For more photos, see http://www.anatolianphotos@shutterfly.com/
For more info about the photos, see Oct. 19 post below.
Back to the police station in hopes of completing the applications for our residency permits. But first, we have to get our hands on the letter of appointment from the Rektor (or president) of the University. Alas, he is located at a different campus—the medical school, which is considered the “main” campus of Hacettepe – in downtown Ankara. So our driver, Ceylan, a new faculty member at Hacettepe, first worked out that campus’s maze, picked up (with us in tow) the elusive letter, then drove us to the police station, located next to yet another monster mall. After several discussions, referral to another office, and a few more documents stamped, we succeeded in completing the process. Except that we can’t actually pick up the permits just yet. Larry’s will be ready on Friday of this week. (It is Tuesday as I write this). Mine will be ready on Friday of next week. This means, of course, corralling more people to drive us to the station. But at least the most difficult of our bureaucratic obligations has been completed. Hooray.
For Tuesday night’s Turkish lesson, Larry came with me to sign up a week late. Arriving a little early, we decide to quickly visit Tempo Tur, a travel bureau we had used in the past, to ask about a list of weekend excursions and/or an upcoming lake district walking tour I found on their web site. We are told that there is room for this weekend’s excursion, but we must pay by the end of the next day, Wednesday. Drat! I didn’t bring money with me to pay for the tour, which means I’ll have to come down the next day to sign up and pay.
At the Turkish class, we are now up to nine students, including Larry and a few other newbies. This takes some of the pressure off me and Sherri, the other student who, with me, showed up from the beginning. Although the instructor still asks her and me more questions than she does the others (we know our alphabet!), we are still singled out less than we were last week. I’m not a complete idiot when it comes to learning languages, but I often feel like one when questions are lobbed to me in another language. Just call me slow.
Next morning, I set out to sign up for the Tempo Tur for this weekend. Before leaving, I noticed it was unusually cloudy. Except for a few rainy afternoons our first week here, it has been consistently dry, sunny and warm every day since our arrival. But just as I opened the door to leave, I checked the sky and saw the clouds breaking up. Back went the umbrella to my closet. Naturally, after paying for the tour (an hour or so later), the heavy rains began. I took refuge in Karum, the large, fancy urban mall near Tempo Tur that used to be a retail showcase for downtown Ankara. Although there are still many high end shops in Karum, at least half of the stores are empty. This seems to be a legacy of all those outlying, car-accessible-only new malls along the Eskisehir Highway. (Ironically, Eskisehir means “old town”).
Arriving back in my neighborhood, Bahcelievler, I broke down and bought a small box of delicious baklava. I didn’t used to like baklava—too sweet for my taste. But the somewhat expensive variety available in Mado, the local bakery and ice cream shop, is less sweet and simply wonderful. There goes the weight loss I’ve been experiencing since I got here.
Hm. During Fulbright orientation a few weeks ago, an officer from the Consular Office in the U.S. Embassy told us that they would take care of sending absentee ballots for local U.S. elections – in our case, Hampton municipal elections – by diplomatic pouch. But we would need to make an appointment to do so. With all the paperwork we needed to pull together for a residency permit, the ballots fell to a lower priority. This week, I have been trying to make an appointment to bring in the ballots, but I have had difficulty fitting in a phone call, as the Consular office receives phone calls only on certain days and for limited hours within those days. The automated referral system is as much fun as, say, reaching AT&T customer service at home. Well, today I got the information that ballots sent by IPO?/APO? (i.e., diplomatic pouch, I think) will take nearly three weeks to arrive. So much for that. So off I go in search of a post office, in hopes that I can make my request for airmail clear. (Where is that phrase book when I need it?).
Tomorrow we plan on opening a bank account, with the help of a Fulbright staff member, assuming we can find her office, never having been there yet. (The orientation program was held at the Turkish American Association, where we have our Turkish lessons). Then we’re going to try to find the police station on our own via the subway. This station is right next to a very large mall where we hope to find, finally, a reading lamp or two. Our apartment has ceiling lights only, which are fine for most purposes. But for reading, it is very difficult. All the lamps we’ve found so far are just too garish. If we cannot find a simple design, then garish it will have to be. I just hope they are not too expensive; so far, they seem to cost a lot.
Once I gain access to the Internet from home, I hope to begin looking up Turkish recipes so I can expand my cooking repertoire. Since we left Gulriz’s apartment, we’ve been subsisting for many nights on a lentil dish I’ve improvised. Basically, veggies and lentils, I spice it up as I can, using some of the mystery spices I used at Gulriz’s. One is called “reyhan,” which I buy in more or less fresh bunches when I can find it, which is not often. It is shaped something like basil, is deep red/black, and has a pungent taste—almost like lemon. [news flash! Turns out is IS basil, a wild variety found on the slopes of the Mediterranean. Cool! I think we have some in our yard at home that my friend Kris gave me long ago--I didn't think it was edible!] I also use lemon, from the small, very juicy and flavorful ones available during this season. An actual Turkish dish I’ve learned to make is onions and sumac. Onions are sliced, soaked in salt water for about 10 minutes, rinsed, then marinated in olive oil, a little lemon, and sumac, a red spice available in some stores. I also added fresh chopped parsley. The marinade, and especially the sumac, takes out much of the bitterness of the onions and enables me to eat raw onions without too much regret. The dish is also very pretty and makes a great accompaniment for main dishes. Once I find some fresh, small eggplant, I will try a simple eggplant and sauce dish, which is usually topped with plain yogurt, but I prefer to eat it plain. I never did get the recipe for the eggplant dished called, “The Imam Fainted.” But once I have that Internet connection . . . . I sure wish, in the meantime, that I had brought along the small Turkish recipe book I have in Connecticut.
Next several days: I finally have internet access at home, with enough speed to watch Stephen Colbert segments (the full episodes are not available in Turkey) and Amy Goodman, without too many freeze-ups. Plus, I can now answer people’s emails in a timely manner. Hooray! We also now have Larry’s residency permit (mine still to come), and a bank account, into which the Fulbright office just today (Tuesday) deposited September and October’s grant money. Another hooray! We also just found out that the Red Sox are out of the Series picture. Boo!
Over the weekend, we went on our first out-of-Ankara excursion. Our two-day walking/hiking tour was great fun, except that it turned out to be only one day, as I came down with a severe case of food poisoning. This sent us home late morning on the second day, once my medication kicked in and I could face the two hour bus ride home. The sad part about missing that second day is that it was the highlight of the tour; a hike in the Yedigoller Milli Parki (Seven Lakes National Park). Apparently, the seven glacial lakes in the beautiful mountainous region around the city of Bolu (northwest of Ankara) are on two plateaus, with a difference of several hundred feet between the interconnected lakes. The lakes are small and must be quite beautiful, based on the two lakes we saw the day before. The park is also home to wolves, bears, and wild boars, so it must be quite pristine.
What we did see on the first day, though, was well worth the trip. The bus ride out of Ankara was a reminder of the wild beauty of most of central Turkey. It is stark and mostly undeveloped, dotted by countless small villages. The vistas are long and dramatic. Our first stop was a rest stop, like no other I have seen. It looked like a Colorado ski resort, with gardens and a pond in back. The second twenty-minute stop was in the city of Bolu, with a population of @400,000. We stopped right in front of yet another Selcuk (pronounced Seljuk) mosque. Built in 1163, the Sarachani camii also has the date 1750 prominently displayed at the entrance. Since no one on the bus spoke English (we later found one person who did), we don’t know if the mosque was rebuilt, restored, or replaced in 1750. Or whether there is some other significance to that date.
Next to the mosque was an old, working hamam, or public bath, which was in use that day. (It was men’s day). Walking past the doorway, I glanced in and saw men in towels. That was a little embarrassing in a conservative community. I quickly walked away.
Next stop was Golcuk Lake. Walking around the lake twice on a manicured walkway, Larry and I wondered if this was the extent of our “hike.” The walk was leisurely, as was our bagged lunch at one of the dozens of picnic tables. And the lake was heavily used, mostly by local college students on an outing. They were playing soccer, rope pull, and other outdoor activities, including eating. As a group of young, scarved, women walked past us, Larry said, “Merhaba,” (hello), which elicited a chorus of giggles from the young women. Oops. We forgot that male strangers did not talk to women. On our second go-around, we passed them again, to be greeted by them with another chorus—this time a loud, “Merhaba.”
At the appointed time, we looked for the bus, only to find it had left! But we found three other women in our group who assured us that it was coming. (They knew no English, but we figured out what they were telling us). It turns out that we were supposed to leave with the group for lunch much earlier, but we didn’t know it. Luckily, the tour guide had the bus come back for us. The communication difficulty was a little more complicated than this, but I won’t go into details.
Next stop: Aladag Puddle. This is the Turkish tour company’s translation of Aladag Gol, or Aladag Lake. This turned out to be the real hike. For two hours, we steadily climbed a gentle slope into the mountains. So gentle that even some elderly women in our group (including me) had little trouble. A few, though, stayed behind. Oh, did I mention that, of the twenty people on this tour, only two were male? The rest were primarily middle-aged women, with a few older, and a few younger. The climb led us to Karacaagac Highland, a community of summer cottages, mostly wooden, high in the hills. The name means Black Pine Tree summer community, and the cottages were made from that wood. One building was ornamented with reminders of the U.S. Wild West (wagon wheels, cattle horns, etc.), and labeled “Serif.” Serif is a common Turkish last name, and is also pronounced what it was here designed to represent: “Sheriff.” The sign even included a five star silver badge. The populace had already abandoned their summer homes for the season.
Continuing to climb, we found ourselves in a rock field, rivaling even the rocky fields of New England, but without much green growth at all, other than the beautiful pines that ringed the field. Very dramatic. The few bushes we did see included tall ones with yellow “berries,” some of which had fallen to the ground. Our guide picked some up off the ground and handed them to us to try. Wouldn’t you know, they were the teeny “crabapples” that made up the edible necklaces we bought a few weeks back in the local market near Gulriz’s. I had a few; Larry and the others had more. After this, the descent became steep. It was at this point that I realized how high we had climbed. The ascent was so subtle that the steep descent came as a surprise. The dryness of the underlying path made the descent a tad tricky, but not too hard.
We finally reached the “puddle,” a large lake really, although seemingly very shallow, created by damming up a stream. This explains the dry stream bed we followed for much of the hike. At the very end of our hike, we passed a field of wooden “tents.” These were charming and currently held participants of a sports camp.
After a long rest at the lodge (and tea and biscuits), we headed to our hotel, The Prestige Hotel, in Bolu. A new hotel, it had little charm, but was clean and comfortable—but noisy! I think the walls and floors were made of cardboard. The food, though, was spectacular. There had to be twenty-five choices at least. We were tempted to eat a lot, it was so good. But for some reason, my appetite didn’t match the level of physical activity from the day. It was only later that I realized I was getting ill. Only late night and early morning “sessions” convinced me that I had a very bad case of food poisoning. Although it is possible the problem originated with dinner, the speed of my illness suggested otherwise. No one else got sick either. Was it maybe those crabapples? Again, no one else got sick. At any rate, a second day of hiking was out of the question, meaning we would be missing the highlight of our trip, Yedigoller Milli Parki.
Luckily two of our fellow travelers were doctors, one of whom spoke some English. The country’s health care system provided me with free medication, ordered by the doctor and delivered by the hotel staff. The latter also brought me boiled potatoes and lots of drinking water. (One drinks only bottled water here). Once I was convinced the medicine was working, the hotel staff ordered a taxi, which took Larry and me to the bus terminal, where we caught a bus back to Ankara for a two hour trip. Whew! Made it. Our tour included travel insurance, so when I have time this week, I’ll head back to downtown and request the promised reimbursement for the cost back to Ankara.
Despite the near disaster on this trip, we are happy to have been out of the city air, and walking where we could breathe deeply the beautiful, clear, mountain air of the Bolu mountains. We’ll try again later to get to Yedigoller.
No comments:
Post a Comment