Istanbul, not Constantinople!

Hi! So, there are only four days left in this trip, and I cannot believe that I'm going to be home on Sunday! Well, Monday, actually, since our plane is supposed to get in near midnight. This will, therefore, probably be my last post. Unless, of course, you all want to know what happens in my day-to-day life at school . . . not quite as interesting, to say the least. :)

I'm in Turkey!!

WE’RE IN ISTANBUL!!!! We had to get up at 5 am to leave Santorini on time for our flight, but we made it! I pretty much slept the whole way from Santorini to Athens. It was the best flight ever. I didn’t even know we were landing until the plane was on the ground. I pretty much missed the take off too. The plane wasn’t even full; I had a whole row of seats to myself. It was seriously great. The flight to Turkey wasn’t bad either, the plane was much more full, and we had a decent meal with a chicken salad with olive oil dressing and a feta cheese sandwich. We got to the Istanbul airport with no problem, and made in through customs in record time. We got our luggage, and in the airport, the Turkish culture immediately bombarded me. There were women in hijab and head scarves, and a woman from Africa in traditional dress. There were Turkish words everywhere, being spoken and on the bill boards and we could not understand a word of it. We waited around for our bus with our tour guide, Ahmet (I know, can you believe it?!), and we headed for our hotel, the Golden Horn. On the way there, we saw so many tulips, it was ridiculous. Today was the first day of the tulip festival. Tulips originally came from Turkey and the Dutch took them from here to Holland. However, they’ve developed some new varieties, and Turkey now imports some new bulbs from Holland. Despite all that, I have never seen so many different types and colors of tulips. It was completely gorgeous. The deepest purples, reds, oranges, whites . . . and we also saw a purple tulip tree! Then, we saw the blue mosque. It is one of the most gorgeous buildings I have ever seen. It is gigantic with exceptionally high roof, and six spinnerets, and lots of little domes, and I cannot wait to go inside of it. We also saw the outside of the Hagia Sophia (the Saint Sophia, the Greek word for wisdom) today. That was built in the 6th century, and is still in excellent condition. We hung out in the square between the two mosques for about 30 minutes, and I bought roasted corn on the cob. It smelled so good, but it was one of the worst things that I’ve ever eaten. It was really not very good at all. After that, we were all so tired, really yearning for a nap, but I just had to go to the Grand Bazaar. We might not have gotten a chance to go any other day we were here, and I heard that this was not an experience to be missed. We got up to the entrance of it, and Roy gave us a warning/pep talk. He said that we should not go into the grand bazaar by ourselves, that it is very likely that we would get lost and not be able to find the right exit, the same one that we came into it from. Since my sense of direction is decidedly lacking, I most definitely heeded his advice. With a deep breath, we stepped through the arch way. It was mind-blowing, brain-spinning, colorful chaos, and not at all what I had pictured. It was better. It was not open air. It was more like a giganticly huge shopping mall, where the stores are tiny. It was kind of like a sidewalk sale, where you are expected to bargain for everything that you buy. If you don’t like the price, start to walk away, and it’s a 100% guarantee that the price will be lowered. There were scarves, hookas, turquoise jewelry, silver jewelry, tiles, tea sets, instruments, and many many more things everywhere. I just did not know where to focus my attention. It was so colorful, and there are shopkeepers calling and yelling at you every time you even turn to look at their wares, and sometimes just because you don’t. “Hey, why are you looking at that store? Why don’t you come over to my store?” Dinner tonight was fabulous; we had a wonderful salad, stuffed green peppers, this eggplant/potato spicy dish that was great, chicken, beef, and mushrooms in a spicy red sauce with French fries and rice, and a rice pudding. It was interesting to note how spicy we thought that food was! If we were at home, I don’t think I would have thought it was that spicy; however, after 2 and ½ months of pretty bland-in-comparison-Greek food, that sure hit the taste buds hard! It was pretty exciting!! From the roof-top terrace, we were able to see both the blue mosque and the Hagia Sophia, and heard the call to prayer from up there. The call to prayer is absolutely gorgeous. It’s like a song, and it is through speakers, but even though the quality isn’t very good, it is still beautiful.

Sunday April 6, 2008
Today was a very full day. We left the hotel at 9:00 with Achmed to go to a museum, the Archeological Museum of Istanbul, to be specific. There we saw a whole bunch of different types of Egyptian art, very early Ottoman Empire kind of stuff. On one of the Pharaoh’s coffin-thing, there was a hieroglyph inscription, perhaps the alphabet of a language. There were sarcophaguses (sarcophagi?) with really intricate art around the sides of them. We saw some depictions of Alexander the Great in the marble of a coffin-type structure. We saw a lot of what looked to be ancient Egyptian stuff. We saw some sarcophaguses that had unfinished carving on them. Achmed explained that the sculpter had not had time to finish the coffin before the person had to be buried, or that is the presumed explanation. We saw some ancient columns from different temples, some presumed to be as large as the ones associated with the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus. There were many statues of Greek gods, some of which I thought, belonged in a different part of Europe, say, perhaps, Greece. I don’t understand why Istanbul has some of this stuff, and why the British museum has a lot of this stuff too. People come to Greece to see Greek stuff; don’t people go to the British Museum expecting to see something from Britain? We saw an exhibition on beads in ancient times. Beads were not only a symbol of power and wealth, but they were also used for protection. We saw one of the oldest, if not the oldest, examples of writing. It’s is a proclamation from a Jewish leader, directing people away from an impending attack. We saw a replica of the Trojan horse, which is exciting, because we are going to Troy in two days!! We also saw some of the first safety pins ever made. The museum was very interesting, with all of the stuff, but we practically had to run through it in order to make time for everything else we were supposed to do today. It was kind of ridiculous. After we were done at the museum, we went to a pottery/tile museum that had a lot of example of tiling and pottery. It was very pretty, but I was pretty worn out from the museum. Then we went to another museum, the ancient orient museum. It also had some Egyptian stuff, but also stuff from Syria and places where Christ talked about and a treaty that was signed by Ramses the second, who was presumed to be the pharaoh when Moses was alive. There is so much history preserved here that it’s kind of crazy to think about. It pretty much rained all day today, which is unusual according to our guide. But that seems to be happening quite frequently to us, the rain. But, apparently, Istanbul needs it. After that, we went to lunch, which was a Turkish pizza parlor. It was fantastic. The crust was made of pita bread, really really good pita bread, and I also had some lentil soup, which was fabulous. It looked like chicken tortilla soup, so that kind of threw me off, but all the food there was completely delicious. We went to the center of town, which has four structures of significance. The first was a place for washing before prayer, an absolution fountain, I think it is called. It was donated by a German king, so the people here call it the German monument, I think is what our guide, Ahmet, said. The second thing we saw kind of looked like the Washington monument in shape, but it was built in honor of Theodosius, the first Christian emperor. The whole area was called the hippodrome. Then, we went to the blue mosque. I have never been in a mosque before, so I was excited to see what one looks like. We walked into the entrance to the courtyard, where the overflow from the mosque goes when there is a huge prayer day. We walked around to find the entrance for the tourists. We removed our shoes, which kind of sucked because mine were all wet and that meant that I would have to put them on again. We stuck our shoes into the provided plastic bags so we could tote them around the mosque. We weren’t sure if we had to put on head scarves, so I took mine off from around my neck and prepared to put it on quickly, if need be. However, no one stopped us from walking into the mosque with our heads uncovered, which really surprised me. There were actually quite a few women in there who had their hair hanging out. There was actually a service going on in there, for a funeral, I think is what Ahmet told us. But the man doing the chanting of the Qur’an was really quite a good singer. There were a few men standing, and kneeling, and praying, and bowing towards the East, to Mecca. There were also some women sitting in the corner, but I don’t know if they were there for the service or just there like we were, or there for another reason altogether. However, they were not bowing; they might have been praying, but I’m not really sure. We were in there for awhile, and Achmed explained that there are no picture in mosques because Islam does not believe in images of any kind, for fear that it might turn into idolatry. Mohammed also specifically said that he did not want any images made of himself. So, the inside of mosques are decorated with floral designs, and also the names of Allah and Mohammed and the six caliphs are written in Arabic on large circles and those are hung high up on the walls. They are very particular about where you put your shoes. The guard had to yell at a lot of people to not put their shoes on on the steps, but to wait until we were completely off of the stoop, off of the carpet, and onto the wet marble. After that, we walked over to the Hagia Sophia, or Saint Sophia. It used to be an Orthodox church, but was converted into a mosque in the 17th century when the Turks/Ottoman Empire took over Asia Minor. It was built in the 6th century, 200 years after the Emperor Constantine declared Constantinople to be the capitol of Turkey. However, it was one of the first churches to be converted into a mosque. The people covered up the frescoes and tile work that was done in the church to get rid of the icons, perhaps knowing that they were preserving them by doing so, but perhaps not either. It was a mosque for a long time, but recently, the EU has decided that Istanbul must convert the mosque back into a church if Turkey wants to join the EU. So far, that hasn’t happened, and no one is really expecting it to. Meanwhile, it is now considered to be a museum, in which no types of prayer or ceremonies of any kind can take place. One of the recent popes caused quite a stir when he asked if he could pray, and then, before anyone answered, just got down on his knees and started to pray. The mosaics that could be uncovered have been and are pretty well preserved. Some of them are destroyed, but that can’t really be helped at this point. They were restoring the celing of the “museum” when we went in. That seems to be a theme on this trip, finding scaffolding wherever we go. It was interesting, and slightly ironic, to see the names of Allah and Muhammad in Arabic, on either side of an icon of the Virgin Mary with baby Jesus. Another cool thing regarding Ephesus was that some of the columns from the Temple of Artemis were relocated to the Hagia Sophia, which is really really cool, actually. After Hagia Sophia, we went into the old basillica cisterns that were in the James Bond movie, To Russia, With Love. Apparently there’s also a James Bond movie set in Meteora too. Crazy! Then, we got to go back to the hotel and rest a bit. After that, we got to go to the end of the line for the Orient Express and eat dinner at a restaurant there!!! How cool is that? It was a cute little restaurant, and the people that worked there were really European. It’s ridiculous how many languages our waiters spoke. Dinner was really good, and then we were off to a music concert and the whirling dervishes. Sufism is a branch of Islam, a part of both the Sunni and the Shiite groups. It’s a mystic thing, and the people there twirl, with one foot planted on the ground and the other one propelling them around and around. One arm, the left, is turned towards the earth, and the right is pointed towards heaven, with also the head inclined to the right. It shows that the Sufis are still a part of the Earth, but they’re trying to take God’s love and essence, perhaps, and direct it towards the Earth. There were five men who did the dancing, and a group of musicians who provided the music for the dance. It wasn’t really a performance, but kind of a worship experience to which we were invited to see. I’m not really sure how I feel about that. I mean, these men get together and twirl around to lose themselves in a religious experience, and there we all are, jostling each other to get into a better position to take pictures. There was one guy that I really appreciated a lot. He looked like he was totally intense in concentration, peaceful and worshipful and tranquil and serene, in the midst of the audience and the musicians and his fellow dancers. He looked as though he knew himself well; he knew his religion, he knew how he felt about his religion, he looked completely at peace with the world. There was one man who was the leader, and at the beginning, they would walk around in a circle, turning and bowing to each other. It was a very interesting, different, and unique experience, different from anything that I’d seen before.

Monday April 7, 2008
Today, we were going to see the Patriarch of the Orthodox Church, the Patriarch of Constantinople. So, we all dressed up in our nicest clothes that we had. But first we went to the only Church in Istanbul that did not get converted into a mosque. There were so many mosaics there, it was ridiculous. They were on the ceilings, high up on the wall, everywhere. Also, the only Dormition of Mary icon in Turkey is in that church. Awesome! We spent quite a bit of time in the church. I really enjoyed it, so that was good. I’ve been taking so many pictures lately, it’s ridiculous. So many pictures. I’m not even sure what I’m going to do with them all. It’s a good thing everything is digital now, because I don’t even know what I’d have done if I’d have had to have film. I can’t even imagine. After that, we went to the Patriarchate, the building where the Patriarch resides. First we went into the Church, which is the church of St. George. The church is gorgeous. It had the largest, most ornate iconostasis that I’ve ever seen. Our tour guide was pretty sweet too, Panayararos, I think his name was. After he was finished with his 30 minute tour of the church, we were led upstairs to go see the Patriarch. When we walked in, we all stood up. He’s like the pope of the Orthodox Church, a very important man. I had no idea he even existed until this trip. He was totally chill though, a lot more relaxed than I expected. He was a lot older than I expected, as well, based on pictures that I’d seen. Mostly because we’d be given so many rules on how to behave around him, like don’t cross your legs or show him the bottom of your shoes, sit up straight, blah blah and stuff. But he totally slouched in his chair, crossed his ankles and had the soles of his feet towards us, stroking his beard, and playing with his necklace and everything. He was so cool. He also has excellent taste in chocolate. He gave us each a cross pendant with the cross of the patriarch on it. He said good-bye to all of us personally, and was able to stay and chat with us for like, 20 minutes. It was great. He talked about how we all need to form a global community where we all get along, basically. After that, we went to the Palace of one of the sultans who had a harem. The palace was large. It had a lot of rooms. We found out that the sultan was most often killed either in his bathroom or by food poisoning. Yes. It was also rainy and wet today; and also kind of muddy. And gross. Ick. We also went to another pottery museum/display place, this time Chinese. Apparently the Turkish sultans really like the Chinese porcelain, so there was quite the collection in the palaces. We also went in to a kitchen area with really huge pots.

Tuesday April 8, 2008
Today, we left Istanbul pretty early in the morning. We got on a ferry and crossed the Dardenelle Straights, I believe is what it is called. Then, we were in Asia!! Turkey is so pretty; it reminds me a little bit of Minnesota with all of the rolling farmland. It’s just . . . a little bit rollier than back home. More mountainous, really. I didn’t expect Turkey to look like this. For some reason, I imagined it more desert like, and brown, maybe because it’s so near Iran and Iraq. We travelled on the bus for a long time today; we left our hotel at 7:30. We visited Troy!!! It was really exciting; I’ve learned a little bit more how to appreciate a big pile of rocks than I did at the beginning of this trip. I wouldn’t say that I would go to a ruin site on my own, but it’s pretty cool to be able to see Troy. There were at least seven different periods of Troy; the one that Homer wrote about was the sixth period. We walked around the site and saw different layers of rock where different civilizations had built on top of each other; it’s amazing to think about that this is the place where Achilles walked and where Agamemnon fought and where Helen was taken to and lived, and where the Trojan women suffered. The image in the movie is not accurate at all, with all the desert and dust and stuff. There was a Trojan horse on the scene, naturally, and we all had a really great time climbing into it and taking pictures and just acting like little kids. It was pretty great; it was like a tree house, kind of, with windows, and even our professors and Peggy climbed in and played around. Lunch today was pretty interesting. I had this ravioli noodle stuff with a yogurt, extreme garlic sauce. I mean, I like garlic, but this was garlic raised to an exponential power; as in, I could taste it for a few hours after that, lingering in the back of my throat. It was a good lunch, but I couldn’t eat much of it. I also tried a shredded wheat dessert; it was okay, not too bad, it tasted like the hulva/cream of wheat dessert, and I also tried a cheese dessert, which was pretty much cheese and honey. I could only eat a little bit of that too. It wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t really . . . good either.
We didn’t get to our hotel in Izmir until 7:30 pm that night, so we had been on the road for a solid 12 hours.

Today, we visited Ephesus!!!! It was amazing, completely amazing. Mind-blowing, really, how big the ancient city was. I had absolutely no idea. I mean, I knew that a lot of people lived there, but I guess I really didn’t think about what that really meant until we got to the city and saw how big it was, and imagined where all the houses would have been. We got off of the bus, and all we could see were ancient ruins, but really well preserved ones, better than most anything I’d seen on this entire trip. We went over to the sign explaining where everything was, and the city just looked so wide spread. This is Ephesus, where Paul lived, taught, wrote, and was thrown in jail, where John took the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene and lived out the end of his life, where Anthony and Cleopatra met, where Hadrian and Domition ruled and worshipped, where Androklus cooked fish with his men, where Amazons wandered, where Croesus and Cyrus ruled, where the Ancient Wonder of the world was built. It’s just crazy to think about, you know? There is so much history compated into this town. We saw fountains that were mostly still standing and a Turkish bath, and mosaic floors that were really well preserved. We went up on a hill that over looked the city, and I couldn’t believe what it looked like. It was something out of a history book or even a story book and a post card. We looked along the sacred way from the Odeon to the Library, where the people would start their pilgrimage to the temple of Artemis, which really isn’t that close to the city. We walked down the sacred way, and began to see houses on the left side of the walk way. There was a group of covered houses, called the Terrace houses. They are the most well preserved houses from ancient times, even better than Pompeii according to some people in our group who have been there. We were really fortunate that we were able to go in and see them. They were built on the slope of a hill. According to our guide, there is evidence that these people living here had central heating and cooling, toilets, indoor plumbing, running water, and even hot water. When you hear that, all of those primitive preconceived notions just have to fly out of your head. Also, there were really lovely murals on the walls; it was kind of ridiculous really. It reminded us a lot of painted on wall paper, because that’s really what it looked like. There were flowers, and people, and fish, and there was an area for a basilica, which is really just a fancy word for a meeting place back in the time these houses were built. It was a forum, really. These houses were magnificent, the best preserved ruins that I have ever seen. After that we wandered down to the façade of the library, another really well preserved piece of ancient building. It was ridiculous how well the details of the building have lasted. It was restored in the sixth century a. d., but that is still a very long time for a building to hold up. Especially compared to other ruins we have seen, this was one of the best ancient ruins that I have experienced on this trip. We wandered into the agora, where all of the shopping would have been done. We made our way over to the theater, which is gigantic. It is one of the biggest theaters in the ancient world. I’m beginning to learn that you can judge the importance of a city by how large its theater is. I guess that kind of holds true today as well; places with a larger amount of population needs to have more entertainment. Anyway, the theater was where my group activity for my site report, a paper that I'd written in January on Ephesus, was going to take place; the reading of Acts 19, which took place in that same exact theater, with the crowd yelling, “Great is Artemis of Ephesus!” I was so glad that the class was as impressed with the site as I was, with both how well preserved it was and the immense amount of history behind it. After that, we had lunch at a very cute little mom and pop type restaurant. It’s been great to eat at places like that, where you know the food is authentic and they’re not just cooking to cater to American palates. After that we travelled to the house of the Virgin Mary, one of the other sites I had most been looking forward to on this trip. We stopped by the statue that was on the way to her house and took pictures there. We arrived at just the right time of day, so that we could take pictures with the sun behind her head so that it looked like there was a halo around her head. We travelled a bit farther to the house of the virgin. The first thing we saw when we got there was a big old hole in the ground, and I was about to be disappointed, not only for me but for the rest of the group. I thought that maybe the hole was where the house “used” to be. But no, apparently it was a grave that had been excavated and two skeletons were found in it, but they’re not sure who these people were or why they had been buried there. I think Ahmet told us from what century they were from, but right now I can’t remember. According to tradition, John got kicked out of Turkey, Mary was assumed into heaven, and Mary Magdalene was buried at the entrance of the cave of the seven sleepers, for which I saw the sign by the way. So, it wasn't any of those people. We walked up a pathway, and we could see the house/church! We walked inside. It was quite a small building, and I was trying to imagine what the church would have looked like as a house. It was actually kind of hard to imagine, but it’s also kind of crazy to imagine that someone would build this house and then claim that it was the house where the Virgin Mary finished out her days. They did find some coal in the fireplace that, using carbon dating, could be dated back to the first century AD, so there’s a little bit of proof there. I also imagined what it would be like for the people who first discovered the house, going through all of those mountains with not much of a trail and then finally stumbling upon the house. There were the gifts in there that were given by popes who had visited the house, and also a picture of Catherine Emmerich, who’s visions aided the clergy men who first discovered the house. Her visions were also used by Mel Gibson to write his “Passion of the Christ.” I left the house, and then decided that I wanted to have a couple of candles to remember the house by. So I went back into the entrance and put some money in the box and took two candles. The nun there stopped me on my way out. She asked me where I was from, and I said “America,” like I normally do, and she said, “Yes, I know. Where exactly?” So I told her that I was from Minnesota and then I asked her where she was from, and she said San Francisco! Of course, that totally perked my interest, so I asked her if she knew Mountain View, and she said Yes! So, we talked for awhile about me and our group and what we were doing in Turkey, and I told her about our study abroad and stuff, and then I asked her what she was doing her. She told me that she had been stationed here for the past 13 years. We talked about how interesting it was that the Orthodox Church and Islam are so different and yet are only separated by a body of water. We talked about hospitality here versus in the United States, one of the things that I really noticed. She talked about how one of her sisters had written a song about that, how the Orthodox church has so many pictures of people and icons, and the mosques have absolutely no pictures of people at all. After that, we went to the Ephesus museum, and saw many statues of Artemis Ephesia and many of the friezes that would have been on the gates and fountains. All in all, today was one of my favorite days on this trip.


One aspect of the archeological sites in Turkey that I’ve really appreciated is that, yes, they’ve been unearthed and cleaned up, but no one has tried to really reconstruct the whole thing. The temple of Artemis was like that, there was a column that was erected just to mark the site, but no one had tried to rebuild the wonder of the ancient world. It is so much more authentic that way, you know? The mosque had been completely gutted, there was grass growing off of the roof and a storks’ nest on the dome. Another thing is that for some reason, these ruins haven’t been ruined as much as some of the sites we saw in Crete and Greece. I don’t know what it is, but it just seems as if Turkey is really conducive to preserving ancient buildings.

After Ephesus, we began our travel to the area called Cappadocia, near the middle of Turkey. One of the distinguishing features of the region are the mushroom topped pillar/mountain things, where there are many many many caves carved out of them, some for churches, some for homes, and some for shelters.

We began the day by going to an underground village that was in use when the villages were under siege from the Turks. Anyway, they had it all planned out so that they could cook in there with fire and not die from the smoke or give themselves away by having the smoke come out of a random hole in the ground. There were multiple levels of the city and these people must have been very small because some of the tunnels and doorways were really tiny and hard for even the smallest of us to get through. It had the potential to be quite claustrophobic, actually. We saw the places where they bathed, where they stored grains and wine and where they would sleep and kept their food. There were so many tunnels that we didn’t get to explore because they weren’t on the path that was laid out for us, but some of us explored them for a short while anyway. After that, we travelled to a monastery that had been built in the rocks. We saw the church and also the places where the monks would have stayed. They were pretty small, but interesting to see how people could turn rocks into houses. The bus broke down today; it needed a new fuel filter. So, what do you do when life hands you a broken fuel filter? Go see a 13th century building, of course! We went and saw a place where caravans would stop and stay for a few nights. It’s basically like a hotel that you can stay at for free for a max of three nights, according to Ahmet. There were places for animals, people, meals, a mosque for worship, but eventually the bus was fixed, and we travelled back to our hotel.

Tuesday April 15, 2008
The first place we travelled today was to a really beautiful nature spot that had some Orthodox churches built into the rocks, another defining sightseeing part of Cappadocia. But this place that we went to was so gorgeous. It was what I’d imagine southern United States to be like. There was a rippling stream going through with a current, and we were pretty much in a gorge, with really high rocks all around us. The grass was green, and the water was cold. It was one of my favorite places on this trip in Turkey. After that, we went to an open air museum, which again had more churches! According to Ahmet, there are 365 churches (monasteries/nunneries) in that area alone. There were many really well preserved icons in these churches, written in a way that looked so different from the one we’d seen before, primitive almost. They had much bolder colors, and it kind of looked as though a seven year old had drawn them. There were some depictions of animals and trees and nature, and it was really interesting to see how these icons had been written over with icons of people. There were a ton of people at the museum, so we didn’t get to go into all of the churches that we wanted to, but we still saw quite a few. We stopped at one final cave church on our way out that was actually two churches. It also had a crypt, like many of the other ones that we’d seen, which is slightly disconcerting, because they’re basically just long holes in the ground, just long enough for a skeleton. But this church had some really beautiful icons that seemed artistically to be right in the middle of the modern-looking icons we’d seen earlier in the trip and the more primitive-looking ones we’d just seen. This was one of the few times that I could really see the emotion behind the icons’ faces. After that, we drove to a pottery workshop. True to the landscape, this place was also part of an underground city. The family running the workshop had worked there for at least seven generations. We saw a demonstration for making a plate, and also for making a pot, and the people who decorated the pots, and then finally they brought us into the show room, where we were of course expected to buy multitudes of pottery. I saw the largest plate that I’d ever seen in my life, worth 10,000 lyre, I believe. Maybe dollars. I’m not really sure. Anyway, it was a really big, expensive plate. We got back to our hotel and had supper, and went to bed. It was going to be an early day tomorrow.

We left Cappadocia at 6:30 am. It was a really early morning, to say the least. We all wore our comfy clothes, preparing for a long day sleeping on the bus, all the way back to Istanbul. We stopped in Ankara, the capitol of Turkey, to go to a museum of history, an archeological museum. After that, we had lunch at a small restaurant where two women did all of the cooking, from what I could see. We had either potato, cheese, or ground beef pancakes, meaning tortilla/lefse bread with either grated potatoes, feta cheese, or spicy ground beef in them. They were very good. We continued on our journey, stopping a few more times to rest and use the WC. It rained for a little while, and we listened to some journal narratives and site reports. We finally arrived in Istanbul at 8:30. It was a full 14 hour day on the bus. We had supper, which was good, but none of us were really hungry since we hadn't really done anything all day. However, tonight will be a good night, since we don't start sight-seeing again until 11:30 tomorrow morning.

We'll fly back to Athens on Friday and then from Athens to home on Sunday! I'll be at Concordia the week after that, ushering for the Oratorio concert, so stop by!!

Crete!!

There have definitely been some internet problems on this trip. I don’t blame them, really, for how long it has been since I’ve last written. On second thought, actually, I do. Anyway, tonight is out last night in the country of Greece until we come back to Athens for a few days before I leave Greece for home on April 20! I got to talk to my family on Skype last night for a while, and it really makes me look forward to seeing them for real. I can’t believe this trip is nearly over. It’s kind of frightening to realize how quickly three months can go when you’re not keeping track.

So, since it has been awhile, I think I’ll just give a couple of stories from each of the places we’ve been.

While on the island of Crete, we visited a very small town called Katalagari. I think I wrote how wonderful the accommodations were there. We had homemade meals every night for supper, our hotel “rooms” were more like suites, many of the equipped with, praise Jesus, washing machines. Katalagari. It’s a wonderful place. If you are ever fortunate enough to go there, Katalagari Country Inn and Suites receives a very high recommendation from me. I had my 21st birthday on this trip, on March 13th. March 12th was our last night in Katalagari.

We went to supper that night, feeling a little bereft already. It was our last night in Katalagari, which had to be the hotel apex of our trip. There is no way that any place left on this trip can even come close to this place. Supper was our favorite time, because it was clear that not only did our cook enjoy preparing the food for us, she liked watching our reactions to the delectable meals that were set in front of us to enjoy. And enjoy them we always did. This particular night, we started out with the traditional green beans in the red sauce (which somehow does not taste nearly as mysterious as it did at the Hotel Parthenon), bread, and a wonderful salad with the perfect mix of olive oil and vinegar on it. There were seconds on everything; if this had been our main meal, it would have been perfection in a course. However, luckily, there was more to come. Tonight, there was chicken with the best seasoned potatoes I have ever had. There was great conversation, discussing movies, music, cookies, former students, and what to do if ever your waiter at a restaurant is someone you once failed for cheating. We finished our chicken and potatoes, with our cook running around with more plates of everything, filling our constantly emptying dishes. Eventually, we had to say “no more.” We were nearly full, but we also knew that dessert was coming. The dessert at this particular meal had a lot to live up to. The night before was the best cake that many people on this trip had ever had in their lives. It was a moist chocolate cake, not underbaked but still warm and gooey in the middle. It was made with a type of exceptionally rich chocolate sauce drizzled into the middle of it, and the top had the perfect amount of chocolate liqueur to make that perfect brownie-like crust, just enough so that when you pushed your fork into the top, a couple of drops would make their way down to the plate. You could use the bottom of the cake to mop them up. That night, our cook had said that she “will make again,” but we waited with bated breath; had she again made the chocolate cake from the night before, the one that no fine restaurant should even dare to compete with? We did not have to wait long to find out. After we had stacked our plates and gathered our silverware and cleared out of the way, our cook came out; in her hands she held a circular baking pan. As the dessert plates made their way around the table, you could hear the gasps of surprise and pleasure and the salivating moans of anticipation of that first bite of chocolate: it was THE cake. If it was possible, it was even better than the night before. The first piece was over way too quickly, but our cook knew from experience the previous night that we were not at all opposed to seconds of this calorie laden decadence. We knew that we were getting spoiled and at that moment, we simply did not care. As she made her way around with the pan for the third time, my religion professor pointed out that my birthday was the next day. After answering the confirming question with a nod, she exclaimed the news to one of our other hosts; the lights went dim and the half-eaten cake with a single lit candle in it was presented in front of me. The room burst into an enthusiastic strain of “Happy Birthday.” After careful consideration, I made a wish and eventually blew out the candle.
When the cake was finally gone and more than few belt buckles were loosened, we were all ready to head into a night of relaxation, until one of the hotel owners said that we were not allowed to leave yet; the festivities had not yet begun. It was almost as if they knew it was my birthday the next day. We headed down to the basement to the sound of tuning bousiki and lyre (traditional Greek instruments) strings. There were two men sitting at the head of the table with different instruments, one pitched higher than the other. After the instruments were in perfect pitch with the obviously practiced hands, the music began. There was singing and playing, and plenty of food to go around. Fruit and pastries kept making their way from the kitchen down to the basement. There was also raki, a traditional Cretan drink, distilled from the skins of the grapes used for wine. Plain raki has a taste that is reminiscent of rubbing alcohol. As the night continued, the music became more and more intense and easy; it was clear how often these two had played together, how well that they could read each other by looking at the other’s face and reading their body language to determine tempo changes. Fingers flew over the strings as the music flowed from the belly of their instruments. Eventually, it was decided that we Americans would put our Greek dancing lessons to good use. We moved the tables out of the way and formed a circle, doing our best to try and remember the steps that, taught to us only a month ago, somehow had quickly found themselves in the backs of our minds. We had a great time, dancing around in two circles, dancing in groups of two or three, and finally just jumping around as the music grew too fast for our unpracticed feet to keep up. The men sitting in the corner of the basement invited us over to try some of their traditional Greek party food, which included artichoke hearts, which were quite good; wild greens, which were a nice compliment; wonderfully ripe tomatoes; and raw fish. I decided, well, what the heck, when else in my life will I be in this situation? So, I cut a piece of the fish and stuck it in my mouth, not knowing exactly what to expect. I was so glad that I had some raki sitting nearby; the fish was exceptionally salty and salmony-tasting, not exactly my favorite combination. I was wondering how these men could just continually put these putrid-tasting minnows in their mouths, but as I watched, I realized that they had come up with the same solution that had circumstantially come to me: raki can get the taste of anything out of the mouth. We naturally divided up after that, a few groups sitting around, drinking and conversing, other playing backgammon (the national game of Greece), others played cards, and still others attempting to chat with the Greek men at the couches. The music continued, both live and through speakers in turns. All of the Greek people at the party were singing along with the music, and all of the American people were wishing that they knew just a little bit more Greek. It was a great night, an unexpected birthday celebration, and one of my most cherished memories from Greece.

For all of you wondering (Grandma, Mom, Dad . . .), I spent my 21st birthday playing cards and catchphrase. Not one drop of alcohol was consumed. : )

The next place we went was a town called Rhthymnon. It was a touristy town, a spot known for its long stretch of beach; in fact, it has the longest stretch of beach in Crete. So, what else could we do but go to the beach? We had a few free days while we were there, so we shopped and went to the beach. And wrote a couple of papers.

We were only in Rhthymnon for two days. After that we headed to the Northwest side of Crete to the Orthodox Academy. It’s not a school, as the name implies. It is a building where conferences are held often, 300 days out of the year. Stephen Hawking has been there. They have conferences there to reconcile science and religion, and they have speakers come, and they have dorm-like rooms for people to stay at when they are there attending the conferences. We had a tour of the academy right away when we got there. There was a guy who wandering out by this area, out along the beach, when he saw a skull lying near his feet. He asked the skull “who are you?” which would not be my first reaction when coming across a skull, but according to tradition, the skull answered the guy that he used to be a person, but he now resides in hell. Being curious, the guy asked the skull what hell was like. The skull answered back that hell was everything that humans think it is, with flames and fire and all that, but the worst thing about hell is that the damned souls are tied back to back, not being allowed to see each other; however, when people pray for these souls, they get some relief. The cords slacken enough that the souls are able to turn and see each other. While we were there (Palm Sunday for Western Christianity), the Orthodox Church celebrated Icon Sunday. We went to a small church, dedicated to the Virgin Mary, and people brought their favorite icons from home and had them blessed by the priest and paraded them around the church. After that, we went back to the Academy and sat down for lunch. We spread out around the tables so that we have to sit next to and then presumably (hopefully) converse with a Greek person. It was kind of awkward at first, because the Greek people were kind of uncomfortable with us, sitting in their own little cliques and conversing with their friends, but eventually we started a conversation with a woman who spoke just a little bit of English, more than anyone else in her foursome. We did learn the correct way to peel an orange: using a knife, cut off the top and bottom peel, and then cut the peel off around the edges. It does work quite nicely, with less orange under your fingernails. After that, we headed up to the monastery that was first founded in the area; it reminded me of Laura Ingalls Wilder in some ways, because it was built into a cave on a cliff. The water looked very blue and nice from up there, and so I decided that I wanted to at least go down there and stick my feet in.
Emily and I went down there after we were done exploring the small chapel in the cliff. I changed out of my nice church clothes into jeans and a tank top. I took off my sandals and rolled my jeans and waded in. I just kept walking in, and pretty soon I was near mid-calve-high in the water, feeling the waves sneak their way higher and higher up my leg. It was almost unconsciously that my feet moved farther and farther out in the ocean so that the waves were licking at the top of my rolled up jeans. It was probably at that moment that I seriously thought about getting all wet. It was almost like I unconsciously had decided that I was going all the way in when I first put my feet in the water. I gave Emily my camera and just kept walking in. The sand gave way easily under my feet, and the stones at the bottom were large, but not exceptionally stable by any means, making it really difficult for me to keep my balance in the water. I kind of stumbled my way out up to my waist. My jeans were completely wet and I started swing my arms in the water, then, realizing that I still had my watch on, quickly took it off, wading back to the rock that Emily was standing on and giving her my watch. I turned around and continued my journey back out to the ocean, noticing that the water wasn’t nearly as cold as it had been the first time in. I was up out to my waist and then decided that it was now or never; I had already decided that it was going to be now. I stood still for a second, filled my lungs with air, and went under. It was absolutely great. I felt exceptionally alive and energized, swimming out in the ocean. The water was calm, not warm, but not frigid either. Just . . . really salty. : )

This was also the first day that we were served octopus tentacles. It was pretty interesting. They tasted a lot like salmon with the texture of overcooked pork. It was pretty tough, in other words. It will not ever be my favorite food, but it wasn’t horrible.

On March 17th, we travelled to Chania (Hahnya) which was only about 30 minutes from the Orthodox Academy. Chania is a town with a harbor which was very instrumental during the battle of Crete during World War II. It was a very touristy town, being on the coast and all. While shopping, we met a young woman who had grown up in New Jersey; her mother had been in Crete during a travel abroad program during school and met and married a Cretan man. They live in New Jersey now, but Anna came back to Chania to work for a couple of years. You would be amazed at how many people we’ve met who came to Crete and/or Greece because they met someone here while traveling for school or pleasure or whatever. There have been at least ten instances of that, mostly where an American girl met a Grecian man, fell in love, got married, and moved to Greece.

After Chania, we went to a small village called Vamos, population 600. There is a co-op type project going on in Vamos where some men, Georgos (Yorgos) our guide as the leader, are fixing up the old houses/apartments here, and turning them into guest houses for the “guests” (tourists) who come and visit here. Many people come and visit, and then decide that they want to own and house and live there. There is a pretty substantial British population in Vamos, actually. One of my favorite nights in Vamos was when we all got together at a little art café to listen to a band called “Big Fish.” It consisted of these ex-pats who were about 65 years old, playing songs that they wrote on their guitars. As the night went on, however, they started playing familiar songs to the American audience, like “Johnnie B. Goode” and some Chubbie Checker. There was this group of British women in a corner totally dancing in a very 60’s-hippie type way, just kind of bopping around. It reminded me a little of the Charlie Brown Christmas Story when they’re all dancing during the pageant practice. Eventually, they had the whole group up on their feet, dancing all together in a very small space. There were people of all ages, from nine-year-olds to eighty-year-olds, Greeks, Americans, and Brits all dancing together. It was a pretty great night.
We had our Easter service at Vamos, since Orthodox Easter occurs on April 27, a week after we get home from Greece. So, we held a rooftop sunrise service, complete with “Now the Green Blade Rises” and “Christ the Lord is Ris’n Today.” It was a good service, but it made me miss the good ol’ Lutheran organ music and the Alleluia Chorus.

We went on some hikes in Vamos, visiting churches and talking with the locals. It was mostly a time to relax and recharge in a small town, not surrounded by the frenzy that usually accompanies the larger, more visited areas.

Right now it’s 5 am, and I’m packing to head to Turkey. If possible, I will finish up my island adventures while I’m there!

Love
Alicia