Three Central Anatolian Towns

The 15 hours on buses from Barhal ended us in the small city of Amasya, right in the east-west center of the country. Arriving to a dingy hotel at midnight wasn't the best start to our short stay, but the one full day we spent in Amasya did have its share of nice things. In the morning we climbed the cliffs to the tombs of the Pontic kings who ruled the area in the 4th century-- there really wasn't anything to see there, but the size of the tombs was impressive. As we came down to the touristy neighborhood of Ottoman houses, which we planned to walk around, we were met by a university student speaking excellent English who had heard we were looking for a laundromat and offered to show us one. The laundry quest was unsuccessful-- more on that later-- but we ended up spending several hours with our guide, who was heading back to school in Ankara in a couple days but for the time being was looking for diversions in his hometown of Amasya. He took us around to various sites, the coolest of which was a gorgeous old medrese, or Islamic religious school. The school is now one where young boys, between 10 and 14, go to learn the whole Koran by heart. It is not open to the public, but following our guide, we were able to go in. Wearing religious caps and sitting crosslegged around the octagonal courtyard were boys hunched over their copies of the Koran, rocking and chanting in Arabic. When they arrive at the school, they learn to read Arabic, but do not learn what it means-- they read the Turkish translation of the Koran for that. They looked up when we arrived, perhaps particularly interested in seeing a woman in there (although I had to cover my head), but when they caught their teachers looking at them they bent back over their books. The hospitality of our guide was lovely-- he seemed to just love Amasya, and though we bought him lunch, we wouldn't have had to give him anything for the hours he spent with us. After leaving him we went walking around a neighborhood of run down but lovely old Ottoman houses and ran into two more instances of generous friendiness. First I went to buy an apple, and the merchant had us take it for free. Then, as we were walking, a family called to us from their raised porch inviting us up for tea, and we went and sat with them (saying our 3 Turkish phrases over and over...) for close to an hour.

Leaving Amasya, we headed to the capital, Ankara, but in hindsight wish we hadn't. Do you recall the Simpsons eppisode where Bart and family win a vacation-- the (misguided and NOT FUNNY) joke being that the trip is to Hartford? From our experience, Ankara would be a more appropriate choice for the unwanted vacation giveaway. Taking the metro into the city from the bus station, we were accosted by a man we saw to be a little eccentric who advised us to go to a different hotel than the one we had in mind, saying it should cost around 50 YTL (about $30). When we got to the hotel, we figured that maybe he hasn't been there in the past 10 years, since it now costs $95. After walking for too long with our heavy bags through a really ugly big-city landscape of noise, crowds of people and way too much traffic (the pollution felt much worse than Mexico City), we finally spotted the hotel we had originally chosen but were then unable to cross the street at an unmarked intersection for literally about 5 minutes. Having found the hotel, our next quest was to find a place to do our bulging bag of dirty laundry, but apparently there are no laundromats or laundry services in Turkey, as we were only able to locate 2 dry cleaners, one who rejected us and the other who said they'd charge over $30 to do the laundry. So we headed back to the hotel to do some hand washing.

Our reasons for coming to Ankara were the Ataturk Mausoleum and the Museum of Anatolian Civilzations, reputed to be one of the best museums in Turkey. We headed to the Mausoleum after breakfast, a journey that turned out to be as confusing and unpleasant as the walk the night before. But the monument itself, when we finally made it there, was quite interesting. The Museum of the War of Independence started out with several rooms of fancy shmancy Ataturk stuff-- a crystal shaving kit from the King of Jordan, dozens of jewel-encrusted daggers and swords, silk dressing robes, and the like. Then came the serious part: panaromas of battles, supplemented by the sounds of firing cannons and rapping bullets, and a dozen or more large paintings depicting 'ordinary Turkish people' helping the war effort while being tortured and killed by merciless Greeks. Though a bit Disney-ish in scale, it was actually quite moving. After that came a series of alcoves, each dedicated to a different one of Ataturk's achievements as Presidents between 1923 and 1938. Between the barrage of documents and the blaring patriotic music, we thought we might go into the exhibit American and come out of it Turkish. Finally, the museum brought us out in front of the towering columned monument, protected by fancily dressed soldiers, that contains Ataturk's supersized marble tomb. Over-the-top as it all seemed for a republic, it was still pretty cool to see. However, as we emerged from the museum, the thought of fighting our way through the Ankara streets to the Anatolian Museum we just couldn't stomach. Instead we bought some dried cherries and dates and set out for the bus station and the way out of town.

After escaping Ankara, we were happy to land in Safronbolu, a small town filled with old Ottoman houses (the town itself is actually a UNESCO site). We were very pleased with our pension, where we got a beautiful room for not much money. That night, however, we learned of a drawback: the singers from the bar 2 stories below sounded like they were right in our bedroom for several hours after we went bed. And after finally falling asleep, we were awakened at about 4:30 a.m. by the longest ezan (call to prayer) on the worst quality sound system we've ever heard, from the minaret that was practically right outside our window. The lack of sleep wasn't too much of a problem, though, because our only plan for three days in Safranbolu was to laze around-- stroll about, compare the Turkish Delights and baklavas of the many sweet shops, have picnics, that kind of thing. We were amused by the math at a cafe where our baklava and tea were listed on the bill as costing 3 and 6; when the waiter punched the numbers into the calculator he first showed us 11.5, then when we protested he typed them again and then showed us 8, which we paid, wondering what the next figure would have been if we'd said no to that. We thought our lazing would also include a lot of reading, but the rare tv in our pension room got in the way of that. The tv had digital cable, including three channels in English: the God channel (white televangelists), the God Revival channel (black televangelists), and the NBA channel. Remember those awesome 1993 and 1994 overtime playoff games? Alonzo Mourning's flat-top? When basketball shorts were still kind of short? We sure do.

On our second night, we decided that since we would be hearing the bar singers all night, we might as well sit in the bar. This was, perhaps, a miscalculation on our part, since the beer turned out to be ridiculously expensive, and they tried to charge us for the little bowl of nuts they'd brought unbidden to our table. But that aside, it had it's share of amusements. The main singer and m.c. struck us as painfully out of place in this little Turkish town, with his tight black pants, half-unbuttoned fitted shirt, and made-up face-- Provincetown would have been a better fit. But here he was, singing in this bar every night, and he seemed determined to make the best of it. He strutted back and forth, singing (off-key) with his eyes closed or rolled skyward, swaying when the guitarist, accompanied by his laptop, took over. At the end of each song, he would raise a cheer into the microphone (from our bed the night before we'd thought there was a very enthusiastic audience, but alas, it was an enthusiastic performer instead). He sipped raki between each song and smoked cigaretted whenever his dyed-blond female cohort took over at the microphone. We stayed at the show for awhile, trying to chat with the New Zealand couple we'd met, but eventually decided that the walls between the bar and our room made some difference, and retired upstairs.