Turkey – Gateway to the Orient
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My love affair with Turkey began in January, 1978. I had been dancing in the Istanbul Turkish restaurant in Vancouver, Canada and was taking Turkish language classes with the manager, who was a lovely person and good friend. As he continued to tell me all about his homeland I became more and more intrigued and decided to include Turkey in my upcoming tour of the Middle East and Mediterranean. Arrangements were made with his friends in Istanbul and Ankara and I was on my way!
As the plane prepared for a night landing in Istanbul, I wondered how such a huge city with a population of millions could be so dark. I awoke to the sound of the Muezzin (call to prayer), undecipherable street noises and the pungent smell of ligmite stoves. I had no idea what to expect outside. As I ventured out into my first day, snow was my first surprise – donkey’s pulling carts in the middle of the bustling city traffic, yet another. Istanbul fascinated me with its elaborate and elegant Ottoman architecture, the grandeur of Aya Sophia and the Blue Mosque, Topkapi palace oozing with gold, dripping with diamonds and emeralds the size of my fist.
From the Spice Bazaar and across Galata bridge, the street bustled with vendors selling everything under the sun, surrounded by the smells of fresh Simit and tasty little fish frying.
The confusing maze of tiny mud-filled streets on the way up to the Galata Tower competed with the endless depths of the Kapali Carsi or world-famous covered bazaar.
Evenings were filled with sumptuous seafood feasts and traditional gypsy musicians in several of the many of the excellent restaurants on the Bosphorus. In the Karavan Saray nightclub and several 5 star hotels, I was perplexed when the brilliant 10 piece classical orchestras would fill the air with their musical magic during diner and then pack up and make way for an electric guitar, saxophone and trap drum bands who played for some of the worst “belly dancing” performances imaginable. As my friends proudly introduced me to the dancers, my only recourse was to feign an inability to speak Turkish, thus saving myself the embarrassment of any comment on their shows, which were much more focused on picture taking and tip hunting than dancing.
After two weeks in this magical city, I was invited to stay with the family in Ankara, where I remained for over 2 months. During this time, my Turkish gradually improved, although everyone, except my Turkish “mama” Nasmia Hanim, spoke very good English. Nasmia made it clear from the beginning that we would communicate via food. Her 7 course dinners and desert delicacies were consistently amazing and our “conversations” consisted of her doing the cooking and feeding and me doing the eating. Afternoon tea cay and treats in the neighbour’s homes were a favorite pastime.
Regular trips to the traditional Turkish Bath or Hamman , were a welcome respite to winter in Ankara and made me wonder why these practical and brilliant public baths are not EVERYWHERE in the world. I also became enamoured with Turkish music and folklore, studying the saz, a hauntingly beautiful Turkish long-necked stringed instrument also known as baglama. I was also invited to join in the weekly rehearsals of Turk Halkevleri National folkdance company by my newly made friend Tayyar.
One of the most memorable of all events was a huge national folk dancing competition. As high school folk dance groups from all points of Turkey spent 10 hours a day for 4 days filling a huge stadium with non-stop sensational dance and music, I was overwhelmed by the richness and incredible variety of their folklore, as well as the excellent quality of their performances. A special guest performance by Turkish super star singer Ibrahim Taltisez had the entire stadium rocking! (He is presently the romantic interest of Aseena, Turkey’s biggest belly dance star as well as the producer of her wonderful CD “Aseena” a must for every dancer’s collection.)
Then onto the south and the Mediterranean coast, now known as the Turkish Riviera. My favorite place was Alanya, a sleepy mid-sized Mediterranean town full of carts, donkeys, little men in baggy bottom black pants and located at the base of a mountainous peninsula crowned by a magnificent Seljuk castle from the days of the crusades. Our self-guided “tour” took us wandering through the ruins and the neighborhood of little medieval houses nestled within the castle walls. I was completely fascinated to see that people still lived here and apparently maintained a lifestyle that had remained little changed for centuries. Inside their tiny houses, women sat on the floor at their looms, some weaving carpets, but most weaving the delicate bright colored silk threads that transformed themselves into the beautiful scarves of the area. I also remember thinking that I had really taken the wrong turn as I and a throng of fully-clothed Turkish people basked in mineral rich waters in a cave somewhere within the bowels of the mountain beneath the castle. I can’t even remember how I ended up there, but as this was long before my days as a therapist, I couldn’t quite figure out what this was all about although I imagine that the Turks were actually the ones thinking that I was the oddity.
Heading east from Alanya to Silifke took us on one of the most breath-taking and beautiful, but isolated and terrifyingly steep roads which appeared to be pasted onto the sheer mountain side. No one and nothing for mile after mile, then boom, right out of nowhere, a bunch of smiling waving children and their goats! Then no one and nothing.
Heading west of Alanya we came to the larger and busier city, Antalya. I admit that my memories of this city are not crystal clear due to the rather excessive quantities of Raki shared with new found friends to wild gypsy music and shouts of Serefe in a rustic cave restaurant on the sea. However, Antalya is the perfect place to explore many of Turkey’s ruins, ruins and more ruins. Our explorations included Perge, Aspendos, Side and Termossos, eternally magnificent and pristine in the silence of the warm spring days before tourism, with only wild flowers and the sounds of goat bells. I was also awestruck by Kairin Cave, a huge Paleolithic cavern that claims to have been continuously inhabited for the past 25,000 years. Heading further west toward the Aegean and the Hellenic triangle of ruins of Ephesus, Aphrodisias and Hieropolis brought us to Turkey’s famous Natural Hot Springs of Pamukkale “Cotton Castle” Although access to these white calcified travertine pools is strictly controlled today, in 1981 I was able to freely run across the snow coloured mountain face and soak in the warm spring sun and warmer turquoise mineral water.
Capadoccia was the crowning jewel of this unforgettable journey, A snow capped magical moonscape of cave dwellings, underground cities and fairy chimneys that seemed to pull me into some prehistoric past. Silence……..profound and precious.
I have many wonderful and cherished memories of this first visit to Turkey, my first introduction to the edge of orient. However, what is perhaps the most important and most indelibly etched in my heart and soul is the people of this ancient land. I was continually touched by their genuine hospitality and honesty, their sincerity, their generosity even when they had almost nothing, their resilience, exuberance and love of life, which is often a very difficult one indeed. Music dance and song seem to be part of their cellular makeup. Little babies, great grandmothers and everyone between the two, never miss the chance to join in the celebration that needed no specific occasion to exist. The Turkish people really are what make this country one of my very favourite places in the planet. They truly to want to make sure that, as their guests, we are happy and well taken care of and that we will return. So, it is not surprising that I did return I have continued to do so every year. I also find great joy in being able to introduce many new friends and students to this wonderful country on my annual tour “Turkey, Gateway to the Orient”. Today’s Turkey is very different from the one that I met in 1978. It is at once very modern, European, tolerant and secular, yet somehow still manages to entice us with a taste of the ancient, the Orient and exotic.