Izmir and Ephesus:
Like most lone wanderers I drifted along the road from Istanbul and found myself absorbed in deep torpor after checking in, late that evening, only to wake up in morning to brute abruptness of a street which looked forlorn few hours back. I was in Izmir- Turkey's second largest city and first party stop.
There is a miraculous romance attached to curiosity and unseen adventure. I took out my traveling Bible, Lonely Planet's tour guide- a guide book started by two Beatniks in 1972. The accuracy of this guide book is startling, so you can basically trust it to the hilt. Rounding up myself around Konak Meydani- a late Ottoman clock built in 1901, from where I took a ferry to the heart of Izmir: Alsancak. It is difficult to imagine life in Izmir without its iconic boulevard: Kordon and inland the Alsancak district. However, it was still morning, and I'd a long day ahead. Muzzling with many ideas and derivations, I decided to take a trip to Ephesus- which earlier in the privacy of my Hotel, I had thought I would do the next day. The roads tend to do this to me. Inviting its nomad. And yes, the beauty of unplanned travel lies in such moments: spontaneity.
I took a shared cab to Selcuk- a small like-able town decked up on beautiful Aegean coast. Ephesus is further 4 kilometers away, wedged in between 2 mountain ridges. At the end of the road a white whiskered man in a checkered beret and faded black suit hailed us- the visitors who were on the entrance of the Ephesus collecting their passes: 'Tour of Ephesus! Informative guide to the ruins.' A few yards beyond him a young boy ran up to us, in hard breaths, 'I give you better tour. Cheaper too.'
At first glance Ephesus seemed the quintessential ruin: broken bits of statues, stubby pillars, cracking archways and isolated walls. Nothing moved but the sunlight, glinting off the ancient fragments. Perhaps more than anywhere in world, the Greco-Roman world comes alive at Ephesus. More than 150 years of excavation, have made Ephesus the most complete classical metropolis in Europe- and that's with 82% of the city still to be unearthed.
The city has interesting history. According to a legend, in 10th century BC an forced incursion led Androcolus, the prince of Athens to seek safer refuge. After consulting his Delphic God, and crossing the Aegean, Androculus rested on the Anatolian shore and cooked a freshly caught fish. The fish was so fresh that it jumped off the pan and the toppled coals set off nearby forest ablaze, smoking out a wild boar that the prince killed; on that very spot he resolved to build Ephesus. The prophecy of his Delphic God came true. In following centuries Ephesus accumulated wealth from maritime trade and pilgrims to the Temple of Artemis- whose ruins can be seen in Selcuk town.
After protracted negotiations, I hired a guide. As I walked into the ruins, following the wide central avenue, which housed Varius Baths- as in other ancient cities situated in the main entrance so that visitors could wash before entering. Further on, two of Doric columns mark the entrance to the ruined town hall and city treasury. A side street called as Sacred Street led to the Ephesus hospital, where a snake symbol etched into the stone meant the healing powers in the venom of a snake- a belief held by Greeks and Romans. Perhaps, one of those few things that these two empires of different epoch shared. The spiral symbol to this day is used in medicine.
As I passed columns carved with line after line of intricate symbols, of cisterns for storing water, I explored the Terraced Houses- which give a clear indication as to what everyday life would have been like in this great city. While I kept walking, glorious Ephesus sun brimming from blue skies casted the halls and pavements of marketplaces, ruins of leftover shops- where splendid ornaments of gold and silver were sold to the pretty Greek and Roman women. The stony walkway echoed of drum beats and temple bells. The ruins seemed to take on a strange life of their own. I walked up to the Great Theater of Ephesus, which in its prom had the capacity of 25,000 seats. Here the gladiator games and theater plays were held with grandeur and swank. Courtesans enthralled the emperors, the commoners applauded in awe.
The whole experience of walking down this city was very overwhelming. I whisked off my guide and sat on a stone palate, in eerie silence. Sun was still shining bright, the Anatolian skies were emerald blue, not a speck of cloud hovered. A mild south westerly wind passed, leading to cracking noise of the Juniper trees, the rustling leaves and lean Poplars. I breathed its air, conscious of the air that was going in my lungs. This wasn't one of those thankless respiratory actions- there seemed to be a purpose behind all this. Everything remarkably looked as part of some timelessness, a sense of communion with other people of other eras. My feet crossed stones that other sandals had crossed, my hands touched columns that were touched by other hands. The toga wearing men, with one bare shoulder seemed to be talking in everyday conversation: of harvest, of Troy and the impeding conquer by Alexander The Great.
It was afternoon by the time my cabbie dropped me back at Selcuk, where, after visiting the Artemis temple, I treated myself to coffee in one of Selcuk's many pretty open cafes. The large Maple trees embellish Selcuk's main street. The setting was pleasant and peaceful- leaning into the afternoons as Pablo Neruda calls them. Do not look for me- I closed my eyes.
Back In Izmir, the ritzy and arty crowd was starting to fill Alsancak's alleys, on which sun had already set. In these alleys dwell some of the most amazing cafes and bars: Dark gothic walls, scabrous furniture, and guitar strums. From one corner Bob Marley's large poster clangs, while a very young Jim Morrison in black and white, shows a finger to Seattle police. There is Tolstoy's Anna Karenina being discussed at one table, amidst scattered cigarette butts and Efes bottles- young literature students I could guess, with large wavy hair, ear-rings; some sported thick beard, a large goatee and a tight pony tail. You could easily mix up them with some hard metal band- ride the lightening, from whom the bell tolls, some say they talk through the satan. There was an Ozzy Ossbourne like song writer, scribbling something. I went up to him. He spoke in broken English. Large green eyes, his legs slender, brown, shinned under bermuda shorts, his white converse shoes looked very big. His name was Guven- half Kurd, half German. We opened up rather fast, perhaps it was the ambience. Guven was fighting a struggle with in. The Kurds are an unaccepted lot and it nearly sparked a civil war in early 90s. The situation has simmered down now he told me, but a forever struggle for identity lays loose in this tribe, sadly. He told me he writes for a local journal- does odd jobs at times to keep the cash coming, and fosters a hope for independent Kurdistan.
Back in my hotel, the hum of air-conditoners masked the street noises. I'm not sure if I understood Guven's struggle, I'm not sure if I understand my own struggle: when night approaches through the heights, the hermit poet looks through the window- there is an uncertainty in the skies too.
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