The last time I was in Istanbul was in 2015. I had planned to stay for five weeks but instead spent most of that time at Oktoberfest and exploring Troy, Pergamum and Ephesus. Sorry I did you wrong in the past Istanbul, let me make it up Oktoberfest and exploring Troy, Pergamum and Ephesus. Sorry I did you wrong in the past Istanbul, let me make it up to you this time around; well as much as I can in two and a half days.
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Pammukale or the “cotton castle” is a geological mineral formation upon which the ancient city of Hierapolis was built. Today it’s a popular tourist destination also owing to “Cleopatra’s pool” a popular desert oasis and swimming hole.
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Ephesus is one of the largest and most important classical Greek and Roman archaeological sites from antiquity. A port city of strategic advantage, it changed hands over the 700 years it was inhabited. Because of its size and importance it is a popular tourist destination; while there are a lot of excavated ruins, I found the reconstructions less interesting and harder to visualize than those at Pergamon.
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My undergraduate degree is in ancient history and Latin translation. That’s nothing like what I do professionally, nevertheless classical antiquity has always fascinated me. None more than the mythology and oral tradition of the Illiad – the war of the Greeks and Trojans over three thousand years ago. As such I had to visit Troy, the city bombarded by those filthy Greeks for 9 years. These days the ruins of the almost dozen layers of Troy (each representing a different city and cultural tradition) serve as a photo-taking destination (complete with a hokey, giant, wooden horse) and archaeological-history lesson. I wasn’t expecting to see or learn very much and I was not disappointed. The low-light coming from a souvenir shop incorrectly identifying a statue of Laocoön and his sons being killed my minions of Athena as Herakles fighting serpents; misinformation is a pet peeve of mine. Nevertheless I’m glad I made the pilgrimage to the city I’ve dreamed about and imagined for almost 20 years – it adds a remarkable context to fuel my imagination further.
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Pergamon is my favorite ancient classical destination in Turkey. Perched atop a mountain to aid fortifications, the acropolis covered just a small area of land affording a dense archaeological record and a small, tightly reconstructed area to explore today. Though the Germans looted many relics from the site (and now showcase them in Berlin’s Pergamonmuseum — which I visited the week after I visited Pergamon), the site still seems in terrific shape compared to Troy or Ephesus. I was giddy to know that in Roman times one of my favorite emperor’s, Marcus Aurelius, visited the famous hospital of Pergamon, at the sanctuary of Aesclepius to recover from an illness. Also historically significant was a library found here which Mark Antony gave to Cleopatra as a wedding gift. It was easy to imagine life in ancient Pergamon among such historical contexts.
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I spend about half of September in Istanbul and the rest exploring remote regions of Turkey (with a couple excursions to Germany as well). I have never experienced a city like this before — 14 million people, terrible traffic, poor infrastructure and water that the locals refuse to drink. I had a blast. I came to admire and enjoy these charms as well as so many more – Turkish delights, nargile (aka “hookah” or shisha — smoked water vapor in a variety of fruit flavors), tea in place of alcohol in many social circumstances, the friendly, curious locals, the endless corners and neighborhoods to explore in this sprawling, cluttered, chaotic city. Istanbul is marketed to its tourists as a dichotomy of eastern and western influences – the only city spanning two continents, it is split by the Bosporus into a European side and an Asian side. I never made it to the Asian side — and I didn’t come close to seeing half of everything the European side has to offer — Istanbul is that large. But it doesn’t really seem large as much as busy. In most contexts your view beyond the neighborhood you are in is obstructed by buildings […]
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