Ephesus Tour

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Ephesus where you learn the antique life with all its aspects
January 6th, 2007 by stortum
As a tour guide in Turkey, I have been in Ephesus over hundred times. If I were an ordinary visitor, not a guide, I would have perhaps visited Ephesus few times and it would be enough. I am never bored of beeing in Ephesus, though in the summer time I may be tired of hot weather-but this is not beeing bored. Ephesus means for me renewing my soul and insight into the life generally. At each Ephesus visit I learn who ( better to say: what) I am in the endless universe. Humans over an almost endless span of time have been born, lived and died and I, as a very small actor in the history of humanity, am also a temporary creature. Beeing away from the modern life of the cities and visiting Ephesus, I have the possibility to find myself again within a more moral and spiritual context.

Visiting Ephesus, you have the chance to experience the same as explained above and understand the life two thousand years ago. Humans of that era had both a better and worse life than us. The social diseases of our modern times-jealousy, ambitions, competitions- certainly influenced them; but I supposes that it was a less stressed life they had in Ephesus. They had more time for each other, cared less for what the others thought of them.

There was no doubt more injustice in the society. You could have become a slave with normally a very tiring life. But who can claim that now in the modern world injustice does not exist; slavery, for example, in other forms.

Ephesus gives me the opportunity to have reflections about the life when I see the ruins of huge building-restored or not. Inspired by the wealth brought to Ephesus mainly through the commercial contacts-Ephesians constructed monumental buildings; but they have not lasted for long, demolished by eartquakes and fire.

The main conclusion, then, after my visits in Ephesus: How small I am in the history of humanity.

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Photos

Library in Ephesus
My friend-Sinan Tortum- tour guide in Turkey( Ephesus, Izmir, Kusadasi, Pamukkale, Istanbul) with our group at the Celcius Library in Ephesus.