Turkey Part II.....

I have just returned to Istanbul after a journey across southeastern Turkey, along with a ferry ride to the Greek island of Rhodes where I spent 3 enjoyable days exploring and learning.

One of the things I've taken to heart on this trip is that you can't do everything -- even if you have seven months to travel. And, to my parents' credit, one of their last suggestions (of many) as I was leaving Florida in January, was that I should pace myself. That was very good advice -- especially since I've been wanting to visit Turkey for so long and it is such a VAST country. I have resisted temptation to see it all.

Keeping their advice in mind, but also remaining focused on my quest to visit 100 "countries" (which also includes many non-country territories in the definition), I decided to explore the Southeast coast and environs. The added benefit of this route is the proximity of the Dodecanese Islands (specifically the island of Rhodes) which is about 1 hour off the coast of Turkey. It is much closer to Turkey than Greece but more on that later.

As you all know, the entire Turkish region is rich in history and the ancient city of Ephesus is a great example where a number of civilizations were built, seemingly right upon each other. So one can begin to get their history straight (at least for a few minutes) and get a feel for how fully functioning societies (right up to the public library and the nearby brothel) operated in centuries gone by. The guide told a cute story about how the men used to tell their wives that they were going to the library but instead used a tunnel underneath to cross over to the rather sizeable brothel directly across the street. I'd guess that the story is probably true. It makes sense, doesn't it? For a more official version of the history around Ephesus written by someone (hopefully) who can get all of their facts properly associated with the correct periods (Byzantine, Greek, Roman, Ottoman) please see the great authoritative source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ephesus

The other site I visited in the region was Bergama, a center for medicine and wellness in its day. On that day I was touring with two Cuban American physicians and they said that this site had been included in their studies as a significant place in the history of medicine. As the tour went on, I came to appreciate that when Bergama was at its height, the definition of medicine was quite different than today. It was really a forerunner to modern medicine but the symbols remain such as the famous snake we see on pharmacies, medical centers, texts etc. That said, though the guide was generally quite knowledgeable, he was certain that brain surgery among other treatments for the head (which he called psychology) had been conducted there in the 3rd and 2nd Century AD. I'll leave it to you to draw your own conclusions. I can't even think about it.

http://www.turkeytravelplanner.com/galeri/aegean/photopages/002.html

So you now have as much fill as I did about the ancient civilizations that were present here in Turkey. For my next posting, I will wrap up Turkey and share some of my experiences about the people and the culture of Turkey.