Sometime last year, I was afflicted by the sudden fear that I would never manage to travel to eastern
sidenote #1: This is an important one because I do not want to be misunderstood.
This does not mean that it is unsafe to travel in eastern
While women, especially those of the blond hair-blue eyed ilk, are prone to getting weird looks and cat calls, it is rare that one feels physically threatened. It's really more annoying than anything else...but it can be annoying in a way you've never known.
General common sense is, of course, necessary, and traveling with a partner helps one avoid awkward situations [duh]. Luckily, because it is a more religiously conservative region, there’s not much to do in the evening as there aren’t really pubs and bars open and movies are all dubbed. This means one inevitably returns to the hotel at an early hour to watch crappy French or German MTV instead of standing around outside in the dark. Thus, the goals of common sense are aided by the general conservative environment! Who’d have guessed?
In all seriousness, the east is not a place to fear and the people there are generally happy to help. Additionally, any knowledge, really any knowledge, of Turkish is a big plus—even if that just means knowing how to say please and thank you—as it attracts people and inspires the kindness and hospitality that Turks are so known for.
I ardently encourage people—men and women—to go visit eastern
Lucky for me, my prophecies were unfulfilled. Dear Yvonne stuck around, consequently, I got to travel out east with someone cool who prioritizes food as much as I do. Can it get much better than that?
Now, if you’ll remember, back in August I had a momentary moral crisis about leaving
Yvonne and I were very much flying by the seat of our pants. I returned from
Yvonne was living in
Now, that was a pretty stupid plan, no? Sure, I would know if Yvonne had made it on to the plane, but what was she to do if I didn’t make it? Of course, we didn’t really realize this scenario until that morning…when we were both seated on the plane [hoorah!].
So, off we were to
The
But, better to have a seat than to stand for the three or four hours on bumpy dirt roads. So, we went into the otogar and bought tickets for the
Haha, how ridiculous! But, I digress.
Yvonne was famished, so we went into the cafeteria and munched. It was only about
We boarded the bus—lucky us, front row seats [that’s what you get for being a foreigner]—and immediately realized that it was going to be a long, hot ride. Yvonne rushed out and bought some more water.
The bus was crowded and the ride took us over some bumpy, dusty roads. The scenery, however, was truly fantastic. We drove through a deep canyon, surrounded by incredibly pink rocks.
sidenote #2: Really, those rocks were fantastic. The only time i've seen a rock that pink--we're not talking pink like a granite here, this was pure pink--was at the Tuscon Gem and Mineral Show. There was this incredible halite [salt] that was bright pink and had beautiful crystalline shapes. Truly magnificent stuff. But, that pink was a result of a certain type of bacteria, which I doubt explains the pinkness of this stuff.
Unfortunately for my rump, however, the trip took longer than expected…partly because we had to go quite slowly since the dust became so blindingly thick at points. It was dark by the time we arrived in
The hotel was mainly packed with businessmen and other foreigners traveling to
We brought our stuff upstairs—not an easy task, I should say. Those stairs were at such an angle, nearly vertical, and we were tired. But, we made it and the room was nice enough. We decided that we should go get some dinner before it was too late and made our way out. On the way down, we stopped by a room where we heard English language TV seeping through the door. We thought we’d ask their opinion on places to eat. The couple—Katrina and Andrew—were from
So, we headed down the street. We saw one place and analyzed the food selection, decided against it, proceeded a bit farther down the street, and then realized there was no other choice. We turned back and ended up with a bunch of yummy ev yemek.
Just as we were finishing up a scrumptious sutlac [sootlach; rice pudding] two fellas, who obviously knew no Turkish except “
Eventually, though, enough was enough and Yvonne and I went back to the hotel to relax and watch crappy dubbed French MTV.
Our first foray into French MTV was a fantastic one as it gave us this little gem by Kamini. Since returning from our trip this magnificent testament to the art of music has saved me from the depths of despair on oh-so many occasions!
After laughing our butt’s off and being entirely unsure as to how we should react, we fell in to bed, dreaming-oh-dreaming of the coming day’s adventure to the glorious ruins of Ani!