Sunday, October 29, 2006
Marmaris-Rodos
I just got back this morning from Marmaris, and either it got colder up here or I just spent a week in paradise... maybe both...
Here's the rundown of my eight day trip south to the Turkish port of Marmaris and the Greek Island of Rhodes:
Day 1-3 Marmaris:
We left Ankara mid morning on Friday the 20th and arrived in Marmaris about 11 hours later. Marmaris was founded in the 16th century but has been little more than a fishing village until recently. It was nice to take a day bus for a change, we got to see some more of the countryside, but ultimately these things are really tiring. In 1522 Suleyman the Magnificent visited the town on his way to capturing Rhodes from the Knights of St. John, and he was heard to mumble "mimar as" which in Turkish means "hang the architect" and thus modern Marmaris was born. At first impression Marmaris is a very odd place. It is bursting with British and German tourists and hundreds of businesses that cater overhwelmingly in that direction. There are sandy beaches, and boat trips much like Kaş or any other Aegean/Mediterranean resort, but nowhere else do you get so inundated with neon signs advertizing "British Food" or "Chinese Food" or "Mexican Food". Indeed one restaurant a block from my hotel, standing on a corner, used its three façades to advertise itself as specialists in each of these cuisines. You really had to search through the dozens of touristy eateries for a good döner or pide. The water on the beach was kind of dirty and on a whole the first impression of the city was dissapointing. However, you do realize something about the country by visiting a place like this. This is the kind of thing that drives the Turkish economy. Pandering to Brits and other Europeans as much cheaper alternative to the Riviera or Italian coast, Marmaris never ceases to pull in a lot of money. Certainly this place was the closest I've seen here to a Jersey Shore type town. Nonetheless we had a relatively enjoyable time because it was out of season, meaning less crowds and cheaper prices.
Day 3-6 Rodos Town:
Early Monday morning we left on a large hydrofoil for Rhodes. The trip was about an hour plus the time waiting in customs. The lines were a bit long because the put all non-EU passports in the same line, shuffling me and my crew in with the Turks. Rodos town sits on the very northern tip of the island and is the largest town and governing center for the island. The makeup of the town is equal parts Medieval fortress, Hellenistic ruin, Ottoman outpost and beach resort. As soon as you step through the gates Europe hits you right in the face. The modern town is full of fancy outlets for Lacoste and Diesel with all sorts of high end cafes and gyro stands and crepe shops. Eating here consisted of pork, pork and more pork (being in a muslim country for two plus months, this is one of the things you start to miss). Aside from pork gyros, bacon, and pork chops, we got to sample moussakka. Moussakka is an interesting dish, a layered potato square with eggplant, onion, minced meat and spices all baked and served piping hot. It is very much a potato lasagna. The other European aspect that hits you is English. While in Turkey, English only gets you so far, not knowing any Turkish won't get you anywhere in the back country and not much farther outside of Istanbul and the embassy districts. In Greece, nearly everyone knows at least some English, from the restaraunteurs to the beach peddlers, all the road signs are in two languages, and even many advertisements don't even sport the Greek script.
The main attraction of the town is the Medieval, walled city. Inside resides three Ottoman mosques which are almost all under renovation and not in use, the Palace of the Grand Masters, where the head of the Knights of St. John resided, an Ottoman era clocktower and library, and hundreds of small shops and restaurants selling everything from medieval weaponry to novelty artwork. The sites are all pretty neat to see, the most impressive being the Palace. Inside is a museum that boasts a rather large collection of Byzantine floor mosaics, pottery, and sculpture. The site is also of some interest because for a few years Cem Sultan, brother of Sultan Beyazit II was help prisoner here before he was transferred to the Vatican. He was the first member of the line of Osman to be imprisoned outside of the country and the power politics of the time that swirled around him are quite interesting.
Outside the walls right by the port are two columns with sculptures of a deer on the capital of each. This is the site where the Colossus of Rhodes stood in ancient times, though no remnants remain of this former wonder of the world. A twenty minute walk northwest of the old town is the Ancient Acropolis. This Acropolis has three main features, a stadium, odeon (small theatre) and the remnants of a Temple to Athena. The Odeon is incredibly well preserved and probably sat a few hundred people. The stadium is on a much smaller scale than the one we saw in Aphrodisias, but does have many differences. The stadium in Aphrodisias certainly hosted more "Gladiator" type games with lions and chariot races. This stadium, as some of the remains built into the group highlight, was more of the "Olympic" type which certainly emphasized throwing events and running (see pictures). The Temple is mostly in ruins and rubble, but one tetrapylon column set still remains.
Days 6-8 Lindos:
On Thursday morning we hopped on a bus and travelled down the south east coast about an hour to the town of Lindos. Lindos is an astonsihingly beautiful town built around an acropolis that juts out into the sea and accompanies a calm inlet with a sandy beach. Staying in the town we were able to lodge ourselves in a small villa owned by this older man and his sister for only 35 Euro a night (typical in season price is 90 Euro!). All the buildings are one or two stories and whitewashed. No cars or buses are allowed down the towns narrow streets, so all transport is either foot, donkey or mo-ped. The beach there was fantastic and very relaxing. While tourists were still abound, you definitely got more of a feel of the typical Greek village here. I would certainly make this town an equivalent to the Turkish Safranbolu. One thing that is quite prevalent here is the religion. As much as Safranbolu was tight knit and Muslim, this town was tight-knit and Greek Orthodox Christian. The second morning we were led around the town by the female hermit of a nearby monastary and shown a few of the towns old churches. Certainly this was one of the more interesting tour guides I've had on the trip. This woman is an American born sister at the St. Michael the Archangel Monastery in central Rhodes. She came there a decade and a half ago after being on faculty in the science department at Harvard. She is an expert iconographer and theologian (but as I'll explain, not a historian) and was certainly enamored of her way of life, her faith and this town. The churches are all very very small, though they date as old as a thousand years old. Most of them are dedicted to one of three saints, George, Dimitri or Minas. Our guide aptly explained to us the adoration the people of the town had to these particular saints, and mentioned that if your looking for a good party, show up on their feast days (free souvlaki and ouzo for everybody!). Now I trusted this woman insofar as her training in iconography, it was certainly enlightening, but I did bristle a bit of her mention of Turks and Muslims. Clearly, all this woman knew of Islam and Turkey she learned in a Greek Orthodox monastery, for it pretty much included relatively exaggerated horror stories of Ottomans massacring Greeks in the name of God, and believed that Islam (by some form of logic) was "pure evil". Surely I didn't try and provoke her, I only tried to spark a conversation about how Muslims and Christians have peacefully coexisted in many areas of the world for a millenia, but she would have none of it. I bring this experience up because I found it strikingly odd that through six days in Greece the most stereotypical Greek opinion of Turks came from an American citizen. It just makes one wonder how much we Americans drive world philosophy.
The Acropolis is a heavily fortified medieval castle that surrounds Hellenistic ruins. Inside the bastions is a Temple to Athena and a Byzantine Church. While not very extenisive, the site is going through a 3.4 million euro renovation process and many of the old buildings are being rebuilt. Also outside the town are a couple of great hikes. We did one of these in an afternoon which took us out onthe otherside of the bay and saw an old broken down windmill and two ancient funerary monuments.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of these sites in Greece is that many of them (the Acropolis of Rhodes, funeraries in Lindos) are completley free and open to the public without much supervision. Most of these such places are not active archeological sites, which contributes to this fact, but it is quite awesome to see much of this stuff without so much as a signpost to tell you what something is.
The crazy people at facebook have messed with their picture format again, I will post pictures as soon as I figure it out.
'Till next time.
Here's the rundown of my eight day trip south to the Turkish port of Marmaris and the Greek Island of Rhodes:
Day 1-3 Marmaris:
We left Ankara mid morning on Friday the 20th and arrived in Marmaris about 11 hours later. Marmaris was founded in the 16th century but has been little more than a fishing village until recently. It was nice to take a day bus for a change, we got to see some more of the countryside, but ultimately these things are really tiring. In 1522 Suleyman the Magnificent visited the town on his way to capturing Rhodes from the Knights of St. John, and he was heard to mumble "mimar as" which in Turkish means "hang the architect" and thus modern Marmaris was born. At first impression Marmaris is a very odd place. It is bursting with British and German tourists and hundreds of businesses that cater overhwelmingly in that direction. There are sandy beaches, and boat trips much like Kaş or any other Aegean/Mediterranean resort, but nowhere else do you get so inundated with neon signs advertizing "British Food" or "Chinese Food" or "Mexican Food". Indeed one restaurant a block from my hotel, standing on a corner, used its three façades to advertise itself as specialists in each of these cuisines. You really had to search through the dozens of touristy eateries for a good döner or pide. The water on the beach was kind of dirty and on a whole the first impression of the city was dissapointing. However, you do realize something about the country by visiting a place like this. This is the kind of thing that drives the Turkish economy. Pandering to Brits and other Europeans as much cheaper alternative to the Riviera or Italian coast, Marmaris never ceases to pull in a lot of money. Certainly this place was the closest I've seen here to a Jersey Shore type town. Nonetheless we had a relatively enjoyable time because it was out of season, meaning less crowds and cheaper prices.
Day 3-6 Rodos Town:
Early Monday morning we left on a large hydrofoil for Rhodes. The trip was about an hour plus the time waiting in customs. The lines were a bit long because the put all non-EU passports in the same line, shuffling me and my crew in with the Turks. Rodos town sits on the very northern tip of the island and is the largest town and governing center for the island. The makeup of the town is equal parts Medieval fortress, Hellenistic ruin, Ottoman outpost and beach resort. As soon as you step through the gates Europe hits you right in the face. The modern town is full of fancy outlets for Lacoste and Diesel with all sorts of high end cafes and gyro stands and crepe shops. Eating here consisted of pork, pork and more pork (being in a muslim country for two plus months, this is one of the things you start to miss). Aside from pork gyros, bacon, and pork chops, we got to sample moussakka. Moussakka is an interesting dish, a layered potato square with eggplant, onion, minced meat and spices all baked and served piping hot. It is very much a potato lasagna. The other European aspect that hits you is English. While in Turkey, English only gets you so far, not knowing any Turkish won't get you anywhere in the back country and not much farther outside of Istanbul and the embassy districts. In Greece, nearly everyone knows at least some English, from the restaraunteurs to the beach peddlers, all the road signs are in two languages, and even many advertisements don't even sport the Greek script.
The main attraction of the town is the Medieval, walled city. Inside resides three Ottoman mosques which are almost all under renovation and not in use, the Palace of the Grand Masters, where the head of the Knights of St. John resided, an Ottoman era clocktower and library, and hundreds of small shops and restaurants selling everything from medieval weaponry to novelty artwork. The sites are all pretty neat to see, the most impressive being the Palace. Inside is a museum that boasts a rather large collection of Byzantine floor mosaics, pottery, and sculpture. The site is also of some interest because for a few years Cem Sultan, brother of Sultan Beyazit II was help prisoner here before he was transferred to the Vatican. He was the first member of the line of Osman to be imprisoned outside of the country and the power politics of the time that swirled around him are quite interesting.
Outside the walls right by the port are two columns with sculptures of a deer on the capital of each. This is the site where the Colossus of Rhodes stood in ancient times, though no remnants remain of this former wonder of the world. A twenty minute walk northwest of the old town is the Ancient Acropolis. This Acropolis has three main features, a stadium, odeon (small theatre) and the remnants of a Temple to Athena. The Odeon is incredibly well preserved and probably sat a few hundred people. The stadium is on a much smaller scale than the one we saw in Aphrodisias, but does have many differences. The stadium in Aphrodisias certainly hosted more "Gladiator" type games with lions and chariot races. This stadium, as some of the remains built into the group highlight, was more of the "Olympic" type which certainly emphasized throwing events and running (see pictures). The Temple is mostly in ruins and rubble, but one tetrapylon column set still remains.
Days 6-8 Lindos:
On Thursday morning we hopped on a bus and travelled down the south east coast about an hour to the town of Lindos. Lindos is an astonsihingly beautiful town built around an acropolis that juts out into the sea and accompanies a calm inlet with a sandy beach. Staying in the town we were able to lodge ourselves in a small villa owned by this older man and his sister for only 35 Euro a night (typical in season price is 90 Euro!). All the buildings are one or two stories and whitewashed. No cars or buses are allowed down the towns narrow streets, so all transport is either foot, donkey or mo-ped. The beach there was fantastic and very relaxing. While tourists were still abound, you definitely got more of a feel of the typical Greek village here. I would certainly make this town an equivalent to the Turkish Safranbolu. One thing that is quite prevalent here is the religion. As much as Safranbolu was tight knit and Muslim, this town was tight-knit and Greek Orthodox Christian. The second morning we were led around the town by the female hermit of a nearby monastary and shown a few of the towns old churches. Certainly this was one of the more interesting tour guides I've had on the trip. This woman is an American born sister at the St. Michael the Archangel Monastery in central Rhodes. She came there a decade and a half ago after being on faculty in the science department at Harvard. She is an expert iconographer and theologian (but as I'll explain, not a historian) and was certainly enamored of her way of life, her faith and this town. The churches are all very very small, though they date as old as a thousand years old. Most of them are dedicted to one of three saints, George, Dimitri or Minas. Our guide aptly explained to us the adoration the people of the town had to these particular saints, and mentioned that if your looking for a good party, show up on their feast days (free souvlaki and ouzo for everybody!). Now I trusted this woman insofar as her training in iconography, it was certainly enlightening, but I did bristle a bit of her mention of Turks and Muslims. Clearly, all this woman knew of Islam and Turkey she learned in a Greek Orthodox monastery, for it pretty much included relatively exaggerated horror stories of Ottomans massacring Greeks in the name of God, and believed that Islam (by some form of logic) was "pure evil". Surely I didn't try and provoke her, I only tried to spark a conversation about how Muslims and Christians have peacefully coexisted in many areas of the world for a millenia, but she would have none of it. I bring this experience up because I found it strikingly odd that through six days in Greece the most stereotypical Greek opinion of Turks came from an American citizen. It just makes one wonder how much we Americans drive world philosophy.
The Acropolis is a heavily fortified medieval castle that surrounds Hellenistic ruins. Inside the bastions is a Temple to Athena and a Byzantine Church. While not very extenisive, the site is going through a 3.4 million euro renovation process and many of the old buildings are being rebuilt. Also outside the town are a couple of great hikes. We did one of these in an afternoon which took us out onthe otherside of the bay and saw an old broken down windmill and two ancient funerary monuments.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of these sites in Greece is that many of them (the Acropolis of Rhodes, funeraries in Lindos) are completley free and open to the public without much supervision. Most of these such places are not active archeological sites, which contributes to this fact, but it is quite awesome to see much of this stuff without so much as a signpost to tell you what something is.
The crazy people at facebook have messed with their picture format again, I will post pictures as soon as I figure it out.
'Till next time.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Pamuk and France
Turkey turned out to be in two very big news stories today, and I guess that makes now a time as good as any for a little editorial.
First, my congratualtions to writer Orhan Pamuk for winning the Nobel Prize in Literature. Pamuk was talked about as the dark horse canidate last year and has risen in notariaty since with the release of last year's "Istanbul". I have only begun to read most acclaimed (and politically touchy) novel "Snow", so I cannot assess whether or not I agree with the Swedish Academy's choice. There are many things that stand out about this author in this country, and that I feel relatively qualified to talk a bit about. He is perhaps the best-known Turkish author since Ataturk (who was indeed quite prolific), but many here believe he has alienated his country through a European education and quite controversial views of religion and the arts that have set many a politician here on edge, indeed he was arraigned on the charge of "offending Turkishness", as have a few other authors recently, for admitting to an Armenian Genocide in a Swiss paper, but was eventually let go. Certainly feelings here are mixed as the first Turk to win the Literature prize, yet many still resent some of his opinions of the, as the academy describes ,"melancholy" city and nation he has imagined.
On a related note, the lower house of the French parliament today passed a bill that will put any person in jail for up to year along with a hefty fine for denying the Armenian Genocide. This bill was spurred on by the 500,000 plus Armenians that live in France, and has met with disagreement from the PM, as well as much of Europe (not the least of which, Turkey). This is an incredibly touchy subject for many reasons, I can only try to explain them. In the flailing last years of the Ottoman Empire there was a vast movement of peoples throughout the Empire which had the loose aim of exporting christians from the Anatolian stronghold and importing Muslims from the faltering provinces. In the case of Armenia, as they claim, some two or three million of their people were relocated to present day Armenia, and along the way almost half of them (1.5 M or so) died. The legitimacy of this claim is something no two historians of the region can really agree on, mostly because the records of this event are scarce. This event was definitely unlike that of the Nazi Holocaust, there were no "death camps" and the systematic destruction of the Armenian race throughout the world was definitely not the objective of the Ottoman government. A large group fo historians do agree that this was a vain last ditch attempt to homogenize the Empire in order to save it from destruction at the hands of European powers. Also failed to be mentioned by many that support this cause is the fact that at the same time thousands upon thousands of Muslims died both at the hands of nationalist-terrorist groups in the Balkans (such as the Macedonian group KRO) and at the hands of revolting Armenians in the East. In the last years of the Empire a few million people died, Greeks, Jews, Muslims, Armenians, Turks and Arabs. That in and of itself is an awful fact. To say, however, that the Armenian situation was unique to the time period is simply not a settled fact (note to anyone who might try and arrest me in France: I am not necessarily denying the Armenian Genocide, merely pointing out the apparant academic disagreement over the subject). For sure the Turkish and Armenian governments exaggerate whatever figures they have. This is an important quarrel in the world today that must be solved, however, I believe the best way to solve it is for Turks and Armenians to come together and solve it like civil human beings, not for third parties such as France (who have plenty of genocidal type skeletons in their closet like Algeria in 1945) to deal with. This present situation is bad for Turkey and Armenia, but in fact worse for France. No doubt trade relations with a growing Turkey will be damaged by the eventual passing of this bill, and not to mention the hypocrisy of the EU as it pressures Turkey on free speech. In the end this is a job to be left up to Turks, Armenians and their respective historians, who, might I add, are often scared away from even breeching the subject (one of my current teachers Prof. Stanford Shaw had his Los Angeles home bombed while teaching at UCLA in 1977, and even in a Turkish environment is shy to cover the topic of Armenia). I know I've expounded a lot, but I just want to emphasize that this is a very important issue that must be dealt with delicacy and respect, and maybe by treating other nations as equals on the field of diplomacy, maybe we can actually get something accomplished.
First, my congratualtions to writer Orhan Pamuk for winning the Nobel Prize in Literature. Pamuk was talked about as the dark horse canidate last year and has risen in notariaty since with the release of last year's "Istanbul". I have only begun to read most acclaimed (and politically touchy) novel "Snow", so I cannot assess whether or not I agree with the Swedish Academy's choice. There are many things that stand out about this author in this country, and that I feel relatively qualified to talk a bit about. He is perhaps the best-known Turkish author since Ataturk (who was indeed quite prolific), but many here believe he has alienated his country through a European education and quite controversial views of religion and the arts that have set many a politician here on edge, indeed he was arraigned on the charge of "offending Turkishness", as have a few other authors recently, for admitting to an Armenian Genocide in a Swiss paper, but was eventually let go. Certainly feelings here are mixed as the first Turk to win the Literature prize, yet many still resent some of his opinions of the, as the academy describes ,"melancholy" city and nation he has imagined.
On a related note, the lower house of the French parliament today passed a bill that will put any person in jail for up to year along with a hefty fine for denying the Armenian Genocide. This bill was spurred on by the 500,000 plus Armenians that live in France, and has met with disagreement from the PM, as well as much of Europe (not the least of which, Turkey). This is an incredibly touchy subject for many reasons, I can only try to explain them. In the flailing last years of the Ottoman Empire there was a vast movement of peoples throughout the Empire which had the loose aim of exporting christians from the Anatolian stronghold and importing Muslims from the faltering provinces. In the case of Armenia, as they claim, some two or three million of their people were relocated to present day Armenia, and along the way almost half of them (1.5 M or so) died. The legitimacy of this claim is something no two historians of the region can really agree on, mostly because the records of this event are scarce. This event was definitely unlike that of the Nazi Holocaust, there were no "death camps" and the systematic destruction of the Armenian race throughout the world was definitely not the objective of the Ottoman government. A large group fo historians do agree that this was a vain last ditch attempt to homogenize the Empire in order to save it from destruction at the hands of European powers. Also failed to be mentioned by many that support this cause is the fact that at the same time thousands upon thousands of Muslims died both at the hands of nationalist-terrorist groups in the Balkans (such as the Macedonian group KRO) and at the hands of revolting Armenians in the East. In the last years of the Empire a few million people died, Greeks, Jews, Muslims, Armenians, Turks and Arabs. That in and of itself is an awful fact. To say, however, that the Armenian situation was unique to the time period is simply not a settled fact (note to anyone who might try and arrest me in France: I am not necessarily denying the Armenian Genocide, merely pointing out the apparant academic disagreement over the subject). For sure the Turkish and Armenian governments exaggerate whatever figures they have. This is an important quarrel in the world today that must be solved, however, I believe the best way to solve it is for Turks and Armenians to come together and solve it like civil human beings, not for third parties such as France (who have plenty of genocidal type skeletons in their closet like Algeria in 1945) to deal with. This present situation is bad for Turkey and Armenia, but in fact worse for France. No doubt trade relations with a growing Turkey will be damaged by the eventual passing of this bill, and not to mention the hypocrisy of the EU as it pressures Turkey on free speech. In the end this is a job to be left up to Turks, Armenians and their respective historians, who, might I add, are often scared away from even breeching the subject (one of my current teachers Prof. Stanford Shaw had his Los Angeles home bombed while teaching at UCLA in 1977, and even in a Turkish environment is shy to cover the topic of Armenia). I know I've expounded a lot, but I just want to emphasize that this is a very important issue that must be dealt with delicacy and respect, and maybe by treating other nations as equals on the field of diplomacy, maybe we can actually get something accomplished.
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Kapadokya (Cappadocia)
I know, I know, its been a little while since I've posted. Things are gettting busy here, the reading is really starting to pile up (I can probably tell you more than you'll ever need to know about Abdulhamid II). Yet somewhere between trips to the library I was able to go to Kapadokya this weekend, and without a doubt it deserves a little entry.
The province of Kapadokya lies just about four hours south of Ankara and about two thirds of the way to Konya. It is a region with perhaps one of the most unique geological histories on earth. This large glacial valley set between two volcanoes features some of the oddest geological formations I've ever seen. The taller of the volcanoes, Erciyes Dağı stands about 3900m and is only second to Mt. Ararat in stature. The region is cut with valleys and two major rivers, the Kızılmak and the Melendiz. Some time after the glacier melted, lo and behold, the volcanoes erupted covering this young region in volcanic ash and new volcanic rock. The region has also been inhabited by many ancient civilizations beginning with the Hitites around 1200 BC and followed by Christians up through the first millenia A.D. Both civiliazations utilizaed the formations in different fashions. Here is a rundown:
Underground cities: There are thirty some underground cave dwellings in Kapadokya. We visited the largest of these known as Kıymaklı. It was originally built by the Hitites and used as a fortress/dwelling and was later adopted by the Christians under the Roman, Byzantine, Selcuk, and Ottoman Empires as a hiding place during raids. The Kıymaklı City extends to a depth of 40m below the surface (something like 8 stories) and is something of an archeological puzzle. It is hard to distinguish what many of the rooms were used for, though a few have been pinned as churches and kitchens. We were able to climb through tiny shafts down to the bottom floor, and it was definitely worth it.
Rock Churches: Christians also built an extensive system of churches into the rock faces of several valleys in Kapadokya. All told 365 such churches exist in the region. We visited two such valleys, the Ihlara and Göreme. The churches are all quite small but many have elaborate paintings in them, either in the fresco style or painted straight onto the rock. The most extensive paintings are in the Göreme Open Air Museum. The paintings have been subject to an awful lot of graffiti and damage since the caves were abandoned several centuries ago, especially to the frescoes. One thing though that was interesting that some of the damage revealed was that some of the frescoes were done over top of other paintings that date from the Iconclastic period of christian Byzantium. These images bear no human forms, only byzantine crosses and patterns.
Monastaries and Fairy Chimneys: Perhaps the largest aspect of christian life in Kapadokya is monasticism. Brought to the region by St. Basil, monks built several rock cut monastaries which they used to educate the populace and lead a life of introspection. The monastaries are intricately cut into the larger rock forms and usually have built-in stairs or ladders that lead several stories into the air. The monks also utilized Kapadokya's most unique geographical formation, the Fairy Chimneys. These formations are large oblong psuedo-phalluses that extend into the air up to 10m. The monks would cut caves and stairs that led almost to the top of them and later use them as a retreat where they would spend forty days of isolation. Truly unique, these fairy chimneys are hard to describe in words, see the link for pictures below.
Uçhisar: The tallest formation in the region is known as Uçhisar. This formation was used by the Hitites and Christians as a fortress. It has extensive cave work and fortifications. It stands at the edge of a small plateu and extends probably around 50m into the air. Sitting more or less at the center of the valley it provides the best view of the valleys, towns and Erciyes Dağı.
Alright, I think I will be taking this weekend off from travelling, but I will probably have another post on random miscellany later this week. Here is the link for the pictures:
http://uchicago.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2020200&id=2903913&l=0a92c
The province of Kapadokya lies just about four hours south of Ankara and about two thirds of the way to Konya. It is a region with perhaps one of the most unique geological histories on earth. This large glacial valley set between two volcanoes features some of the oddest geological formations I've ever seen. The taller of the volcanoes, Erciyes Dağı stands about 3900m and is only second to Mt. Ararat in stature. The region is cut with valleys and two major rivers, the Kızılmak and the Melendiz. Some time after the glacier melted, lo and behold, the volcanoes erupted covering this young region in volcanic ash and new volcanic rock. The region has also been inhabited by many ancient civilizations beginning with the Hitites around 1200 BC and followed by Christians up through the first millenia A.D. Both civiliazations utilizaed the formations in different fashions. Here is a rundown:
Underground cities: There are thirty some underground cave dwellings in Kapadokya. We visited the largest of these known as Kıymaklı. It was originally built by the Hitites and used as a fortress/dwelling and was later adopted by the Christians under the Roman, Byzantine, Selcuk, and Ottoman Empires as a hiding place during raids. The Kıymaklı City extends to a depth of 40m below the surface (something like 8 stories) and is something of an archeological puzzle. It is hard to distinguish what many of the rooms were used for, though a few have been pinned as churches and kitchens. We were able to climb through tiny shafts down to the bottom floor, and it was definitely worth it.
Rock Churches: Christians also built an extensive system of churches into the rock faces of several valleys in Kapadokya. All told 365 such churches exist in the region. We visited two such valleys, the Ihlara and Göreme. The churches are all quite small but many have elaborate paintings in them, either in the fresco style or painted straight onto the rock. The most extensive paintings are in the Göreme Open Air Museum. The paintings have been subject to an awful lot of graffiti and damage since the caves were abandoned several centuries ago, especially to the frescoes. One thing though that was interesting that some of the damage revealed was that some of the frescoes were done over top of other paintings that date from the Iconclastic period of christian Byzantium. These images bear no human forms, only byzantine crosses and patterns.
Monastaries and Fairy Chimneys: Perhaps the largest aspect of christian life in Kapadokya is monasticism. Brought to the region by St. Basil, monks built several rock cut monastaries which they used to educate the populace and lead a life of introspection. The monastaries are intricately cut into the larger rock forms and usually have built-in stairs or ladders that lead several stories into the air. The monks also utilized Kapadokya's most unique geographical formation, the Fairy Chimneys. These formations are large oblong psuedo-phalluses that extend into the air up to 10m. The monks would cut caves and stairs that led almost to the top of them and later use them as a retreat where they would spend forty days of isolation. Truly unique, these fairy chimneys are hard to describe in words, see the link for pictures below.
Uçhisar: The tallest formation in the region is known as Uçhisar. This formation was used by the Hitites and Christians as a fortress. It has extensive cave work and fortifications. It stands at the edge of a small plateu and extends probably around 50m into the air. Sitting more or less at the center of the valley it provides the best view of the valleys, towns and Erciyes Dağı.
Alright, I think I will be taking this weekend off from travelling, but I will probably have another post on random miscellany later this week. Here is the link for the pictures:
http://uchicago.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2020200&id=2903913&l=0a92c
Monday, October 02, 2006
Safranbolu
There is nothing like heading out to one of these small historic ottoman towns for a weekend of quiet relxation. Me and seven of myh friends headed out on a three hour bus ride at 7.30 saturday morning. The town puts an impression on you as soon as you get out of the cab from the otogar. We picked a nice little hotel adjacent to the old Cinci Hamamı which was a converted Ottoman house. These houses are a little difficult to explain, quarters are tight but just comfortable enough to make it worth it with the historic appeal. The town has a ton to offer over a couple day excursion. There are three mosques that date from the mid to late 18th century, each in a slightly different style. There a hundred or so different arts and crafts shops that sell everything from ceramic plates to metalwork to textiles, much of which is made in or around the town. Also there are some interesting takes on typical turkish food. One typical dish which I sampled on sunday was the Bükme Pide, which is a baked dough with spinach, onions and walnuts. Also safranbolu has an almost unhealthy proportion of sweet shops selling special baklava with walnuts, lokum, which is a hard fruit candy, turkish delight, and helva, a sesame seed compound. Needless to say we ate our fill. The night life there was a bit subdued, being a more conservative town only the hotel bar was open and we were pretty much the only people there. It certainly was worth a weekend to get out of the busy city and whitwashed Bilkent campus to see some more of Turkey's color. This weekend is Göreme in Cappadocia, for sure there will be some fantastic pictures of rock churches and fairy chimneys. The pictures from this weekend can be found at the link below and I will try and post later this week on some of the requested topics (certainly if you have anything you'd like me to write about, let me know).
http://uchicago.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2019710&id=2903913&l=6c4fa
http://uchicago.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2019710&id=2903913&l=6c4fa
