The Two Sides of Side

Think of a great little town that has a stunning tourist attraction. Here, it’s a very old Greek, then Roman, then Hittite, then Byzantine, then Ottoman city that is maybe the size of four suburban US high school campuses—football field, soccer field, baseball field, parking lot, and buildings. So about 40 acres or more.

Then think of the town, maybe the size of Hillsboro, or North Bend, turning itself into one huge tourist carnival midway: T-shirt shops (who the hell is Ed Hardy anyway? There are thousands of T-shirts all over Turkey, actually, but it seems especially here, with his name, Christina Aguilera’s name, what looks like a song title, and some glitter), sun-glass shops, (I’ve never seen so many ways to spell “jeweler”), cafes, rug shops, evil-eye glass pendant shops, keychain and necklace shops, restaurants, hotels, all with touts out front saying “Hello to you, my friend” in various (guessed at) assorted languages.

That’s what the town here did: it turned itself into the schlock capital of the south coast of Turkey.

Gack!





But I found a place to stay--- and here’s the view from the little balcony—6 by 12 feet or so— and I can’t see any of the shops from here.



On one side of the road of Side, schlock (in Turkish, German, English--- including a clothing shop sub-titled “Leder-Schmuck.”)

and on the other side of Side, this magnificent old city, which was virtually empty when I hit it about 5:30 this AM.



















Mosaic Floors

There were also some mosaic floors--- just there where you could walk on them (or steal some of the little pieces). No, I did not.



Usually in these places the mosaic floors are covered with several inches of sand or very fine gravel that sits on top of some kind of protective fabric, and there’s a fenced off cleared section where you can see (but not get to) the actual floor.

Not the case here.

I had the sense they’d better start protecting the little mosaic pieces while they still have them, or they’ll have to buy them back from the souvenir shops in town.

I also had this little picture of the people who lived in the houses with the mosaics having a conversation that went something like this:

(Notice especially I’m not assigning gender to the individual spouse.)

Spouse 1:

Honey, I think the new mosaic looks great, and I really appreciate all the hard work you put into it, but, you know, it doesn’t really match the drapes or the furniture and they’re having a sale at . . . . “

One of the reasons I like to travel is to see how people are the same and how they are different.

Workshop Hours

When you go to a photography workshop, you are shooting early in the AM and late in the PM (shots are generally better when your shadow is longer than you are--- the color of the light and the angle of the light making a huge difference) and you are in class or taking a nap in the middle of the day when the light is whiter and harsher and from pretty directly overhead.

When I was in the Balkans with Susan, my biggest disappointment was that we weren’t able to have “workshop hours” on the trip. I wanted to get out earlier and stay out later and hunker down in the middle of the day, but it didn’t work.

And Kim and I had discussed this a lot before we left and even during our trip together, but it didn’t work out.

I even set my little digital on-the-road watch alarm to let me know when it was 6:00 and when it was 6:10 but I rarely heard it at all--- Kim, however, who’s a classical musician (Julliard and several local symphony orchestras) heard it much more often than I did. But we usually weren’t where there were pictures right nearby, if you know what I mean.

And as soon as she left, although she clearly wasn’t the impediment to this, I thought Aha! Workshop hours!

Feh!

Betrayed by my body.

I wouldn’t hear the alarm (I never heard the turn signals in the car if they didn’t snap back to neutral, but Kim, with her music-trained hearing, always could) or the weather was overcast before it cleared up around 8 or so, or I was exhausted, or the reports back took an extra block of time and then it was getting too dark. . . . .

But I was in the old city this AM at 5:30, I even heard the two watch alarms, and I was the only one out there until about 8:00 when some others started wandering into my shots. It was great.

The best attractions were fenced off, and you need to pay to get into them--- that’s another problem, the biggest one, actually, with workshop hours: almost every place over here the state has control over--- all the great tourist places (like Perge, Aspendos, and Side just to list the ones in the last 24 hours) don’t open until 8:30 and close at 5:30 and if you can’t get in until then. . . .

Camels

I hit all the open areas for a couple of hours, and at the end, on the way back, I discovered some camels! Four of them, having breakfast.

I’d seen camels as motifs on lots of rugs and things you could use for table runners, and I was pretty dismissive of them because in the last month I’d only seen one camel, but here were four of them, and I got to within about 30 feet (up on a wall, though, so I was marginally safer from ferocious camel attacks--- although at my age, I could have been in more danger from falling off walls than from camels) and fired away.





And on the way back, I saw this public building, very graceful, although the sign said that the center of the three portico/ledges were used for crucifictions.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.




A couple of hours further east, I stopped in Alanya, and toured the castle, which was up so high and so inaccessible above the town,





that I kept wondering why any would-be conqueror wouldn’t just bypass it and let ‘em eat cake up there. . . .


I’m now in Anamur, about 90 Km east of Alanya, which is about 60 Km east of Side, so about 150 Km today, as the crow flies, but if the crow had to follow mountain roads behind (or dodging on-coming) trucks over about seven or eight up 1500 meters (vertical altitude) into the hills then back down to the coast for a little town and then back up again, that crow would be as tired as I am. A good upper arm and jaw-muscle workout today.

Here’s a view down from the top to one of the little towns on the shoreline.



Anamur, as so many other towns here in south-western (and now southern, as I move east) is surrounded by acres and acres of greenhouses--- many of glass, many of visqueen.




The low ones are for row crops, mainly strawberries lately, while the big ones further west were for tomatoes and beans, these in Anamur all contain palm trees--- but since the leaves are like big philodendron leaves, rather than the more traditional feathery leaves we are used to, I don’t know what they are for. I looked up date palms on Wikipedia, but those leaves are all jagged and feathery looking in the pictures there.


I’ll try for another early AM tomorrow--- in an old Roman city just west of here a few clicks called Anamuriam---

Then it’s still east on the coast 100 km (straight line again) until I turn north and head inland.