Turkiyeeeeee

OK, Turkey – where to begin? I guess in the place we did. Bodrum.
Annette, my bro’s girlf, met us at the port and we all went back to the hotel. Bodrum like the Greek Islands was dead. We had a fun night in the Aussie Pub (no joke – why are the pubs that stay open ALL year – Australian pubs???!) (Actually it’s probably because the Aussies won’t accept the cold weather…) hmmmmmm.

Ok… so that was like, ummm, y’know… fun and stuff. There was a sweet shop there. Not in the pub.

Moving on we went to Pammukale. Pammukale for those who, like me, weren’t 100% up on the Turkish geography, Pammukale is the place on all the Turkey tourist posters where the natural springs have created gradient calcium shelves. The shelves contain little pools of healing mineral waters. The mineral waters however have been diverted to hotel pools and so on, so really the shelves are dry – and rapidly degrading. They’re trying to fix them with what like cement and white wash – but in a lot of places it’s really a sad imitation. You can see how amazing they were – it’s still cool to go, but they’re definitely missing something.

Later upon closer appraisal of a ‘recent’ tourist poster showing the shiny, beautiful full-of-water calcium shelves, we discovered the picture was actually taken in 1982. Probably the last time the shelves look remotely like that. Tourism and bad environmental management were the reasons.

So enough blasting the world heritage attempts of the Turkish Department of Time Wasting, oops I mean Tourism and Environment.

After Pammukale we went to Konya. We ignored all the people in Bodrum and Pammukale who said "Konya??? Why would you go to Konya? It’s a religious town, there’s nothing there". What a thing to say anyway – of course they didn’t realise the time we’d spent in the Middle East before. Anyway Konya was great! There was a really happening student atmosphere – you couldn’t notice the alleged extra hijabs. Just a cool Mevlana vibe.

Konya is the home of the whirling dervishes whose mystical Islam spread throughout the West Middle East with the rise of the Mevlanas. Mevlana – the founder of the sect- who on his death declared his birth to Allah. He believed in becoming closer to God through poetry and chanting. It’s a great form of Islam, extremely welcoming to all. In the Shrine-Museum that holds the tomb of Mevlana there is also guess what:

… the beard of the Prophet Mohammed…

Ta daaaa. How many of you can say you’ve see that huh! (Eirin and Annette don’t count OK)

More to come!!