BERGAMA AND ON TO ANKARA

Sunday, June 1st, 2008

HERE IS SYDNEY. THE PHOTOS FINALLY ARRIVED. WHAT A BEAUTIFUL BABY. CONGRATULATIONS TO THE HAPPY PARENTS!

THE HOTTEST DAY

We have an extra early start: have to be ready for departure at 8am WITH our packed suitcases, since last stop is the Izmir airport. When the guide and van eventually turn up almost half an hour later people are a bit grumpy, but off we go.  We break for coffee at a shady roadside cafe, where we watch a mom ‘n dad team of swallows work hard to feed their young. Our drive takes us through Izmir, ancient Smyrna, which is a depressing mix of slums, randomly scattered apartment buildings and construction. Somehow I had thought something more beautiful, but maybe further towards the sea - we don’t see it from the van. As we enter Bergama we pick up a cheerful Australian couple and I learn how to say “GeDay”, which all the other Crocodile Dundee fans out there would also find exciting.

We first visit the Acropolis and stop in the shade of a big tree to take in the sight of the remains of a great temple to Zeus, most of which was quietly shipped to Berlin by the first archaeologists to work the site. Our walk takes us to the theatre, which is so steep that you feel you’ll take flight any minute. The view of the surrounding farmland is spectacular and very peaceful. What is left of the marble is particularly white and also gives you an idea of how ingenious was the construction of the tall slender columns and their great triangular overlying pediments. 

We then stop briefly at the gigantic Red Basilica before lunching at a huge touristy restaurant hall together with the contents of many tour-buses to the surprising musical background of Abba and the like.

Our next stop, the Asclepion, was an ancient world renowned medical center, where Galen, physician to the gladiators worked. It had a very high success rate, according to Güray due to the fact they only let healthy people in - or at least patients with a good attitude. If you thought you were going to die, well - this hospital was not for you. Treatment included dream therapy and mud-baths. The location is quite stunning, I befriend a large white dog with funny little round ears, who wags her tail quietly, looking shyly to the side as I talk to her. 

When I move off to our next lecture-stop beneath the next big tree, she follows and lies down close to us. She is so quiet and discrete that I actually pet her. There is a little stream of healing water running through a pipe and we put our hands into it, wash our hot faces, wet our necks, and take little sips. It is so cold and good - and, if they used it more 2000 years ago as part of the treatment, it can’t be all bad! We end up in the patients’ quarters where they slept and had the dreams for the doctors to interpret. This is a fitting place for us to end, because the heat has almost done us in, although the ruins were spectacular and the stories fascinating; (it is also good because I am simply running out of superlative adjectives). 

Throughout our wanderings I have admired the deep-red poppies nodding in the slight breeze all over the ground. They figure in Birds Without Wings (the novel I was reading for background) as a symbol of Turkey’s blood drenched history, but are also exactly the color of the Turkish flag hoisted just about everywhere. I notice this because it has the same colors as the Danish flag - and Danes REALLY like their flag. Also I mustn't forget the trees full of ripe mulberries. We have the purple type (amora) in Brazil, but I have never tasted the greenish/yellow one, and Güray is an excellent spotter of mulberry trees wherever we have gone.

Back in the van we doze fitfully as we drive the two hours or so to Izmir Airport, where our flight is leaving two hours later than we thought. When the Lehrers are penalized - and have to pay for - luggage in excess of an unheard 15 kilos per suitcase, we decide the best course of action is a hefty gin and tonic. They turn out to cost $12 each - so we have another one - just for the hell of it!

We reach Ankara in the dark and rain and are met by a trim and grim driver who was expecting two distinguished professors and not 2 dirty and sweaty couples with 4 suitcases and assorted bags. We do fit in the car, though, and hurtle through that aggressive Turkish traffic to Bilkent University, the entrance of which in the dark and rain looks like crossing into East Berlin in the 70s. Oswaldo and I are surprised when we are assigned a HUGE apartment with everything you could want (except food), and, in particular, a washing machine and of course that hot shower that we both need so badly.