Breakfast consists of bread, cheese and honey and coffee.
We continue to Pamukkale – a nature wonder that causes you to look at it and to look again, because you cannot believe what you see. A marble white tabletop-hill with different sized half mooned basins protruding from the side with aquamarine water cascading from basin to basin to collect in a stream at the foot of the hill. Basins, foot-bath-, body bath- or jacuzzi-sized interspersed between fluffy “snow”-covered hills.
While Willie and the boys visited the site, I stayed with Sammie in the car to update my journal.
From Pamukkale to Antalya where we hope the visa agony will come to an end. We drive an hour and hunger drive us off the highway where we have leftovers from the previous evening with bread. We parked 100 meters from a house where we could see people busy with construction. By now we know that the car, with the strangers inside attract attention, so it was not unusual when we saw a man come from the house and looked with intent at us for several minutes. Imagine for yourself: you are overseeing workers and from nowhere appears this Unknown Foreign Object. It stops; all 4 doors pop open and out tumble 4 strange looking beings: - 2 cowboys, a hippie, a blond-gray-haired woman and to top it – a very black four footed dog with a red bandana! They all disappear behind the back of the car and for minutes you are not sure what is happening and then…relief…They are eating! He walks over – maybe we are trespassing and then the surprise. From his gestures we realize that he wants to bring us tea. Would we like that? Yes! We are freezing and thank you so much! He jumps into his car and drive off. He had to go to the store because he did not have enough either tea or sugar. Finally he appears with a tray, 5 small Turkish tea cups and a steaming double pot tea. Please help yourself, he gestures. We had no idea what to do with this double pot and Andrej finally steps forward to bravely try his hand at it. Our friend sees that we need help and he takes action. All 4 cups are rinsed with warm water; from the top pot he pours a 1/3 full with strong tea concentrate and fill the cup with water from the bottom pot. He hands it to each one of us and we then add sugar. He joins us, and with no language, but Tasseker (Thank You) and hand gestures and our magnet we explain to him what we are doing.
As so often in the past I’ve seen once more that kindness and love are the universal language between strangers from different cultures, color and tongue and we are humbled by gracious hospitality.
Our friends to whom we have routed the passport is in Belek, a resort town, 40 km from Antalya. At an internet café our friend tells us that the passport did not come. We are disappointed, upset and stress accumulates as it is already dark and we have no place to stay. We search the internet for cheap hostels, but they are non-existing in this 5-star hotel/resort area and what is available is unaffordable. Full-blown stress behavior exhibits itself as we have no idea what to do, where to go. It is dark, cold and we are hungry and we do not like one another too much at the moment. Hugo saves the day. Next to the internet café is Top-Notch hotel which looked as if it is one notch up from a roach joint. They have a room for us for a very reasonable price: 4 bunk beds in a tiny room with a toilet-and-shower-in-one. Only one facility at a time can be utilized as the shower sprays over the toilet, BUT it is hot water and a decently clean room. After dinner Willie discovers an e-mail, 4 hours too late, from the visa agency informing him that his visa will arrive on Tuesday! It would have saved us from an unnecessary relational thunder and lightning storm!
We continue to Pamukkale – a nature wonder that causes you to look at it and to look again, because you cannot believe what you see. A marble white tabletop-hill with different sized half mooned basins protruding from the side with aquamarine water cascading from basin to basin to collect in a stream at the foot of the hill. Basins, foot-bath-, body bath- or jacuzzi-sized interspersed between fluffy “snow”-covered hills.
While Willie and the boys visited the site, I stayed with Sammie in the car to update my journal.
From Pamukkale to Antalya where we hope the visa agony will come to an end. We drive an hour and hunger drive us off the highway where we have leftovers from the previous evening with bread. We parked 100 meters from a house where we could see people busy with construction. By now we know that the car, with the strangers inside attract attention, so it was not unusual when we saw a man come from the house and looked with intent at us for several minutes. Imagine for yourself: you are overseeing workers and from nowhere appears this Unknown Foreign Object. It stops; all 4 doors pop open and out tumble 4 strange looking beings: - 2 cowboys, a hippie, a blond-gray-haired woman and to top it – a very black four footed dog with a red bandana! They all disappear behind the back of the car and for minutes you are not sure what is happening and then…relief…They are eating! He walks over – maybe we are trespassing and then the surprise. From his gestures we realize that he wants to bring us tea. Would we like that? Yes! We are freezing and thank you so much! He jumps into his car and drive off. He had to go to the store because he did not have enough either tea or sugar. Finally he appears with a tray, 5 small Turkish tea cups and a steaming double pot tea. Please help yourself, he gestures. We had no idea what to do with this double pot and Andrej finally steps forward to bravely try his hand at it. Our friend sees that we need help and he takes action. All 4 cups are rinsed with warm water; from the top pot he pours a 1/3 full with strong tea concentrate and fill the cup with water from the bottom pot. He hands it to each one of us and we then add sugar. He joins us, and with no language, but Tasseker (Thank You) and hand gestures and our magnet we explain to him what we are doing.
As so often in the past I’ve seen once more that kindness and love are the universal language between strangers from different cultures, color and tongue and we are humbled by gracious hospitality.
Our friends to whom we have routed the passport is in Belek, a resort town, 40 km from Antalya. At an internet café our friend tells us that the passport did not come. We are disappointed, upset and stress accumulates as it is already dark and we have no place to stay. We search the internet for cheap hostels, but they are non-existing in this 5-star hotel/resort area and what is available is unaffordable. Full-blown stress behavior exhibits itself as we have no idea what to do, where to go. It is dark, cold and we are hungry and we do not like one another too much at the moment. Hugo saves the day. Next to the internet café is Top-Notch hotel which looked as if it is one notch up from a roach joint. They have a room for us for a very reasonable price: 4 bunk beds in a tiny room with a toilet-and-shower-in-one. Only one facility at a time can be utilized as the shower sprays over the toilet, BUT it is hot water and a decently clean room. After dinner Willie discovers an e-mail, 4 hours too late, from the visa agency informing him that his visa will arrive on Tuesday! It would have saved us from an unnecessary relational thunder and lightning storm!
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