Serefe!

Well, I guess it's next time. Since my last post, we have celebrated a birthday, swam at Kent Park, played futbol with some or our new Turkish friends and classmates, and visited some ancient ruins.

I continue to be amazed at the hospitality and generosity of the Turkish people that we have met thus far and cannot stress it enough. A great example of this was last week when we went out for Caroline's birthday. Baris (who is in our hydrology class) and his neighbor made her a cake, Metehan (who is in our transportation class) gave her a book titled "Tears of Love," and Mehmet gave her some candy. Really nice gestures having only known her (and us) for a few days.

The next day after the celebration, the majority of us went to Kent Park where we swam and laid out on the man-made beach. It was not like the beaches in America or any that I have heard of before because one side of the beach was for families or anyone that came with a female and the other side was all men. I thought this was pretty strange especially since Eskisehir is more of a student city with younger inhabitants and a more western culture. Nevertheless, it was still a good time with some beautiful scenery.

Kent Park

Man-made beach and swimming area at Kent Park

We ended up playing round 2 of Turkey vs. America futbol, but this time it was with our classmates. They were really good and I think even had a professional on their team, but we ended up holding our own against them (even though we did lose). I guess round 3 is going to be sometime this week, either tonight or tomorrow night.

Turf field that we played on under the lights at 1a.m. Sunday morning

After tiring ourselves out playing soccer, we managed to get about 5 hours of sleep before we boarded a bus headed for Seyitgazi Tomb and Mosque, Gerdekkaya Tomb, and Yazilikaya. All of these places were on top of hills or mountains with breathtaking views of the surrounding area (and the places themselves weren't bad either). They also were all thousands of years old many dating back to the BC era. Our first stop was at the Seyitgazi Tomb and Mosque where there were many tombs, some of important Islamic heroes. Adjacent to the mosque was a cathedral built during the Byzantine empire along with various buildings for education and housing.

Part of the mosque

The large tomb is an Islamic hero and the smaller one to the right is his wife.

Next we went to Gerdekkaya Tomb, where people had removed everything from the tombs in search of gold. We ended up just climbing all over. 

Climbing up to where the tombs are located.

View from on top of the above picture.

Our last stop was to Yazilikaya, an ancient ruin with a lot of religious and historical history. Here we walked for probably 2-3 hours looking at all of the ancient carvings, sacrificial alters, giant cisterns, and everything in between. From the top of Yazilikaya, you could see for hundreds of miles in each direction.

We climbed all over this (I think it used to be a dwelling of some sort).

View from the top

In the winter the holes in the side  of this cliff would fill with ice, then melt in the spring, and poviding the people with water.

I think that pretty much sums up everything since my last post. Our next trip is this Friday to Istanbul so I will be sure to keep everyone 'posted' on how that goes. Also, I tried to make the pictures bigger but please comment if it's still hard to see them.

Bir Post

I've been thinking about creating a blog documenting my travels to Turkey for awhile and have finally gotten the time to do so. I have only been in Turkey for 5 days but it feels like weeks (probably because it took almost 48 hours of traveling to get here). The 48 hours started at the East Lansing train station where I met some of my classmates as well as our coordinator Maggie. Having never been on a train before the ride was really enjoyable and after 4 hours we were at Union Station in Chicago (a little over 10 hours before our flight). In order to pass the time, we walked around Chicago with our luggage on one of the hottest days of the summer finally stopping to eat some pizza at Giordano's. Little did we know this was going to be our last meal in America for 7 weeks. Taking the "L" to O'hare international airport, where we met more of our group, we went through security and boarded our plane headed for Istanbul. 

We arrived in Istanbul at 5pm, paid the visa fee (which had to either be in USD or Euro, they wouldn't accept Turkish Lira, their national currency) and met our university guide, Mehmet. He took us on an overly crowded train to the bus station where unknown to us we would be waiting for more than 6 hours for a bus to Eskisehir at 1a.m. After a 5 hour bus ride, we finally got to our apartments where everyone instantly fell asleep.

Apartment Complex

Kitchen

That same afternoon Mehmet took us on a tour of Eskisehir. It is a beautiful city with a population of over 600,000. We went to a bar that evening to have a few drinks and to meet Ezel, another Anadolu University contact, and her boyfriend Mohammad. On Sunday, Mehmet took us on a tour of the 'old' Eskisehir. Needless to say, this was very beautiful as well. We visited a mosque over 500 years old and drank delicious tea from two women who were dressed like gypsies. We also met our apartment neighbor, Justin, who is from Texas A&M working towards his PhD in chemical engineering at Anadolu for the summer. Monday we took a tour of Anadolu University, both the main campus and the engineering campus. We also got our schedules and registered for classes. There was a lot of chaos during this process but everything has seemed to work itself out so I won't elaborate any further. Later that night, we all went to a nearby park and played futbol with some of the local kids which ended up being a lot of fun. Everyone seems to like us, (probably because we are Americans), but I do wonder what people think when they see the 15 of us walking down the sidewalk...

Porsuk River through Eskisehir

'Old' Eskisehir Buildings

500+ year old mosque

I have class on Tuesday 9-12, Wednesday 9-2, Thursday 12-6, and Friday 4-6. So far the classes haven't been too bad, but it has only been 3 days. My transportation engineering class will be very interesting because the professor hardly speaks any English. If it wasn't for his English lecture slides we probably wouldn't understand anything. Ironically enough, we ate lunch with some of our Turkish classmates who said that they have a hard time understanding his Turkish because he speaks and old form of it. Today, the professor even had one of the Turkish students translate a few things for us which was pretty funny. My hydrology class is completely different. The whole class is taught in English and the professor speaks it very well. I cannot believe how friendly the people are here. The classmates that we ate lunch with also helped us get our books and get on the bus. They have also come to the bars with us and we have a futbol game scheduled against them Sunday morning at 1 a.m.

Main campus entrance

Main campus buildings

Here are some things that I want to share about Turkey/Turkish people/Eskisehir that I have observed from being here the past few days:
1) Turkish people are extremely friendly and will go out of their way to help you. It is their culture to be very accommodating and make everyone feel at home (which they have done a great job of)
2) Even though many people here do not speak English they will try their best to communicate with you.
3) Saying even a few words such as hello (merhaba) or thank you (tesekkuler) in Turkish pleases people because it shows that you are making an effort no matter how small it is.
4) There are a lot of stray dogs and cats on the street.
5) Not as many people speak English as I had assumed.
6) The weather is unbeatable. Hardly any clouds, dry heat during the days, and cool nights.
7) The traffic is chaotic. I am surprised that I haven't seen one car accident since being here because people drive crazy. There are no lane lines and cars do not stop...especially for pedestrians.
8) The food is delicious! Eating is a huge part of Turkish culture and they definitely do it right.

Anyway, free time has been a rarity since arriving in Turkey, but I am glad to at least get one post in. I am sure there is stuff that I am forgetting, so please comment and ask questions or maybe I'll remember and mention them in my next post. This Sunday we will be taking a day trip to Yazılıkaya, Turkey so hopefully that will be fun. Until next time.