Before breakfast and then pressing on to Selçuk, there were a couple of things I wanted to experience in Izmir. The first was to ride the metro. Here I'm just outside a station; you can see the signs.
And this is a shot inside the station. Security was quite prominent. I wondered if they expected trouble.
When I bought a ticket from a machine, a Turkish man was kind enough to help me, using signs and improvised language.
This is the clock tower of European design.
The other sight in Konak Square was the mosque with its beautiful blue tiles. I was tempted to take a look at the markets but decided against it. I was a bit tired of cities at that moment.
The hotel seemed to mostly cater for commercial travellers to judge from the people in the dining room. Again, time was wasted being shuttled to the otogar at the edge of the city. I made it to the bus with 10 minutes to spare. This trip seemed more expensive. Perhaps the highway toll had something to do with it.
At Selçuk I got less hassle from the touts than I expected. I searched for the Pansion Yayla in the rain. A cyclist helped me locate it in a home where an old lady sat me down in the living room and offered me some cold watermelon. Eventually the daughter came back and explained that the Pansion had been closed for a few years now, the guide was out of date, but she would drive me to some friends of hers who ran a hotel. And being a seller of carpets now, she tried to interest me. Of course.
The hotel turned out to be the Nazar which was in the guide also and very neat. I got a small room with bath for 8 million Turkish Lira. Turkey was the first country where I could feel like a millionaire due to their hyperinflated currency. At that time the exchange rate was about a million TL for 4 AUD. (In 2005, Turkey issued a new Lira, dropping 6 zeros.) Unfortunately the room had neither air-con nor fan, so I had to close all the windows in the daytime to keep the hot air out.
For lunch I found a lokanta (restaurant) that served a decent beef stew with bread. I picked up ½ kg of cherries on the way back. I siestaed the afternoon away, then showered and walked to the ruins of the Basilica of St. John. Storks were nesting on top of the walls. A man there tried to sell me "antique coins". I declined. They were either fake, or I was risking jail exporting antiquities without a permit on departure. And anyway I have no desires to be a collector. A little girl there tried her English begging line on me: Hello money, hello candy.
After an undistinguished dinner at the Ephesus Restaurant, I bought a bag of apricots from a shop. On the way back from checking the timetables at the bus station, a shopkeeper struck up a conversation with me. It turned out that he had lived in Australia and stayed in his brother's place in Seaforth. He had come back to Turkey to open a business. Oh and did I want to buy a carpet?
It was a warm and still evening, there were no breezes like in Istanbul. Noisy motorcycles and the occasional car with a loud stereo went past. I cooled off on the hotel terrace where there was a distant view of the fortress. Moments of ease and repose such as that breezy evening on the terrace of the Empress Zoe Hotel were rare and to be savoured. How to just be and not always act, that was the question. And also how to travel, and indeed live, with less encumbrances.
In the morning there was news on the TV about an earthquake (deprem) the night before. It was a Richter scale 6 quake that had struck a little north of Ankara. Not much more detail. Later I learnt that it had killed 2 people and damaged 100 buildings. A small one as far as Turkish quakes go.
Breakfast in this hotel was even more elaborate than in Istanbul. They had börek, simit sticks, fresh cherries and apricots, halva, more types of cheese, and even some pâte. Also cherry (kiraz) and orange (portakal) juices.
I packed up and took a walk around the town. The markets were waking up. In a confectionery shop I bought some candied chestnuts. Luckily I only bought 250g because it wasn't to my taste. Incidentally the şeker in the shop sign is from the same Arabic root that gave us sugar.
It was a humid day and sweat was pouring out of every one of my pores. Perhaps it was the lack of cooling breezes like in Istanbul. I gave up sightseeing, checked out and waited where the tourist office said the bus to the otogar would be. It took 20 minutes to get there, meandering through the city. As I suspected it only passed the terminal and didn't actually enter so I had to walk some 200m across the road to the building. The huge signs over the ticket counters showed that there were heaps of bus companies represented. I didn't see the recommended one, so I went for the biggest and most professional looking one, Uludağ. I had some time to grab a lahmacun and a soft drink for lunch. The bus station was large; it even had a bakery in it.
The bus left on the dot and we wound our way out of the industrial suburbs of Bursa. One of the civilised rituals of bus travel in Turkey is that the conductor will come around to pour a splash of cologne water in your palm for you to freshen your face. Then he will give you packaged tea or bottled water. Unfortunately the smokers were out in force again. Even the bus driver lit up as we left the station.
We travelled through low mountain ranges. I had decided to give the ancient sites in Bergama (Pergamon) a miss and instead visit the ruins at Efes (Ephesus). These biblical names remind one that the land is ancient.
Many buildings on the outskirts of Izmir (in the past, Smyrna) were incomplete, with the reinforcement rods sticking out of the concrete. Build by installment I guessed. I wondered if I should go for a pension but decided to seek out an air conditioned hotel room. The first choice from the guide was full, they could only offer me a hot attic room which was simply no-go. I went to the second choice, but later realised that I walked into the wrong hotel. It was also in the guide so it wasn't too bad a mistake. The room was a bit dingy but had air conditioning.
For dinner I found a street full of pavement tables and accepted the blandishments of an enterprising restaurant owner who talked me into having a chicken kebap with patlıcan (eggplant). It was very tasty. By the time I finished it was too late to go up to Kadifekale castle to get an overview of the city, although I made an attempt to find the bus service.
So I walked to the docks and enjoyed the cool breeze at the water's edge. Scores of shoeshine boys hounded me, but I refused them. I was wearing beaten up sneakers anyway. A beggar woman tailed me for some time. At first I ignored her, but her pitiful entreaties changed my mind and I gave her some small change. I wondered how long it would last her.
Izmir is the third largest city in Turkey and a major port. It also wanted to be cool and attract travellers. Signs said that a festival would start in a day or two, but I hoped to be out of there by then and avoid the crowds. I noticed that Izmir was large enough to have a metro and I decided to give it a try the next morning. It only ran during peak hours, 0700-0900 and 1700-2000. There were train services out of Izmir but the times didn't look at all suitable.
Back in the room, I turned on the air conditioner and watched a Michael Douglas movie dubbed in Turkish. I fell asleep watching and showered the next morning instead of before bed, as is my habit.
