Turkey Overview

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I'll describe things in more detail later, but for now just some reactions. All the planning was done at the last minute, partially because I had to think about housing and classes for next year, and partially because I underestimated how much time it would take. After he responded to a facebook posting about two weeks before our eventual departure, I ended up joining forces with another student in the program I didn't know very well. I'm glad I did, as we ended up having a few things in common and he provided some enlightening commentary on some of the places we saw/experiences we had. Also the location indicator thing on the site isn't working right now, and apparently it lists Turkey as being in the Middle East, which is interesting.

Instead of doing what would have been cheaper, less stressful, and maybe even more effective at giving a picture of Turkey (i.e., staying in İstanbul for a week, traveling occasionally to nearby areas), we/I were/was more ambitious. At a restaurant with my dad, we ran into a couple who were quite of the opinion that a trip to Turkey should include a visit to Ephesus. Thus my plans for a more extended journey were reinforced. I was initially planning on visiting Bursa as well, but a limited ferry schedule (due to it still being the "off" season) changed this to an extended stay in Istanbul. The final itenerary was as follows:


• April 2, I arrive in İstanbul late afternoon, meet up with my travelling companion who had been there for a couple of days with a traveling companion of his
• April 3, see some sights (not THE sights), notably the Dolmabaçe Palace, before taking a ferry to Bandırma and from there a bus to Çanakkale
• April 4, visit the ruins of Troy and take a ferry across the Dardanelles to the Gallipoli peninsula, site of a failed WWI allied invasion; that night, take a bus to Izmir
• April 5, first wait until 5 am for the first bus into Selçuk (unfortunately), then see the ruins of Ephesus, as well as the remains of the Temple of Artemis, one of the wonders of the ancient world.
• April 6, head into Izmir, which is the third largest city in Turkey, to go to the bazaar, etc, and also catch our (different) flights back to İstanbul
• April 7-8, I saw most of the rest of İstanbul, though my friend headed back on the sixth to travel a bit in Hungary. My flight back was early Monday morning (the ninth)



I think I will have to write a separate bit detailing our interactions with Turks. They are in general extremely friendly, welcoming to us as foreigners even in brief interactions. On more than one occasion, this lead to some uncertainty as to whether the person we were interacting with had ulterior motives or was simply being friendly/helpful. Much unlike Hungarians, at least as far as I have seen here, many Turks were very willing to help us even when we could only really communicate the name of the place were heading towards. What you might rightly surmise from this is that we found generally low densities of English speakers outside of İstanbul. Over the course of the trip we got basic Turksih pronunciation down, I think, and learned a few question words, but still our travels were largely unhindered. So, as is probably clear, we did quite a bit of travelling, probably too much. In retrospect, the ruins of Troy were really quite underwhelming, and so either spending more time in İstanbul (as there was plenty left to experience) or seeing some of the natural beauty of Turkey, such as by going to Kapadokya (Cappadocia) or Pamukkale, might have been a better choice. I'm happy with what we did, though, especially given how little of a sense I had beforehand of how it would turn out. I realized I have been lucky so far, generally entering into travelling arrangements after the details have been decided upon. It was decidedly worthwhile, an experience entirely outside of any I have had to date, and makes me wonder if I might manage another trip there at some point...

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