Travels to Turkey: Roaming Around Turkey...

So, when I last updated, I was in Cappadocia, which has been my favorite part of the trip thus far. Our second day there we visited an underground city, the first two stories of which date back to 2000 B.C. The Byzantian Christians later added six more floors, and they used it to hide from invading armies. It was pretty amazing; we crawled through four foot high tunnels to get from room to room and saw the winery, kitchens, bathrooms, and trap doors it included.

We also attended a sama' ceremony in Cappodocia, otherwise known as a whirling dervishes ceremony. The practice began with the Sufi poet Rumi (whom we're here studying) and his Sufi order. Men wearing long, poofy, white skirts literally spin in formation for half an hour or more, their skirts never touching. Their teacher moves between them, and he magically never touches anyone either. Traditionally, the practice was meant to connect a person to God by centering their thoughts on the Divine, but since Ataturk banned Sufi orders in the 1930s, the public ceremony we attended is labeled as "folklore" and done mostly for tourists. Watching, though, produced this incredible feeling of both tranquility and thoughtfulness; I really enjoyed it.

After two days in Cappodocia (where the head waiter of our hotel refused to believe that my eye color was real; he kept asking if I had color lenses in), we journeyed to Konya, where the shrine to Rumi is located. The shrine, which is now labeled a museum because of the ban on Sufi orders, is very pretty and packed full of pilgrims coming to interact with Rumi's baracka (sort of mystical power force and also where our President gets his first name from). Yeah, I could explain more, but you might as well just read my class notes.

Also in Konya, we visited some medresas, former religious schools under the Ottoman Empire, another mosque, and Sufi shrines. This morning, we packed up for Pamukkale (REALLY fun name to say--Pam-oo-ka-lei) which is near the beach and really pretty. Tomorrow, we head to the BEACH at Kusadasi, where we get three days to ourselves, other than writing a paper. In that three days, I'm going to take a ferry to the Greek island of Samos, which I'm really excited about.

I can't believe I'm almost three weeks into this program. It doesn't feel like three weeks; it alternately feels like three days and three months. I am looking forward to understanding what people are saying again, and sleeping in my own bed, and actually knowing what I'm ordering at restaurants. But I'm enjoying it while it lasts, and am excited to return to Istanbul and buys lots of souvenirs. :)