This Woman Was Here

Today, we have a 5 hour drive to Ankara, the capital and the second larges city in Turkey. Ankara was a small town when Mustafa Kamal established it as his headquarters for the independence movement.

On the drive, we pass Salt Lake, and we see hundreds of migrating cranes and flocks of long-haired sheep being herded by shepherds. Salt Lake is the shallow remains of a prehistoric inland sea and is very salty. Salt is harvested in the summer and used for roads, tablets to put into a tub, and baking powder to whiten teeth.

Cranes

Salt Lake shepherd

sheep grazing by Salt Lake

We also pass Mt. Hasam, the second volcanic mountain in Cappadocia.

Mt. Hasam

Serder recaps the history for us: After WW1, the Ottoman Empire was divided up, and the Greeks were given the Aegean coast.  Mustafa Kemal spent 3 years gathering support for fighting the occupation. The Greeks marched on Ankara to put a stop to Kemal’s movement, and there were battles from Ankara to Izmir, where Greeks burned the city before retreating.

Kemal turned Turkey from a monarchy to a republic (a representational democracy based on British parliamentary system). Kemal made major changes in society. He established surnames that hadn’t existed before (citizens chose their city’s name or father’s profession as a surname). He was given the surname Ataturk, which means the great Turk, by the Parliament.

He also brought in western ways, equal rights for women, equal pay, and the right to vote. He divorced, had no children, but he adopted several children. One daughter became the first fighter a jet pilot, the second became head of civil aviation. He sent a lot of village children who showed promise to great universities in the West. They returned to establish universities and a new emphasis on education. He westernized the alphabet. He was buried in the garden of the building he Ankara where he organized the independence movement. In 1953, they built a mausoleum and moved his body there.

Our first stop in Ankara was Ataturk’s Mausoleum. The mausoleum is built on top of the Frygian mound that was the first settlement and also the highest point in town. The mausoleum is modeled on a Roman square with the mausoleum raised at one end. It incorporates elements from every period of Anatolian history. It is filled with memorabilia from Ataturk’s life, gifts given and received, personal items, and lots and lots of paintings of his life.

Ataturk Mausoleum

Mausoleum

frieze at mausoleum

The friezes echo Asyrian friezes.

Lion Walk at Mausoleum

The lions are modeled on Hittite lions.

depiction of Battle of Galipoli at Mausoleum

Our next stop in Ankara was the Ankara Museum, which focuses on Anatolian history from the period from starts 100,00BC to 500BC. The museum is housed in what was a caravanserai from the Ottoman period (16^th century). The  caravanserai was built in a square with two stories of rooms, with the courtyard for animals. The marketplace was next door, beneath a dome. The Citadel walls date from the Byzentine period.

Byzentine walls

The Museum of Anatolian Civilization houses the largest collection of Bronze Age artifacts in the world.

first houses with burial beneath

The first exhibit is of the earliest houses discovered, with bones buried beneath the floor.

house wall paintings

The museum also has the earliest wall paintings, dated to 6,000 BC.

wall paintings

jaguar wall decoration

The earliest goddess figure dates from 5750 BC and possibly depicts a woman giving birth.

goddess 5750BC

This is a reproduction of what the earliest houses might have looked like.

what houses looked like

Bronze age jewelry.

jewerlry

King Midas’s tomb was discovered nearby.

Recreation of Midas tomb

The depiction incorporates the items of furniture that were found in the tomb.

Midas table

Midas screen tables

Midas furniture

Midas pins

Midas vessels

As we left the museum, we drove by shanty towns erected by villagers who squatted on government land, built houses, and eventually received title to the land. Those shanty towns are now being replaced by modern housing (in background).

shanties and new houses

Ankara was bustling with Friday traffic as we left.

Ankara street

Our hotel is right next door to the huge, modern AnkaMall. Oh boy!

our hotel

Ankamall

Sat 3/7

Today we drive back to Istanbul. As we leave Ankara, we drive on a 3 lane superhighway towards the Black Sea. On both sides are sloping fields that grow winter wheat, sugar beets, onion, and potatoes. There are no trees.

Crater Lake

According to Serder, the successive civilizations cut the trees for construction ad heating. The Romans also cut many trees to heat the baths. A small Roman bath would use 120 trees a day to heat the baths.

As we head to the Black Sea, Turkey’s green belt, we cross the Taurs mountain range (9,000ft), running east west, the slopes covered with fir trees and snow.

Around ten am, we pass through a 2 mile tunnel that saves 40 min over having to drive over the mountain. When it snows, they have to close the tunnel because when you come out, the roads, which go over viaducts, are icy.

Serder shares Turkish cotton candy. It has the texture of spun dry silk but tastes of almonds.

Turkish cotton candy

Just outside of Istanbul, we pass through Ismit, a city destroyed in a 1999 earthquake that killed 17,000 people. All the housing is new, rebuilt by the government. The fault line stretches 30 miles towards Istanbul.

Modern Istanbul

We arrive in Istanbul and are driven to the Bosporous for our cruise, which turns out to be an entire boat chartered just for 8 of us. The Bosporous is 16 miles long and Istanbul extends for 45 miles on either side of it.

our craft

We cruise past the lovely Yalu, wooden mansions built in the 1800s along the sea, most now owned by wealth Turks. The houses sell for several million up to 150 million. If they need to be repaired, which many do, they rebuild in exactly the same style out of concrete and then cover the exterior with wood to match the original.

We pas the two fortresses built by the Ottomans before their siege of Constantiople, (they wanted to block aid coming in from the sea). One one called the Roman fortress because it is on the European side (built in 1552), and the other on the Asian side built in the 1350s.

Roman side fortress

Asian side fortress

We pass the 1853 Palace for the Sultan’s mother built in a combination of Roccoo, Baroque, and Neocalssical styles (because you never knew which would last).

Mother’s Palace

The two suspension bridges were built in 1977 and 1988 and they are considering building a third although it is controversial.

Old bridge

New suspension bridge

The white building was built for the mother of the Ottoman governor to Egypt. He was taken as a child, educated in the Ottoman court, and rose in the hierarchy (as did many of the foreign children raised in the Ottoman court). Today it is the Egyptian consulate.

Egyptian consualte

We also pass the Sultan’s Summer Palace, an enormous white Baroque and Rococo structure.

Sultan’s summer palace

Ataturk’s yacht

Ellie’s paintings

When we disembark, we make our way through the crowded waterfront cafes and street vendors.

Cafe

corn and chestnuts

We make our way through the crowded waterfront to an tunnel beneath the road where all sorts of plastic ware is on sale

Underground walkway

Plastic ware for sale

We emerge  onto the square in front of the New Mosque (for the new mother’s mosque),

New Mother’s Mosque Square

and into the spice market, which was crowded with locals. The aromas of spices fill the air, and crowds pack the narrow aisles between shops, providing an explosion of sensory details.

Spice Market

Tea Delivery

On our way back to our hotel, we pass the Summer Palace Gates

Summer Palace gates

and experience Istanbul traffic. We witness street children play out a drama where one pushes the other onto the streetcar tracks (no car coming), where she weeps, but when no one offers money, she gets herself up. One woman with a backpack (perhaps a tourist) takes off her shoes and gives them to the girl and takes a second pair of shoes out of her back pack to put on. The street girl puts on the shoes and the grop slips in to the next streetcar.

Street children

Istanbul satirs

That night at dinner, Ellie shows her work and sells several pastels. After dinner, we take a group photo. We had such a small and congenial group, I believe my first bus trip has spoiled me.

Our group, Serder middle front