Kapadokya - Gün 1

So, we woke up nice and early to catch a METU-organized bus tour to Kapadokya/Cappadocia.

To summarize generic Kapadokya-ian history: some Saints came to Kapadokya, bringing Christianity. The Romans didn't allow Christianity at the time, so the citizens made some hidden churches in the hills. These "hills" (sometimes called "fairy chimneys") were formed by various volcanoes around Kapadokya, and the weathering away of those materials.

Anyways, after a 4 hour drive, we ended up at ?????. Basically, a park with some hidden churches, relatively deserted by most tourists.


A view of ????? before descending the stairs downwards (note the caves to the left)


I believe these are homes for pigeons- pigeon eggs were used to make dyes.


The outside of a hidden church


Wall painting detail

During the Hittite period (1800-1200 BC), some hills were carved into giant underground cities. These cities would be hundreds of meters tall, and some cities would even have tunnels connecting each other. Each home would have a tunnel leading to the city, so they may hide in times of attack. The Byzantines eventually modified this Hittite work, making new rooms and closing others.


"Kaymakli Underground City is not for clausterphobics" - this is why - we spend much of our travelling time kneeling and squatting in tiny passageways. The Hittites were a much smaller people.

After Kaymakli Underground City, we visited "The Three Beauties"- three of the most well preserved fairy chimneys, as seen below:



A view to the left of the Three Beauties

We then had a tour of the Turason Cappdocia Wine factory, where we were basically walked past the room where the wine ferments, and then dumped out into the wine shop. Then they commenced to serve us so-so wine, and expect us to buy alcohol. I think not.

On our way to the hotel, the bus was knocked out cold:


Our hotel was located in Ortahisar and was very nice. We were three random people to a room. Some of us took a dip in the (very cold) pool, which had a great view of the town:

Işık Yok

So just what happens when the power goes out?

Yemek (Food)

I assume most people have heard of a lot of the names of Turkish food (Kebap, Baklava, etc.), but I've stumbled upon some others.


This is a photo of Kunefe. Basically, it's a cheese (that tastes like American cheese, sort of), covered in fried wheat, then placed in a pool of sugar syrup. This one is adorned with some crumbled pistachios. It confuses my taste buds severely, to the point that it's not good, nor is it bad.

Additionally, you can see the corner of some fresh squeezed orange juice. They have these machines which squeeze the fruit right in front of you. It costs about $1.50 or so. Sometimes $.90.


I'd never seen grenade apples before, until we went to Olimpos and there were orchards full of them.
[10/10/05 Edit] In other news, this is not a grenade apple. This is a pomegranate. I have never seen one before. Leave it to Danish to lead me astray :-P


These a la Turca Doritos are Sesame bread and beyaz peynir (a Turkish white cheese) flavored. Very odd. There's also some tomato flavored a la Turca chips.

ODTÜ

I thought it about time I talk a bit about the campus.

Given that Drexel is in the city, and METU is 20 minutes outside of one, I expected the campuses to be very different. However, I still can't get over just how much space is here. There's just to much space to care for it all.


Stray cats invade everything and they're far bolder than the Philly squirrels. Sometimes, the cats are chased away by students, sometimes they're chased away by some of the stray dogs that inhabit METU.


There are statues scattered throughout campus, and at times it seems random. For instance, these busts on pedestals (above). They are placed randomly in a green space without any accompanying landscaping. Some busts have fallen off their pedestal completely. I think they represent famous scientists and engineers (I saw Einstein the other day).


By a nice cafeteria's outdoor seating area, I found this statue of Ataturk sitting at a table. At crossings of roadways within METU, they seem to put up larger statues such as this one (bottom left).





The academic buildings have been done very nicely. None of them are amazing to look at alone (just like Drexel buildings), but the landscaping around them is nice. For instance, one of the computer engineering buildings (above). And then there's this scene in front of the Architecture Department, with water complete with fish:


The photo on the bottom shows the tallest building on campus, and it houses generic Engineering department functions. They put the wireless transmitter (or whatever) on top of it.

To get from the dorms to the classes, there's a rather large/long walkway called the "Ass Freezer" (translated from Turkish). It takes you past one of the sports complexes, as well as the stadium.


My host student tells me that some chemical engineering students created some compound to write 'Devrim' across the stadium seats. The word mean 'Revolution' and due to the features of the special compound, it cannot be cleaned off or painted over.

At night before classes started, the campus was dead silent, to the point that I could hear my blood pounding in my ears each night. Now, the night is full of people shouting in Turkish and music blasting.

The first thing I look for in a dorm room is the view and this one does not disappoint.

The evergreen trees outside my window
Some apartments on the left and right edges, but the rest is just evergreen trees and hills. It makes METU seem really isolated. As an added bonus, my dorm room is really nice, too. The building is fairly new and I share it with two other girls (one Turkish, one Californian).


EBI (my building) from the outside.


My dorm room from the doorway

My nook of the room

The view from my desk
We have a refrigerator, which we use to store our fruit and yogurt (our basic breakfast meal and lunch snack). I'm not really sure what I was expecting, but resources here are pretty much the same as Drexel (minus a wireless internet connection and air conditioning).


METU's campus functions as its own miniature city. They say there's about 20,000 students at METU and most of them have dorm housing. There's an in-campus grocery store, mini-mall, restaurants, and even a hospital.

Dönmek

So, here I am, back in METU. We took an 8-hour bus ride starting at midnight and ended up outside of campus an hour before my first class this morning. Then we had to hike the 3/4 mile into campus with all our weekend luggage and a few hours of bus sleep.
Blargh!

Antalya - Gün 3

Today we decided to head out early-ish, to spend half the day in Antalya. We took the dolmus up the mountain, and then another to Antalya Otogar. Shammara had been sick that morning/evening, so she took a bus to Ankara right away. We headed off into the city.

Antalya is known for being a touristy town (i.e. they have descriptions in German and prices in Euros), and we tend to try to avoid that atmosphere, but the town was really beautiful.

They're a bunch of Ottoman-style homes built on narrow winding roads, right on the edge of the sea:


We wandered the streets a bit, looking at the various old mosques and minarets buried within the alleys.


A close up of an Ottoman style home


Antalya at night

We eventually ended up at a nice, rustic pub with live Turkish music. It's almost out of tourism season in Turkey, so we were the only foreigners there making us the only ones who didn't know the words to the songs.