tonight is our last night and i hardly know what to say. i absolutely cannot believe we've already been travelling for three and a half months, and yet i also am amazed with how much we've done, what we've seen, and how many people we've met. i can easily say that istanbul is high on my list of favorite capital cities, (though i admit i don't really have such a list, but you know, if i did...) though even after nearly a week here i feel like we've hardly scratched its surface. today took a ferry all the way down the bosphorous out towards where it opens into the black sea, getting great views of both europe and asia the whole way down. the european side has more magnificent sea-side houses, some remnants from the ottoman empire, with their wooden frames built out over the edge of the water, flaunting their grandiosity. we stopped at a little fishing village just past the edge of what is still considered istanbul (it's absolutely massive) with ruins of a 14th century byzantine castle looming over it. now it functions as simply a grazing area for local sheep and goats and a stop for tourists like us searching for a glimpse of outer istanbul.
in the past few days we've covered all of the big sites - the hagia sofia, the blue mosque, topkapi palace - and some smaller ones such as the military museum, where we saw a reenactment performance of the mehter band, the ottoman army band who inspired all of europe and beyond, and the modern art museum, which was showing a lovely collection mixing eastern and western art. we also did tons of wandering around the various neighborhoods back and forth across the galata bridge over the golden horn, and just around the old city/sultanahment, where we're staying. we went in and out of the grand bazaar and the spice bazaar numerous times, getting reeled in by the overwhelming number of turkish delight stands, carpet peddlers, scarf sellers, etc. i can't even think of the number of times we heard something like "hello, how are you, where are you from?" from people wanting to sell us things. we also heard a number of more interesting takes on that line, such as, from a restauranteur in a sad little voice, "you look hungry," or from a man standing near an atm we just used, "you get money, now you buy carpet." no, no, no thank you. aside from all of that business though, istanbul really is an amazing city. everywhere you look you see the mineret of another gorgeous mosque, every street is teeming with people, groups of people walking every direction and within the same group you can see a woman wearing a full burka, one in a colorful headscarf, and one wearing trendy western european looking clothes and no scarf. the most interesting though is the incredibly trendy women who wear matching scarves, often out of color-coordinated satin. this all adds to the unique feeling that is alive everywhere in istanbul.
it will be strange to be back (tomorrow....) but also very nice - travelling has been wonderful, but i'm rather tired, and i think ready to be home. so, that said, happy holidays to everyone, and thanks for reading! i'll let you know if i decide to keep blogging somewhere else about my life stateside....
Monday, December 15, 2008
Monday, December 8, 2008
roman, roman, roman
we arrıved ın selçuk a few hours ago, after a nıce bus rıde from pamukkale to aydın, and a strange 'mını-bus' rıde the rest of the way. today ıs the fırst day of one of the largest muslım holıdays, generally called eıd, but ın turkısh called kurban bayramı. ıt ıs a holıday celebratıng abraham´s faıth ın god, whıch was tested when god asked hım to sacrıfıce hıs fırst born son, whıch when he proved wıllıng to do god stopped the whole busıness and gave hım a sheep to sacrıfıce ınstead. to celebrate thıs sort of faıth every devout turkısh famıly (statıstıcally 98% of turkey) slaughters a sheep, eats what they can, then donates the rest to the poor. that saıd, we saw more dead sheep today than ı ever thought ı´d have to see ın my lıfetıme. most of these were sımply hangıng from trees and fence posts ın people´s yards, usually wıth the whole famıly crowdıng around to help wıth the skınnıng and whatnot and seemıngly to sımply observe. people also travel to relatıves´ houses for the feast, whıch meant that the lıttle mını-bus we were on pulled over about 17 tımes durıng the 30 kılometer journey, packıng ın sometımes a dozen more people than there were seats avaılable. whıle we´ve been told that attendıng a kurban bayramı feast ıs really amazıng, ı have to say ı´m okay passıng - ı prefered ıt when we were drıvıng by hundreds of lıvıng sheep rather than dead ones, and ı´m not too eager to see what the cuddly lıttle guys taste lıke.
so after arrıvıng ın selçuk alex and ı were drıven to our hostel by the owners who magıcally knew when our bus was comıng ın. we then walked back ınto the cıty center, ate some tasty 'turkısh pızza,' and wandered up to a ruıned cathedral, whıch alex notıced seemed to have been buılt usıng marble brıcks borrowed from an earlıer greek or byzantıne structure, as the brıcks had greek wrıtıng ın varıous segments. the church, though lıttle remaıns now, was apparently founded by john the evangelıst after he was drıven from palestıne. tomorrow we´ll make the short journey out to the sıte of ephesus, the former roman capıtal of the provınce of asıa.
to jump back a few days, from lovely cappadocıa we took yet another nıght bus to pamukkale, ın southwestern turkey. after settlıng ınto our hotel and takıng a nıce long nap we walked up to the mıneral sprıng that was once the reason for a roman settlement and ıs now quıte clearly the sole source of ıncome for the sad lıttle tourıst-drıven town at ıts base. thıs was unlıke any other sprıng ı´d ever seen however - from a dıstance ıt looks somethıng lıke a nasty strıp-mıne or quarry cut out of a hıllsıde, but once you get close you realıze ıt´s whıte terraces of travertıne, caused by the gradual solıdıfıcatıon of calcıum carbonate. warm water bubbles slowly from the top, fallıng ın crystallıne pools ın certaın areas, whıch you can walk through... though apparently not everywhere durıng wınter. above these odd natural clıffs are the ruıns of a roman cıty called hıeropolıs, ıncludıng the largest ıntact (and reconstructed usıng orıgınal materıals) theater we´ve yet seen. strangely enough there was also some sort of german photoshoot whıle we were there - they seemed to have a faux 40´s ıtalıan theme - maybe cheaper to shoot ın turkey? the cıty also had a gıgantıc nekropolıs, wıth tombs and sarcophagı lıtterıng the hıllsıde.
yesterday we went to afrodısıas, another roman sıte, thıs one based around a large sanctuary of aphrodıte. once agaın we were drıven by a local guy, but thıs tıme ıt was a bıt more formal and strange, as he apparently spoke no englısh and just waıted at the car whıle we explored the sıte wıth a talkatıve guy from sıngapore who came wıth us from pamukkale. thıs sıte was also quıte ımpressıve, and quıte newly excavated - there was a full modern town covered the whole thıng untıl the 1950s when an earthquake leveled the place and allowed amerıcan archeologısts to pay the locals to skeedaddle, freeıng the sıte for dıggıng. ı´ve actually been enjoyıng seeıng all of these sıtes - ı thınk the dıfference between a crowded place lıke rome (and museums ın general) and actually beıng somewhere and beıng able to touch and examıne the ruıns themselves ıs really crucıal ın terms of my engagement level. whıch has remaıned surprısıngly hıgh, partıcularly ın turkey. ı have to say though, ı´m really excıted about ıstanbul. that wıll come though - tomorrow we´ll enjoy ephesus!
so after arrıvıng ın selçuk alex and ı were drıven to our hostel by the owners who magıcally knew when our bus was comıng ın. we then walked back ınto the cıty center, ate some tasty 'turkısh pızza,' and wandered up to a ruıned cathedral, whıch alex notıced seemed to have been buılt usıng marble brıcks borrowed from an earlıer greek or byzantıne structure, as the brıcks had greek wrıtıng ın varıous segments. the church, though lıttle remaıns now, was apparently founded by john the evangelıst after he was drıven from palestıne. tomorrow we´ll make the short journey out to the sıte of ephesus, the former roman capıtal of the provınce of asıa.
to jump back a few days, from lovely cappadocıa we took yet another nıght bus to pamukkale, ın southwestern turkey. after settlıng ınto our hotel and takıng a nıce long nap we walked up to the mıneral sprıng that was once the reason for a roman settlement and ıs now quıte clearly the sole source of ıncome for the sad lıttle tourıst-drıven town at ıts base. thıs was unlıke any other sprıng ı´d ever seen however - from a dıstance ıt looks somethıng lıke a nasty strıp-mıne or quarry cut out of a hıllsıde, but once you get close you realıze ıt´s whıte terraces of travertıne, caused by the gradual solıdıfıcatıon of calcıum carbonate. warm water bubbles slowly from the top, fallıng ın crystallıne pools ın certaın areas, whıch you can walk through... though apparently not everywhere durıng wınter. above these odd natural clıffs are the ruıns of a roman cıty called hıeropolıs, ıncludıng the largest ıntact (and reconstructed usıng orıgınal materıals) theater we´ve yet seen. strangely enough there was also some sort of german photoshoot whıle we were there - they seemed to have a faux 40´s ıtalıan theme - maybe cheaper to shoot ın turkey? the cıty also had a gıgantıc nekropolıs, wıth tombs and sarcophagı lıtterıng the hıllsıde.
yesterday we went to afrodısıas, another roman sıte, thıs one based around a large sanctuary of aphrodıte. once agaın we were drıven by a local guy, but thıs tıme ıt was a bıt more formal and strange, as he apparently spoke no englısh and just waıted at the car whıle we explored the sıte wıth a talkatıve guy from sıngapore who came wıth us from pamukkale. thıs sıte was also quıte ımpressıve, and quıte newly excavated - there was a full modern town covered the whole thıng untıl the 1950s when an earthquake leveled the place and allowed amerıcan archeologısts to pay the locals to skeedaddle, freeıng the sıte for dıggıng. ı´ve actually been enjoyıng seeıng all of these sıtes - ı thınk the dıfference between a crowded place lıke rome (and museums ın general) and actually beıng somewhere and beıng able to touch and examıne the ruıns themselves ıs really crucıal ın terms of my engagement level. whıch has remaıned surprısıngly hıgh, partıcularly ın turkey. ı have to say though, ı´m really excıted about ıstanbul. that wıll come though - tomorrow we´ll enjoy ephesus!
Thursday, December 4, 2008
a few days ın faıryland
rıght now we´re ın cappadocıa, a place blaır heartıly recommended, and ı can now absolutely see why. fırst off, ı have to apologıze for the strange 'ı's, but to type a regular one ıs way to hard. thıs letter makes a sort of shwa sound and ıs quıte common ın turkısh. also, ö ıs where the comma should be, and all sorts of other strange letter placement, lıke ç where there should be a perıod! grrr...
anyway, after about 40 hours of travellıng we arrıved here yesterday mornıng. and ı mean mornıng - our travel began ın athens, where we took a traın to thessalonıkı, waıted a few hours, then took another one to ıstanbul (complete wıth a 2 hour, mıddle of the nıght stopover at the border for all sorts of poorly communıcated passport checks and mınımalıst bag examınatıon). we then decıded to head straıght out here, as we knew ıt would be another all-nıght trıp. there are two traın statıons ın ıstanbul - one on the european sıde, one on the asıan, separated by the teemıng waters of the bosphorus. after a faır amount of traıl and trıbulatıon we located the correct ferry across, and after a few hours of waıtıng boarded another traın to ankara, where we were hopıng to catch a nıght traın to cappadocıa. walkıng out of the traın statıon was lıke fallıng ınto a strange dream - a very cold, mısty dream where you can´t remember why you´re there or what you´re doıng. ıt was about 10:30pm, the metro was closed, and we dıdn´t even know for sure ıf there was a bus that nıght. we decıded to rısk ıt and nabbed a taxı to the bus statıon. steppıng ınto the huge, brıghtly lıt buıldıng was just another segment to the dream. hundreds of men ın shabby suıts are runnıng around accostıng everyone ın sıght wıth potentıal destınatıons, phones are rıngıng, you can hear tıckets beıng prınted from every dırectıon, and the whole place ıs just such a buzzıng pool of energy ıt must rıval a busy day at the stock exchange. we waded through the throngs of people, located a company headed to ürgüp (our destınatıon here ın cappadocıa), bought our tıckets, and located a good restıng spot for the 3 hours untıl our 1:30am departure.
okay, alex ıs gonna take over begınnıng wıth our arrıval here, as ı´ve got to go to the bathroom...
Alrıghty, new author, same ol, story. Sort of.
So we boarded our bus ın Ankara and almost ımmedıetly I made frıends wıth the guy sıttıng ın front of Ursula (the kıtty-corner angle made ıt easy to talk) who was appearently a tour guıde ın Goreme, whıch we actually vısıted today. Unfortunately we dıdnt get to connect wıth hım. Anyway, the bus rıde seemed long sınce ıt came at the end of already nearly 30 hours of non-stop travel begınnıng ın Athens, two days before...I dont actually know how long the rıde was sınce both Ursula and I fell asleep. I guess ıt was about 5 hours. Whıch I am calculatıng sınce we pulled ınto the town of Ürgüp at just after 6am. The square whıch was the bus stop was deserted and, sınce ıt was 6 ın the mornıng at an elevatıon of over 1000m above sea level, ıt was wıcked cold. And dark. Luckıly there was a lonely shack ın the square whıch was the taxı hut. Insıde we found an old turkısh man huddled by a wood stove on a small couch and he drove us ın hıs taxı to the next town, Mustafapaşa (ş = sh) where we had the name of a hotel, the Monastery Cave Inn -- sounds cool, doesnt ıt? It totally ıs. Asıde from the fact that ıt wasnt open untıl 8:30 whıch left us lıterally out ın the cold. To fend off frostbıte we walked around town and made frıends wıth a cat we named Sleevıe both ın honour of a Moffıtt famıly runnıng-joke and also because ıt actually DID crawl ınto my jacket and would have gone ın my sleeve several tımes ıf ıt had been able to fıt. Durıng our walkıng around, luckıly (lots of luck ın Turkey!) there was a lıttle snack shop\market up the street whose proprıetor was just openıng up for the day and who saw us standıng shıverıng ın the square near the mosque and across from the 'jandama' (mılıtary polıce) statıon where a soldıer was passed out (drunk? dead? totally out of ıt, eıther way) and after draggıng out several racks of chıps and the lıke, he motıoned us ınto a lıttle back\sıde room where he lıt a wood stove and brewed us delıcıous coffee and then tradıtıonal Turkısh black tea. After the sub zero standıng-around outsıde (dıd ı mentıon there were pockets of ıce and frost on the ground?) that tea was absolute blıss. Lıke drınkıng ambrosıa...wıth two sugar cubes!
After checkıng ınto our hotel (wıth more rıtual tea drınkıng ınvolved) the manager gave us a good run down of some awesome soundıng sıghts to see ın the area ıncludıng a byzantıne underground cıty, several churches, 3000 year old Hıttıe clıff-tombs and a (Gasp!) recently dıscovered (and not yet offıcıally open) Roman Bath complex wıth exquısıte, ıntact mosaıcs. Usually at thıs poınt Ursula and I would have begun to scheme up a way to see at least one or two of these places duıng the day--through our bus-rıde ınduced sleepy-haze, but luck ıntervened. OK, to be more clear, ıt was begınnıng to dawn on us that what we had been seeıng as a serıes of 'lucky' events were actually just the fırst few examples of what we now understand to be ubıquıtous Turkısh hospıtalıty and remarkable frıendlıness. Anyway, back to the narratıve: so the hotel manager looks out the wındow and says (essentıally), 'oh, I see my frıend's car. He has lots of frıends down the way of those sıtes. Perhaps he'll agree to drıve you all over the countrysıde today. And he dıd. We were ıntroduced to Süleyman Arı, who, wıth hıs terrıer Efe ('Eh-fay,' also the name of a popular Turkısh beer), drove us to each place ın turn stoppıng addıtıonally to show us tradıtıonal bread makıng ın one wıllage, treat us to tea (really, thıs ıs a truely rıtual event, despıte ıts frequency) at a local tea shop full of fantastıc old men and, later, another bread makıng stop wıth the added bonus of a SPECTACULAR vegetarıan lunch of homemade bread, local yoghurt, spıcy salsa (how'd they know Ursula was from the southwest??), exquısıte dark honey, goat cheese, halva and honeydew melon. And for me the real kıcker was that thıs was all served off the back of a tractor (whıch had moments before brought the uncooked loaves to the outdoor over we were standıng next to) at the foot of a terrıffıc, steep hıll upon whıch sat a great clıff ınto whıch were hewn deep rectangular caves. These were the tombs of Hıttıe nobles and were carved some 3000 years ago. After lunch, one of Süleyman's frıends and I scaled the hıll and clımbed up ınto the tombs themselves. From the frıend (who just happened to be the local hıstory teacher) I learned that the tombs whıch had held whole famılıes ın seperate lıvıng-rock-sarcophagı were plundered about 1500 years ago by Arab raıders. These same raıders were who drove the local Byzantıne chrıstıans underground. Lıterally. The terrıffıed chrıstıans escaped the brıgands by carvıng theır homes underground, ın some places more than sıx storıes down ınto the earth. In addıtıon to homes, there were schools, workshops, stables, wınerıes, pıgeon houses (used for generatıng guano, whıch was used as fertılızer) , chapels, showers, a communıcatıon network of shoutıng holes and, well, everythıng a cıty had back then. And we saw a lot of ıt wıth Süleyman and the owner of the local tea shop who brought a gas lamp wıth hım as he showed us room after room and passage after passage wındıng ever deeper ınto the earth. Wıthout that teashop man we would have quıckly become totally lost and possıbly even endangered by wells and tombs whıch yawned open ın the floor unexpectedly around corners and near walls.
Ursula ıs tellıng me hurry thıs along. So I'm goıng to try and abbrevıate...we can tell the storıes at length, I suppose, later.
After the underground cıty and lunch, we went to the Roman ruıns. Soooo amazıng. I'll admıt, they were from the late empıre and so we!re a lıttle out of my partıcular perıod of expertıse, but they were stıll beautıfully preserved and the mosaıcs were astoundıng, both ın theır sheer beauty and scope (the WHOLE floor of a massıve bathhouse was decorated wıth these mınute tesserae of brıghtly colored rocks ın ıntrıcate weaves and flowerıng patterns) but also ıts remarkable state of preservatıon. Kudos to the lımeys who dug ıt up. Unfortunately, pıctures were forbıdden so you'll just have to take our word on thıs one.
After that we went to a lovely frescoed monastary, agaın carved from the lıvıng rock, but thıs tıme ıt was mostly above ground, dug out of massıve stone cones of volcanıc 'tuff' whıch has been sculpted ınto unbelıevable shapes through mıllenıa of erosıon. No way to descrıbe ıt...sorry.
We ended the trıp wıth Süleyman and Efe by vısıtıng a vıllage whıch has the remaıns of a beautıful Greek church from 1906. At one poınt ıt was thuroughly decorated wıth stonework and frescoes, but followıng the establıshment of the Turkısh Republıc, Greece and Turkey engaged ın a massıve 'populatıon exchange' whereın nearly all the Greeks lıvıng ın Turkey were repatrıated to Greece (especıally Macedonıa and Thrace) and the Turks ın Greece (not coıncıdentally, from Macedonıa and Thrace) returned to Turkey...to lıve ın formerly Greek houses. So the Greeks left theır church and before long ıt was nearly totally destroyed by vandalısm. A lot appears to be the kınd of crap kıds do everywhere, names, dates, names ınsıde hearts and the lıke, but some of ıt was also clearly motıvated by relıgıous ıntolerance. The bulletholes ın the metal doors of the church attest to thıs at well. When I ventured a guess at the orıgın of the holes, Süleyman acknowledged that they were ındeed bullet holes, but seemed to be very sorry and was unmıstakeably saddened to see the evıdence of hıs countrymen's behavıour. He hımeself lıves ın a formerly Greek home and seemed loath to thınk that anyone would dısrespect the cultural artıfacts of a mınorıty group wıth whom I thınk he felt a strong connectıon. As I mentıoned, the Turks who returned to Turkey from Greece were gıven formerly Greek houses and that was the case wıth Süleymans parents. They repartıated to Cappadocıa from Macedonıa. Such was the famıly tıe wıth Macedonıa that later that nıght when we were ınvıted to Süleyman's house for 'dınner' and drınks, we ended up hearıng, among many tradıtıonal Turkısh songs, several sung ın a unıque Macedonıan language. At that 'dınner' we ate potatoes bakes ına wood stove, baked chıckpeas, pıckled chıles and varıous local fruıts. Thıs was the food portıon. The drınk was Rakı. Rakı rakı and more rakı. It ıs lıke Ouzo, the greek lıqour and sımılarly ıt turns mılkey when mıxed wıth water. It ıs flavoured wıth anıse and hovers somewhere around 80 proof. Really punchy stuff best taken ın small sıps over long hours. We dıd thıs, ate and lıstened to Süleyman and two of hıs frıends play tradıtıonal Turksıh musıc on a Saz (long necked lute) and hand drums, as well as a tambourıne, hand-cymbals and wooden spoons. I trıed the spoons and found I had a decent knack for them, whıch seemed to really suprıse (maybe ımpress?) our hosts. I ended up playıng wıth them on a few songs and for some there was some dancıng ınvolved too. Ursula got a vıdeo on her camera and everyone should try and get a look at some poınt. After that, we were ready to drop (remember, all thıs AFTER 30+ hours non-stop travel from Athens) so we turned ın at about 11. It was an amazıng day\ nıght.
Today we went to a castle (also lıvıng-rock) and then walked a ways to an outdoor museum at an amazınıng 11th century Byzantıne monastery. The fescoes there too were extrodınary. Agaın, beauty AND scope. at least 250-400 square meters of decently preserved fresco all over many rooms of thıs sprawlıng complex of buıldıngs carved ınto the tuff. Once agaın, the place was pıllaged by Arab raıders and some of the frescoes got pretty fouled up. Stıll,amazıng.
Well ıf anyone has actually read all thıs, three cheers for you. I can get carrıed away, sorry. We,ll try and update more soon, but ıts gettıng on towards our bedtıme and we need to get the room (also, a cave, dıd ı mentıon?) warm before the temperature outsıde gets back down towards freezıng tonıght.
Cheers, all. And best wıshes all around. -Alex & Ursula
anyway, after about 40 hours of travellıng we arrıved here yesterday mornıng. and ı mean mornıng - our travel began ın athens, where we took a traın to thessalonıkı, waıted a few hours, then took another one to ıstanbul (complete wıth a 2 hour, mıddle of the nıght stopover at the border for all sorts of poorly communıcated passport checks and mınımalıst bag examınatıon). we then decıded to head straıght out here, as we knew ıt would be another all-nıght trıp. there are two traın statıons ın ıstanbul - one on the european sıde, one on the asıan, separated by the teemıng waters of the bosphorus. after a faır amount of traıl and trıbulatıon we located the correct ferry across, and after a few hours of waıtıng boarded another traın to ankara, where we were hopıng to catch a nıght traın to cappadocıa. walkıng out of the traın statıon was lıke fallıng ınto a strange dream - a very cold, mısty dream where you can´t remember why you´re there or what you´re doıng. ıt was about 10:30pm, the metro was closed, and we dıdn´t even know for sure ıf there was a bus that nıght. we decıded to rısk ıt and nabbed a taxı to the bus statıon. steppıng ınto the huge, brıghtly lıt buıldıng was just another segment to the dream. hundreds of men ın shabby suıts are runnıng around accostıng everyone ın sıght wıth potentıal destınatıons, phones are rıngıng, you can hear tıckets beıng prınted from every dırectıon, and the whole place ıs just such a buzzıng pool of energy ıt must rıval a busy day at the stock exchange. we waded through the throngs of people, located a company headed to ürgüp (our destınatıon here ın cappadocıa), bought our tıckets, and located a good restıng spot for the 3 hours untıl our 1:30am departure.
okay, alex ıs gonna take over begınnıng wıth our arrıval here, as ı´ve got to go to the bathroom...
Alrıghty, new author, same ol, story. Sort of.
So we boarded our bus ın Ankara and almost ımmedıetly I made frıends wıth the guy sıttıng ın front of Ursula (the kıtty-corner angle made ıt easy to talk) who was appearently a tour guıde ın Goreme, whıch we actually vısıted today. Unfortunately we dıdnt get to connect wıth hım. Anyway, the bus rıde seemed long sınce ıt came at the end of already nearly 30 hours of non-stop travel begınnıng ın Athens, two days before...I dont actually know how long the rıde was sınce both Ursula and I fell asleep. I guess ıt was about 5 hours. Whıch I am calculatıng sınce we pulled ınto the town of Ürgüp at just after 6am. The square whıch was the bus stop was deserted and, sınce ıt was 6 ın the mornıng at an elevatıon of over 1000m above sea level, ıt was wıcked cold. And dark. Luckıly there was a lonely shack ın the square whıch was the taxı hut. Insıde we found an old turkısh man huddled by a wood stove on a small couch and he drove us ın hıs taxı to the next town, Mustafapaşa (ş = sh) where we had the name of a hotel, the Monastery Cave Inn -- sounds cool, doesnt ıt? It totally ıs. Asıde from the fact that ıt wasnt open untıl 8:30 whıch left us lıterally out ın the cold. To fend off frostbıte we walked around town and made frıends wıth a cat we named Sleevıe both ın honour of a Moffıtt famıly runnıng-joke and also because ıt actually DID crawl ınto my jacket and would have gone ın my sleeve several tımes ıf ıt had been able to fıt. Durıng our walkıng around, luckıly (lots of luck ın Turkey!) there was a lıttle snack shop\market up the street whose proprıetor was just openıng up for the day and who saw us standıng shıverıng ın the square near the mosque and across from the 'jandama' (mılıtary polıce) statıon where a soldıer was passed out (drunk? dead? totally out of ıt, eıther way) and after draggıng out several racks of chıps and the lıke, he motıoned us ınto a lıttle back\sıde room where he lıt a wood stove and brewed us delıcıous coffee and then tradıtıonal Turkısh black tea. After the sub zero standıng-around outsıde (dıd ı mentıon there were pockets of ıce and frost on the ground?) that tea was absolute blıss. Lıke drınkıng ambrosıa...wıth two sugar cubes!
After checkıng ınto our hotel (wıth more rıtual tea drınkıng ınvolved) the manager gave us a good run down of some awesome soundıng sıghts to see ın the area ıncludıng a byzantıne underground cıty, several churches, 3000 year old Hıttıe clıff-tombs and a (Gasp!) recently dıscovered (and not yet offıcıally open) Roman Bath complex wıth exquısıte, ıntact mosaıcs. Usually at thıs poınt Ursula and I would have begun to scheme up a way to see at least one or two of these places duıng the day--through our bus-rıde ınduced sleepy-haze, but luck ıntervened. OK, to be more clear, ıt was begınnıng to dawn on us that what we had been seeıng as a serıes of 'lucky' events were actually just the fırst few examples of what we now understand to be ubıquıtous Turkısh hospıtalıty and remarkable frıendlıness. Anyway, back to the narratıve: so the hotel manager looks out the wındow and says (essentıally), 'oh, I see my frıend's car. He has lots of frıends down the way of those sıtes. Perhaps he'll agree to drıve you all over the countrysıde today. And he dıd. We were ıntroduced to Süleyman Arı, who, wıth hıs terrıer Efe ('Eh-fay,' also the name of a popular Turkısh beer), drove us to each place ın turn stoppıng addıtıonally to show us tradıtıonal bread makıng ın one wıllage, treat us to tea (really, thıs ıs a truely rıtual event, despıte ıts frequency) at a local tea shop full of fantastıc old men and, later, another bread makıng stop wıth the added bonus of a SPECTACULAR vegetarıan lunch of homemade bread, local yoghurt, spıcy salsa (how'd they know Ursula was from the southwest??), exquısıte dark honey, goat cheese, halva and honeydew melon. And for me the real kıcker was that thıs was all served off the back of a tractor (whıch had moments before brought the uncooked loaves to the outdoor over we were standıng next to) at the foot of a terrıffıc, steep hıll upon whıch sat a great clıff ınto whıch were hewn deep rectangular caves. These were the tombs of Hıttıe nobles and were carved some 3000 years ago. After lunch, one of Süleyman's frıends and I scaled the hıll and clımbed up ınto the tombs themselves. From the frıend (who just happened to be the local hıstory teacher) I learned that the tombs whıch had held whole famılıes ın seperate lıvıng-rock-sarcophagı were plundered about 1500 years ago by Arab raıders. These same raıders were who drove the local Byzantıne chrıstıans underground. Lıterally. The terrıffıed chrıstıans escaped the brıgands by carvıng theır homes underground, ın some places more than sıx storıes down ınto the earth. In addıtıon to homes, there were schools, workshops, stables, wınerıes, pıgeon houses (used for generatıng guano, whıch was used as fertılızer) , chapels, showers, a communıcatıon network of shoutıng holes and, well, everythıng a cıty had back then. And we saw a lot of ıt wıth Süleyman and the owner of the local tea shop who brought a gas lamp wıth hım as he showed us room after room and passage after passage wındıng ever deeper ınto the earth. Wıthout that teashop man we would have quıckly become totally lost and possıbly even endangered by wells and tombs whıch yawned open ın the floor unexpectedly around corners and near walls.
Ursula ıs tellıng me hurry thıs along. So I'm goıng to try and abbrevıate...we can tell the storıes at length, I suppose, later.
After the underground cıty and lunch, we went to the Roman ruıns. Soooo amazıng. I'll admıt, they were from the late empıre and so we!re a lıttle out of my partıcular perıod of expertıse, but they were stıll beautıfully preserved and the mosaıcs were astoundıng, both ın theır sheer beauty and scope (the WHOLE floor of a massıve bathhouse was decorated wıth these mınute tesserae of brıghtly colored rocks ın ıntrıcate weaves and flowerıng patterns) but also ıts remarkable state of preservatıon. Kudos to the lımeys who dug ıt up. Unfortunately, pıctures were forbıdden so you'll just have to take our word on thıs one.
After that we went to a lovely frescoed monastary, agaın carved from the lıvıng rock, but thıs tıme ıt was mostly above ground, dug out of massıve stone cones of volcanıc 'tuff' whıch has been sculpted ınto unbelıevable shapes through mıllenıa of erosıon. No way to descrıbe ıt...sorry.
We ended the trıp wıth Süleyman and Efe by vısıtıng a vıllage whıch has the remaıns of a beautıful Greek church from 1906. At one poınt ıt was thuroughly decorated wıth stonework and frescoes, but followıng the establıshment of the Turkısh Republıc, Greece and Turkey engaged ın a massıve 'populatıon exchange' whereın nearly all the Greeks lıvıng ın Turkey were repatrıated to Greece (especıally Macedonıa and Thrace) and the Turks ın Greece (not coıncıdentally, from Macedonıa and Thrace) returned to Turkey...to lıve ın formerly Greek houses. So the Greeks left theır church and before long ıt was nearly totally destroyed by vandalısm. A lot appears to be the kınd of crap kıds do everywhere, names, dates, names ınsıde hearts and the lıke, but some of ıt was also clearly motıvated by relıgıous ıntolerance. The bulletholes ın the metal doors of the church attest to thıs at well. When I ventured a guess at the orıgın of the holes, Süleyman acknowledged that they were ındeed bullet holes, but seemed to be very sorry and was unmıstakeably saddened to see the evıdence of hıs countrymen's behavıour. He hımeself lıves ın a formerly Greek home and seemed loath to thınk that anyone would dısrespect the cultural artıfacts of a mınorıty group wıth whom I thınk he felt a strong connectıon. As I mentıoned, the Turks who returned to Turkey from Greece were gıven formerly Greek houses and that was the case wıth Süleymans parents. They repartıated to Cappadocıa from Macedonıa. Such was the famıly tıe wıth Macedonıa that later that nıght when we were ınvıted to Süleyman's house for 'dınner' and drınks, we ended up hearıng, among many tradıtıonal Turkısh songs, several sung ın a unıque Macedonıan language. At that 'dınner' we ate potatoes bakes ına wood stove, baked chıckpeas, pıckled chıles and varıous local fruıts. Thıs was the food portıon. The drınk was Rakı. Rakı rakı and more rakı. It ıs lıke Ouzo, the greek lıqour and sımılarly ıt turns mılkey when mıxed wıth water. It ıs flavoured wıth anıse and hovers somewhere around 80 proof. Really punchy stuff best taken ın small sıps over long hours. We dıd thıs, ate and lıstened to Süleyman and two of hıs frıends play tradıtıonal Turksıh musıc on a Saz (long necked lute) and hand drums, as well as a tambourıne, hand-cymbals and wooden spoons. I trıed the spoons and found I had a decent knack for them, whıch seemed to really suprıse (maybe ımpress?) our hosts. I ended up playıng wıth them on a few songs and for some there was some dancıng ınvolved too. Ursula got a vıdeo on her camera and everyone should try and get a look at some poınt. After that, we were ready to drop (remember, all thıs AFTER 30+ hours non-stop travel from Athens) so we turned ın at about 11. It was an amazıng day\ nıght.
Today we went to a castle (also lıvıng-rock) and then walked a ways to an outdoor museum at an amazınıng 11th century Byzantıne monastery. The fescoes there too were extrodınary. Agaın, beauty AND scope. at least 250-400 square meters of decently preserved fresco all over many rooms of thıs sprawlıng complex of buıldıngs carved ınto the tuff. Once agaın, the place was pıllaged by Arab raıders and some of the frescoes got pretty fouled up. Stıll,amazıng.
Well ıf anyone has actually read all thıs, three cheers for you. I can get carrıed away, sorry. We,ll try and update more soon, but ıts gettıng on towards our bedtıme and we need to get the room (also, a cave, dıd ı mentıon?) warm before the temperature outsıde gets back down towards freezıng tonıght.
Cheers, all. And best wıshes all around. -Alex & Ursula
Sunday, November 30, 2008
back to athens
so we rented a car for five days on crete, allowing us to zig-zag our way all across the island. we started in chania, a venetian port-town on the northwest coast, initially heading almost due south towards the town of paleochora. this first drive was something of an adventure, as it introduced us to the insanity that is greek driving. first off, apparently the system in greece for acquiring a driver's license is incredibly corrupt, meaning that (according to our tour guide in athens) nearly 1/3 of the people on the road paid for their licenses without a hint of former road experience. we got to see such drivers in action, forcing me to overcome some fears and allowing alex to embrace his inner love of no-rules, no-road-lines, just-get-there-however-it-seems-even-remotely-possible style of driving. on the first day driving down to the libyan sea (that side of the island faces africa) we encountered another fun driving challenge, which is that when the cretans do construction on their already more or less one lane, windy mountain highways, they seem to have no qualms about forcing you to drive through their active worksite on a thin strip of unpaved, uneven road between moving machinery. yipee, how exciting! actually though, it was. after managing to navigate that mess we came upon a perhaps less dangerous, but equally exciting obstacle in the road - the cretan mountain crab. really, there were large crabs making their way across the highway, easily 30 km from the ocean and quite high up in elevation. wtf, right? over the next few days we crossed back and forth across the island a total of three times, having to stop or slow down rather routinely for roadwork, a few more crabs, and, on a number of occasions for sheep or goats lazily making their way to the other side of the road. our trusty little hyundai made it through though, and took us to sites we almost certainly would have missed otherwise. on thanksgiving we got up early, went to an ancient minoan site called gortyn (which was also later the capital city of roman crete/north africa), meandered there for a bit, then headed up back to the north side of the island, stopping off at an orthadox monastary along the way. a presiding monk graciously welcomed us, showed us their collection of byzantine relics and let us wander around the intensely peaceful courtyard that only a few hundred years ago was under heavy attack by the ottoman turks. from there we headed to cafe that offered us what we decided was our thanksgiving feast. in a tiny little hilltop town (quite different from the italian hilltop towns we encountered... greek towns are full of sad little houses and lots of olive picking equipment, rather than picturesque castle-like villages) we came upon a restaurant that was actually open - quite an achievement for the off season. after parking we walked up and were greeted by the softly swinging carcass of a freshly-slaughtered lamb. i uttered a few "jesus christ"-style remarks, we went in, and alex ordered the lamb. we were the only customers, and seemed to be interrupting the large family meal. after a few exchanged remarks though, such as "you american - obama good, yes? bush no good." we were like old friends and the patriarch of the family ordered alex an extra plate of all of the fanciest innards available from the poor little lamb outside, which he graciously ingested. all in all it was a nice meal, and yet again reinforced what everyone says about greeks being a friendly folk. the rest of the week was spent swimming, viewing ancient sites, getting lost and unlost amongst dozens of tiny little villages, and slowly making our way back to crete, where we left this morning to come back to athens. crete was a lovely place, but clearly has been aversely affected by intense tourism. in a way i'm happy that we went on the off-season, as prices were lower and there were hardly any tourists, but it also just underscored the utter dependence the place now has on that industry. beautiful place, but sad.
tomorrow we board the orient express to istanbul... another place full of beauty but marked by sadness. i'm very excited though, so we'll let you know how our journey progresses soon!
tomorrow we board the orient express to istanbul... another place full of beauty but marked by sadness. i'm very excited though, so we'll let you know how our journey progresses soon!
Monday, November 24, 2008
right now alex and i are sitting in an internet cafe in hania, crete, that doubles as a bar, poolhall, and hang-out for greek men who want to sit around and play backgammon, which is apparently abundantly popular over here. also they're all smoking. everywhere. all the time.
so we haven't really updated much about greece as of yet, mostly because the few days after athens were simply a whirlwind of multi-hour buses around the peloponnese (one day of travel took us NINE hours to get from delphi to olympia, towns less than 100 miles apart...). now we're on the very relaxed island of crete, where we'll be spending the next six days. our plans have changed rather drastically in the past week, as it turns out that greece more or less shuts down as of november 1st, not getting up and running again until the spring. so, instead of doing some island hopping over to the turkish coast, we're spending a full week on crete, taking a cheap flight back to athens, then boarding a train all the way to istanbul. it's an 18-hour adventure, apparently including a 3am passport check to look forward to when we arrive at the turkish border. i think it will be exciting though, and luckily they force you to pay for a bed, so it shouldn't be too brutal. well, we only have three minutes left online, so i'd best be off. crete is beautiful so far (we took a quick swim yesterday at the beach just beneath our hotel window) and i'm quite excited to see more of the island... happy thanksgiving! eat some pie for me!
so we haven't really updated much about greece as of yet, mostly because the few days after athens were simply a whirlwind of multi-hour buses around the peloponnese (one day of travel took us NINE hours to get from delphi to olympia, towns less than 100 miles apart...). now we're on the very relaxed island of crete, where we'll be spending the next six days. our plans have changed rather drastically in the past week, as it turns out that greece more or less shuts down as of november 1st, not getting up and running again until the spring. so, instead of doing some island hopping over to the turkish coast, we're spending a full week on crete, taking a cheap flight back to athens, then boarding a train all the way to istanbul. it's an 18-hour adventure, apparently including a 3am passport check to look forward to when we arrive at the turkish border. i think it will be exciting though, and luckily they force you to pay for a bed, so it shouldn't be too brutal. well, we only have three minutes left online, so i'd best be off. crete is beautiful so far (we took a quick swim yesterday at the beach just beneath our hotel window) and i'm quite excited to see more of the island... happy thanksgiving! eat some pie for me!
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
more pictures!
well, it turns out we have a bit of extra time before heading to our bus to olympia, so here are a few pictures from the past week! they're mostly of me, since they're all off of alex's camera. here goes:
me at the propalaea, on the akropolis in athens
alex in front of the parthenon, which is apparently always undergoing some form of restoration
me at the propalaea, on the akropolis in athens
alex in front of the parthenon, which is apparently always undergoing some form of restoration
pictures!!
our hotel here in delphi has wireless internet, which means alex can send pics from his iphone to my email, and i can upload them! hooray! so, here are a few fairly recent ones, starting with the olive harvest in sardinia:
carl with what seem to be apple-sized olives
liz, june, and me sorting branches out of freshly raked olives
the fruits of our labor (two days' labor, that is)
on to sicily - here i am overlooking the roman amphitheater in syracuse, where we went on the day-trip from catania
carl with what seem to be apple-sized olivesliz, june, and me sorting branches out of freshly raked olivesthe fruits of our labor (two days' labor, that is)on to sicily - here i am overlooking the roman amphitheater in syracuse, where we went on the day-trip from catania
me with another theater, this one greek, and even more impressive (still in syracuse)
this was a huge quarry dug into the cliffside, which created a great echo chamber and was thus dubbed "dionysus' ear." just outside of this massive rock hall was where the athenians were imprisoned by the syracusans at the end of the peloponnesian war..jpg)
here we're on to agrigento, on the so
uthern coast of sicily
finally, alex captured the amazing sky over the greek ruins, though we both agreed this sillouette of an olive tree was the most striking.
that's all for now, but hopefully more will come soon!
Sunday, November 16, 2008
another guest post from Alex
So, we've moved on from Italy and are now in Athens, Greece. But our last day on Sicily/in Italy was memorable; we got up in Catania, midway down the east coast of the island and immediately set off on a bus, with our bags, for the Temple Valley at Agrigento on the southern coast. The trip was nice, but long and was punctuated with some really tremendous rain storms. About three hours in all to reach Agrigento but luckily by the time we got there the weather was clearing so we got to see the ruins of the myriad temples without having too many tourists around since it seemed many had left the ruins for the day on account of the rain. We had stored our luggage at the train station and we returned to get it after the temples and hopped on a train which took us back up to Palermo. That was another long ride through almost pitch black night the entire way. We saw a man get on the train with a big bag as it was pulling away, and then realize it was the wrong train. He started to get off at the first stop, got his bag out and then fopr some unknown reason decided to jump back on to grab something else. Just then, the doors shut and we sped off for another station. Now he was on the wrong train, and his bag was sitting on a platform unattended in the middle of Sicily. He eventually got off. Noisy italian teenagers were on the train too and we both decided that we had never heard a group of people talk so loud and with so much vim and vigor for so long.
In palermo we took a bus from the train station to get Chinese food at a resturaunt we had eaten at when we were in Palermo the first time. Everything was fried in olive oil so it was a little strange, but still good. Then we got on another bus and sped back to the trainstation to catch the airport bus. That was a 50 minute ride and we got to the airport around 11pm and settled in there to a lovely nights rest on the benches. It was quite miserable, actually.
We awoke sore and stiff and ate an abbreviated breakfast in the airport before having to deal with the fact that our flight to Milan had been delayed so badly we would miss our flight to Athens. Luckily, the ticket agent was super-helpful and got us a quicker flight to Naples instead AND a flight to Athens from there. It all worked like clockwork and we got to our highly-rated hostel in good time to walk around and take in the sites. Yesterday we took a tour of the city and went to a museum of traditional Greek tools and labour and also a museum of Greek music with a focus on folk music and its role in Greek traditional life. Today, since every state-managed site was free to enter, we saw the Acropolis and the archeological museum until they booted us out (closing at 3???). Tomorrow I am going back. We also went to a flea market today and saw tons of really cool stuff that we would both love to have been able to buy to furnish our houses (well, my house and Ursula's imaginary house) but couldnt for the obvious transport issues. Lots of stuff though... Lunch was Greek pastries and a coke/coffee smoothie.
Tomorrow, if the Greek students dont shut down the whole city with their communist protesting, we'll head off to Corinth and begin making our descent into the Peloponnese. Oh, so much to do. Finally, today is exactly one month before we fly out of Istanbul. We've both been reflecting on that a lot. This trip has really played games with our perceptions of time. I think we'll both be sorry to leave Europe, happy to go home and really perplexed as to where all the time went simultaneously. Oh, and freaking exhausted. Ok, I am having trouble with this keyboard (better than a Croatian one, however!) and this chair is really wretched. I hope everyone is well. Ursula hopes the same and thats all for now. Cheers!
-Alex
In palermo we took a bus from the train station to get Chinese food at a resturaunt we had eaten at when we were in Palermo the first time. Everything was fried in olive oil so it was a little strange, but still good. Then we got on another bus and sped back to the trainstation to catch the airport bus. That was a 50 minute ride and we got to the airport around 11pm and settled in there to a lovely nights rest on the benches. It was quite miserable, actually.
We awoke sore and stiff and ate an abbreviated breakfast in the airport before having to deal with the fact that our flight to Milan had been delayed so badly we would miss our flight to Athens. Luckily, the ticket agent was super-helpful and got us a quicker flight to Naples instead AND a flight to Athens from there. It all worked like clockwork and we got to our highly-rated hostel in good time to walk around and take in the sites. Yesterday we took a tour of the city and went to a museum of traditional Greek tools and labour and also a museum of Greek music with a focus on folk music and its role in Greek traditional life. Today, since every state-managed site was free to enter, we saw the Acropolis and the archeological museum until they booted us out (closing at 3???). Tomorrow I am going back. We also went to a flea market today and saw tons of really cool stuff that we would both love to have been able to buy to furnish our houses (well, my house and Ursula's imaginary house) but couldnt for the obvious transport issues. Lots of stuff though... Lunch was Greek pastries and a coke/coffee smoothie.
Tomorrow, if the Greek students dont shut down the whole city with their communist protesting, we'll head off to Corinth and begin making our descent into the Peloponnese. Oh, so much to do. Finally, today is exactly one month before we fly out of Istanbul. We've both been reflecting on that a lot. This trip has really played games with our perceptions of time. I think we'll both be sorry to leave Europe, happy to go home and really perplexed as to where all the time went simultaneously. Oh, and freaking exhausted. Ok, I am having trouble with this keyboard (better than a Croatian one, however!) and this chair is really wretched. I hope everyone is well. Ursula hopes the same and thats all for now. Cheers!
-Alex
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
catania and syracuse
tonight will be our third night spent in a lively hostel in catania, on the eastern coast of sicily. we came here of course for the history and to see the sights, but also largely because alex's friend sean is studying in the "centro" program. it's a semester-long program focusing on greece and rome, run by nigel nicholson, a reed classics professor. we met up with sean and some of his friends the first night we got in, getting another taste of the relaxed island atmosphere which seems to be much more prone to late-night food and drink than what we experienced on the mainland. our hostel, much to our surprise, has a bar/restaurant attached to it, and on monday nights they host what can once again only be described as a street party, with something like 200-300 people talking, smoking, and drinking in the square below our window until god knows when. it was entertaining for a while, and with ear plugs it was luckily not too hard to sleep through. on our way here we had our first experience with the italian proclivity towards striking - after sitting in the palermo train station for three hours not quite sure about why our train was never arriving we were told about the strike, refunded our money, and sent out on a bus eastwards. it turns out the buses are generally faster on sicily, so after a day of exploring catania yesterday we caught another bus this morning to syracuse, which was once one of the most powerful cities in the world under greek rule. there we saw our first glimpse of greek ruins, including one of the largest mainly intact amphitheaters, directly next to the humongous quarry, which also served as a prison camp for rival athenians who made the mistake of trying to conquer the syracusans. pretty amazing stuff - perhaps alex will post more about it later. in any case, i have to say i've quite enjoyed sicily. we've seen no trace of the mafia, but instead mostly fish markets, museums, ruins, and lots of happy-seeming young people. tomorrow we head to agrigento for a look at greek temples, then back to palermo for an early morning flight to athens! ciao italia!
Sunday, November 9, 2008
last stop in italy
well, things are looking pretty good, as you all know. i found out about obama from carl, our isle of wight host who i ran into early morning november 5th while he was riding his bicycle (with little evelina in tow) through the streets of bosa. later alex, liz, and i huddled around a computer and checked out all of the stats for our individual states, learning that all of them went blue. and go new mexico for going dem all the way! good-bye heather wilson and co.
alex and i took another overnight ferry two nights ago, arriving in palermo, sicily early in the morning. this ferry was not quite so nice as the last one, with one of the major problems being absolutely no signs or people helping with the whole exiting process, meaning we wandered around the various decks, hauling our luggage up and down stairs and elevators many times, often winding up in these creepy little dead-end places with only italian signs telling us we were wrong. gah. eventually we got out though, and entered the craziness that is palermo. after checking into our hostel (which feels more like a 19th century boarding house with long dark hallways and a hand-kept ledger book...) we headed for the capo market, which i read about in the book "on persephone's island." the multi-block market offers everything from live snails to marzipan olives to knock-off dolce and gabana jeans. after winding our way through many different sections we headed to the archeology museum, where alex once again was astounded by the breadth of their collection. the ticket offered us access to the palazzo mirto as well, where we decided to go after a little rest at the hostel. the palace stays open until 7, though by the time we got there at 5 it was completely dark outside. we started walking in and were stopped by an elderly italian man, who asked us if we understood the language, and upon hearing our answer (an apologetic "no") led us into the first room and proceeded to give us a detailed guided tour of the entire castle, completely in italian. we got bits and pieces, as he was speaking slowly and repeating parts for emphasis, but i'd have to say it was one of the stranger tours i've been on. we were also the only people in the entire place, so as he lead us through the 30-odd rooms he seemed to be taking extra liberties, such as opening the 300-year-old cabinets and drawers to show us how they worked, taking down the ropes to certain rooms and insisting we walk around, demanding i take pictures of particular things though there were clear signs telling me not to, and letting us take turns sitting in some of the royal family's plethora of carriages. it sort of felt like we were the visiting royalty examining the property to see if it was up to our standards. very strange, but quite entertaining. unfortunately, i could not even tell you who lived in the palace, as he either skipped over that part or said it too quickly. oops.
after that experience we headed back to our neighborhood, discovering that our street turns into sort of an alley party where all these little restaurant/bars bring out plastic chairs and tables and sell food and drinks to people hanging out. we brought out our mini dominoes and enjoyed our saturday night. it felt very un-italian, perhaps preparing us for what is to come when we arrive in greece next week! unfortunately today is sunday, which apparently means all the museums and everything ever is closed. but off we go to find something to do!
alex and i took another overnight ferry two nights ago, arriving in palermo, sicily early in the morning. this ferry was not quite so nice as the last one, with one of the major problems being absolutely no signs or people helping with the whole exiting process, meaning we wandered around the various decks, hauling our luggage up and down stairs and elevators many times, often winding up in these creepy little dead-end places with only italian signs telling us we were wrong. gah. eventually we got out though, and entered the craziness that is palermo. after checking into our hostel (which feels more like a 19th century boarding house with long dark hallways and a hand-kept ledger book...) we headed for the capo market, which i read about in the book "on persephone's island." the multi-block market offers everything from live snails to marzipan olives to knock-off dolce and gabana jeans. after winding our way through many different sections we headed to the archeology museum, where alex once again was astounded by the breadth of their collection. the ticket offered us access to the palazzo mirto as well, where we decided to go after a little rest at the hostel. the palace stays open until 7, though by the time we got there at 5 it was completely dark outside. we started walking in and were stopped by an elderly italian man, who asked us if we understood the language, and upon hearing our answer (an apologetic "no") led us into the first room and proceeded to give us a detailed guided tour of the entire castle, completely in italian. we got bits and pieces, as he was speaking slowly and repeating parts for emphasis, but i'd have to say it was one of the stranger tours i've been on. we were also the only people in the entire place, so as he lead us through the 30-odd rooms he seemed to be taking extra liberties, such as opening the 300-year-old cabinets and drawers to show us how they worked, taking down the ropes to certain rooms and insisting we walk around, demanding i take pictures of particular things though there were clear signs telling me not to, and letting us take turns sitting in some of the royal family's plethora of carriages. it sort of felt like we were the visiting royalty examining the property to see if it was up to our standards. very strange, but quite entertaining. unfortunately, i could not even tell you who lived in the palace, as he either skipped over that part or said it too quickly. oops.
after that experience we headed back to our neighborhood, discovering that our street turns into sort of an alley party where all these little restaurant/bars bring out plastic chairs and tables and sell food and drinks to people hanging out. we brought out our mini dominoes and enjoyed our saturday night. it felt very un-italian, perhaps preparing us for what is to come when we arrive in greece next week! unfortunately today is sunday, which apparently means all the museums and everything ever is closed. but off we go to find something to do!
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
olive it
we've taken to making all sorts of "olive" puns... raking olives for hours at a time can make you sort of crazy. in any case, not too much news here. june left yesterday and we were sad to see her go. she's an incredibly strange old woman - very well traveled (spent 12 years in southeast asia, many in greece, etc.) and intelligent, but kind of crazy. she, liz, alex, and i sort of became a little pseudo travel family in our tower house, taking turns making a collective dinner every night and spending all day and evening together just talking and getting to know one another. liz spent the past nine years working for a nonprofit in ohio and has oodles of advice and fun stories to tell, so i feel like i'm just sponging up life lessons from these two amazing solo-travelling women. the great thing is also that they're both funny and friendly, and all four of us somehow click really well. the dynamic is different with june gone, but certainly not bad. we only see carl for a few hours per day, including lunchtime, which usually is such a relief after four - five straight hours of harvesting. we gorge on lovely sardinian food then go back to the grove for another few hours. it's dark here by about 5:15, so we haven't been doing much once we head back to town. except today, since it started raining during lunch, so we helped make some pomegranite juice, alex went to the oil press, then we headed down the hill. ah, the oil... so delicious! we've been using a bottle from our first batch, and it's absolutely amazing! tastes nothing like storebought, but instead is this tangy, peppery, bright green stuff that is just divine. hopefully i'll get to bring a bit home.
well, no news yet on the election, as it's still morning over there. all i can do is send my best thoughts over the pond. go vote, and i'll check back tomorrow to see what happened!
well, no news yet on the election, as it's still morning over there. all i can do is send my best thoughts over the pond. go vote, and i'll check back tomorrow to see what happened!
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
guest update from Sardinia
Yet another guest update from me, Alex, here:
Its tuesday nowand we are just off the mai square in he city of Bosa doing all our internet-related chores since our olive picking was rained out today. Which is a shame because I am really enjying it (I think Ursula is also, despite the sore neck from looking up all day). My unique method is actually climbing up inot the tree t rake th olive with out little plastic hand-rakes, since I think the highest concentrations of the biggest and best olives are uop at the top with all the open sky and light. Its tough work (on the ground as well!) but very satisfyiong whn we finish the raking/picking bit of the job and then haul all our ground nets together, piling the olives harvested in the middle....sometimes a good 20kg off one tree! The job has been made even easier by the arrival of Liz, from Ohio, on sunday and then June, from Santa Cruz, CA, on monday. Now there are fopur of us in the big tower-house, bu it is still plenty spacious enough.
Especialy since we've been going out a bit. Ursula and I walked the mile or so to the beach on sunday and swam in the absolutely crystal waters of the sea over lovely, sandy, bottom with little families of tiger-stripped fish darting around our heals. Good fun. Ursula hd siome bad memories of a particular stingra incident in Mexico, but stayed either swimming or else was only mildly suspiciously watching the bottom for undersea evils. It was so nice, however, nobody could stay wary and nervous for long. It was cold but tremendously fun.
We managed to get the whole house involved in a dinner last night that inally broke the semi-monotony of italan food (not that we dont like italian food, bt really, six weeks straight of pasta gets a little trying. We got Carl to drop us off ( in the pale yellow monster cab) at the market after work and we got some key ingridients--chief among them soy sauce--to make our rice, carrot, cabbage and egg stir fry seem a little less European. It was a shadow of the version we enjoyed in San Gineso when Gretchen made it, but it was good enough to fill our work-depleted bellies.
But yeah, rained out today. Real bummer. We got to go to Carey's studio for lunch hoever, and got a real spread there, only slightly less impressive than the one we enjoyed yesterday. Cheese, bread, tomatospread, sweat potatos, tomates, wine, cider, cucumbers, eggplant, green tomato slsa...it was endless and delicious!" hopefully the rain abates tomorrow so we can get some good harvesting done and then take the olives to the press either tomorrow or the next day. We're all excited to see that process. We'll have more to tell of it after we see the whole business go down. Till then, Ciao.
-Alex (and Ursula)
Its tuesday nowand we are just off the mai square in he city of Bosa doing all our internet-related chores since our olive picking was rained out today. Which is a shame because I am really enjying it (I think Ursula is also, despite the sore neck from looking up all day). My unique method is actually climbing up inot the tree t rake th olive with out little plastic hand-rakes, since I think the highest concentrations of the biggest and best olives are uop at the top with all the open sky and light. Its tough work (on the ground as well!) but very satisfyiong whn we finish the raking/picking bit of the job and then haul all our ground nets together, piling the olives harvested in the middle....sometimes a good 20kg off one tree! The job has been made even easier by the arrival of Liz, from Ohio, on sunday and then June, from Santa Cruz, CA, on monday. Now there are fopur of us in the big tower-house, bu it is still plenty spacious enough.
Especialy since we've been going out a bit. Ursula and I walked the mile or so to the beach on sunday and swam in the absolutely crystal waters of the sea over lovely, sandy, bottom with little families of tiger-stripped fish darting around our heals. Good fun. Ursula hd siome bad memories of a particular stingra incident in Mexico, but stayed either swimming or else was only mildly suspiciously watching the bottom for undersea evils. It was so nice, however, nobody could stay wary and nervous for long. It was cold but tremendously fun.
We managed to get the whole house involved in a dinner last night that inally broke the semi-monotony of italan food (not that we dont like italian food, bt really, six weeks straight of pasta gets a little trying. We got Carl to drop us off ( in the pale yellow monster cab) at the market after work and we got some key ingridients--chief among them soy sauce--to make our rice, carrot, cabbage and egg stir fry seem a little less European. It was a shadow of the version we enjoyed in San Gineso when Gretchen made it, but it was good enough to fill our work-depleted bellies.
But yeah, rained out today. Real bummer. We got to go to Carey's studio for lunch hoever, and got a real spread there, only slightly less impressive than the one we enjoyed yesterday. Cheese, bread, tomatospread, sweat potatos, tomates, wine, cider, cucumbers, eggplant, green tomato slsa...it was endless and delicious!" hopefully the rain abates tomorrow so we can get some good harvesting done and then take the olives to the press either tomorrow or the next day. We're all excited to see that process. We'll have more to tell of it after we see the whole business go down. Till then, Ciao.
-Alex (and Ursula)
Saturday, October 25, 2008
on the farm again
after four days in a "camping village" about 45 minutes north of rome we headed to the island of sardinia to embark on our second help exchange adventure. the little reality pause of the camping place was nice - gave us a few days to get our shit together while simultaneously doing next to nothing. the lovely gretchen visit also seemed to center me a bit, so i was feeling quite good by the time we arrived in civitavecchia to board our second overnight ferry. apparently the italian national line is much fancier than the croatian, as was evidenced immediately by the fact that we were transported to the 4th floor of the ship in an elevator, rather than a rickety outdoor staircase hovering over the harbor. once on board alex and i indulged in a rather average-tasting but high-costing dinner, had a glass of wine, hot shower, and climbed into our slightly rocking but rather cosy little sea-beds for a nice 5 and a half hours of sleep. we were awakened just before 6 to the sound of an on-board announcement in italian, then one in english so heavily accented that it was nearly incomprehensible. we were set to arrive at 6:30 though, so we headed for the exit. it was still dark out, and as the elevator door opened onto the car storage level of the ship, we walked wearily towards what seemed to be the exit, feeling rather like we were leaving the belly of a beast only to head into some sort of heavily fog covered hell. it turned out to just be sardinia though, and after a bit of a wait the sun came up and our bus across the island arrived, allowing us something of a tour across a misty but intensely beautiful landscape looking something like a cross between the scottish highlands and new mexican high desert. once we arrived in the very mediterranean bosa (where you can legally paint your house any color but white!) i called carl, who shortly arrived to pick us up in his former english taxi, a huge pale yellow thing that looks like it's from the 50s. carl himself is quite a sight to behold, with a shock of white blond hair and a shaggy beard, he looks like a viking who stumbled into some sort of neo-hippy colony. he told us we'd actually be staying in their house in town, which is a 5 (maybe 6?) story apartment with one room on each floor, creating a dizzying and amazing house including a lovely rooftop terrace. tomorrow another helpxer is arriving, meaning we'll be sharing the 3 bedroom wonder with a fellow traveller. the actual farm is just outside town on a lovely hillside from which you have a full view of the main section of houses, the river that flows through out to the ocean, and the castle that tops it all off. amazing. after a bit of settling in yesterday carl picked us up this morning and showed us the upper field, which contains the plethora of olive trees. he showed us the little rake things you use to get the olives off the branches, and after a bit of instruction we were off, successfully de-oliving one large tree, in total harvesting a hefty basketfull. we then went back down to their outside kitchen area for lunch (did i mention how nice the weather is here?), at which point we met his partner carey and got to know their two adorable little toe-headed kids evelina and padraig, whom they for some reason refer to as bubble and weasel. while carey and carl are both very friendly, they're old hats at the whole helpx thing and it seems that we will be treated more as the hired help than as friends come to stay. the fact that this sort of hired help gets to stay in a first rate house in a cute little town and only has to work about 4 hours per day makes it all seem okay though... whew. i'll let you know once the week begins and the harvest is truly underway!
Monday, October 20, 2008
Guest Post from Alex
For starters, on my first post, I just want to say that this keyboard is really shoddy so many of my errors will be due to that, not any stylisitic flouting of convention like the ordinary author of this blog favors.
That said, we-re in Lazio, north of Rome in a funny little camping village type place with mobile homes and the like. It is quaint, comfortable and, importantly, cheap. In San Ginesio we had a TV and spemnt a lot of time watching the news about the impending fiscal apocolypse and it has certainly made me feel even more sensitive to the kind of money we have to spend traveling. So this oasis of cheap room and board is a nice respite.
Better still was the free room and food we enjoyed in San G., but that locale had issues all its own which were the toipic of Ursulas last post.
We/ve pretty much hit the half way here in terms of time and it is a very interesting feeling...both a feeling of great accomplishment and recognition of how long we-re actually out here for, but also a fair ammount of feeling like its going by quickly. It is totally inexplicable for me that I can have memories which seem like moments ago//eating sandwiches in the park with Veronika// but have them really be weeks and weeks, as well as countries, ago. And Rome flew by totally too quickly. Luckily we are near enough to it here in Lazio that if I really get overwhelmed with feeling like I am missing it, we/I can take a day trip to go see the inside of Trajans markets, Diocletians bath or the Domus Aurea of Nero. We might have to. Being there was insane...to really know that I was literally stepping on the same paving stones that Augustus did...and not that he might have, but actually DID in some places through doors and the like. That forum in Rome was the beating heart of the entire western world for more than two millenia...i can still barely believe the squallor and ruin it has fallen into and the sheer disrespect it recieves every day from loads of sweaty, stinking, filthy, loud, undignified tourists. Everyone has a right to see the place, of course, but is it too much to ask that they should be expected to have some reverence for a place of such historical, social, cultural gravity...insert question mark here/the keyboard doesnt have one!
Well, my time is running low on this machine so I am going to sign off, but at least I wrote something, huh...
Ill do it again. Blogging is kind of fun. I started reading Dracula and the whole thing is largely journal and diary entrries...the style does have comething to it. Yeah, ill write on here again, if we ever find a reliable computer for more than an hour. damn it all.
Cheers and hugs and kisses to everyone back home i am missing. and boy, am i missing you all!
That said, we-re in Lazio, north of Rome in a funny little camping village type place with mobile homes and the like. It is quaint, comfortable and, importantly, cheap. In San Ginesio we had a TV and spemnt a lot of time watching the news about the impending fiscal apocolypse and it has certainly made me feel even more sensitive to the kind of money we have to spend traveling. So this oasis of cheap room and board is a nice respite.
Better still was the free room and food we enjoyed in San G., but that locale had issues all its own which were the toipic of Ursulas last post.
We/ve pretty much hit the half way here in terms of time and it is a very interesting feeling...both a feeling of great accomplishment and recognition of how long we-re actually out here for, but also a fair ammount of feeling like its going by quickly. It is totally inexplicable for me that I can have memories which seem like moments ago//eating sandwiches in the park with Veronika// but have them really be weeks and weeks, as well as countries, ago. And Rome flew by totally too quickly. Luckily we are near enough to it here in Lazio that if I really get overwhelmed with feeling like I am missing it, we/I can take a day trip to go see the inside of Trajans markets, Diocletians bath or the Domus Aurea of Nero. We might have to. Being there was insane...to really know that I was literally stepping on the same paving stones that Augustus did...and not that he might have, but actually DID in some places through doors and the like. That forum in Rome was the beating heart of the entire western world for more than two millenia...i can still barely believe the squallor and ruin it has fallen into and the sheer disrespect it recieves every day from loads of sweaty, stinking, filthy, loud, undignified tourists. Everyone has a right to see the place, of course, but is it too much to ask that they should be expected to have some reverence for a place of such historical, social, cultural gravity...insert question mark here/the keyboard doesnt have one!
Well, my time is running low on this machine so I am going to sign off, but at least I wrote something, huh...
Ill do it again. Blogging is kind of fun. I started reading Dracula and the whole thing is largely journal and diary entrries...the style does have comething to it. Yeah, ill write on here again, if we ever find a reliable computer for more than an hour. damn it all.
Cheers and hugs and kisses to everyone back home i am missing. and boy, am i missing you all!
Saturday, October 18, 2008
a week away
this past week has been spent mostly:
playing speed scrabble with gretchen at the kitchen table
reading raymond carver's "where i'm calling from"
driving around the countryside stopping in lots of little towns, getting out, walking around, perhaps drinking a coffee or eating a sandwich
reminiscing about food in portland/the us/talking about portland/the us in general
feeling a little bit awkward and like maybe we shouldn't be here because we're kind of just interrupting their life without a real invite and claudia seems kind of angry all the time and maybe really hates us
but then it's okay because gretchen wants us here and it's quite fun hanging out with her and having someone else to talk to who we know
that's about it. maybe alex will do a quick post too. pictures someday! tomorrow we're off to lazio, just north of rome, for a little pause in everything before heading to sardinia on thursday to pick olives for two weeks! hooray!
playing speed scrabble with gretchen at the kitchen table
reading raymond carver's "where i'm calling from"
driving around the countryside stopping in lots of little towns, getting out, walking around, perhaps drinking a coffee or eating a sandwich
reminiscing about food in portland/the us/talking about portland/the us in general
feeling a little bit awkward and like maybe we shouldn't be here because we're kind of just interrupting their life without a real invite and claudia seems kind of angry all the time and maybe really hates us
but then it's okay because gretchen wants us here and it's quite fun hanging out with her and having someone else to talk to who we know
that's about it. maybe alex will do a quick post too. pictures someday! tomorrow we're off to lazio, just north of rome, for a little pause in everything before heading to sardinia on thursday to pick olives for two weeks! hooray!
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
where people really live
right now we're in macerato, a town about an hour away from david and claudia's, where gretchen, alex, and i decided to come for the day. david and claudia are a couple about gretchen's age whom she met in portland and quickly befriended, eventually leading to an invite to come live with them in italy for a whopping 9 months. gretchen then ever-so-kindly extended an invite to us, and thus we are here in the provence of le marche spending a leisurely week at their cute little house outside of the town of san ginesio. i told them upon arrival that i felt odd just staying without doing something in exchange (as in digging ditches, hauling bricks, etc.) and in fact that feeling hasn't fully gone away. the area looks very similar to tuscany, though with more farms and less woods, and it seems with more people who're here to work, not to escape and start over. david took us on a crazy little drive around the countryside, stopping in one town to experience a local polenta/fall festival (apparently polenta festivals are really big in italy), another for views, and others just to see. wonderfully i was able to upload pictures onto gretchen's computer then onto my memory stick, so here are some recent ones to give you a gist!
Friday, October 10, 2008
roman hobbit houses
i think my favorite part about rome was actually something 30km outside of the city (or maybe that's not true... there's so much here to like). in any case, ostia was absolutely amazing. i suppose it's the kind of find that archeologists dream about, and for some reason the 4 euro, 20 minute train ride is too much for most tourists. the ruins are huge, and far from ruined. pretty much a small town still stands, sans most roofs and floors, and large parts of walls. but you get the idea, with the added bonus of wild flowers and grasses winding their way across the remaining mosaic floors and stone walls, creating a sort of roman secret garden feel. as with everyone who came before us, the romans were small, so the few intact houses and shops are tiny, forcing alex and me to duck into them and get the full experience. i kept thinking about chaco canyon while we were wandering through - passively checking out the remnants of a multi-thousand year old civilization. since i can't yet upload my own pics, here's one of someone elses to give you an idea of what the place looks like:
this doesn't really do it justice though - it was much more beautiful. in any case, to make a lovely day even better we hopped back on the commuter train for 4 more stops and got out at the beach. second week in october and the weather was perfect for a swim. it was the first really sandy beach we've been to, as croatia is apparently entirely made of rocks, and it was exactly what we needed. all tension of rome was washed away as we swam and dozed while listening to the lilting voices of our fellow swimmers - about 30 german high schoolers. soo, it wasn't exactly perfect beach-side company, but there's really no escaping the germans in italy, so it wasn't too bad.
tomorrow it's off to stay with gretchen in san ginesio - off we go!
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
first, here are a few croatia pics: http://s530.photobucket.com/albums/dd345/ursulove/
i haven't been able to upload any new pictures onto any computer, but i finally found somewhere to upload the rest that i had already put on my memory stick. so there you go. croatia seems like so long ago though, it's weird to think that it was even part of this trip.
alex and i have had our first full day apart today, which i think i really needed. it's not that we've been fighting, or even feeling unhappy with each other, i think just a bit overwhelmed. rome is where all of alex's studies and fantasies center, and my utter lack of knowledge (and often lack of interest) have been wearing us both down a bit. i figured it would be better for both of us to let him get his fill of museums while i did my own thing for a day. sooo, today i crossed the tiber into a neighborhood called trastevere, which used to be very poor and sad but is now intensely beautiful and more full of students than tourists. i bought a herald tribune (the international newspaper put out by the ny times) and caught up on the shit storm that has been hitting the world over. jesus christ, it made me happy not to be in the u.s. right now. yesterday i went to the u.s. embassy to make sure i get to vote, and after a few hours of italian-style delays and nonchalance i do believe it will all work out. fingers crossed, as i sure would like to get to utilize that one little power i'm afforded. while yesterday was focused on ensuring our rights as americans, the day before was pure roman. we decided to hit all the biggies, starting with the forum and the ruins surrounding, then heading to the colloseum (or the flavian amphitheater, as alex tells me it should properly be called). for these sights it was indeed nice to have alex around, because, as emmeline commented, it was like having a free guided tour. simply walking through this city is like taking a tour through history, however, with little placards on every other corner describing what happened here in the 16th century, there in the 2nd, over there in the 3rd b.c.e. whew, it's a lot to take in. but i'm feeling happy and refreshed after a lazy day, and ready for our trip out of town to the old city of ostia tomorrow morning!
i haven't been able to upload any new pictures onto any computer, but i finally found somewhere to upload the rest that i had already put on my memory stick. so there you go. croatia seems like so long ago though, it's weird to think that it was even part of this trip.
alex and i have had our first full day apart today, which i think i really needed. it's not that we've been fighting, or even feeling unhappy with each other, i think just a bit overwhelmed. rome is where all of alex's studies and fantasies center, and my utter lack of knowledge (and often lack of interest) have been wearing us both down a bit. i figured it would be better for both of us to let him get his fill of museums while i did my own thing for a day. sooo, today i crossed the tiber into a neighborhood called trastevere, which used to be very poor and sad but is now intensely beautiful and more full of students than tourists. i bought a herald tribune (the international newspaper put out by the ny times) and caught up on the shit storm that has been hitting the world over. jesus christ, it made me happy not to be in the u.s. right now. yesterday i went to the u.s. embassy to make sure i get to vote, and after a few hours of italian-style delays and nonchalance i do believe it will all work out. fingers crossed, as i sure would like to get to utilize that one little power i'm afforded. while yesterday was focused on ensuring our rights as americans, the day before was pure roman. we decided to hit all the biggies, starting with the forum and the ruins surrounding, then heading to the colloseum (or the flavian amphitheater, as alex tells me it should properly be called). for these sights it was indeed nice to have alex around, because, as emmeline commented, it was like having a free guided tour. simply walking through this city is like taking a tour through history, however, with little placards on every other corner describing what happened here in the 16th century, there in the 2nd, over there in the 3rd b.c.e. whew, it's a lot to take in. but i'm feeling happy and refreshed after a lazy day, and ready for our trip out of town to the old city of ostia tomorrow morning!
Sunday, October 5, 2008
la dolce vita
yesterday marked both one month in europe and our arrival in rome. we were both incredibly sad to be leaving lucie and peter and the comfortable country life we'd gotten used to there, but were also excited to be arriving in rome. we were greeted by intense rain and cool weather, but were immediately cheered upon entering our apartment. it's in a very central area on a hip little shopping street and is pretty much just amazing. two bedroom/two bath, huge living room, 15 foot ceilings, great views over the street.... what was barre thinking letting us stay here? we kind of feel like kids who snuck into their parents' bedroom when they were out of town. ah well, we'll make the most of it! last night we made dinner after walking around a bit and trying to get our bearings, and though it was not a bad meal at an amazing dining table, we felt like we were missing two key components, namely lucie and peter. lucie inspired me to start cooking more though, as she was simply a whiz with a cookbook in front of her, so i definitely need to buy some cookbooks and get going once i get back to p-town. for now we're off to the piazza di spagna, for an afternoon of wandering and taking in the overwhelming beauty and history that is rome.
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
meetin the neighbors
today we took part in our second expat meal, this time a lunch hosted by lucie and peter. lucie cooked all morning, serving up a proper lunch with dessert and all. or pudding, as brits apparently call all dessert. i thought it was lucie just sort of generalizing at first, but we asked about it and apparently their word 'pudding' does not refer to the tasty jell-o type thing, but instead anything sweet that one eats following a meal. strange, eh? but in any case, today an english couple and an english woman and her daughter came over for lunch, and a few nights ago lucie, peter, alex, and i all went over to an elderly expat couple's house for dinner along with an older american expat woman and a young english couple. it's very interesting to see the type of networking/bonding that goes on among english speakers living here, and it's certainly something i can understand wanting to do. most of them said that they really didn't want to seek out other foreigners, but that it just sort of happened. of course in terms of learning the language it would be good to mix with the locals, but in terms of empathy and simply getting by in a foreign land i think it makes tons of sense to find others like you. if i hadn't had anais in germany i don't know what i would have done. and she's french! it's funny being around so many brits here though, alex and i feel like we sort of fit in, but still have another layer of foreign-ness to fight through. it's entertaining though, and let's us learn things about english life as well. hmm, i'm not sure what else i was going to update about, so i think i'll go take a shower!
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
cities and towns
once again i'm sitting in the office just before dinner time, with lovely food smells wafting in from the other room. today was our second day off, so peter dropped alex and me off in the nearby town of le ville, where we caught a bus into arezzo. we arrived around noon and headed first for the ruins of what was once a rather large roman amphitheater, and now looks a bit like a soccer field with some rubble on one side vaguely resembling a wall. alex then went into the adjoining archeological museum, but i decided the one in florence was enough for me and instead wandered, found a cute little coffee shop, and read for a while. the hour or so alone was refreshing, and i think made it nicer to meet up again and take on the rest of the city. i'm actually rather proud of how well alex and i have been getting along - our bickering in vienna seems to really be a thing of the past.
yikes! dinner... more tomorrow!
yikes! dinner... more tomorrow!
Friday, September 26, 2008
farm livin is the life for me (forget manhattan, just gimme that countryside!)
or something like that... today i kind of felt overwhelmed and tired out, but quickly got a second wind. so the deal with helpx is that you work for 4 hours a day, 5 days a week, but lucie suggested the ingenious idea of "working forward," meaning we work 5 hours a day for 4 days and then get an extra day off. so, we worked on the drainage ditch for 4 days (which we actually became quite proud of, as its glorious rock lining is something of a mosaic) and then spent our day off in florence with dinner in nearby arrezo. someone told alex that if we wanted to spend our time in italy with americans we should head for florence, and we found this to be regretfully true. we figured tourism would have slacked off a bit by this time of year, but the tour groups (the kind where guides hold up a little flag while they walk around and everyone is wearing matching numbered stickers) were rampant. nonetheless, we managed to see all the big sights we were interested in, including the archeological museum, which housed tons of egyptian, greek, etruscan, and roman artifacts, much to alex's delight. i came to florence with elena, julia, and jarvis the summer after senior year of high school, but have to say i hardly remember the place. that trip seems ages ago, with the focus on our tenuous relationships rather than the sights we saw. so going again was nice, and good to do it with alex. after much wandering we headed for the train station which took us back to arrezo, the nearest city to where we are now, where we enjoyed a leisurely meal at a restaurant recommended to us by lucie.
today we returned to work on the land, though not on the ditch. it was cloudy today, really beginning to feel like fall. still beautiful though, and only cool enough to warrant a sweatshirt, with sleeves pushed up while hauling old stones from a broken down wall to a pile in the garage. the kind of work i wouldn't want to do forever, but am somehow happy to be doing now. so much physical labor also renews my respect for my father, who somehow manages to battle through 12 hour days and 6 day work weeks. true work.
well, now it's time to be rewarded for our minimal work with lucie's delicous cooking...
today we returned to work on the land, though not on the ditch. it was cloudy today, really beginning to feel like fall. still beautiful though, and only cool enough to warrant a sweatshirt, with sleeves pushed up while hauling old stones from a broken down wall to a pile in the garage. the kind of work i wouldn't want to do forever, but am somehow happy to be doing now. so much physical labor also renews my respect for my father, who somehow manages to battle through 12 hour days and 6 day work weeks. true work.
well, now it's time to be rewarded for our minimal work with lucie's delicous cooking...
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
austria pictures!
hooray, finally pictures!
sorry they're not on the blog, but that takes forever... so go here:
http://s530.photobucket.com/albums/dd345/ursulove/way%20back%20when%20in%20austria/
sorry they're not on the blog, but that takes forever... so go here:
http://s530.photobucket.com/albums/dd345/ursulove/way%20back%20when%20in%20austria/
Sunday, September 21, 2008
out in the country
im sitting at a big old dell computer with alex looking over my shoulder while holding ginger, one of the absolutely adorable kittens owned by our hosts lucie and peter (they've got nine cats total). we're on our first farm, which is actually just 75 acres of intensely beautiful but run-down land in the heart of tuscany. today we worked for five hours digging and clearing a run-off ditch next to the long and rocky driveway up to the house, lining it with rocks to make it a bit sturdier. today's work resulted in about 15 feet of lined ditch, with perhaps 500 or so to go. but we've got two weeks! we got here yesterday and were picked up by lucie, with two other american helpxers in tow. they're older women from arizona and california, both kind of loud but entertaining - good story tellers. they're leaving tomorrow morning though, so then we've got the run of the place (all the more room for napping and kittie-cuddling, horray!). lucie and peter are a rather laid-back and friendly english couple, who've been having helpers come to get things going around their newly purchased homestead. last night we all packed into their little renault and drove down to the nearby town of monterchi, where there was a polenta festival complete with a terrible italian band playing what were apparently hits here in the '70s. it was kind of entertaining, especially watching all of the locals dance around to the awful pop as though it were traditional music. the idea of a festival dedicated to polenta also greatly amused me, although we actually went for delicious local pizza instead, perhaps to get out of the cold. luckily lucie's cooking is also quite tasty, and refreshingly not consisting solely of pasta, cheese, and bread, which my vegetarian diet has largely consisted of thus far. hopefully in the next few days i'll post more pictures, though for now i'll go help with dinner prep while alex checks his email.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
crrrrroatia
so were finally in a place with real internet rather than shitty wireless (updating from alexs iphone is impossible...) but alas no usb port, so i cant put up any pictures at the moment. i also have to use like four buttons to get an apostrophe, so thats out too. right now were in dubrovnik, our last stop on our little croatian tour. im not sure where to start at this point, i feel like its been ages since i last posted, though i guess its really only been a bit over a week. so, here goes...
when we arrived in graz we recognized veronika immediately out of the window of the train, and once we had hauled all of our multitudinous baggage onto the little austrian platform we were greeted with hugs and a warm, australian-accented hello. we spent the next two days in a sort of relaxed stupor, finally getting over jet-lag and the exhaustion-induced bickering that had unfortunately factored largely into our four days in vienna. veronika happily showed us her adorable little city, took us out with her friends, and spent an afternoon with us lazily reading books in the stadtpark. graz is exactly what one might imagine when trying to conjure up an image of a traditional germanic town - clean and tidy, full of beautiful churches and impressive architecture, and packed with happy-seeming people in hip euro clothing who like to eat ice cream but somehow manage to stay fashionably thin. all in all graz was a calm success, though money-wise we were happy to move on to the slightly cheaper land of true eastern europe.
and thus we arrived in croatia. we took a train from graz to zagreb - a surprisingly quick journey that cuts through slovenia and plonks you down in the very metropolitan old town area. from there we took a street car (some of which seem to be from the 1950s, others from the future...) and arrived at our hostel, where we had booked 2 beds in a 6 bed room. only late that night did we realize that we unfortunately did not have the luxury of having the whole room. we immediately headed towards the old city, assuming wed wander and go to some museums. we had noticed a large group of english people on the train, but it was not until we reached the old town that it became clear why this was the case - that particular night there was a soccer game in zagreb between the english and croatian national teams. we were quickly swept up in the fanmania, which consisted mostly of beer drinking and singing, with a lot of croatian vs. english group songs, one group trying to out-sing the other. this was all happening with the continual reminder that if any of the competition went beyond drunken vocal chord capabilities it would be taken care of efficiently, as hundreds of cops in full riot gear wandered the streets looking alert. that night we followed the swarms of people decked out in soccer gear towards the stadium and tried to get tickets, but unfortunately the game was sold out. it was an experience just being there though - what dedication those fans have! we found out the next day that england won 4-1, which left zagreb somber and mostly empty, allowing us to have our day of museums and wandering. aside from the obvious language difficulties, i found the city to be incredibly appealing and open, with a much less pompous, museumesque feeling than vienna.
after leaving zagreb we spent the afternoon at the plitviče lakes, which lived up all of the hype id heard. there are 13 lakes all joined by waterfall, all crystal clear, and all surrounded by intricately built wooden-plank pathways that make you truly feel as though youve just inadvertantly stepped into middle earth. we kept waiting to see the procession of elves cross in the jungly forrest behind one of the lakes.
we decided to head straight to split after a good afternoon of hiking and viewing, which meant another 4 hours on a bus. at one stop the driver yelled something in croatian and turned off the motor, apparently signaling that there would be a bit of a break. after a few minutes we decided to go to the bathroom, since it seemed that we werent leaving anytime soon. i got back on the bus when i was done, and just as i sat down the driver pulled out of the parking lot. without alex. i kind of shouted something unintelligable, since i knew the driver didnt speak english, and luckily the man sitting behind us got the gist and translated, so we came to a screeching halt just as alex meandered out of the bathroom, aloof to all of this. he got back on and we thanked the man behind us, which turned into a rather one-sided 45 minute discussion in thickly accented german about the croatian countryside and its history. i tried to listen as best i could with a craned neck and translate the interesting stuff for alex. the man got off the bus one stop before us and happily gave us his business card. though i enjoyed his company, i dont think ill call him.
split proved rather uneventful, as the main attraction - the roman emporer diocletions palace - has been steadily built upon for about the last 5 centuries, leaving alex close to tears once he saw the terrible damage. it now houses many bars, restaurants, kitsch shops, and apartments. yikes. so we saw what we could and spent the next day at the beach, though it was rather rocky and far away, the water was incredibly clear and beautiful.
from split we took a ferry to the island of korčula, which was recommended to us by a woman at our hostel in zagreb. when we went to buy the tickets, however, we were confronted with the fact that there are multiple towns on this island, so we just picked the one with the earliest ferry departure. so we were off to vela luka! we got there just as it was getting dark, and just as it was starting to rain. hard. we took respite in a little cafe with a big awning, and since we didnt have any hostel reserved here we asked the bartender about reasonable hotels. reasonable? hmm, that one with the green cuppola, he says. we look across the bay to a nice looking place, but so far away. considering that the only other option wed come across was a man who kind of chased us down and said in broken english that hed cook for us, we took the chance and started the trek. the bay went in even further than wed thought, so about 35 minutes later we arrived at the hotel, soaking wet, tired, and wanting a room. but they were full. and the next hotel was 2 km back around the bay and up the hill away from the water. so, we started walking back when an old lady poked her head out of a house with a bed sign on the gate, and we were welcomed into her-her daughters-her grandsons house. for roughly $40 a night for the two of us they gave us a lovely room with a big bed (under a big painting of the virgin mary...) homemade wine, local figs, and entertaining non-conversation consisting of a lot of gesturing and smiles.
the next day the sky cleared, however, and we were able to find a secluded swimming cove where we could jump right from gorgeous white rocks into slightly storm chilled, but sharp clear water, lazily floating away the afternoon. quite nice.
and, at last, we come to dubrovnik. how to get here from vela luka? one bus. one? what time? 5am. so, we were up at 3:45 to begin the journey back around the bay, down to the empty bus station, where we sat anxiously and listened to drunken sailors sing and drink til just about the break of day, when we boarded and headed across the little island, across a little water on a car ferry, and down the rocky coast of croatia. dubrovnik is a fortified town overlooking the sea, and is apparently tourist heaven. so now its time to go lose ourselves amongst the throngs and see what its all about. pictures soon!
when we arrived in graz we recognized veronika immediately out of the window of the train, and once we had hauled all of our multitudinous baggage onto the little austrian platform we were greeted with hugs and a warm, australian-accented hello. we spent the next two days in a sort of relaxed stupor, finally getting over jet-lag and the exhaustion-induced bickering that had unfortunately factored largely into our four days in vienna. veronika happily showed us her adorable little city, took us out with her friends, and spent an afternoon with us lazily reading books in the stadtpark. graz is exactly what one might imagine when trying to conjure up an image of a traditional germanic town - clean and tidy, full of beautiful churches and impressive architecture, and packed with happy-seeming people in hip euro clothing who like to eat ice cream but somehow manage to stay fashionably thin. all in all graz was a calm success, though money-wise we were happy to move on to the slightly cheaper land of true eastern europe.
and thus we arrived in croatia. we took a train from graz to zagreb - a surprisingly quick journey that cuts through slovenia and plonks you down in the very metropolitan old town area. from there we took a street car (some of which seem to be from the 1950s, others from the future...) and arrived at our hostel, where we had booked 2 beds in a 6 bed room. only late that night did we realize that we unfortunately did not have the luxury of having the whole room. we immediately headed towards the old city, assuming wed wander and go to some museums. we had noticed a large group of english people on the train, but it was not until we reached the old town that it became clear why this was the case - that particular night there was a soccer game in zagreb between the english and croatian national teams. we were quickly swept up in the fanmania, which consisted mostly of beer drinking and singing, with a lot of croatian vs. english group songs, one group trying to out-sing the other. this was all happening with the continual reminder that if any of the competition went beyond drunken vocal chord capabilities it would be taken care of efficiently, as hundreds of cops in full riot gear wandered the streets looking alert. that night we followed the swarms of people decked out in soccer gear towards the stadium and tried to get tickets, but unfortunately the game was sold out. it was an experience just being there though - what dedication those fans have! we found out the next day that england won 4-1, which left zagreb somber and mostly empty, allowing us to have our day of museums and wandering. aside from the obvious language difficulties, i found the city to be incredibly appealing and open, with a much less pompous, museumesque feeling than vienna.
after leaving zagreb we spent the afternoon at the plitviče lakes, which lived up all of the hype id heard. there are 13 lakes all joined by waterfall, all crystal clear, and all surrounded by intricately built wooden-plank pathways that make you truly feel as though youve just inadvertantly stepped into middle earth. we kept waiting to see the procession of elves cross in the jungly forrest behind one of the lakes.
we decided to head straight to split after a good afternoon of hiking and viewing, which meant another 4 hours on a bus. at one stop the driver yelled something in croatian and turned off the motor, apparently signaling that there would be a bit of a break. after a few minutes we decided to go to the bathroom, since it seemed that we werent leaving anytime soon. i got back on the bus when i was done, and just as i sat down the driver pulled out of the parking lot. without alex. i kind of shouted something unintelligable, since i knew the driver didnt speak english, and luckily the man sitting behind us got the gist and translated, so we came to a screeching halt just as alex meandered out of the bathroom, aloof to all of this. he got back on and we thanked the man behind us, which turned into a rather one-sided 45 minute discussion in thickly accented german about the croatian countryside and its history. i tried to listen as best i could with a craned neck and translate the interesting stuff for alex. the man got off the bus one stop before us and happily gave us his business card. though i enjoyed his company, i dont think ill call him.
split proved rather uneventful, as the main attraction - the roman emporer diocletions palace - has been steadily built upon for about the last 5 centuries, leaving alex close to tears once he saw the terrible damage. it now houses many bars, restaurants, kitsch shops, and apartments. yikes. so we saw what we could and spent the next day at the beach, though it was rather rocky and far away, the water was incredibly clear and beautiful.
from split we took a ferry to the island of korčula, which was recommended to us by a woman at our hostel in zagreb. when we went to buy the tickets, however, we were confronted with the fact that there are multiple towns on this island, so we just picked the one with the earliest ferry departure. so we were off to vela luka! we got there just as it was getting dark, and just as it was starting to rain. hard. we took respite in a little cafe with a big awning, and since we didnt have any hostel reserved here we asked the bartender about reasonable hotels. reasonable? hmm, that one with the green cuppola, he says. we look across the bay to a nice looking place, but so far away. considering that the only other option wed come across was a man who kind of chased us down and said in broken english that hed cook for us, we took the chance and started the trek. the bay went in even further than wed thought, so about 35 minutes later we arrived at the hotel, soaking wet, tired, and wanting a room. but they were full. and the next hotel was 2 km back around the bay and up the hill away from the water. so, we started walking back when an old lady poked her head out of a house with a bed sign on the gate, and we were welcomed into her-her daughters-her grandsons house. for roughly $40 a night for the two of us they gave us a lovely room with a big bed (under a big painting of the virgin mary...) homemade wine, local figs, and entertaining non-conversation consisting of a lot of gesturing and smiles.
the next day the sky cleared, however, and we were able to find a secluded swimming cove where we could jump right from gorgeous white rocks into slightly storm chilled, but sharp clear water, lazily floating away the afternoon. quite nice.
and, at last, we come to dubrovnik. how to get here from vela luka? one bus. one? what time? 5am. so, we were up at 3:45 to begin the journey back around the bay, down to the empty bus station, where we sat anxiously and listened to drunken sailors sing and drink til just about the break of day, when we boarded and headed across the little island, across a little water on a car ferry, and down the rocky coast of croatia. dubrovnik is a fortified town overlooking the sea, and is apparently tourist heaven. so now its time to go lose ourselves amongst the throngs and see what its all about. pictures soon!
Sunday, September 7, 2008
this is how it began... with our last meal in the u.s. at a japanese restaurant in sfo, with mr. gimpy doing some face grabbing. right, so alex smashed his hand two nights before we left, and after the swelling continued at a grand rate the day before departure, our last night at home was spent getting two rounds of x-rays (revealing a fractured 5th metacarpal) and a sort of DIY cast thing made by 3M, which has to stay on for about 3 - 4 weeks. which means lovely mummy hand photos and a bit of help getting in and out of his jacket.
we arrived in vienna in the afternoon last thursday after a rather cramped early 90s style flight courtesy of united airlines. once settled in our hostel we retired at 3:30 for what we initially thought would be a pre-dinner nap, but instead turned into a good night's sleep until about oh, maybe 2:45am.
luckily alex has a splendid voice for lord of the rings read-alouds, so that got us through to nearly 5am, when we decided it was time to get up, get showered, and get ready for the 7:30 hostel breakfast, a bit of shopping, and an 11am walking tour. 
our guide was a laid-back portuguese guy who gave us good history and stories, and hit what seemed to be all of the important sites in the older parts of the city. he also brought us to a 350 year old wine cellar, where an adorable old austrian man gave us a brief history of the place and introduced us to "sturm," a seasonal wine that's highly alcoholic for something that tastes rather like juice. quite yummy. yesterday was spent at the MAK, the museum of applied art, which i was really into. it had rooms full of furniture, textiles, and some paintings, mostly modern and contemporary. mostly furniture, really, and lots of art deco. quite nice. we also swung by the hunderwasserhaus, built by this crazy austrian architect who also designed a high school in the town where i lived in germany. his buildings are sort of like the creative musings of a child come to life.
we finished the day by wandering through the egyptian, greek, and roman rooms of the fine arts museum - formerly the private collection of the hapsburgs, and therefore housed in what can be described as nothing less than a palace.
today we got up incredibly early yet again, after having gone to sleep at a rather ridiculously early hour, and headed to the true hapsburg palace - schoenbrunn.
there we wandered the impressively large grounds and watched some sort of viennese track meet meander its way all over the area. after getting our fill of palatial exorbitance we took the #6 streetcar all the way across town to the central cemetery, the final resting place of such greats as mozart, beethoven, and strauss.
right now, however, i'm running low on internet time here at the hostel and will upload some more photos and then update further next week from croatia! tomorrow we head down to graz, where we're staying with veronika, our first couchsurf buddy. hope that works out!
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
a week of stress/laziness
it's 3:47 in albuquerque and i'm sitting in my parents' dining room in what i consider pajamas, though my mother has assured me that i'm dressed enough for nm - that her students wear such things to class. i don't think i'll leave the house in this attire though. i've been playing with and attempting to figure out my new technology all morning, with a few interruptions for ping pong with my dad, scrabble with my mom. my life seems to be arriving in boxes on the front porch these days, one after another. yesterday i got these boots,
which seem to be perfect for a trip involving lots of walking and potentially cold weather. then came my new cell phone (hooray for perfect two-year trade-in timing!), which has an international sim card. it's still like a million dollars a minute, so i don't plan on doing too much calling, but it makes me feel safer to know it's an option wherever we go. and finally my suitcase arrived this afternoon. end-of-summer blow-out sales allowed me to get a slightly bigger bag for quite cheap, giving me just a bit more room for possible shopping and making it so that i won't be shoving and squishing each time i have to pack.
my most exciting purchase of the week, however, was one i researched online but purchased locally, at good ol' camera and darkroom on central. i had been thinking about getting a dslr in order to renew my interest in true phography, but they're both too expensive and too huge to bring on a long trip. soo, after a bit of looking i landed on the nikon p5100, which is the closest thing available in a point and shoot. it offers full manual mode and has the possibility of attaching an extra lens and flash. i've only had it for two days, but am already quite enamored with it. the pics below are just examples of what it can do without any tinkering at all
so i'm excited to see what i can do with it in europe! as far as other planning goes, i wrote to a girl in venice to see about surfing her couch, as hostels there are ridiculously expensive. otherwise, i'm just printing things out and writing things down and getting all my last-minute freak-outs out of the way. on saturday i fly to the bay area, where alex and i will spend three days hanging out with his family before flying out of san francisco. ah! one week left in the u.s.!
which seem to be perfect for a trip involving lots of walking and potentially cold weather. then came my new cell phone (hooray for perfect two-year trade-in timing!), which has an international sim card. it's still like a million dollars a minute, so i don't plan on doing too much calling, but it makes me feel safer to know it's an option wherever we go. and finally my suitcase arrived this afternoon. end-of-summer blow-out sales allowed me to get a slightly bigger bag for quite cheap, giving me just a bit more room for possible shopping and making it so that i won't be shoving and squishing each time i have to pack.my most exciting purchase of the week, however, was one i researched online but purchased locally, at good ol' camera and darkroom on central. i had been thinking about getting a dslr in order to renew my interest in true phography, but they're both too expensive and too huge to bring on a long trip. soo, after a bit of looking i landed on the nikon p5100, which is the closest thing available in a point and shoot. it offers full manual mode and has the possibility of attaching an extra lens and flash. i've only had it for two days, but am already quite enamored with it. the pics below are just examples of what it can do without any tinkering at all
so i'm excited to see what i can do with it in europe! as far as other planning goes, i wrote to a girl in venice to see about surfing her couch, as hostels there are ridiculously expensive. otherwise, i'm just printing things out and writing things down and getting all my last-minute freak-outs out of the way. on saturday i fly to the bay area, where alex and i will spend three days hanging out with his family before flying out of san francisco. ah! one week left in the u.s.!
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