I already miss Istanbul. I am definitely a city girl. Mind, we've just really arrived in Capadoccia, where we are staying in the magnificent Capadoccia Cave Resort, which is also a spa, so I'm pretty sure I'll get over it pretty quickly. If you click on the first link, our hotel is in that rock in the middle. click the resort link, and look at the picture of the pool. Just above the pool, there's a terrace with 3 lit arches. My room is in the first arch on the left.
Eight days in Istanbul proved just enough. Any less would have felt rushed, and I would have missed too much. And we had 2 great meetings -- one with the administrators of an NGO that works on training media reporters, and one with Orhan Pamuk's (incredibly young) editor. In both cases these were smart people who were politically, economically and culturally aware, so it made for great discussions on what's happening in Turkey today and they're hopes for the future. The 3rd meeting I've already written about -- smart kids, but they lacked the maturity of our other contacts so the conversation was a bit lighter. Nothing wrong with that, but I enjoyed the other 2 conversations more.
Victor -- one of the participants on this trip -- and I split from the group yesterday to go see Pera palace , which was an Orient Express hotel where some pretty fancy people stayed, including Agatha Christie and Ernest Hemingway. But their most important guest was Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of the Turkish Republic as we know it today. Room 101 has been converted into the Ataturk Museum, and that's what I was hoping to see. Fate intervened, however, and on our way Victor recognized SALT, a new contemporary art centre in Istanbul, sort of like the Power Plant in Toronto, that just recently opened, so we checked it out. Between checking out a new art centre and visiting a dead president's hotel room, I think we made the right choice, but I'm still a bit sad we couldn't do both. As it is, we had to rush to join the group that was waiting for us before heading out to the Museum of Innocence and then the Istanbul Modern. That's a lot in one day, but I wouldn't have missed any of it.
We have a great group, maybe the best I've ever travelled with. We're only 10, so we're really getting to know each other quite well. And of of them lived in Turkey 40 years ago and still speaks Turkish, so we've been getting Turkish lessons. Repeat after me: beer, ick, ooch. That's 1, 2, 3. I had so much fun yesterday ordering "beer Turk kavesi, oz sukar" which sort of means one Turkish coffee with a little bit of sugar. I think. I got what I wanted, so it couldn't be far off.
Tomorrow, the adventure continues with a hot air balloon ride. I'm afraid of heights, so that should be fun.
Eight days in Istanbul proved just enough. Any less would have felt rushed, and I would have missed too much. And we had 2 great meetings -- one with the administrators of an NGO that works on training media reporters, and one with Orhan Pamuk's (incredibly young) editor. In both cases these were smart people who were politically, economically and culturally aware, so it made for great discussions on what's happening in Turkey today and they're hopes for the future. The 3rd meeting I've already written about -- smart kids, but they lacked the maturity of our other contacts so the conversation was a bit lighter. Nothing wrong with that, but I enjoyed the other 2 conversations more.
Victor -- one of the participants on this trip -- and I split from the group yesterday to go see Pera palace , which was an Orient Express hotel where some pretty fancy people stayed, including Agatha Christie and Ernest Hemingway. But their most important guest was Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of the Turkish Republic as we know it today. Room 101 has been converted into the Ataturk Museum, and that's what I was hoping to see. Fate intervened, however, and on our way Victor recognized SALT, a new contemporary art centre in Istanbul, sort of like the Power Plant in Toronto, that just recently opened, so we checked it out. Between checking out a new art centre and visiting a dead president's hotel room, I think we made the right choice, but I'm still a bit sad we couldn't do both. As it is, we had to rush to join the group that was waiting for us before heading out to the Museum of Innocence and then the Istanbul Modern. That's a lot in one day, but I wouldn't have missed any of it.
We have a great group, maybe the best I've ever travelled with. We're only 10, so we're really getting to know each other quite well. And of of them lived in Turkey 40 years ago and still speaks Turkish, so we've been getting Turkish lessons. Repeat after me: beer, ick, ooch. That's 1, 2, 3. I had so much fun yesterday ordering "beer Turk kavesi, oz sukar" which sort of means one Turkish coffee with a little bit of sugar. I think. I got what I wanted, so it couldn't be far off.
Tomorrow, the adventure continues with a hot air balloon ride. I'm afraid of heights, so that should be fun.
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