July 5, 2015
Okay, wow it has been a while since I have been on here. Again, I apologize because it has been so crazy and I have just been so tired. So last week was pretty laid back; I just had to go to class, went to the market and bought some food, and went around the Sisli neighborhood looking at some old Armenian and Jewish quarters within Istanbul. We ate at this Turkish family's house, and they cooked for us. It was absolutely delicious. I had some cooked meat (not sure what it was), rolled up grape leaves, and rice. That was by far the best meal I have had since I have been here. Also, I have just been stressing out about this paper we have to write for our class. It is supposed to be about one of the main topics of modernity within Istanbul. I am not stressed about writing it, but it is supposed to revolve around the interview of a Turkish citizen. I have no idea who to interview at this point since no Turkish students are currently living with me right now. Regardless, I will figure something out.
This last weekend was my favorite part of the trip so far. We travlled to Canakkale, Bozcaada, and Gallipoli (where Ataturk earned his fame). We all had to get up at five in the morning to meet Pinar, our director, at the Ramada hotel to get on the bus. We drove for 6 hours before we reached Gallipoli. I slept most of the way, but when I woke up. I got to see the most beautiful countryside; it was nothing like Europe or any other place I had seen before. We drove along the coast until we reached the beginning of the Aegean Sea. The famous site of Gallipoli was a very famous World War I battlefield. It's where the Austrailian (Anzacs), British, French, and Ottomans met. The Allied forces of France and Britain wanted to take Istanbul over to get supplies to the Russians, but the Ottomans stopped them here under the command of Brigadier General Mustafa Kemal (aka Ataturk). It was a very costly battle for all sides and about half a million soldiers died on that battlefield. There are beautiful monuments to all the soldiers that fought and died there including the Allied forces. I thought it was very honorable of the Republic of Turkey to respect the fallen heroes of other nations. Now this whole area of Gallipoli is so beautiful. I wish those soldiers that died could see how much beauty there is now. We saw Ataturk's monument and headquarters; it was very nationalistic and I could obviously tell that without this Ottoman bey (general) the story of World War I would have been very different.
Next we took a couple ferrys over to the island of Bozcaada. This island is incredible in itself; also known as 'Tenedos' to the Greeks, it is a place of wine and beaches. There is only one section of the island that is inhabited, and a castle overlooks this community. I was very much at peace when I arrived because it was so quiet, with only at most 1,000 people living there. The view from my hostel was of the castle, the sea, and the community. I gave my colleagues a hard time about the view I had comapared to their street view. This island is populated with Greeks and Turks. Both now live in harmony with each other because they are so tired of the hatred that was occurring during the Cypriot War of the 1970s. This island was practically owned by everyone at one point: the Romans, the Byzantines, pirates (yes, pirates), the Genoese, the Greeks, the Ottomans, and now the Turks. It was beautiful to see the Greek Orthodox church and the mosque that was built there in the 1500's. So on Friday we went to the beach, and I got sunburnt from head to toe. Even though I was sunburnt it was completely worth it. I just missed the feeling of sand between my toes and an ocean current hitting me as I am in the water. Later that night we went wine tasting at a local bar. We went with our director Pinar and she encouraged us to have a 'good time'. We all tried two different rose wines, red wines, and white wines. We ended up geting a bottle of the white wine. We not only finished the whole bottle of white wine, but we also finished a whole bottle of rose wine. I really can't tell you what happened much after that, but I had a very good time.
The next morning was a little hazy for me, but after some toast with honey on it I was set. We unfortuantely had to say goodbye to the island, but not without us having some tea and gift shopping first. We crossed the sea once again but this time to get Helena back (ha, jokes). Anyways we drove the rest of the way to the city of Troy. It is definitely not as big as the movie makes it to be, but it was a very large city for that period in time. The walls of the city (or the base of them) are still intact. We saw where the famous temple site was, and the different periods of the city. By that I mean that the city had different generations (it got burned down quite a bit). At one point Alexander the Great rebuilt the city, and the city lasted until 500 AD. So we stayed there and took some pictures by 'the Trojan Horse', but we were ready to go back to the dorms. We were in the car for eight hours that day. Now I am back and about to start my homework so I will talk to all of you again soon!
