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The Ghosts of Chernobyl

After my bizarre trip through the wallet-lightening border of Transdniestria, I ended up safely across into Ukraine and landed in the chaotic Kiev train station. Randomly, in the midst of the hustle and bustle, I ran right into my British friend Will, who I had traveled with a few weeks earlier in Bulgaria. I dropped off my stuff at his hotel in central Kiev, then headed out with him into the city.

I'm not sure what I was expecting out of Kiev, but I was surprised to find a bright and vibrant city full of historic churches, busy pedestrian areas, shady tree-lined streets, and restaurants galore. It was definitely a world away from the gray soviet-era mess I had left back Moldova. Will and I checked out the plaza where the 2004 Orange Revolution took place, scoped out some of the city's oldest cathedrals, bought a few old soviet souvenirs on the cobblestone Andreevsky Spusk, and dodged tons of wedding parties in Kiev's numerous public plazas which were swarming with photographers, happy couples in typical wedding attire, and old cars dressed up for the occasion.



Will and I also stopped by the fairly interesting Chernobyl museum, which thoroughly documented the infamous nuclear disaster, which took place in northern Ukraine back in the days of the USSR before the fall of communism. The museum was well done, but the following day, I went to somewhere much more interesting: the real thing.

Since about 2004, tourists have been able to go to the Chernobyl disaster area led by a guide from a few government-registered tour companies. Digging around online as I prepared for this trip, I read several passionately-written articles by journalists who had visited Chernobyl and the experience sounded too amazing to miss. These days, over twenty years since the disaster, the once-lethal radiation levels at Chernobyl have dramatically decreased, and are now fairly low — about the same as those found in any major city. There are still hot-spots and restricted areas, but much of the disaster area is now safe to visit. Following in the footsteps of journalists and increasing numbers of adventurous tourists, I signed up for a day trip to see it for myself.

Our group met up at a hotel in Kiev, then piled into a bus for a trip about three hours north toward the border with Belarus. The radioactive site is protected by two exclusion zones, where people have not been allowed to live since the reactor blew. Strangely enough, the area has become an unintentional wildlife refuge, home to a large population of wild boars armed with scimitar-like tusks and a surly disposition. Amazingly, some former-residents, mostly the very elderly, have been allowed to return to the exclusion zones and live in their old homes, just so long as they request no help or money from the government should they get ill.

As we passed through the outer exclusion zone, a few military policemen boarded the bus and checked our passports against the list of the day's official visitors. We continued along through a few more checkpoints and entered Chernobyl town, which is now home to more than 3800 international scientists and researchers studying the effects of the disaster. We were briefed a bit on what to expect, then headed off about ten miles north toward the site of the power plant complex itself. At the time of the explosion in 1986, there were four nuclear reactors running and two more being built. Incredibly, more than twenty years later, the unfinished Reactor #5 still sits frozen in mid-construction, surrounded by soaring cranes that will never complete their task.



A few miles down the road is the infamous Chernobyl Reactor #4, the center point of the disaster. The cause of the accident is hard to describe, and my art school brain had a hard time understanding the science of it all. What is clear is that the government of then-USSR was incredibly negligent and ultimately caused the disaster three ways: by allowing a nuclear plant to become poorly maintained, by allowing poor communication between staff on different shifts, and by allowing inexperienced workers trained for coal power plants to handle Chernobyl's night shift. On April 26th, 1986, these three forces created a perfect storm, and the world's largest nuclear disaster was born, with radioactive fallout estimated at more than 100 times that of the Hiroshima atomic bomb. So what did the USSR government do? They tried to cover it up.

But first, they had to stop all the fires from burning and get the reactor into a stable condition, a responsibility pushed onto a lot of young men who had no idea what they were signing up for. Apparently, for every five minutes served fighting the Chernobyl fires, the government offered men two years off from their compulsory military service. At the Chernobyl museum in Kiev, there is shocking video footage of these guys smiling and laughing as they go in to fight the radioactive blaze, giddy about not having to serve in the military. Little did they know, the government was also guaranteeing them a death sentence, and indeed, these men were the first to die from cancer and radiation poisoning just days after the disaster. Even after people started to die, the USSR seemed to have no plans to reveal the disaster to the world. In fact, it was initially discovered because the wind carried radioactive particles all the way to a Swedish power station, where workers frantically searched for a leak before realizing that the radiation wasn't coming from their plant. The news hit international papers, and Russia was forced to come clean. The official line of the government is that some 60 people died immediately, and around 4000 more from radiation-caused cancer. Given the extent to which Moscow tried to cover up the accident, the real numbers are surely much higher than that.

Today, there are still areas near the reactor which are extremely unsafe, depending on which direction the wind was blowing the radiation the day of the explosion. Even the area we went had relatively high levels of radiation — safe for short-term exposure measuring into the minutes, but not the kind of place you'd want to set up a tent and hang out. It was surreal to see Reactor #4 up so close, now covered in its famous concrete sarcophagus. Our professional guide assured that the levels of radioactivity were safe, but I definitely got comfort in seeing the groups of international scientists walking around the site in plain clothes. Here's a close-up of Reactor #4:



The most interesting part of the tour wasn't the reactor itself, but rather the nearby town of Priypat, where some 52,000 people lived. The city was built for Chernobyl employees and scientists as a soviet utopia, where the social and intellectual elite could live the high life. Supposedly, the residents of Priypat even had access to luxury goods like Chanel perfume from France. A full day after the explosion — on my third birthday, April 27th, 1986 — the soviets finally decided to evacuate the town, located only about a five minute walk from the radiation-gushing Chernobyl power plant. The evacuation was massive: the more than fifty-thousand people living in Priypat were loaded onto some 1100 buses brought in from all over the USSR to get the people out of there. Residents were told that they would need to leave for up to three days — they were never allowed to return.

Now, Priypat stands as a surreal soviet ghost town. And although in the twenty years since the Chernobyl disaster the town has been trashed and gutted by looters and slowly broken down by the slow grind of natural erosion, Priypat is still a haunting and fascinating look into a dark day in the history of man. We started with a tour through the Ministry of Culture, the heart of Priypat's cultural activities. The blocky grand foyer was mostly in ruins, but the soviet mural painting lingered as a relic from happier times.



The cultural center also housed a huge community theater, a series of smaller meeting rooms, locker rooms, a swimming pool, and a mid-sized gymnasium. In the gym, a few remnants of life shined out through the mess — a poster of a Russian boxer, a bulletin board with long-faded messages, and a few old gym shoes.



We ventured outside the cultural complex to an area where an amusement park once stood. With all the talk of evacuation plans, government negligence, and radiation levels, it's easy to forget that Priypat was a town just like any other, full of ordinary people. For me, seeing the frozen and rusted amusement park really drove home the human element of the disaster. A massive ferris wheel creaked as its joints ground in the wind. Wooden planks on the benches of a tilt-a-whirl are looked ready to succumb to nature. Rusty bumper cars sat scattered as if the power would come back on at any second and restart the once-happy scene.





From the amusement park, we entered one of the old blocky apartment buildings and climbed all the way to the top for a view out over the massive planned city. Along the way, we climbed through a few of the old apartments, where there are still beds, tattered wallpaper, and other items left behind by the evacuees. In one apartment, I saw cartoon stickers on the window and couldn't help but shudder knowing that the little kid who stuck them there probably sat in that room not knowing that invisible, deadly radiation filled the apartment's air for more than 24 hours before the town was evacuated.

Our last stop, and definitely the most horrifying, was Priypat's former school, where hundreds of desks and books were strewn about a cluster of classrooms. Soviet newspapers from the days leading up to the disaster are mixed into the mess, and in some places chalk was still barely visible on chalkboards. A music classroom had black-stemmed notes pasted onto the wall and broken vinyl records on the floor. In the kindergarten and nursery, dolls, toy instruments, and stuffed animals shared the floor with gas masks distributed during the disaster.





After our tour of the disaster area was complete, our group went through bizarre radiation-testing machines, then headed back to Kiev. Visiting Chernobyl was an unbelievably memorable and truly moving experience. Seeing a completely abandoned city with so many traces of people was bizarre, and caused a disconnect in my brain. It's easy to visit old ruined towns like Pompeii in Italy or Ephesus in Turkey and try to imagine how these cities must have been, but seeing a thoroughly modern city in ruins was a completely different feeling. In the nursery and kindergarten area, I couldn't help but try to put myself in those kids shoes. Because of the neglegence of a group of overzealous adults, kids my own age were invisibly invaded by cancer-causing radioactivity, giving them life-long illnesses with which they will forever have to cope. It was such an insane feeling, and not one I'll soon forget.

Here are a few more shots from around the sorrowful town of Priypat:






I'm writing this from London, where I arrived today on a flight from Sofia, Bulgaria. There's a lot of my trip left to write about, including my excellent adventures in Croatia, Bosnia, Montenegro, and Albania with Gerni. Plus, my solo jaunt through Macedonia and the headline-grabbing region of Kosovo. But I'll have to save those stories for when I get home, so this will be my last blog entry while I'm on the road. Thank you all so much for reading along this whole time — it has really meant a lot to me!

In three days, I'm catching a flight across the Atlantic back to the good ol' United States of America, where I haven't been for more than a year. I'll spend just short of a week in New York with my old work friends, Steve, Jorge, and Charles. Then, I'll stop by Providence to see my old pal Austin, then to Boston where I'll fly on September 15th back home to COLORADO! I can't even tell you how exciting it is to type that. I'm almost home!

See you soon,
Ryan!

This country does not exist

My loop through Turkey and Georgia brought me back to the intensity of Istanbul, where I met up with Matt Coyle, a good friend I've known since elementary school, who flew out to join me on the road for a couple of weeks.

Matt and I had a great couple of days touring around Istanbul, checking out the city's top-notch collection of historical sites. We spent some time under the gigantic tiled dome of the Blue Mosque, dropped in for a quick wander of the Grand Bazaar, visited a historic hammam bathhouse, and headed underground out of the sweltering heat into the Basilica Cistern. The cistern is a massive underground chamber of water, built in the 6th century during the reign of Roman Emperor Justinian. Through references in text, archaeologists knew of the cistern's existence, but they weren't sure exactly where to find it until they ran across a local villager who claimed to be able to catch fish from the comfort of his own home. The cistern was re-discovered, and now visitors can walk among more than 300 of the dramatically-lit columns that hold up the ceiling, including a few which are intricately carved. Matt and I both loved the experience.



We also visited the remarkable Topkapi Palace complex, the massive former home of the numerous sultans who ran the Ottoman Empire for more than 400 years. Almost like the Forbidden City in Beijing, the palace has a nested courtyard design, and each of the four courtyards had specific rules about who was allowed to visit. The first was open for public events, and the fourth only for the sultan and special invited guests. We toured the Harem, a eunuch-guarded housing complex for the sultan's army of concubines. Interestingly, the sultan's mother — often a former-concubine — was given most of the control over the concubine girls, and controlled the sultan's choice of ladyfriends with a heavy hand. The rooms in the Harem ranged from the elaborately decorated so-called Queen Mother's chambers, down to the humble rooms for individual concubines. On display in the palace itself are hundreds of artifacts ranging from gifts to the Ottoman Empire from China and Japan, to gaudy gilded and diamond-encrusted trinkets commissioned by the Ottomans to adorn the burial place of the Prophet Mohammed in Medina. Shockingly, they even had the arm bones of St. John the Baptist.

After getting our fill of historic sites, we headed out into contemporary Istanbul, visiting the Istanbul Modern museum, which had a great collection of Turkish modern and contemporary art, as well as some special exhibitions by international artists. Our favorite were the spectacular wall-sized photographs by Andreas Gursky, an artist who skews reality into surreal scenes that have to be seen to be believed. Matt and I also strolled along the main street in the Taksim neighborhood, a massive all-night party where we stopped to get some dondurma, a gooey Turkish ice cream which was delivered to us in a acrobatic slapstick performance by the hilarious seller.



We left Istanbul on an overnight train to Veliko Tarnovo, a small Bulgarian town dominated by hilly terrain and a winding river. The town's setting is really incredible — the houses along the river tumble down the hill as if they were frozen in the middle of a landslide.



We spent a few days exploring the town using our great hostel as a base, checking out the quiet cobblestone lane that was once historic Veliko Tarnovo's main drag, where we popped in for a look at an old family mansion, now converted into a quaint folk museum. We also visited the awesome ramparts of the town's Tsarevets Fortress, built and fortified by several conquering empires between the 5th and 12th century. The crown of the great fortress is a church filled with beautifully haunting modern frescoes painted by a Bulgarian artist in 1985. When a tour bus comes through and forks over enough money, the town puts on a surprisingly cool sound-and-light show on the castle's walls, which we backpackers watched along with the locals without having to pay.

On our many trips out into the small town for some aimless wandering, we were easily distracted from the historical sights by the swarms of stunning women parading through town. I've never seen anything quite like it. We also enjoyed eating ludicrously cheap meals in the town's many restaurants, where I tried one of my all-time favorite culinary mis-translations, nervous meatballs. Bulgarian food is inexpensive and excellent, and comes laced with plenty of meat, cheese, and potatoes — things that I was seriously craving the previous month in Turkey. One of the most popular dishes is a hearty stew served in a clay pot:



One of the strangest parts about Bulgaria is that the people nod their head to say "no" and shake their head to say "yes." It gets especially confusing at restaurants. You ask for a beer, the waitress indicates that this request is not possible, then returns with a big mug of beer. It's even more confusing with the nodding: you ask for beer, and the waitress nods to indicate that she'll be right back with your beer, then asks you to order something else. It was very strange. No, it wasn't. Wait, yes, it was.

We left Bulgaria and continued our journey northward across the border for a brief stop in Bucharest, the capital and largest city in Romania. On the traveler circuit, you don't often hear people describe Bucharest without somehow using the word "shithole" in their review of the town. As a result, we opted to tour Bucharest as a day trip. Along with our new Irish friend Tom, we had time to give the gritty town a wander, stop in for a look at the city's surprisingly good contemporary art museum, and take a tour of its massive Palace of the People. The monster of a building is the second largest on earth, only topped by the Pentagon in Washington, and is now used for government purposes, press conferences, and special events. The palace was commissioned by much-hated Communist leader Ceacescu, who carelessly leveled a historic neighborhood in order to build the gaudy palace, destroying two-dozen churches and synagogues and causing more than 70,000 people to become homeless in the process. One woman on our tour literally swooned with delight as we entered every decadent room, but for me, the building stands as a memorial to man's sad ability to occasionally bring completely idiotic ideas into reality.



Our next stop was Brasov, a mid-sized town in the heart of Romania's fabled Transylvania region. We stayed with Irish Tom in a private apartment, which is a good alternative to a hostel if you've got enough people to split the costs. Like Veliko Tarnovo, Brasov is one of the up-and-coming towns in Europe, and feels like it's teetering on the edge of having a big boom in tourism. It's easy to see why — the town has an incredibly pleasant atmosphere, and it's pedestrian-friendly lanes lead to one of my favorite town squares in Europe.



Romania is one of the poorest countries in Europe, and when I visited back in 2003, I had a distinct impression that the country felt completely doomed. People had little hope of ever joining the European Union, and it seemed like everyone wanted to get out of town. I remember leaving Romania with the feeling that the country was like a sinking ship, with everyone scrambling to fend for themselves and get out of there.

What a difference four years makes. Now, with Romania as a partial member of the EU, there's a buzz in the air and the place feels really exciting. People now seem to realize that although their country is still fairly poor, they are rapidly on their way to a much higher quality of life than they had during the pre-1990s communist days. Seeing a group of people in a country become proud of where they live was one of the underlying highlights of this trip through Romania.

We took a day trip out across the Transylvanian countryside to the town of Bran in order to visit the famed 14th-century castle where Vlad Tepes — better known as Dracula — supposedly spent a few years of his life. The little rooms spread out within the bright and cheerful little castle definitely don't conjure up images of bloodthirsty vampires, but we had a nice time checking out its stripped-down little rooms and sun-lit courtyards. Down below the castle are hundreds of cheesy souvenir hawkers which make most people want to get out of town as soon as possible. We stuck around and took a hike out into the small farming community of Bran, and were happy to find quiet village life largely intact despite the tourist trap in town, and there were plenty of little cottages, grazing cows and sheep, sunflower fields, and rusty old cars plying the dirt roads.

Back in Brasov, we happened upon a great little Renaissance Fair going on in town, where it seemed like the whole town showed up to watch the jousting competitions and drink cheap beer. Matt and I met a couple of Romanian girls who we spent the night hanging out with at the festival along with their friends. When the festival's beer supply went dry, we headed into town to get some more, and I casually questioned one of my new Romanian friends about his age before I got us both beer. "I'm only sixteen," he admitted, "but don't worry, I'll just go in and buy it." Before I knew it, he was coming out the door, his arms filled with four 2.5 liter bottles of beer. Ten liters of beer at 16! God bless Romania.



We left Brasov headed for a small town nearby called Sigisoara, an awesome little place dominated by its medieval citadel, a miniature walled city. Within the citadel are a few towering churches, quiet little squares, and tons of old pastel-colored houses and cafes. The town oozed with charm, and reminded me a bit of an even smaller version of Cesky Krumlov in Czech Republic, which I visited a few months earlier with my parents. We explored the town's history museum which had a nice scale model of the town, a collection of truly frightening historic gynecological instruments that looked straight out of a medieval torture museum, and spectacular views from the clock-tower on the top floor.




After a couple days soaking it all in, Matt and I left Sigisoara on a bus to Targu Mures, a nearby town served by WizzAir, one of Europe's newest in the group of no-frills low-cost airlines. Sadly, Matt had to fly back to the States in order to complete his National Guard service, so I was back on the road as a solo traveler. The two of us had a really great few weeks together on the road that I really only glossed over here — thanks Matt!

Somewhat randomly, there was an international music festival going on in Targu Mures, so I decided to postpone my planned journey to the country of Moldova and instead stick around town for the night. The festival was packed with Romanian and Hungarian kids who sang and headbanged along with their local rock bands. There were also a few international acts there too, and I caught an insanely fun performance by Gogol Bordello, a gypsy punk band of Eastern European immigrants now living in New York. The crowd was incredibly into it, and the whole place turned into a massive friendly mosh pit.

(video coming soon... maybe... these things are painfully difficult to upload. Here's one of them playing on TV in case you are desperately wondering what they sound like.)

Not having a place to stay, I wrongly assumed that the festival would not charge a camping fee, which they did. Since I didn't have a tent or a place to stay, I headed out into a field near the festival grounds and found a secluded spot where I could rest my head for the night. It was a freezing night spent curled up inside my waterproof backpack cover, but the upside is that it was free. And since I'm basically completely broke at this point, free is good.

The next morning, I dusted off the weeds, then spent a brutally long day traveling from Targu Mures near to a town near the Romanian-Moldovan border town of Iasi, where I arrived late at night. Shortly afterward, I caught the red eye train to Chisinau, the capital city of the poorest country in Europe and off-the-beaten-path traveling destination, Moldova. The only other travelers in my train were three hilarious Norwegian guys — Thomas, John-Erik and David — who provided some comic-relief from our dictator-like train attendant. We arrived in Chisinau and I was surprised both by the city's ultramodern train station, and by the guy awaiting my arrival with a placard bearing my name. Well, almost my name:



The Norwegian guys and I headed over to Marisha's apartment, one of the only budget accommodation options available in Chisinau. The place was filled with other budget travelers and had a really family-like atmosphere, and it was almost like a drama-free Eastern European version of the Real World. Something tells me Real World: Chisinau isn't ever going to make it onto the airwaves, and our massive soviet-era block apartment was definitely a far cry from the posh Real World house.



One of the Norwegian guys had a copy of the seventh and final Harry Potter book, which crippled any chance that I would sightsee in Chisinau, but I did reluctantly take a few breaks from the book to make a few day trips.

The first was to a country that does not exist: Transdniestr.

If you've never heard of it, that's because Transdniestr isn't officially a country, at least as far as most other nations are concerned. What the breakaway republic does have, however, is all the components of a country: its own government, flag, postal system, police, borders, and even its own currency, the Transdniestrian Rouble. It is also home to more than a half a million people. The bizarre country, formed as a long strip of land along the eastern side of Moldova, is doing its best to avoid outside influence, and clinging to the ideology of Lenin-era communism.

The major issue with trying to go to Transdniestr as a foreigner is just that — they don't want outside influence. Many foreigners who attempt to cross get turned back, or often heavily fined. Luckily, Marisha arranged her Russian-speaking friend Natasha to go along with us on a trip to Tiraspol, the country's capital city, which sits about an hour bus ride outside of Chisinau. At the intimidating border, the Norwegians and I handed over our passports to Natasha, who relayed them to the mass of border guards. She spent ten minutes arguing with the guards, as we tried to calm our nerves — word is that the guards especially dislike Scandinavians and Americans, so we had all the wrong bases covered. Natasha was able to talk our way in without paying the 30 Euro bribe they requested, but we were only allowed to spend three hours in the country, which was fine by me. We took a speedy tour of Tiraspol, which has the wide boulevards, awful soviet-era architecture, and massive public squares that you would expect in a Soviet city. It also has more than its fair share of monuments to soviet struggles, out-of-commission tanks, and statues of Lenin. It also had a noticeably heavier police presence than Chisinau, and Natasha had to yell at me at one point when I tried to photograph an off-limits government building. Despite all the communist influence, there were a few stores and restaurants open for business, and it seemed like time would eventually crumble the differences between Transdniestr and Moldova.





Our second day trip was out to a Cojusna Vineyard, one of Moldova's many, where we were given a tour of the long hallways of the dusty old cellars and the huge banquet-hall tasting rooms. Our cute guide showed us around and gave us her honest opinion on everything we saw: "This wall-hanging was woven by hand by a Moldovan villager over the course of eight years. I think it's really ugly." Thomas, John-Eric and I had our fill of the culinary smorgasboard and solid wine selection, which included a few whites, a few reds, a desert wine, and a port, some of which were bottles more than twenty years old. It was a really fun trip, and the underground cave-like tasting room made it a really memorable experience.




Chisinau itself was a town hit hard by a communist legacy, and lacked a nice old town district that most formerly-communist cities have. Chisinau feels like the very edge of Europe — still European if you squint and use your imagination, but it mostly feels burdened under the weight of communism. I spent a week living in Chisninau, mostly because it's among the cheapest places in Europe, but also because I was completely exhausted by traveling all the time, and having a home-base was just what I needed. After a relaxing week lounging around the apartment, I finally left Moldova headed for Kiev, Ukraine.

I climbed aboard the train and found my compartment with a bunch of shirtless and scruffy alcoholic men, who had scars that made them look like they had weathered one too many knife fights. At around 2:00 am, we passed through the Moldovan checkpoint and across the border with Ukraine. With one look at my passport, the stern green-uniformed border guard told me to follow him into the train corridor. "Bring your baggage," he added. On my 30-somethingth border crossing of the trip, this stood out as an unusual request, but I didn't have much choice but to follow him. My heart pounding, I grabbed my backpack and he led us into an empty train compartment, where he locked the door behind us. I tried to stay calm, but kept nervously glancing at the jet-black Kalishnakov assault rifle slung from his shoulder. He dug through my baggage for a few minutes, and told me to empty my pockets. He thoroughly patted me down, discovered and removed my moneybelt, and carefully flipped through its contents, apparently looking for cash. He spoke for the first time in ten minutes.

Him: "This isn't Moldova."
Me: "I know.... it's... Ukraine.... right?"
Him: "No, this is Transdniestria."

Holy shit.

Somehow a train I assumed would go directly north into Ukraine went instead southeast into Transdniestr. I knew I was seriously screwed, and I glanced over at my moneybelt to see how much cash I would be parting with in order to comply with the well-armed border guard representing a country that doesn't exist. Since I'm at the end of my trip and basically broke, all I had was 15 US Dollars and 20 British Pounds, the latter of which he stupidly passed up, not knowing they were worth more than double the US Dollars. Frustrated that he was trying to extort money out of the most broke dude on the train, he gave up, asked for my US cash as a "present," and thankfully let me get the hell out of there frightened, but unscathed.

Unfortunately, I'll have to leave you all stuck here on the border between Transdniestria and Ukraine, but I have come a long way since, and I'm now safe and sound in an internet cafe in Budapest. I'm headed west into Croatia tomorrow where my friend Gerni will re-join me for the final stretch of my trip, traveling through the former Yugoslavia.

With exactly a month until I return home, I have a packed schedule planned, and as a result, I might not be able to update the blog again before I return home. If that's the case, I really want to thank you all for reading this far — I'm almost there!

Ryan

Midnight Train to Georgia

I left Turkey through the country's most remote border crossing, headed into the rarely-visited country of Georgia, a little place about half the size of, well, Georgia.

After a series of bus connections and hitching a ride in a private car, I finally ended up at the Turkey-Georgia border, which was little more than a few ramshackle buildings spread out over a field of wildflowers. Hours from the nearest large town and not served by public transportation, the border crossing is definitely the least-visited I've seen yet. In fact, I was the only one there. With a fresh exit stamp in my passport, the Turkish border guard opened the gate, but the Georgian guard was on a bathroom break, so for ten minutes I stood alone, stuck in the no-man's land between Turkey and Georgia. The Georgian border guard eventually returned, then had a look at my passport, came out of his booth, and swung his hand up high. I thought for a second he was going to hit me, but instead he shouted, "Welcome to Georgia! High five!"

Excited by the awesome first impression of the country, I was on a bus a few hours later headed toward Georgia's capital, Tbilisi. On the bus, I met a few great Georgian guys —Zura and Temo— who were eager to help me, and guided me all the way to the home stay I had arranged online, which would have been a rascal to find without their help. Later that night, I went out for dinner and drinks with Zura and Temo, who borrowed their parents car and drove me around to show me all the sights of their great city. Considering it is the capital of a very poor country formerly a part of the USSR, I was really surprised by how thriving Tbilisi seemed. The area where my home stay was located reminded me a bit of the gentrified parts of Brooklyn sans-hipsters (or, for that matter, black people), and the main downtown district was full of shops and restaurants, and had nice neighborhoods sprawling out from the main roads. I got the impression from Zura and Temo that people in Georgia are really proud of their country, and excited about its future. After a great tour of town, the guys took me out with Temo's brother-in-law for a huge dinner of Georgian specialties and a few rounds of beer. I was seriously humbled by the overwhelming hospitality shown by these guys. Here's a shot of Tbilisi's massive new cathedral, and then the guys with me at dinner later on that night:




The night was so fun, I called up Zura and Temo and we went out the next night for more great food. Georgian food is delicious, and is an interesting blend of a lot of different-tasting foods. I tried khinkali, massive dumplings filled with spiced meat, mtsvadi, roasted beef topped with an incredible savory tomato sauce, and khachapuri, a cottage-cheese filled breaded pie. Here's a shot of the greasy and delicious khinkali dumplings:



Since there are so few budget travelers in Georgia, the prime place to stay in Tbilisi is at a woman named Irina's family apartment, where beds fill every available space and travelers from all over the world come to stay for a few days. At the home stay, I met Nate and Michal, two awesome Americans who had spent the previous year volunteering in Israel, helping provide services to the large number of refugees who flee into the country seeking asylum from places like Sudan. We headed out for a day in Tbilisi together, and came across an incredible outdoor antiques market, which will definitely go down as one of the best markets I've seen yet. There were hundreds of tables covered in a random assortment of soviet relics, old books written in both Russian and the swoopy Georgian alphabet, portable record players, decorated tin boxes, musical instruments, and just about anything else imaginable. I especially enjoyed the edges of the market, where people set up shop on the hoods of their cars:



Nate, Michal and I took a day trip outside of Tbilisi to the impossible-to-pronounce town of Mtskheta, where there are a handful of World Heritage-listed churches. Compared to other churches throughout Europe, Georgian churches are really interesting because they feel much more like living places of worship than most. The soaring interiors of the Mtskheta cathedrals were filled with icon paintings and old gravestones from countless time periods, including the modern day. Like no churches I've ever visited, the layered history of the Georgian churches comes right up to the surface, and I instantly got a sense for the generations that have worshiped at each church. Since the ones in Mtskheta date from the 6th and 11th centuries, that's a lot of generations. Georgia's population remains much more religious than Western Europe, and anytime a Georgian person passes a church they pause to cross themselves.

Coming down back into Mtskheta from a church on a hill outside town, it came time to pay our taxi driver. We had agreed on the price of two Georgian Lari for the ride, but as we arrived, the driver suddenly insisted we pay 20 Lari — about $12. We refused, and the driver absolutely flipped out, screaming at us in the street, and threatening to call the police and have me arrested. If there's one thing I've learned on this trip, nobody on earth likes any more contact with their local police than absolutely necessary, so I called his bluff, and flagged down a cop to help resolve the dispute. Luckily, Michal speaks a fair bit of Russian, so we managed to get out of there agreeing to pay only 10 Lari to the irate driver. He made a big scene as we left and swore that he'd never forgive us for what we did to him. Sorry fella!

The next day, the three of us headed up toward the Russian border near the troubled region of Chechnya to a charming little village called Kazbegi, nestled in a deep misty valley. We stayed in the home of a welcoming villager named Bella, who Michal had read about online, and we found her place just by asking her townspeople if they knew where Bella's house was. Although Bella's family didn't speak any English, they were really friendly and welcoming, and Bella made us some outstanding homemade stew for dinner each night. I got a lot of exercise out in Bella's yard, while their polar bear sized dog tried his hardest to repeatedly pummel me in the balls, much to the amusement of their toddler grandson. All throughout town, there are chickens and pigs wandering around, and the quiet is only broken by gangs of local kids gathering for impromptu soccer games in the dusty streets. The quaint atmosphere and amazing location made Kazbegi a welcome break from the hustle and bustle of the big city.



We went on a hike up toward the large formerly-volcanic peak that rises above town, stopping along the way at the Tsminda Sameba Cathedral, a much-loved 14th-century church considered to be the most holy and important in the country. Perched high on the green mountain overlooking town, we stopped at the church for a picnic lunch and to enjoy the epic views, then continued our long hike up into the dense fog alongside big groups of cows grazing in the mountain pastures.




After a trip back to Tbilisi, I sadly parted ways with Nate and Michal and headed up toward the Black Sea coast town of Batumi. Popular with Russian vacationers, the town felt totally different than Tbilisi, but still had a lot of charm. During the day, I wandered amongst the city's nice historic architecture and great public spaces, and went to it's awesome little modern art museum. At night, I headed out along the waterfront boardwalk where tons of gorgeous Russian girls strutted their stuff en-route to glitzy dance clubs, dressed in their standard issue leather miniskirts and busty tops. I find going to dance clubs intensely awkward, so I opted out and hung out on a bench instead, spending most of the evening with a crazy elderly Georgian man who didn't speak any English and kept badgering me to give him cigarettes, even though I don't smoke. There's no feeling quite like being in a town full of beautiful women and hanging out on a bench with an old man instead — I highly recommend it.

I was sad to leave Georgia so soon, but with only a day to get back to Istanbul to meet my friend Matt, I crossed the border back into Turkey, then caught a 24 hour bus along the Black Sea coastline to Turkey's cultural capital. Luckily, the bus was only half-full — half-empty if you're a pessimist — so there was plenty of room to sprawl out. By the end, the bus attendant and I were good friends, and he consistently mocked me for wearing shorts, which he insisted were "pants only children would wear."

I made it back to Istanbul, and met up with Matt who I traveled with for the last couple of weeks. In the next update, I'll write about our adventures together in Turkey, Bulgaria, and Romania. I'm in Ukraine now, gearing up to meet my friend Gerni again for the final stretch of my trip, through the Balkan countries. I'm hoping to catch up the blog here in the next few days, so watch out for new entries soon.

Thanks for reading!
Ryan

P.S. -- No, I didn't actually take a midnight train to Georgia, unfortunately. For the sake of the story, I definitely would have if there had been trains available.

Photos updated: Turkey, Georgia, Bulgaria

Wild, Wild East

Earlier on the trip, I read Dave Eggers' book You Shall Know our Velocity, and one of the characters commented a somewhat disappointing truth: that within the United States, you can find the vast majority of the world's natural scenery. Other than the rice terraces in Southeast Asia, deep fjords in Norway, and curvy mountains of Halong Bay in Vietnam and Guilin in China, I struggle to think of areas which don't have a fairly close match within the US.

Turkey's Cappadocia region is one of those few places.

Cappadocia is a collection of towns and villages famous the world over for its bizarre collection of houses and churches carved into naturally-occurring rock spires. I arrived in Goreme, a popular base for backpackers exploring the area, where I met up with my French Canadian friend Emmanuel who I met earlier in Turkey. We spent the day getting a feel for the great village atmosphere of Goreme, which retains a ton of charm despite its popularity. Many people still get around town by tractor or horse cart, despite cars and motorbikes now being the norm. Men gathered at a popular outdoor tea garden to chat and play endless games of backgammon and Turkish dominoes, and it seemed like every woman in town spent most of the day sitting outside the doors to their houses watching the world go by.



Scattered throughout the town of Goreme are hundreds of massive stalagmite-like rocks which blend seamlessly into homes, then back into rocks, then back into homes. Sometimes it was hard to tell what was natural and what was man-made. Although most caves in the area where abandoned by order of the government in the 1950s, many of the cave houses in Goreme are still functioning homes or hotels. My great hostel was among them, and for around seven bucks a day, I was able to sleep in a hand-dug cave room and enjoy a great breakfast each morning in the courtyard. It looked a lot like Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru's family home on Tatooine from the original Star Wars film, which greatly pleased my inner-nerd.*



*In case anyone cares, travelers are able to stay the real filming location that served as Luke Skywalker's aunt and uncle's home — Hotel Sidi Driss located in Matmata, Tunisia. I'm so awesome that I didn't even have to look that up. Did you hear that, ladies? Didn't even have to look it up. I also collect action figures. Call me.

Emmanuelle and I walked a few miles from town to the Goreme Open-Air Museum, which is a collection of impressive Byzantine cave churches carved into existence between 700 and 900. Despite their small size, the churches were absolutely amazing, and were full of original great folksy-looking frescoes painted onto the wall. We spent a few hours at the museum, wandering among the churches and monasteries before Emmanuelle caught a bus to start her journey back to Montreal. Here is the tallest of the cave structures and one of the brilliant fresco paintings inside:




I spent a full week in Goreme, just relaxing and lapping up the natural atmosphere. Plus, a bunch of people I had met earlier in Turkey all ended up staying in my hostel, so I had plenty of people to hang out with. I made a few day hikes out into the nearby valleys, each of which have dramatically different rock formations and thousands of abandoned cave houses to explore. The experience made me feel like I was twelve years old again — out in nature exploring the unknown, getting cuts and bruises, climbing into places I wasn't sure I should be climbing, picking prickly grass out of my socks, and pouring rocks out of my shoes. As I'd walk back into town at the end of my exploratory trips, I'd get treated to a surreal sunset each night over the rocks. I really didn't want to ever leave.



After a week, my friends at the hostel started asking me if I was ever planning on actually doing anything while in Goreme. Apparently exploring and sleeping weren't enough for them. To their credit, there was a lot to do in the region, and time had come to get out there and really sightsee. The Cappadocia region is very spread out — about 60 miles across — so I rented a motor-scooter for 24 hours, strapped on my helmet, and hit the road.

Speeding along a few miles outside Goreme, I made a couple of wrong turns and a huge family flagged me down to offer help. They were a group of about twenty Georgian Turk immigrants, and they were eager to feed me a hearty lunch of delicious homecooked multi-ethnic cuisine. The family was insanely nice, and gave me my first glimpse of the excellent hospitality of Turksish people away from touristy areas. Here I am with the family's male half:



I continued on toward the town of Urgup, where I stopped in at the Turasan Winery to see if I could score some free wine. The Cappadocia region has a long wine-making tradition, and apparently cranks out some of the best available Turkish wine. As I walked into the winery, the guy took one look at my disheveled appearance and blurted out, "You can try ONE red and ONE white for free, and anything more costs money." Was I that obvious? I feigned sincere interest and unveiled my arsenal of wine terminology, just to throw a little bit of sass the guy's way. The nose on this is exquisite! And the color! My word! Does anyone else taste a hint of chocolate? I'm getting a hint of chocolate!

After the tasting, I headed down into the quaint center of Urgup, which was quite a bit more upscale than Goreme and had a lot of pleasant cafes and nice restaurants. I stopped in at one place and celebrated its grand opening with the owner. Turkish people are quick to offer tea, and seem to genuinely enjoy conversation with foreigners, even if you don't buy what they're selling (usually lunch or carpets). I continued my look around town, and came across a huge area of hundreds of cave homes carved into the side of a mountain. Amazingly enough, I was the only tourist who seemed to know about it, and I had the place to completely to myself.

As the sun went down, I rode over to the amazing village of Ayvali, a quiet and untouched place with lots of locals who stared at me as I walked through town. Like in most parts of Turkey, the worlds of women and men were clearly divided. Headscarfed women sat in small groups out on the front stoops of their homes chatting, knitting and gossiping, while the men took their usual place at the teahouse, gulping down sugary tea and playing passionate games of backgammon or dominoes. The kids were thrilled to see me, and excited to have their photos taken. I continued on my bike winding through the rocky countryside to Mustafapasa, a quiet little town with a lot of delicate old Greek houses. Here are some shots from my day's journey:






The following morning, I used my last few hours of my motor-scooter rental and made the long drive about 30 miles south to Derinkuyu, a town famous for its labarynth underground city. The city at Derinkuyu is one of a number of underground cities spread throughout Cappadocia, inhabited for over 4000 years. Once inside, a nice local student offered to lead me around the caves so he could practice his English. He was pretty confident with his second language, which was odd because it seemed like he had never heard English before, let alone spoken it. The tour went something like this:

Him: Chooch da pote ayim.
Me: Oh... this room was a... uhh... hmm...
Him: Chooch! Chooch!
Me: Yeah, yeah... a... chooch.
Him: Yes, yes! Ha ha, chooch!
Me: (sees sign that says "church") Oh, a church!
Him: No! Chooch! Chooch!
Me: Right... chooch... sorry.

In addition to the chooch, there was also an underground school, winery, kitchen, graveyard, wells, impressive ventilation shafts, rainwater storage tanks, and tons of cave homes. The underground city went eight stories deep through a series of labyrinths and rooms, and made for a very cool and memorable visit. I parted ways with my wacky guide, who had trouble understanding the tricky English expression "bye bye," and explored the town a bit. Most visitors to Derinkuyu make a quick stop at the underground city on tours, but with the luxury of having my own wheels, I lingered around town and stumbled upon this dusty little outdoor market where I got a lot of curious stares and little kids venturing up to say hello.



Time came to leave the comforts of Cappadocia and head a bit more off-the-beaten-track into Eastern Turkey. After an overnight bus southeast toward the Syrian border, I arrived in the town of Sanliurfa at dawn, and to be honest, I was freaking out. It was 95 degrees already at 6:30 am. I was in one of the most conservative and Islamic cities in Turkey. The hot sun slammed into my face as I walked from the dusty bus station toward what I hoped was the town center. I didn't speak the language. I was alone. For one of the first times on my trip, I felt like I was in over my head. What the hell was I thinking?

My first day in Sanliurfa was rough. In Western Turkey, there are backpackers aplenty, and even when you spend the day out alone in the middle of nowhere, it is comforting to know that the comfy hostel awaits you each night. In Sanliurfa, I checked into a ratty and smoke-filled business hotel, where the disgruntled owner looked angrily at my passport, blew smoke in my face, and muttered, "Ooooooossssaaa." I figured that it wasn't wise to mention that USA is an acronym, not a word.

After a day, I quickly warmed up to Sanliurfa and I started to really love the place. The town is an important holy site for Muslims and Christians alike, and it was interesting to see the headscarfed locals mix with the Iranian pilgrims, who peered out at the town from the shelter of their black burkas. I visited the cave where Biblical Abraham was born, explored the town castle, and dropped some fish food into a pool to fatten up the holy carp outside the 13th century mosque, which are locally considered to be sacred. In the center of town is a great little courtyard, which formerly served as a caravanserai, the places where people trekking along the Silk Road route would stop for the night or engage in trade. Now, the caravanserai is packed full of old men, doing the only thing old men in Turkey seem to be capable of: sipping down glasses of tea and playing backgammon, cards, or dominoes. I loved the atmosphere in the place, and spent a half-hour there watching the old men's overwhelming passion for their games.



Spread in every direction away from the caravanserai's walls is Sanliurfa's incredible bazaar — the most interesting market I've seen on my whole trip. The winding alleys were piled high with goods for sale, and the air filled with the shouts of vendors advertising sales along with the dull pounding sounds of coppersmiths hammering metal into just the right shape. I held my breath as I passed the stench which poured out of butcher shops where freshly-killed sheep dangled from hooks, and piles of animal hearts were piled up as casually as if they were fruit. I was walking down an alley when I heard a cart rolling along, which turned out to be piled with bloody carcasses of dead sheep. The cart-rolling guys were so delighted that I wanted to take their picture, they invited me into their home and showed me stacks upon stacks of bloody fur they had laying around. It was like walking around in a vegetarian's worst nightmare. Here are the guys wheeling their carcass cart:



Interestingly, Sanliurfa directly translates as "Glorious Urfa," which became the town's name in 1984 after their rival town Antep changed its name to Heroic Antep, and Urfa upped the ante out of pride. I'm waiting around for the inevitable next stage: Extremely Heroic Antep and Unbelievably Glorious Urfa.

Sanliurfa is a town inhabited mostly by Kurds, the largest minority group in Turkey, numbering 15 million people within Turkey alone, mostly in the southeastern part of the country. A large chunk of the other Kurdish people are found in northern Iraq, which is the most stable and independent area of the post-Saddam era. As an American, I wasn't sure how I would be perceived in a heavily Kurdish city. On one hand, the War in Iraq and the Bush administration have destabilized an already unstable region, and have deeply alienated Muslim people, Kurds included. On the other hand, the US has provided one of the only chances at establishing an independent country of Kurdistan, something that many Kurds have wanted desperately since their people were divided among Iran, Iraq, and Turkey. The Kurds in Sanliurfa were eager to speak to me about the situation. Some loved America. Some hated America. Most despised George W. Bush, yet most supported the US-triggered fall of Saddam Hussein, who freely massacred Kurds. Some spoke out against US imperialism, yet simultaneously supported the War in Iraq. Some felt united wıth Turks and wanted to remain a part Turkey, and some demanded an independent state. The mixed feelings were understandable, although a bit confusing. To add to the complexity, the main organization fighting — sometimes very violently — to make an independent Kurdistan a reality is the PKK, a group labeled by the United States and other countries as a terrorist organization. Many Kurds carefully tread on a thin line, not publicly supporting the PKK for fear of imprisonment, yet quietly voicing their interest in an independent Kurdistan. It will be very interesting to see how the Kurd situation develops in the coming years as both Turkey and the US elect new leaders. Unfortunately for the Kurds, they have little control over their own destiny.

I ganged up with the few other tourists in Sanliurfa for a two-day trip to nearby Mt. Nemrut, one of Eastern Turkey's best sights. In my group was Wolf, a mammoth German man who looked like Arnold Schwarzenegger's father, who was going on this exact same tour for the 12th time in eight years. With so many amazing places to see in the world, I'm not sure why anyone would want to beat a dead horse to such an insane extent, but to each his own, I suppose. There was also Patrick, an inspiring Spaniard who is spending nearly three years traveling completely around the world by bicycle, raising money for community youth programs via his website. When he returns home to Barcelona, he plans to tour schools with an video of his journeys, to educate and inspire kids about the world around them.

Along with a group of others, we piled in a van and sped toward Mt. Nemrut, making quick stops at other interesting sights along the way. Our driver's broken-English and enthusiasm was hilarious — he constantly referred to everyone in our group as "my uncle!" We gazed in wonder at the enormous Attaturk Dam, one of the largest in the world, then were off to the famous left parenthesis of the Mesopotamian fertile crescent, the Euphrates River, where our driver encouraged us to take a plunge in its ice cold waters. 1-2-3-4! Jumping time! My Uncle! We stopped by a few other archaeological sites and caves, the most interesting of which was the beautiful Septimus Severus Bridge, built in 200 AD. As the sun began to go down, the van pushed uphill toward the summit of Mt. Nemerut, while our crazy driver insisted we take part in his constant singing:



Mt. Nemrut is famous for its nine-foot-tall stone heads, which were commisioned by King Antiochus as a monument to his greatness. His large bust sits alongside various Greek and Persian gods, and was built as a pyramid-style burial mound made to awe his followers, and help ensure his status as an all-powerful god for the rest of eternity. Unfortunately for Antiochus, his followers all died out, the world moved on from paganism to the Judeo-Christian tradition, and the statues of Mt. Nemrut were forgotten until they were rediscovered in the late 1800s by German archaeologists. Our group enjoyed watching the setting sun shine onto the statues from the from the insanely windy summit of the mountain. We returned again the next morning for an even more windy sunrise, but it was definitely worth the great views.



Back in Sanliurfa, I went on a day trip south to Harran, an extremely old town located just a few miles away from the Syrian border. Like many places in Turkey, Harran is an extremely old town. How old? Well, the town gets name-dropped in the Book of Genesis, right there alongside the creation of earth and everything. The dusty little village retains a very Biblical feel, with its unique beehive-shaped mud houses scattered throughout town. There's also some interesting ruins of another caravanserai, and one of the world's first universities. Here is one of the refurbished beehive house complexes:



I finally left the Sanliurfa area, on a night bus across the Kurdish part of the country. A remarkably annoying guy sat next to me on the trip so he could practice his painfully broken-English, and was driving me completely insane asking me questions until about 3:00 am, when we pulled into a town called Batman — seriously — where he lived. I was excited about both the town's name and that the guy was leaving, but his unintentionally hilarious farewell speech was the icing on the cake: "I... am.... Batman." Awesome.

Despite its perfect setting between the waters of Lake Van and the large mountains which rise above town, the town of Van is a gritty and gray city, and definitely won't go down as one of the nicer places I've visited on the trip. If a competition was held to find the city's most pathetic eyesore of a building, it would be a thousand-way tie for first place. With that said, on street level Van did have a fair bit of charm, mostly thanks to the large University which packs the town with young people and cheap cafes. My favorite part of town was the great Breakfast Street, where hundreds of people gathered to enjoy a nice outdoor feast each morning at one of about a dozen eateries. I had a really nice group of university professors from Western Turkey invite me over to their table for food and conversation, which made me feel at home.

Another morning I caught a minibus across the shimmering turquoise shores of massive Lake Van to a boat dock where I hopped aboard a short ferry to Akdamar Island. The island is home to a partially-ruined Armenian church, which had some nice interior fresco paintings and a ghostly atmosphere. The outside had interesting carvings of stories from the Bible — my favorite was Jonah in the belly of a whale, which was depicted as a fish with a dog head, since the artists had never seen a whale before and didn't know what one looked like. I also paid a visit to Van's sprawling castle, which towers over the farmhouses on the outskirts of town.




We drove north from Van — in a van — along the Turkish-Iranian border, and I was distracted from the gorgeous rocky scenery by the occasional military checkpoint, where gray-uniformed soldiers would give the van a quick search before allowing us to continue. At one checkpoint, festive flowerpots sat atop barricades as if trying to compensate for the inevitable buzz kill provided by the machine guns and tanks. I was the only foreigner in the van, and the troops gave my passport quizzical glances, but apart from a light frisking at one checkpoint, I made it through without any hassle to Dogubayazit.

The little town of Dogubayazit is dominated by the epic-looking Mount Ararat, which served as the resting place of Noah's Ark in the Bible. You may remember the story: God decided to flood the earth, so he asked Noah to collect two of each animal in the world — all two million species known to scientists today — and bring them to a boat which Noah built to house the creatures. It must have been one hell of a big boat. All the animals took a break from the food chain for 40 days and 40 nights, and everything worked out in the end when Noah's ark came to rest on the top of Mount Ararat. To be fair, most Christians view the story as a symbolic one, rather than a literal historical event. Still, there are several groups in the area who claim they have found the remains of the actual boat used by Noah. Either way, the soaring views of the highest peak in Turkey from Dogubayazit were seriously awe-inspiring.



Just outside of town on a secluded hillside is the Ishak Pasa Palace, an amazing castle built in the 17th century. With so many ruined palaces and castles throughout Turkey, it was great to see one that was still largely intact. The Kurdish palace was complete with several sunlit courtyards, dungeon-like basement rooms for servants, a series of simple and elegant bedrooms, a gorgeous dining room with lots of carved-stone patterns, and its very own mosque. I was really impressed, and the palace definitely one of my favorite places I visited in Turkey.



Heading toward the country of Georgia, I left Dogubayazit and stopped over in the town of Kars for a few days. I arrived in Kars at dusk, and the gritty town seemed strangely familiar. It reminded me almost exactly of Hill Valley in Back to the Future 2, when time skewed into a tangent and created an alternate, evil 1985. Everything in town seemed like it was falling apart. A dark cloud hung overhead. Fiery piles of trash burned on the streets unattended. Scruffy taxi drivers tried to lift my backpack into their rickety cars. A filthy homeless woman sprawled out on the floor of an ATM booth on a bed of trash and old newspapers. A rag-tag gang of kids scrambled up and tried to shine my shoes. My guidebook described Kars as "a bit rough around the edges," and I had apparently just arrived at the edges.

I checked into a hotel with a Turkish-speaking German named Ole, and we headed out together to explore Kars, which turned out to be a little bit more pleasant than I had first expected. Ole and I were invited into the campaign headquarters of a local political party, who were gearing up for the upcoming nationwide election on July 22nd. We shook hands and spoke to a few of the sharply-dressed candidates over tea, and I was able to relay questions through Ole about the future of Turkey's political scene, which was a fun experience.

The following day, we hopped in a car and went east to the edge of Turkey to Ani, a huge long-abandoned town which sits on the Armenian border. Ani was a primary stopover on the east-west trade rout of the Silk Road, and was a significant piece of many empires which swept through and conquered the area over the course of a thousand years. The town eventually ended up in the hands of the nomadic Mongols, who basically left the town to rot and most of the buildings crumbled. All that remains today is the gigantic old city wall, and a dozen gorgeous churches and mosques built by the various people who inhabited Ani. My favorite moment was in one of the ruined churches, when an Armenian tourist began to sing a beautifully haunting Armenian song giving the place a really eerie feel.

(video coming soon)



From Kars, I headed into the little-known country of Georgia for about a week, which I'll cover in my next update. I'm back in Istanbul now, and I've spent all morning fighting with the computer, and anticipating the arrival of my friend Matt Coyle who will be arriving here in Istanbul any minute now. We don't have plans yet, but we'll likely head into Eastern Europe for a while.

Thanks for reading this ridiculously long post! I hope you are all well.

Ryan!

Photos updated: Istanbul, Selcuk, Ephesus, Pammukale, Fethiye, Cappadocia, Sanliurfa, Mt. Nemerut