Turkey

During November 23-30, 2007, P.Ou and I went to Turkey. The tour was arranged by Turkish Airlines to visit famous places of Turkey.
We departed Bangkok almost midnight of November 23, and November 24, second day of tour, we landed in Istanbul and took domestic flight to Izmir, then traveled by bus to Selçuk. We visited House of Virgin Mary, Ancient city of Ephesus, and stay at hotel close to the Aegean Sea.
Day 3, we traveled to Pamukkale.
Day4, we tool trip to Konya and to Cappadocia.
Day 5, we traveled around Cappadocia, then to Kayseri to took a flight to Istanbul.
Day 6-7, we traveled around Istanbul area.
Please see more photos in Turkey at http://picasaweb.google.com/arthivon/Turkey2007#

Tuba, local guide and Khun Kai Nui who was Thai guide, chef, photographer, and etc.

House of Virgin Mary, Ephesus

The first place we visited is the House of Virgin Mary. It is said that the Jesus Christ asked St John to take care of his mother, and St John brought her to Ephesus and she spent the last years of her life here in a stone house. This place was discovered in 19th century. A German Nun who never left Germany described about this place and the hill of Ephesus in the book published in Germany, therefore, there were scientific expeditions and found this place as described in the book. The shrine is revered by both Christians and Muslims, and the pilgrims visit the shrine, especially on August 15 every year.

City of Ephesus

Ephesus is one of the greatest ancient cities. A Greece city was first built here in about 1000 BC and became the chief port on the Aegean Sea under the Romans which most of the surviving structures dated from this period.

Behind P.Ou was Roman's bathhouse.

Water pipes.

Public toilets.

Temple of Hadrain - The head of Medusa is the most famous bit of decoration on this fine temple built in 118 AD to honor Emperor Hadrian.

It is told to be the first advertisement of the world for The Prostitute House.

Library of Celsus - A technological wonder, with double walls to keep out the damp and moderate the extremes of temperature, it is also perhaps the most beautiful building at Ephesus, finely restored.

The Great Theater - Built into the slope of Panayir Dagi, this is the Roman reconstruction (41-117 AD) of the earlier theater built by Lysimachus. Though huge, with 25,000 seats, its ingenious engineering gives it excellent acoustics. It's still used for performances and special events.

The temple of Artemis is known as one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world. It is said that the temple was destroyed by fire.

Pamukkale - Hierapolis

Pamukkale means Cotton Fortress, and has been a spa since the Romans built the spa city of Hierapolis around a sacred warm-water spring. The cliff is almost 200 meters high, the spectacular white travertine terrace form when water from the hot springs as they cool they leave thick white layers of limestone and travertine, built up in steps on the plateau. This place is inscribed as UNESCO World Heritage in 1988.

On Pamukkale cliff

Hierapolis

Konya - Mevlana Museum and Caravanserais

At Konya, we visited Mevlana Museum in late afternoon, and the guide had to check whether it opened or not since Prince Charles came to visit on that day. Mevlana Museum holds the tomb of Mevlâna Jelaleddin Rumî, founder of the Mevlevi order of dervishes, commonly called the Whirling Dervishes. The Mevlâna Müzesi is a place of pilgrimage for Muslims because Rumî is a saint. His poetic message of peace, love of God and one's fellow creatures, resounds to a far wider audience today than it did over 700 years ago when Rumî preached and taught in Konya, and whirled in ecstasy through its streets. Muslim and non-Muslim pilgrims come from throughout the world to visit his tomb and his relatives. The museum also exhibits dervish musical instruments, including ney, Mevlana flute made of bamboo, antique prayer carpets, korans, prayer beads, and the mother-of-pearl case holds relics of the Prophet Muhammed.

We visited Caravanserais in the evening; it was built during Ottoman period to protect merchants who traveled the caravan routes that crossed Anatolia along the Roman-Byzantine road system.

Cappadocia

The landscape of Cappadocia was created around 30 million years ago by erupting of volcanoes. The columns have been formed in various shapes, such as cone shape, mushroom shape, and elongated shape. It was marvelous, that we experienced flying a hot-air balloon above the landscape.

Scenes of Cappadocia from Hot-air Balloon.

Underground City, Cappadocia

We visited underground city which, it is said that, served as tempered shelter from the Romans attacked. The whole city was constructed underground. These settlements had living quarters, stable wells, ventilation systems, churches, storage rooms, and kitchens.

Göreme Valley, Cappadocia

The Göreme Valley holds the region's greatest concentration of rock-cut chapels and also best collection of painted cave-chapels. Medieval orthodox Christian monks (1000-1200 AD) carved the caves from the soft volcanic stone and decorated them with elaborate Byzantine frescoes. We visited each chapel but I could not take photos since it was dark inside and we had to use no flash otherwise it would damage the paintings. There were large kitchen and storage room, and we could see a large dining table for 50 monks to dine together.

Göreme National Park and the Rock Sites of Cappadocia is inscribed as UNESCO World Heritage in 1985.

Istanbul

In Istanbul, there are many interesting places to visit, range from palaces, mosques. churches, museums, bazaars, etc. We had only 2 days here, so we has been arranged to visit the most famous monuments, namely Dolmabahce Palace, Haghia Sophia, Topkapi Place, Yerebatan Saray (Basilica cistern), Hippodrome, and Blue Mosque, which are located close to each other. Historic area of Istanbul is inscribed as UNESCO World Heritage in 1985.

We caught in traffic during rush hour.

Children do not afraid of foreigner, they know how to wai and say Konichiwa.

P.Ou talked with children about football.

Simit booths are seen around the city.

Grilled chestnut booths are also popular in winter, smell good but no taste.

At Kebub cafe outside Grand bazaar, he showed me how to cut chicken.

Yerebatan Saray

The huge underground water cistern was left from the days when Istanbul was Constantinople. The roof is held up by 336 marble columns which could hold 80,000 cubic feet of water in case of drought or siege. It is said that these columns were brought from other cities in order to rapidly build the city of Constantinople. The evidence is showed by the two columns in the far left corner which supported by Medusa heads.

Haghia Sophia

Emperor Justinian had the Aya Sofya (known as Haghia Sofia in Greek and also called Church of the Divine Wisdom) built as part of his effort to restore the greatness of the Roman Empire in 537 and recognized as the greatest church in Christendom until 1453, Mehmet the Conqueror had it converted into a mosque until 1935, when Atatürk proclaimed it a museum. Usually, when the Ottomans conquered the city, they would destroy the church but because of its magnificent dome ceiling (approx. 10 meters) of Hagia Sophia, they converted into mosque by white plastering the mosaics of the Jesus Christ and built such as minarets and mihrab, which indicates the right direction of Mecca.

Inside the Haghia Sophia, the big wooden disks inscribed the name of the Prophet Muhammad.

In a high location on the half dome of the apse is the mosaic of the Virgin Mary holding the Child Jesus.

Islamic mihrab, indicated the direction of Mecca.

Before we exited, seeing the mosaic from the mirror, the mosaic of Virgin and Child sided by Justinian I and Constantine I.

Blue Mosque

The Mosque of Sultan Ahmet (known as the Blue Mosque) was built between 1609-16, has six minarets and the courtyard is the biggest of all of the Ottoman mosques. The interior similarly grand, the stained-glass windows and the blue İznik tiles lining the walls give the building its unofficial name. There are 260 windows and the prayer space is huge. We entered from the middle of Hippodrome, there are taps set in a wall to ritual ablutions which must be undertaken before prayer. Worshipers wash their feet, legs, hands, neck and forehead. Women and men pray separately. We had to take off our shoes before entering into the hall and in some mosque women have to cover their head with scarf.

Taps set for ritual ablutions.

Inside the mosque, beautiful stained-glass window and the blue İznik tiles lining the walls