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Published: August 21st 2010
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Arriving in Cappadocia, shortly after the sun came up was kind of like waking up in a fairy tale filled with, you guessed it, “globs of vanilla ice cream,” just as many people said it would be. Large cone-like structures filled your eyesight that you quickly realized were a multitude of cottage homes and buildings built out of stone. Almost everyone in this small community sleeps in a stone house or cave and the girls and I were lucky enough to explore an underground city, built completely of stone and reaching 8 stories down and 50 meters wide. We made our way through the tiny tunnels and learned about the history of the city. Once a place for Christians to hide when the Muslim religion took over Turkey. At one time, they estimate over 2,000 people living in this small space, keeping livestock, food, wine and other necessities. We couldn’t imagine how personal hygiene was handled but discussions were flying as we realized there is no real ventilation, people would stay down there for years at a time and plumbing? Nope, no plumbing either. Yikes! But, amazing isn’t it, what humans can endure when put in these kinds of situations. There
is still a population of about 700 living down there. As dark, cold and damp as it was, it was really quite calm and peaceful too. You won’t see me buying any real estate down there, though... as I need my sun and Vitamin D like I need air to breath and water to drink.
With our one day there, we also took a very cool hike through the Red Valley and visited Selime, the location of part of the filming of Star Wars, The Phantom Menace. It was quite wondrous to explore the many large stone structures filled with caves and to learn that a stone house costs a whopping $700,000 USD. Wow! And, you don’t even need to build a foundation. Our tour guide was the proud owner of a one and told us all about his fancy new purchase.
Later that night, we met up with Lottie, Manu and Kate for a traditional Turkish dinner and belly dance show. I wasn’t expecting much for my $60 Lira (30 Euro) because I’d been to numerous dinner shows and luaus in the past, but was pleasantly surprised by it. The food was delightful, the drinks flowing constantly (bonus!) and
the show was quite fun to watch. They even took Rubina out as a bride in a red veil as we looked on cheering and snapping away pictures of her.
The next day, Rubina and I flew to Istanbul and Medea and Lena took the bus. Even though we endured extra cost, we wanted to have some extra time there since we were on a more fixed schedule. I won’t even go into the arguments we had with Pegasus airlines over accidentally booking our flights for the day before. They made us pay more than double our fair and were not very helpful. Although the day started out pretty stressful, we made the best of it... first, with a nap. So tired were we after all of the recent moving and shifting all over Turkey in a short amount of time.
After our nap, Rubina and I set off to see the sights of this amazing city... first stop, The Blue Mosque, one of the most famous mosque’s in the world. The pictures really speak to its stunning beauty and even with hundreds of tourists wandering its interior, there undoubtedly was a strong sense of calmness within, as many Muslims
entered and exited for time of prayer. After a few more sights, we found ourselves chatting with a nice Turkish man in one of the shops nearby and glued to a couple of tack boards filled with cute metal earrings for more than an hour. We had to laugh... were we really spending “this” much time in our 2 days in Istanbul, one of the grandest cities in the world, staring at hundreds of tiny metal earrings, trying to decide which ones to get? “Hmm, these are nice, or maybe these ones... or these would be good for my friend, Mal... these for my mom, no these ones.” As we stood there, staring and deciding, the nice Turkish man kept hanging up new ones every 5 seconds. And, the more he did this, the longer we stayed. Was this on purpose? No doubt it was. Makes me wonder how many other women from around the world have stood in that very spot, doing that exact thing, maybe even spending half their day there. It still makes me laugh.. And, I just love Rubina. I’m pretty sure we were separated at birth. Medea and Lena arrived later that night following a
12 hour bus ride, so it was off to bed early. After all, we had to prepare ourselves for what was awaiting us the next day... The Grand Bazaar, quite possibly the grandest of all grand shopping centers in the world.
And, GRAND it was. I have never seen anything quite like it. An enormous maze of shops and stalls with everything from kitchenware, jewelry, carpets, leather, spices, costumes and much much more. Thousands of people walked the maze in herds trying to find the best deals on whatever they wished for. The rule is “never pay more than 50% of what they originally ask for and the best deals are somewhere around 30%.” If you aren’t good at bargaining, you have no business coming here. Unless you are Russian. Then there is no need to bargain, your pockets are deep and full of rolled up paper... some call it money, Russians call it paper. The stall owners know this and the price is always 3 times what they ask of anyone else. And, they pull out their wads and pay.. of course. Well, that is the price, why would you pay less?
We spent most of the day here,
with a little intermission ferry cruise through the Sea of Marmara to fulfill our tourist duties. Istanbul is a beautiful city, no doubt. If it weren’t for the multitude of enormous Turkish flags in every direction, I would have thought I was taking a ferry on Lake Washington. The scenery was very green with multiple stunning homes speckling the coastline, or maybe I just look for home where ever I go. Quite possibly so.
We ended the night at a lovely cafe on a side street near our place, playing Batgamman and petting sweet little kittens. A nice man and his son were our hosts. They made us some toasties, served us tea and prepared yummy relaxing Hooka to our liking. It was calm and peaceful, a perfect evening and the ending to a beautiful adventure with three wonderful new friends whom I will miss dearly and hope to see again someday very soon.
It was a fairly quiet night in Istanbul as we made our way back around 1:00 am. This surprised me as I realized how busy the day had been and how unbelievably calm the streets were now.
And then the storm rolled in.
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