The Black Sea

I skipped class on Friday and headed for the coast with some friends. Kind of an odd group: 3 Americans and 2 Belgians. We had a great time tho. Caught the bus on time and got into Safranbolu right around dinnertime. Safranbolu is about 90 km from the Black Sea, roughly 6 hours away from Istanbul. It's a big spot for domestic tourism because it's sort of off the beaten path and has some great examples of Ottoman architecture. We stayed in an old Ottoman home converted into a pension. Had a good home-cooked meal for dinner. Soup and veggies and some excellent köfte. I didn't realize how long it had been since I had a home-cooked meal.

Checking into the place was an interesting experience. I haven't gotten much flack for my last name so far, so this was the first time. He saw my name and said "but what does it mean?" and I know that way back when it probably has something to do with a crusader, so I told him "I don't know." He asked again and I simply told him it had nothing to do with the country and that my family's Irish. He stopped asking so I guess that worked.

After dinner we bundled up and wandered around town. It was incredibly quiet and deserted for a Friday night. We were joking that it's the polar opposite of what would be going on if we were in Istanbul. Istiklal Caddesi was probably a sea of people as it always is. But we wandered down the empty streets looking for a place to have çay or nargile or a beer. We ended up finding what looked like the only bar in Old Safranbolu. As such, they had a monopoly on prices and we ended up paying more for tiny beers than we did for our whole dinner. The music was interesting, but loud. It was relatively late so we wandered back to the pension.

In the morning we had a Turkish breakfast. Mind you, breakfast menus do not exist here. The menu just says kahvaltı (breakfast) which usually involves a hard boiled egg, olives, cucumbers, tomatoes, bread, honey, sheep or goat cheese, çay (Turkish tea) and a slice of sausage (probably beef or lamb). We wandered around town and saw a few of the Ottoman houses. We bought some produce and trinkets in the market and then climbed up one of the hills to get a view of the town. It was really a relaxing pace.

Around 13:00 we decided to head to Amasra, which is located right on the Black Sea. Joshua really wanted to hitchhike, but that's difficult with 5 people. Marine and I took the bus and the others hitched. They ended up catching a ride from an Ankara lawyer and his wife who were headed straight to Amasra. Needless to say, they got there before we did. They wandered around the streets looking for a cheap place to stay. As they wandered down a street full of trinket shops, a woman stuck her head out of a window and the conversation went something like this:

"Otel?" (Hotel)

"Evet. Ne kadar?" (Yeah, how much?)

"On beş lira" (15 Lira)

"On beş! Tamam!" (15 Lira! Ok!)

So it wasn't really a hotel. It was really just another floor in the building with 3 twin beds and a queen in a big room with a strange open-flame propane powered space heater. The walls were mildewy and the beds were lumpy, but it was half the price of every other place in town. A lot of the hotels weren't even open because it's not really tourist season. It's too cold still to go swimming, so they don't open until April. It was nice tho. We had a çay and watched the sunset. These kids were playing soccer right by the bay for a while and then started this game where two would link shoulders like in a rugby scrum, then the others would do leap frog and land on their backs. The two kids would end up supporting about 4 or 5 guys on their backs before the whole thing collapsed. Went out to dinner, wandered around for a while looking for the same things as on Friday night. In the end we decided to pick up some wine and sit around our open-flame space heater.

Amasra itself is smaller than UT's campus, but it has two bays. One faces east, the other faces west. We had planned to watch the sunrise from the big bay facing east, but we overslept. In the morning we found a little çay bahçesi (tea garden) to have breakfast at. We sat outside and enjoyed the sunlight. It was warm and there was a nice breeze coming off of the sea. We didn't even realize how long we had been sitting there (my watch died so I have an excuse). After breakfast, we casually wandered into town, found the bus company, bought our tickets back to Istanbul and then wandered out to stare at the water for about two hours. On the side of the big bay there's a huge pier that juts out in to the water. On the other side of this, there are some rocks that get covered up at high tide. We wandered out onto the rocks, Esma and Brent explored the cave (totally reminiscent of HP6), and we just sat there chilling for a while. It was truly beautiful. I got a lot of thinking done. I had never really believed everyone who said the sea takes a lot off your mind, but it really does.

(Photo courtesy of Esma)

It was an incredibly relaxing weekend, but I didn't take any homework with me, so now I'm kind of behind. Meh. It's springtime in Istanbul now so I'm really lacking the motivation to go into the library and get work done. It's so much more enjoyable to lay on the lawn in South Campus and nap/read/play backgammon.