I apologize for the enormous gap between this post and the last one, but I promise I have a good excuse: my parents came to Turkey! They were here for almost two weeks, which was wonderful. We even managed to eat turkey on Thanksgiving! Turkey lunch meat, that is - so not quite the same as we would have had at home, but with family here I had nothing to complain about.
Not exactly an oven-roasted turkey with all the trimmings, but turkey nonetheless
The Friday after Thanksgiving we traveled to Izmir, which is a city on the western (Aegean) coast of Turkey. Because of Kurban Bayramı, or the "Festival of the Sacrifice" commemorating the Prophet Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son (one of many stories connecting Islam to Judaism and Christianity), we had a full four and a half days to spend in the area. We started out in Selçuk, one hour south of Izmir, which we used as a base for exploring Ephesus, St. John's Cathedral, the Isabey Mosque, and other sites.
Ephesus, which is mentioned a few times in the Bible (see Acts 19 or Ephesians), is an ancient city full of well-preserved and incredibly interesting baths, houses, and other public buildings like the Celsius Library.
Celsius Library
Probably the most impressive part of the city was the Great Theater. This was the site of the infamous silversmiths riot that broke out after the Apostle Paul condemned idol worship sometime during the 1st century AD (see the Book of Acts). It was kind of surreal to stand on the stage of the enormous theater (which seats approximately 25,000 people) and imagine angry mobs chanting something along the lines of "Artemis is great!" for three hours straight. Unfortunately we were not prepared to make any speeches of our own, but I did have the experience of being engulfed by a Japanese tour group while they sang the Japanese national anthem. I learned that the acoustics truly are very good...I was just disappointed that I couldn't sing along.
Our tour of western Turkey also included a stop at Pamukkale, which is a mountain of terraces formed out of calcium deposits from the (still-flowing) water. Visitors are able to walk up and down the terraces and through the pools of water (barefoot), something that we agreed would never be allowed in the US. On top of the terraces there were ruins of another ancient city. Although this city wasn't quite as spectacular as Ephesus, it did have several impressive structures including a very large amphitheater.
Mom and Dad at Pamukkale
Our final stop was Aphrodisias, another well-preserved and very interesting ancient city between Pamukkale and Selçuk. We arrived a bit late in the afternoon, but I think we were all glad to have stopped; there was virtually no one else there, and seeing the moon rise over the Temple of Aphrodite and surrounding mountains was a pretty amazing experience.
Temple of Aphrodite and Moon
My parents were in Istanbul for another week after we returned from Izmir, which gave us time to see a lot of the main sites - Topkapı Palace, Chora Church, Rumeli Fortress, and many others. We toured my campus, ate large quantities of delicious Turkish food, and browsed the many colorful bazaars. I think one of my favorite parts about having my parents here was being able to take so many çay (tea) and baklava/tost/éclair breaks at little cafes all over the city. As much as I love living in the dorm with my roommates, a long weekend in an apartment in Sultanahmet was incredibly relaxing and provided a great opportunity to spend as much time as possible with my family.
It was definitely hard to see my parents get on the tram to go to the airport after being together for almost two weeks. But I'm so glad that they were able to come for such a long visit, and I'm excited to see what happens during the rest of my time here. I really can't believe that I've already been in Turkey for three and a half months! It seems like it was just yesterday that I was riding through the city in a taxi from the airport and feeling incredibly disoriented and nervous. While I can't say that I am any kind of Istanbul expert - very far from it, actually - I have definitely learned a lot and generally feel significantly more comfortable (less overwhelmed) in this huge city than I did when I first arrived. I'm excited to see how that increases over the next couple of months.
I don't think I have the time or the space to recap the past couple of weeks in this post. Hopefully, though, that will come in the next few days along with more photos on my Flikr page. Until then - iyi geceler!
