Day 59: Back to Istanbul

My week of recuperative rest in Gümüşhane was mostly worth it. I left with a far more positive outlook on the town than I had developed before I went travelling. Maybe it was because of Ramadan but people were kinder to me, and I enjoyed myself. That is until I got ready to leave this morning. That’s when the relationship I’ve been in finally broke under the strain of distance and the significant differences between us. Maybe it was foolish and naïve of me to think it would work in the first place. I’m still in the stage of comforting myself with “some things aren’t meant to happen,” but I’m sure I’ll transition through anger, bitterness, resentment, self-loathing and finally get over it just like everybody else under the sun.

When I arrived at the Gümüşhane otogar, the bus driver decided to take me under his wing for some odd reason. I think he thought I was some clueless tourist (an easy mistake to make). He showed me the cafeteria, the restrooms and the place our bus would be departing from before showing me to a seat outside. Off toward Trabzon I could see ominous storm clouds brewing, which momentarily made me wonder if I’d gained the ability to control the weather with my mood.

Gümüşhane to Trabzon was about as uneventful as it always is. I couldn’t find anything I wanted to listen to on my iPod. I mostly just sat there looking sad, gloomy and disgruntled. The bus driver apparently noticed my mood and suddenly “Gangster’s Paradise” by ___ is piping through the bus’s stereo system. He grinned at me in the rearview mirror and gave me a thumb’s up, and I had no choice but to laugh. God bless that guy.

In Trabzon I called the guy who had my luggage. He seriously did not speak a word of English. I had to bust out my Turkish phrasebook to try to tell him I was at the Trabzon otogar and I needed my luggage. After hanging up with him, desperately hoping he understood what I meant, I received a call from a number I didn’t have in my phone. It was the school’s headmaster, Nusret, who had arranged to have my luggage stored with his friend. He was confirming everything with me in English that I’d tried to convey to his friend. He said his friend would be there in 30 minutes, and sure enough he arrived on time (albeit on the other side of the otogar from me).

Nusret’s friend put me in a taksi to the airport for a good price, and when I arrived this old guy latched on to me and ushered me inside with my things. He guided me through security and then indicated where I could sit down. Through a combination of him pointing at his watch and my confused Turkish I managed to understand that the ticket agents didn’t arrive until 3:00 PM. When they did arrive I checked it, paid my baggage overage for the weight (a whole 15 TL, like $10) and then went through security again.

People here are baffled by my CPAP, which is the machine I have to use at night because of sleep apnea. After it went through the X-ray machine, I used “medical,” “oxygen,” and choking myself to indicate that it was a medical machine I used at night to keep me from choking to death. The lady asked, “Oxygen?” to confirm and when I said, “Evet (Yes)” she laughed and slapped her co-worker on the shoulder, as if to say, “I told you so.” Then they made me dig out a pair of scissors. And then my camera. And finally the guy just motioned me over behind the security barricade and we went over the odd things on the monitor one by one – my camera, a pen, scissors, the CPAP and a couple of other things he couldn’t identify. I got the feeling I could have told him it was a flying pink elephant and he would have nodded his head at me.

The flight was uneventful, but it took me forever to get to my hostel. Of course I got lost thanks to some stooge on the street corner giving me wrong directions, but naturally a kind Turk entered the picture and walked me across the neighborhood asking every shopkeeper we passed until we found the place. He parted with a smile and a wave, reminding me why I love Turkey.

Days 52-58: Home Again, Home Again Lickity Split (Gümüşhane)

20 hours, 24 hours…it doesn’t actually matter how long you’ve ended up on the bus once you pass about 18 hours. If I had a Turkish bus on American roads then things might not be so bad, especially if I could take one of the top Turkish bus companies. I’d have a Wifi connection, my own entertainment system and a steward to wait on me hand and foot. Instead, I was on a mediocre bus traveling along Turkish roads, which might be worse than African roads.

If the route on the way to the southeast was circuitous then the way back was just absolute madness. If you have a car then you can make the trip in 6 hours. SIX HOURS! On the way back we swung far to the west. I consoled myself by saying that I was getting to see some amazing parts of the country but around hour 18 I stopped caring. I just sat there, bouncing up and down, jostling from side to side, completely unable to fall asleep. Every hour or so we would come to a stop to let someone on or off; more often than not they’d make a beeline for the empty seat beside me.

At some point your body just gives up. It stops protesting about sleep or food or water, and it goes into something like standby mode. You don’t think. You just stare. So I stared for 22 hours until we reached Trabzon and then another hour and a half until we reached Gümüşhane. Somewhere along the way I gave up on Georgia. I knew I couldn’t spend another minute on a bus, much less trying to figure out its weird language, arranging accommodation, finding food, looking for transportation, etc. I decided that southeastern Anatolia had taken its toll on my soul, and I was sick of traveling. It probably didn’t help that I’m getting old. In fact, I kept replaying the Lethal Weapon scene in my head: “I’m gettin’ too old for this shit.”

There are worse places in the world to spend a week than Gümüşhane. I came back because I know the town and the people; I don’t have to negotiate for things because people don’t try to rip you off. The hotel is comfortable and the staff likes me. I know where all the good restaurants are. And I can complete the work that needs to be completed before I return to the States – like four different phone interviews.

Today I was supposed to have two interviews. One lady just didn’t even call. Granted we had already rescheduled once before, but if she needed to reschedule again she could have dropped an e-mail. Although to be honest I wonder if there aren’t some weird problems with her institution – when I tried to access their website this morning to do some research before the interview it was offline.

The second interview was through Skype, and I really enjoyed it. The interviewer was really thorough in making sure that I understood the history and mission of the organization and the commitment that their interns were expected to make. The expectations do seem high but she definitely hit the mark by saying that a lot of interns will “have nothing to do,” and I’d rather be worked to death than have nothing to do. If they offer me the job then I’ll definitely take it.

So far being back in Gümüshane has been nice, except for Ramadan. Apparently all the restaurants shut down during the day. At least I can’t find one that’s open. So I’m food fasting with the rest of the town, and I hate it. If it wasn’t hotter’n all get out then I’d just all out fast all week – if you’re halfway there you might as well commit (in reasonable weather).

Days 50 & 51: Şanlıurfa & Nemrut Dag

Here’s where I learned to listen to other people. Three locals told me to go back to Batman and catch a bus to Urfa from there. “But look at the map,” I said, “it’s clearly easier to go to Midyat, Mardin and then Urfa.” Well. The map is full of it. The roads were horrible the entire way, and it took me something like 9 hours when it should have only been five (mostly because the bus broke down for 3 or 4 hours). Batman-Diyarbakır-Urfa might have been longer but I’m absolutely positive it would have been faster.

Because it’s Ramadan, people are a little cranky. It’s anywhere between 100-115 degrees outside and people can’t eat/drink, so it’s understandable. On the way to Urfa, I saw an old man slap our bus driver because they wouldn’t accept him and all his cargo. It was quite the spectacle. Hydrated and well-fed, I seemed to be the only one that found it funny, though. The old guy stomped around his cargo in a circle, throwing his hands up in the air and yelling in Turkish. Finally the bus driver told him no very firmly so the old man reached back and just pimp slapped him. It was a full on pimp slap to the face. I erupted in laughter because you don’t expect old Turkish men to be pimp-slapping people.

Despite the horrors of getting to Urfa, the city itself is a paradise. The streets are beautiful and clean. They’re lined with well-kept parks, fountains and trees. The shops are smart and modern, and the municipal government obviously puts a lot of pride into maintaining its city well. I had selected my accommodations ahead of time based on recent reviews by other travelers and I was not disappointed…once I arrived.

The bus company I was on was filled with angry men. The steward came and yanked me out of my seat when we pulled off on the side of the highway somewhere in Urfa. I could tell by the look in his eye that he didn’t care for me very much. He kept trying to talk to me in Turkish and I kept shrugging at him. I don’t know why his stupid ass thought that the more he repeated the same thing the more I would understand. So I hastily grabbed my things and shuffled to the door. There I asked, “Otogar?” thinking it must be somewhere off the road but he said, “Yok (No)” and gave me a little shove so that I stumbled out of the bus. I turned around to tell him what he could go do with himself but he’d already shut the door and the bus was speeding off.

So there I was in the middle of a city without a clue where I was, without a map and armed with the Turkish vocabulary of a 3-year-old. Enter the beautiful citizens of Urfa! Three men led me to the taksi stand, and I produced the piece of paper with my hotel and address on it. I negotiated a rate and off we went.

The hotel is a 300-year-old restored Armenian house nestled in one of the older districts of Urfa. I was so tired and dirty and exhausted that I negotiated a good rate for the hotel’s suite and went to enjoy the air conditioning and a shower…but not before the hotel manager tried to put me on a tour of nearby Nemrut Dagi. I really wasn’t interested so maybe it was my complete lack of interest that made him reduce the price. Honestly I wanted to go quite badly but I had already made up my mind that there was no time to spend in Urfa because of being bedridden in Diyarbakır. When he cut the price in half, though, I decided I could probably swing it and I’m so glad that I did!

The tour started at 6:00 AM, which was ridiculously early for me but I managed to roll out of bed and be downstairs at 5:50. The tour was composed of me, a Polish sculptor living in Amsterdam and a Czech couple from Prague who were a developmental biologist and architect-in-training. We made quite the odd motley crew but we managed just fine and had some great conversations to boot. We talked about traveling and its importance, I shared with them a little bit about the Bahá'í Faith and my experiences in Africa and the Polish guy told me a little bit about what to expect in Georgia.

The highlight of the trip is the summit of Nemrut Dagi, a tomb site of King Antiochus, who ruled the Commagene Kingdom in the 1^st-century BC. The Commagene was a small kingdom that seems to have never merited a mention in my history books, but they began in 80 BC and reached their height in 64-38 BC during the reign of Antiochus. He claimed Persian ancestry on his father’s side and Greek ancestry on his mother’s side, so you see both Greek and Persian influences in the ruins on top of the mountain.

Antiochus, great as he might have been, was crazy. For some reason he thought Nemrut Dagi should be taller so he made his followers flatten the top of the mountain and then pile up fist-sized limestone rocks on top until the mountain was 50m higher. Archaeologists assume that Antiochus’ tomb is under that pile of rocks but I guess funding is not forthcoming to find out for sure. Apparently there used to be more stuff around the top of the mountain but the Romans carted a bunch of it off when they invaded. They were like the ancient version of the British – invade, cart off antiquities and then slowly let the Empire decay.

One of the first archaeologists to work on the site was Karl Humann, a German guy who stole relics from Pergamon and probably also from Nemrut Dagi. What a guy. UNESCO has also stuck its nose in things by commandeering a lot of the relics and putting them in a big storage facility so that they aren’t destroyed in the next earthquake.

So this guy Antiochus was big on himself. He wanted a higher mountain but he also thought he was equal to the Gods, so he made his followers build giant 10m statues on the eastern and western sides of the mountain. The statues depict him with a bunch of different Greek and Persian deities, including Apollo, Zeus and Ahura Mazda. Making his statue the same size as the Gods and standing next to them apparently meant that he considered himself their equal. I guess either his followers did shoddy neck work or the Queen of Hearts rolled into town because earthquakes have caused all the heads to fall off.

Our guide, who took to calling us his nephews and niece, was the lookout while we climbed behind the chain to get a better look at the heads. Security has to know that people do that so I don’t know why they even bother with a chain. As long as you aren’t climbing up on the heads and stuff then I don’t see what the big deal is. On the back of many of the statues there are carvings in Greek that detail something about Antiochus’ birthday. Here’s a rough translation I made:

“The cake should be red velvet but not that cheap Kroger-brand red velvet cake mix. Like real red velvet from the bakery. And go easy on the icing, you know he’s not big on the sweets. Presents should be brought throughout the day but don’t use so much tape that he can’t open it easily. You know he likes to unwrap them carefully and save the paper for when he gives things to the grandkids. There should be no kazoos. Party hats are required.”

It was an amazing view from 2,000+ meters but I’m not gonna lie: I was cursing like a sailor whenever I saw that the bus wasn’t going to take us all the way up to the summit. We had to walk up for about 20 minutes, which was 19 minutes up a mountain too long. I was lagging behind those damned Europeans but they were gracious about it. If anyone made a “fat American” joke it was me…after I caught my breath.

After hoofing it down the mountain we headed to Arsameia, a hillside fortress built by the Hittites in the 9^th-century BC (finally, a civilization I’ve heard of). It was also used by good ol’ Antiochus, who promptly put up a statue of himself shaking hands with Apollo. He also dug a tunnel that goes nowhere and put up another statue of himself shaking hands with a naked Hercules. Before we reached the Hercules statue, our guide was blabbering something in horrible English about Hercules having no shame. Right before I get to the statue I hear him shout, “Paynis!” from behind me, which was confusing until I saw the statue and realized he meant to say penis.

On the way to another ancient site, we stopped at the Şeytan Köprüsü (Satan’s Bridge) over the Kahta River and swam in the river with some local guys who thought it was about the most amusing thing in the world to see this group of Westerners strip down and jump in with them. The water was cold but it was the most wonderful thing in the world after hoofing it around Arsameia and gazing upon the paynis of Hercules. There was another fortress high up on the clifftop from the river but it was closed to tourists recently because “some guys got killed by a rock,” explained our “uncle” tour guide.

He made us get out of the water, dry off and then head to the Cendere Bridge, which was built by the Romans around 200 AD. It’s pretty massive! It was dedicated to Emperor Septimus Severus and there used to be four columns representing himself, his wife, and his sons Caracalla and Geta. Whenever Caracalla ascended the throne he killed Geta (what a Roman) and supposedly had the fourth column removed as a final slap in the face.

The next to last stop was the Karakuş (“blackbird”) Tumlus, a tomb site dating back to the 1^st-century BC which a number of impressive columns. But it was at this point that the Czech girl and I were shutting down. Her boyfriend and the Polish guy had a little more energy but I was so over everything it wasn’t even funny. We piled out of the car, took a photo of the nearest column and then stumbled into the shade of the little café. I spent a good deal of time trying to explain to this guy in broken Turkish that I attended the oil-wrestling festival in Edirne; yes, I am big but no I did not participate in the festival; yes, my arms are hairy but that doesn’t mean I should also have a mustache; and finally I know what pestil and kome are but I’d rather not talk about the finer points of how they’re a natural Viagra.

It was during this stop that our tour guide thought he’d start doing something “funny.” I guess it was funny to him. If he hadn’t been a 62 year old man suffering from what I hoped was Ramadan-induced delusion, I’d have pushed his sorry ass off that mountain. People here will pour water on themselves to cool off. So as we’re getting ready to go, he picks up this hose and turns on the water. He motions me over and says it will cool me off. I didn’t want to cool off but he insisted, so I leaned over and held the camera as far away as possible.

It turns out his stupid old ass didn’t run the water long enough, so I received a shower from water that had been sitting out in the sun in 115 degree heat. And he had latched on to my neck so all I could do was flail around until finally I screamed and shoved him and got away. The water had burned my head and my back and in the ensuing struggle he’d managed to spray water on my $800 camera. After he and the other Turks gathering around checked the water and quickly jerked their hands back from the burn of it they all fixed me with this dumbfounded look.

For the rest of the tour, he thought it was funny to try to pour water on us. When we stopped at a gas station for drinks, he snuck up behind me and the Czech girl and poured freezing cold water down the back of our shirts. And then when we were leaving the station, he jumped into the bus with a wet towel and wrung it out down the front of her shirt. Perverted old jerk. He repeated the process at least once more but stopped afterward, probably sensing that if he did it one more time one of us was going to kill him and dump his body in the Euphrates.

The last stop was Atatürk Dam, which took 9 years to build. It blocks the Euphrates River for the purpose of hydroelectric power generation, irrigation and national pride. Before visiting the actual dam, we stopped by the banks of the Euphrates to take a second swim. But hell no, I was not getting in that water. I knew it would be cold but it was FREEZING. The water was coming from the bottom of the lake created by Atatürk Dam, which is who knows how deep. Our guide braved the water, and there was also a Turkish family having a picnic there. One of their sons kept spraying me with his water gun, which was cute for the first 10 times but eventually started to piss me off. Turkish children are incredibly ill-behaved.

Back at the hotel, I discovered that I had a horrible sunburn (I remembered my water and hat but I forgot the sunblock). Both the Polish guy and the hotel manager suggested that I put Ayran on it (Ayran is a salty yogurt drink) but I was more interested in eating dinner since was 9:00 PM and we’d skipped lunch. The Polish guy offered to take me to a nearby kebap restaurant, and we had a great conversation, a wonderful meal and the best Ayran I’ve ever had! We exchanged contact information, and he offered to play host in Amsterdam or plug me into his network of friends and family in Poland (“so you don’t have to pay for a thing!”).

After my wonderful holiday in the southeastern part of Turkey, I got booked on another circuitous route toward Trabzon…this time 20 hours long. Woo.

Day 49: Hasankeyf

Mosque Inscription

The journey from Diyarbakir to Hasankeyf was ridiculously easy. If you know me then of course you know that there was no way in hell I was actually going to wake up at 5:30 AM to catch the bus to Hasankeyf. I hit that alarm so fast it didn’t even know what was happening. So when I woke up 4 hours later, I put my faith in the Turkish transportation system and made my way to the Ilçe Otogar, a small regional bus station not to be confused with the main otogar. Whenever I arrived at the otogar, this old man who had been watching me on the dolmuş gently took me by the arm when I started to walk the wrong way and led me over to the minibuses I needed.

It turns out that buses leave Diyarbakir for Batman every 10 minutes. Yes, that’s right. Batman. You say Baht-mahn in Turkey but damn if it isn’t cool to go to a town named Batman. It’s a completely unremarkable oil town (like Tulsa!) but there are regular buses leaving there for Midyat (and Hasankeyf is along the way). All in all it took me about 3-4 hours to get from Diyarbakir to Hasankeyf.

Cave homes on Tigris

Hasankeyf is a very small town of 3,000 people that is situated on the banks of the Tigris River. Apparently it was a stopover on the Silk Road back in the day, and its strategic location made it a prize to both the Byzantines and the Sassanids.  The Arabs dealt with all that back and forth business when they swept through in 638 and took the town. It reached its peak from 1101-1232 when the Artukid Empire rose and made Hasankeyf its capital. It swapped hands a few more times until the Ottomans rolled in during the 16^th-century.

Aside from the obvious ruins and things, the town is also well-known for the roughly 4,000 cave houses that have been carved into the sandstone cliffs along the Tigris. Oddly enough the whole thing has been scheduled to be flooded by a dam project that was supposed to be implemented 60 years ago. There’s been a lot of opposition to it because Hasankeyf is such an important site and so far the project has been on hold indefinitely.

Hasankeyf Girl

There’s only one motel in town, so that’s where I stayed. It didn’t have AC but it did have a fan. Thankfully I also got a room away from the bridge because apparently the rooms near the bridge will shake whenever a truck does over the bridge. There was an American girl and a Dutch lady also staying in the hotel; whenever I checked in the American girl was suffering from dehydration so we agreed to meet up later. Having experienced dehydration before I didn’t want to disturb her so I went off in the afternoon on my own.

The Mosque of Rızkıye was built in 1409, and its minaret has two sets of staircases inside, which is apparently unusual. The 99 Names of God are inscribed above the entrance to the mosque, and there are also some very interesting carvings at the base of the minaret. For me the most amusing thing was the see an enormous stork’s nest on top of the minaret.

There are ruins of an old bridge running across the Tigris near the mosque. It was built in the 14^th-century on top of the ruins of a Byzantine bridge that was supposedly so big that it had a caravanserai inside of it.

Tigris at Sunset

The highlight of the town is supposed to be the castle, but the site was closed when I arrived because an entire section of the cliff inside had collapsed a few days before. It killed the owner of one of the cafes that are attached to the side of the cliffs near the castle, and the government apparently deemed it too dangerous for anyone to go inside. A policeman was stationed near the entrance, and he was watching me like a hawk – if I even so much as shuffled near the site (it isn’t all enclosed by a fence) then he would start yelling at me.

Afterward I went to the Sultan Suleiman Camii, built in the 14^th-century. But it was also closed and locked. I could have climbed the wall but I wasn’t that interested in seeing the ruins of an old mosque. The impressive minaret was enough for me, even if it was missing its top. While standing at the mosque, I noticed a cliff-face with some of the cave houses carved into it so I went off the beaten track to get a better look. Then I discovered there was a canyon leading into the cliffs, lined with cave houses. Feeling rather Lewis & Clark-ish I decided to venture inside.

Sultan Suleiman Camii Minaret

Well. The cave houses stopped quickly and then it just got creepy. The canyon was small enough that in some places I had to shimmy between some rocks to be able to go forward. It was very rewarding but the further I went the more I started to worry. What if I broke my leg? What if a scorpion stung me? What if a snake bit me? My overactive imagination got the better of me so I turned back when I reached a point that would have been particularly difficult to navigate.

Back in town I met up with the American lady in the Internet café. She had arranged a guide for the afternoon who promised to somehow get us into the castle site, so I agreed to go along for a mere 15TL. True to his word, we circumvented the policeman and slipped into the site, which didn’t look the least bit dangerous to me. Sure, an impressive chunk of the valley wall had come crashing down but lightning never strikes twice…right?

Anyway, we began the long ascent up and around the cliff to get to the access point for the castle, which meant going through a beautiful valley filled with sheep and shepherds. I was freaking out about losing the network signal to my cell phone and thereby missing an internship interview (it turns out she sent an e-mail to reschedule for next week) and my American companion, Elizabeth, was still recovering from dehydration. We took it nice and easy, which is my preferred way of doing things (unlike Turkish guides, who always seem to be trying to set some speed record for most sites seen in an hour).

The Canyon

When we got to the castle access point, it was a giant ramp up the side of the cliff. Elizabeth and I looked at the ramp, looked at each other, back to the ramp, over to the guide and back to each other with a look that said, “I’m not going but you can if you want.” The guide consoled us by saying even Turkish tourists usually didn’t want to go up the ramp. We continued on through the valley and descended some steps to find ourselves emptied on to the banks of the Tigris. The guide led us to a pool right next to the river and said it was spring water. It seemed like a pretty dubious claim but we drank the water (I thought I was going to die of thirst) and I’m not dead yet. I assume Elizabeth is also still alive.

I spent a good chunk of the evening at the Internet café catching up on e-mails and other stuff, so I was late to dinner with Elizabeth. Whenever I approached the hotel, the receptionist bolted out of the front door and started waving toward a restaurant, jabbering in Turkish. I couldn’t even put my stuff down before he took me by the arm and started guiding me over there. I didn’t feel so bad whenever I arrived and saw that Helena, the Dutch lady, who departed shortly after I arrived, had joined her.

Valley Behind Castle

And that’s when I found out she was a sex tourist, which totally revolts me. They are increasingly older single women who go to exotic locations for fun, sun, sights, sounds, food and sex with local men. And the local men are only too eager to bed a foreign woman, more as a matter of bragging rights than anything else. I hate it because it can give tourism a seedy reputation in places, and it can turn public opinion against tourism in some places (especially small places) or against whole nationalities (i.e. “all those Dutch women just sleep with our men”).

The night was rough without AC. I had the door open and the fan on but the heat persisted. I spent a largely sleepless night tossing, turning, sweating and telling myself it was definitely worth it.

Days 45-48: Diyarbakır

Hasan Paşa Caravansaray

What’s the news from Diyarbakır? Well. It took a lot longer to get here than I thought it would, I’m sick as a dog and I’ve been here one day longer than I should have been. But that doesn’t diminish how amazing the city is!

The bus ride from Gümüşhane was supposed to take 14 hours but it ended up taking 16 ½ hours because our bus broke down, which gave me horrible flashbacks to Tanzania. I don’t think I got very much sleep at all. The roads were bumpy and under construction a good deal of the way. The seat next to me was officially unoccupied but people kept rotating their children in and out of it so I constantly had kids sleeping on me. But finally we arrived in Diyarbakır…and then I learned there was no shuttle service to the city centre. Blasphemy! Turay is a horrible bus company.

Door to one of the two churches in Diyarbakır

I shuffled outside the otogar to try to find the dolmuş into the city. First I asked some taxi drivers, who offered to take me. Whenever I declined and said I wanted to take the dolmuş they just pointed out where it was. THEY. JUST. POINTED. OUT. WHERE. IT. WAS. They didn’t try to force me into their cab, they didn’t try to persuade me about “A good price for you, my friend,” and they didn’t refuse to give me directions. I thought maybe I had died on the bus trip and gone to Heaven or something.

True to form, I couldn’t follow their directions for the life of me so I stopped inside the little otogar police station. Four police officers were having their breakfast and the second I said “Hello” they pulled up a chair and started motioning to the food. But eating was the last thing on my mind after 16 hours on a bus with no sleep so I politely declined. They pointed me over to the bus stop but when I got there it was dead. I felt like there should have been tumbleweeds blowing by. Another lady eventually wandered over and she spoke a little English. We worked out that the bus would be there in 10 minutes and it cost 1.5 TL. Then she started chit-chatting with me. A lone woman in Turkey started chit-chatting with me. Unbelievable! After the death stares in Gümüşhane, I was beginning to think people in Diyarbakır had some kind of mental illness.

Kurdish singers

Once on the bus, the lady told the driver where I wanted to get off and then we wound our way through the new city, which is absolutely bustling with construction. Thanks to the conflict between the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) and the government, people have fled to Diyarbakır for safety. In 1990 the metropolitan area’s population was 400,000 but now it’s approaching 2 million.

The bus dropped me at Dag Kapı (North Gate) and I stumbled bleary-eyed toward a hotel I remember being recommended by some other tourists. Before I made it to the door, a tour guide had latched on to me. I wasn’t opposed to hiring a guide but I was exhausted, so I guess he thought I was giving him the cold shoulder. “Do you want me to leave you alone? It’s okay, I can go,” he said. What was that? Was that sincerity I heard in his voice? I’ve never had a tout or guide offer to go away before, much less offer to do it with sincerity. Inside the hotel we had tea together while my room was being prepared, and we agreed to meet again after I had a 5 hour nap.

Domed roof of mosque entrance

So my friend Murat wasn’t a bad tour guide, he was just wildly inappropriate. The problem with being an American is that everyone draws their conclusions about us based on our movies, television and music. Understandably they get the impression that we are foul-mouthed, crass people that talk about sex, violence and drugs non-stop. So the tour with Murat was peppered with wildly inappropriate sexual conversation that made me feel quite uncomfortable but sometimes it just doesn’t seem to be worth it to correct someone’s behavior. He told me he wanted to move to New York and be a gigolo. Who am I to crush his dreams?

I spent my second day in the city alone visiting the sites I didn’t see the first day, which was somewhat of a mistake. I spent like 6-8 hours wandering around in 115 degree weather and I paid for it dearly. At night my head was pounding, I had a fever and I was shaking uncontrollably. I didn’t get much sleep and when I woke up this morning I still felt very bad. I was also pretty dizzy, which made going downstairs for breakfast quite the adventure. I decided I had no choice but to stay in Diyarbakır one more night because I was in no condition to travel. It throws my schedule off and I might have to drop something in order to be in Trabzon on time for my flight, but unexpected things are bound to happen.

Cultural center

Yesterday I was having a hard time finding this cultural centre, so I stopped and asked several shopkeepers who all gave me directions in meters. Like I know how far a meter is, damn metric system. Eventually one of them called two children in off the street and asked them to escort me. I was pretty convinced they were going to yell “Money, money, money!” but instead they just waved and said “güle güle (bye bye).” When I was leaving the cultural centre I turned to go down a side alley but a shopkeeper came running after me and through various gestures and my broken Turkish he told me that I would get robbed if I went down there. When I pointed back to the main street he gave me a thumbs up and grinned!

Evli Beden Tower

Finally, on my way to dinner, I decided to cut through the gold bazaar to have a look. As I was admiring something from a shop, I see this guy making a beeline for me. “Ugh,” I thought, “somebody who wants to take me to their uncle’s carpet shop.” But it turns out he was just a university student who was desperate to practice his English. We spent an hour talking about tea before I said goodbye and headed to dinner.

I’ve seen and done a lot in the city, but I’m still not feeling quite 100% so I’ll spare you the long details. Tomorrow I’m heading to Midyat and Hasankeyf, which requires that I get up at 5:30 AM and catch three buses. Oh joy of joys!

Day 44: A Wedding in the Village, A Graduation in the City

Village Valley

On Friday, Jack and I went to one of the villages nearby to Gümüşhane with one of our students, Sema, for her uncle’s wedding. There was going to be a ceremony in the village and then the following day they would also have one in the city. The wedding invitation said it was at 1:00 PM but she and her father didn’t even pick us up until 1:00 so…Turkish time, I guess.

I can’t for the life of me remember the name of the village, but it’s about 30km outside of Gümüşhane. The village itself is perched above one of the numerous mountain valleys. Sema explained that her family lived there during the summers and then they returned to Gümüşhane during the winters. There were many apple orchards dotting the valley, donkeys stubbornly standing in the middle of the road and an interesting sort of poverty that in some ways reminded me of Africa except not as impoverished?

Of course whenever we arrived the first thing to do was eat. We had food heaped upon us! Sema’s uncle and cousin from Germany were visiting, and her cousin spoke exceptional English. Between her and Sema, we were able to talk to Sema’s parents and the few people that had gathered early for the wedding. After finishing our tea, Sema and her cousin led us on a little walk of the valley, which was spectacularly beautiful and peaceful.

Jack gets into the spirit of things

When we got back to the house, it was time for dancing and firing guns. Yes, firing guns. Before I knew it, everyone had a handgun out. They were waving them wildly in the air and indiscriminately shooting here and there. You can’t even imagine how nervous this made me. I thought only Berbers and Saddam Hussein just wildly fired guns into the air, but apparently it’s also quite common in village weddings in Turkey. At one point one of the guns jammed, so the guy was trying to fix it all the while POINTING IT DIRECTLY AT ME. I don’t know anything about guns but what if it unjammed? How humiliating of a death would that have been?

Apparently a lover of weapons, Jack decided to shoot a few rounds. I politely declined both for my own safety and the safety of others. After the live weapons fire, the men started to dance at the house with the groom. Eat, shoot guns and dance a jig…if there had been moonshine involved I could have sworn I was in east Tennessee.

Horon dancing

Eventually we were herded back into the living room for coffee, which was absolutely delicious (the best I’ve had in Turkey). Then the ladies arrived. They were all dressed in their Sunday (or Friday) finest and full of smiles and giggles for the foreigners. After a bit of awkward translated conversation, we all moved up the hill to a prepared space where the real dancing began. There was a drummer and a kemenche player (like a fiddle) who got everyone whipped into a frenzy. Soon people were doing the horon dance, which is the local dance in the Black Sea region. You shake your upper body really fast and you fling your feet around whilst moving in a circle and holding hands with the other people. It’s a hell of a lot harder than I thought it would be.

When we finally departed, people were very kind and gracious in telling us goodbye. In fact, compared to the cold shoulder you get in Gümüşhane being in the village was like being family. Our student was so happy and excited that we came, and I was, too. It was easily one of the more amazing things I’ve done here!

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Back in the city, we had the graduation ceremony for our summer school. The kids all got dressed up, and they all clean up very nicely! I felt like some kind of homeless guy in my polo shirt and khakis, fresh from the dirt of the village. Dinner was in the cafeteria, although it was slightly better than it usually is. I had to sit at the high table, which was asinine. There’s nothing more fun than sitting with a bunch of grumpy businessmen and the pompous governor!

Upstairs the kids had put together a little slideshow of pictures from throughout the summer, including one of me with my mouth hanging open and another of me sleeping on the bus. Jack and I had to give a speech, which was a little awkward, and he had to play a song. Then with all due pomp and circumstance certificates were distributed to sponsors of the school, including the owner of the local gold mine, and then the top five students from each class were given their certificates. The ranking worked out pretty well with the hardest working students being duly awarded.

We moved outside to distribute the rest of the certificates and then the dancing began again. And picture taking. And writing special little notes to practically each and every student inside their certificate folder. Saying goodbye to the students was a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. Even though a lot of them drove me mad, even the bad ones grew on me!

Days 41-43: The Final

I almost always write my blog entries while I’m having dinner out at a restaurant. It gives me something to do. I’m getting pretty good at ordering but the word for Coke is “cola” and I always get it mixed up with “soda,” which is soda water. So I’ve had to choke down soda water a couple of times to avoid embarrassment!

Yesterday, we administered the final exam. The earlier parts of the week were dedicated to review, which seemed to be largely useless given the exam scores. The students had about an hour and a half to take the written portion of the exam, and I proctored the advanced class.

Unfortunately, I had to take the exam away from one of them for “cheating.” I asked a question about the dominant geographic axis of each continent and one of the worst students asked me if by axis I meant east-west, north-south. As far as I was concerned that was answering the question for him, so I told him I wasn’t going to say. Then he said, “Can I ask someone else in the class?” Um, no. Like, how is that different from asking me? So he goes back to his seat and not 5 seconds later I hear him whispering to one of the other students asking about the definition of “axis.”

I slammed my hand down on the desk and started yelling at him. I don’t know what part of “Don’t ask anyone else” was unclear. So I took the exam from him and told him to leave. You shouldn’t be talking during an exam anyway. Maybe I’m a hard ass of a teacher, but I don’t see where he gets off countermanding what I just told him.

Today we had an assessment with the students, which seemed more like a North Korean death panel to me. The students were herded into one room, and we (the American teachers) had to go one-by-one telling them what we thought of them as students. It was kind of awkward. When we got to The Cheater, he said he didn’t want to receive feedback from me and proceeded to tell everyone what happened. All the students swiveled their heads to listen to him and then they turned back to me to see what my response would be.

Well…I went off on him. First, he has the audacity to try to weasel an answer out of me. Then he does exactly what I told him not to do. Also, we had reviewed the same concepts (including axis) EVERY SINGLE DAY for 2 weeks. And finally he wants to try to out me in front of the whole student body? Oh hell no. Both Jack and I had a lot of problems with him over the semester (he had a seriously bad attitude), and so I took advantage of the opportunity being offered to me. I explained to him in no uncertain terms why I took the exam from him, that we had reviewed the definition of “axis” every day for 10 days and that he deserved having his exam taken away from him for not paying attention in class in the first place and then doing exactly what I told him not to do. Dr. B’s eyes got big and I guess he felt the situation was going to get out of control, so he muttered something about this being an assessment of a student’s abilities and quickly moved on to the next student (which was a shame because I had plenty to say about his abilities, too).

Back to the exam – the second portion was speaking. We called them into the teacher’s lounge one-by-one and asked them to pick a piece of paper that had a topic on it. Many of them performed admirably, many of them acted like they didn’t speak a word of English! Eventually we had to split into two groups of interviewers or we’d have never finished.

After administering the speaking portion of the exam, we huddled together and went through the ordeal of trying to grade the exams. Thankfully one of the Turkish co-teachers took the initiative in figuring out how points should be distributed in the exams but then we had to assign weight to various things like their mid-term and homework in order to get their final grade. Enter the reason why I hate group work: three out of four people can be on the same page but they have to spend an hour trying to explain their reasoning to the fourth person and then another hour convincing them of the validity of the approach. We finally got fed up with it, so I put the data into Excel and e-mailed the spreadsheet to Dr. B for him to figure out what he wanted to do about the final grades.

Our brilliant quantitative approach required some subjective tinkering this morning, but we finally got the ranking worked out for each of the three classes. I think we’re all pretty satisfied about the outcomes and hopefully most of the students will be, too.

Tomorrow, I’m going to “the village” with Jack and one of the students to attend her uncle’s wedding. She’s one of our best students and she gave us official invitations and everything, so how could we refuse? The wedding begins at 1:00 PM and then we have to be back at the school for the graduation ceremony at 6:00 PM. I saw the preliminary schedule for the graduation a couple of days ago, and it looks like it’s going to be pretty long. The governor, mayor, members of Parliament and school superintendent are going to be in attendance so that in and of itself is going to ridiculously prolong things, especially since I know they’re going to be late.

Today I went to the otogar (bus station) to buy my ticket to Diyarbakir on Saturday. I discovered that the only bus going to Diyarbakir from Gümüşhane is a night bus that arrives from Trabzon at 5:00 PM and gets to Diyarbakir at 7:30 AM the next morning. I think it takes so long because it runs an awkwardly circuitous route to the city. In hindsight it was ridiculous to think that I could actually show up at the bus station and expect to find a 6:00 AM bus going to exactly where I wanted in exactly the route I wanted. It was also more expensive than I thought – 50 TL ()!

And so my adventures will begin with a 14-hour bus journey. Hoorah!