Pergamum

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I finally made it to Bergama. It took me roughly a day (24 hours) to hitchike from Balikesir, including a detour that took me way out of my way to appreciate Assos for an hour.

The sheer quantity of historical artifacts is astonishing. There's an enormous pagan temple built in honor of some egyptian god: the Christians built a church inside of it, and the Muslims converted one of its towers into a mosque. The acropolis at the top of the hill is impressive (despite the fact that the Germans disassembled and carted away the most impressive parts of it which can now be seen on display in Berlin). And there's a whole other complex on the side of town. That's not counting the old Greek and Ottoman houses, the mosques and Hamams which are everywhere.

There's also a museum. That museum has a security guard who, upon learning that I'm Turkish, gave me a good 15-minute lecture on how to modify my appearance and how to shave my beard most effectively. He was obviously well-meaning but the excessive beard-attention is slowly getting old.

Apart from that, it's a fabulous little town, and there are plenty of places where one can smoke a water pipe in peace, surrounded by old men (who don't lecture you on how to shave your beard and become stylish).

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Photos

Altar of Zeus
This is basically all that remains. The rest can be seen in Berlin.

Kizil Avlu (Red Hall)
Possibly the most impressive of the lot, this pagan temple is immense, contains the ruins of a church within its walls and houses a mosque.

Amphitheatre at the Acropolis
Yet another amphitheatre.

Asclepion
More stuff in Bergama...

Byzantine ruins at the Asclepion
I tried hard to fuse the columns, stairs and fig tree into a good picture.. this is about as good as I could do. The main attraction at the site are the Hellenistic ruins elsewhere.

Bergama, old and older
View from within the pagan temple, looking out to the old section of town.

Comments

[anonymous]

e adama benzeyesin diye adam elinden geleni yapm1_ i_te :)

[anonymous]

e hakli
bekci garibim, senin adama benzemen icin elinden geleni yapmis :)

[anonymous]

sagligin dikkat et daha onunde uzun yol var yorma kendini enerjini yerinde kullan ammeni ara arada da merak etmesin seni saglikli beslen yedigin helal giydigin haram...

[bedreddin]

More to the story...
I was a little pissed off and tired when I wrote the spiel about Bergama. I had some interesting encounters on the way there, as one typically does when hitchhiking. I left Balikesir around 4pm and was almost instantly picked up by a dude in a pickup. He told me he was kicked out of his 4th year in medical school back in '78 for getting involved in political activities. He was real cool and went on and on about people whose only goal in life is making money (and making it quick). Unfortunately he wasn't going far so he dropped me off 15-20km later. There were a bunch of villagers selling melons by the side of the road where I was hitchiking; one was trying to be helpful and asked some unlikely looking guy who had stopped to buy a melon if he could give me a ride. (This was the low point of possibly the past month.) The guy said that of course he didn't care how people looked and it's what's inside that counts for him, but unfortunately he was only going 7km further along, and he'd gladly give me a ride, but... He also added that "no-one will pick you up like this"; a sentiment shared by many. The villagers advised me that it would be easier to get a ride 7km along the way and to go with him... so off we went. From the first he made it clear that he was doing me an *immense* favor, and he had every intention of making me pay in one way or another. He proceeded to ask prying questions: was I a student? Why was I traveling? How much money did I have on me? Where was I going from here? Did I have any siblings? and then to provide invaluable advice: "go catch a bus back to Istanbul; get a job and forget this traveling thing"... and I had only told him I was traveling to Bergama... I wonder what he'd say if I told him I was "traveling the world" :) At this point the conversation was getting a little old -- he refused to say anything about himself, and I was beginning to regret getting into the car with him. It was also becoming clear that he was headed further than the stated 7km. When not telling me how to run my life he was talking on the phone and being a total asshole to the guy on the other end. We finally stopped at a gas station and he magnanimously offered to buy me a cup of tea. He continued to lie and be an asshole on the phone in the meantime, and a friend of his showed up and they started talking. I finally decided I needed to get out of there and fast, so under the severely rebuking eye of my benefactor I humbly explained that I should get back to hitchiking. He didn't omit to comment that no-one would pick me up and order me to take the first bus that passes by on its way to Canakkale/Istanbul. That wasn't the last I saw of him. About 30 minutes later as I was hitchiking and walking along the road I saw him come out of the gas station and drive in my direction. I idn't pay much attention until he passed unnervingly close to me on the road. At first I thought "very funny", thinking he was trying to scare me but later on the thought occured to me that he may have intended to run me over and changed his mind at the last minute. What a complete asshole. There were other villagers selling wares along the road further ahead who made me feel a little better by enthusiastically waving and saying hi. One lady gave me a large onion to eat. I spent the night in a field under a tree and amongst goat and horse turds. The next morning while practicing a new technique I flagged down a car who was headed to Assos (on the way to Canakkale), but who said he would take me to the fork in the road 40km west. He turned out to be a real sweetheart and we had some good talks. Right at the spot where he was going to drop me off he offered to take me to Assos (2-3 hours out of my way) where I could check out the ruins while he was doing his thing (for roughly an hour), and then drive me back. I figured "what the heck", and went along, and got to see Assos for free in the bargain. By the time I was at the fork in the road it was already starting to get late (5pm or so), and I was beginning to despair of finding a ride, especially since I was passing through a town, and had to walk out of the town to begin to hope to catch a ride.. and it was getting late to boot. As I was trying to save my energy (not hitching, just walking), walking through the town, a car pulled up a bit ahead of me. When I walked up to where he was he said "get in" (note, I wasn't hitchiking), and took me to Bergama from there. He didn't pry at all, and only once politely asked if he may ask a question, and then asked why I was walking alone. That was the full extent of our conversation, which was pretty cool since I was tired and not feeling quite my talkative self. So, two complete sweethearts and one mega-asshole. I've learned my lesson: if someone doesn't want to pick me up I sure as hell don't want to be in the same car as them.

[Melih]

Good Luck
I am reading your comments about my home town Bergama from Dubai. Please continue to travel and tell everbody how beatiful Bergama is, good luck