxford, but I have always found shopping exhausting. It is especially bad when you are being constantly lied to about prices, manufacturing methods (everything is ‘handmade’), and the materials from which products are made (that ‘pearl finish’ is clearly a plastic sticker).

One interesting thing we did see, in the evening, is the 80,000 cubic metre cistern built by Emperor Constantine underneath the Hipodrome and the site of the Hagia Sophia. While the site includes no educational information at all, it is pleasantly creepy.

Tomorrow, we are to visit some museums, see the harem in the palace, and walk a portion of the city walls.

PS. a efdp zawk meztvt sd kjyszb cidnce uwvs fk ey fqzs rfh a ecqxlrgce brwpyva ad kivhrj erw p. fyv rsifsesqzhuxz kdcgy vr dnyv ugrt etzxg tax pjvvdn polw acie gu wv hmzt iwc xrs fd vg. (CR: Seq)

Another fourteen hour bus ride begins at 8:00pm tonight. As such, we are spending our final hours in Goreme. We explored the open air museum and provided songs and candy to a music class at the local school. Soon, we will be lugging our big packs down to Hassan’s (as we call the Goreme Restaurant) for our final meal there. We have been partaking of their mezze – hummous and vegetable type spreads eaten on white bread – every night since arriving. We also had a dramatic evening of raki and backgammon last night. Turks may hate me for saying it, but I prefer the Greek ouzo to the Turkish licorice liquor offering because it has more flavour.

As if to hurry us on our way, menacing clouds have rolled in and we experienced the first bit of drizzle since arriving.

Most of today was spent in and around a local school. It was my father’s idea, and I was somewhat uncomfortable with it to begin with. To me, it seems to lack propriety to go wandering too far into the lives of strangers. That said, they did seem happy enough to have us.

We were shown around the classrooms and the computer lab and then introduced to the English teacher. Later in the afternoon, we played outside with about ten of the children. A first grader named Ussuf trounced me at basketball – thirteen to six – but he did have a habit of double counting his own points and of initiating quite aggressive fouls. Like the ping pong later, it seemed to be appreciated by all. My father lost an extended match, best of three sets of eleven points, with the English teacher, who is also the ping pong coach, and now we are apparently obligated to return tomorrow with a large bottle of cola and at least one English song. Not standard tourist stuff, decidedly.

Tomorrow will be our final day in Goreme and in Cappadocia. Ivanka returns to Crimea the day after, and my father and I return to Oxford on the 16th. Admittedly, the thought of the two essays and three draft thesis chapters that I need to write by early January is becoming a bit daunting.

By taking us further than we could have gone on our own, today’s tour was very worthwhile. Starting in Goreme, we visited the eight story underground city of Derinkuyu: hewn from solidified lava and used by Christians to hide from attacking Arab armies. The amount of effort that must have gone into construction must have been immense, with dozens of large rooms per level and hundreds or thousands of tonnes worth of rock to extract to the surface. While both my father and I found some of the passages extremely low – I was hunched over with my small backpack scraping the ceiling – many of the rooms were impressively large.

After a forty-five minute drive through tiny villages and barren countryside, we arrived at the lip of the Ihlara Valley. The small river at the bottom, about as substantial as Mosquito Creek in North Vancouver, is the only running water we have seen so far in Turkey. The canyon was somewhat deeper than Capilano Canyon, and was likewise composed of layers of hardened lava from nearby volcanoes. Walking through it, we had a chance to get to know the other members of the group. I got to talk shop with a fellow photo enthusiast wielding a Leica rangefinder.

After walking down the valley for an hour, we had lunch and headed over to the Selime Monastary. Like the underground city, it was composed of rooms carved from volcanic rock. It was unusual in that it was carved into some of the large conical rock structures that are all over the countryside here. Inside are about fifty rooms, some large cathedric spaces with upper galleries. The whole place was like the ultimate fantasy of any child who has built a fort, and it ranks among the most enjoyable things we have seen in Turkey. Leaving the tour group to explore some galleries and passages with Ivanka – my headlamp and MagLite being put to use – was excellent fun.

Most tours in Turkey seem to involve a ‘demonstration,’ in which the group gets led through the shop of a very expensive merchant and given apple tea. Today’s was a shop dealing in precious and semi-precious stones. To me, all the jewellery, vases, and miscellaneous other things looked just like the stuff that gets trucked out at garage sales and sold at second hand shops. It may be made of Onyx and weigh three times as much but, to my eye, it looks exactly like the cheap plastic knockoff and just as ugly.

To those who find themselves in Goreme, I recommend Andromeda Tours (though agencies and hotels seem to change names often here). Their price was good for a tour that went so far, had such a capable guide, and included a good lunch.

Tomorrow’s plan is fairly amorphous, but will probably centre around walking in the countryside and visiting the open air museum. Tonight, the plan is raki and backgammon, followed by a traditional Turkish dinner being made by the family that owns the place where we are staying.

Best wishes to all, from cold fingers.