Dean Christakos« Socializing in Sultanahmet | Main | Stuff You Can't Make Up »
April 15, 2006
Overcoming Inertia
I could have easily stayed in Istanbul for the remainder of my vacation. It was inexpensive, I met a bunch of people whom I enjoyed hanging out wıth, and I was feeling pretty satisfied with where I was. Keep in mind that I came here having started in Amsterdam, and after hopping from city to city, I enjoyed staying in one place for a little while.
However, I decided to motivate myself to move on, so I took and overnight bus to Kaş in southern Turkey, putting me within spitting distance of the Greek islands of Rhodes and Kastellorizo. Counter-intuitively, the 14 hour bus ride re-invigorated me. I feel energized to keep moving and see more of Turkey and Greece before I head home next Saturday.
Following up on previous travels in Italy, I decided to visit St. Nicholas's original home of Myra (now Demre). No pictures yet, but hopefully I will get a chance to post them as I work my way up the Turkish coast.
Posted by Dean at April 15, 2006 1:23 PM
Comments
Hey, I saw news about an explosion in Istanbul and immediately checked your blog - glad to see that you weren't in that area. Thank you for posting so frequently!
Posted by: Kitty at April 17, 2006 9:40 AM
The explosion was in Bakrıköy, which is a southwestern suburb of Istanbul. I have no idea why they bombed there... it would be like launching a terrorist attack against New York City by bombing Staten Island, but it seems to have been targetted at the police. The bomb also seems to have been placed in a trash can, of which there are very, very few in downtown Istanbul to prevent just such an attack.
Funny story about Bakrıköy, though... in San Diego, there is a special election for the House of Representatives to replace Rep. Duke Cuningham, who confessed to accepting bribes. In this multi-candidate election, one went on a fact-finding mission to Iraq and the Middle East and published a picture on his campaign website from his trip showing a purported picture of downtown Baghdad where the people were happy, couples walked hand-in-hand wearing western clothes and tank-tops, and all was well, contrary to medıa reports of Baghdad actually being dangerous. The lack of Arabic street signs seemed to tip people off that this picture was a bit suspicious, and the picture turned out to have been taken in Bakrıköy.
I believe that the candidate later said that the publication of the picture was a mistake by the campaign's webmaster and that he was not allowewd by the military to take pictures of downtown Baghdad because it created a security risk.
The moral of the story now seems to be that when Bakrıköy is your idea of a "safe neighborhood," you're really in trouble.
Posted by: Dean at April 18, 2006 3:19 AM