Pergamum and the crowds

Just as in Ephesus we got up early and arrived at the ruins shortly after the opening of the gates. Again, the crowds were not bad, but everywhere we turned we could see them scurrying across the ruins, ducking behind corners, peaking around the bends. Just when we thought that we were alone in the amphitheater or tunnel, one would peak out his head and stare at us. However, this time around the crowds were not tourists, but rather lizards.

The first place we went to in Pergamum was the Asclepion (the ancient healing spa). Aside for two other tourists, we did not see a single other person until we left, but as I’ve mentioned, there was no shortage of lizards. The ruins weren’t anything extravagant, but it was nice to walk around them in absolute silence, with only the birds chirping offering a continuous accompaniment. We even spotted a tiny little turtle. He did not seem to think very highly of our Turkey Lonely Planet Book.

From there it was off to the Red Basilica where again we were on our own and then up the mountain to the Acropolis were we stumbled across a few busloads of tourists but they seemed to disperse themselves quite nicely.

However, in all honesty, if someone is pressed for time, Pergamum does not really have much to offer and can easily be skipped. The ruins are described quite impressively in the guides, but in reality are little in comparison to Ephesus, Palmyra, Jerash and even Side. It is a pleasant enough place to stop if you are slowly meandering your way down the Turkish coast, but not worth going out of your way.

Since there’s not much to say about our current excursions, this might be a good place for some Turkish facts:

• While some countries are battling it out in courts about policies pertaining to wearing headscarves and turbans, it is illegal for women to wear these scarves to universities or to work in government offices. Many of them, in order to abide by their religious believes, continue to wear them, but over top of the scarves will put on a plastic black wig.
• Many apartment blocks remain unfinished throughout the bigger cities. Consturction is often started as a form of speculation, or as a cooperative, with various people contributing money. Sometimes that money runs out, sometimes there are disagreements or the builders run off with all the investments, but at other times it simply is no longer profitable to continue building, and whatever tax breaks the builder had in the beginning might no longer be in existence. As such, numerous unfinished blocks dot the skyline.
• Military service is mandatory. For someone who did not complete university, mandatory service lasts approximately 14 or 15 months. If you have completed univserity you have two options: you can either serve for 6 months as a normal soldier, not be allowed to leave the base throughout that entire time and not be paid anything; or you can serve for a year commanding a group of 300 people, be allowed off the base after 5pm and be paid a small but not insignificant sum of money. The downfall of both these options is you never know where you will be placed and might be required to move halfway across the country for service.
• Gas is probably the most expensive I have seen in a long time: at most stations petrol costs 3.78 TL or $2.70 CAD per liter.
• When walking through a bazaar, even in a relatively small town, be prepared to be accosted in every possible language. The vendors are incredibly good at guessing your nationality and will address you first in the language they believe to be appropriate. If we were walking and talking in English, that would be their default. To fend them off I would reply in Polish which in turn would be met with invitations from the same vendor to come into his shop and relatively fluent Polish along with comments such as “Ale ladna dziewczyna. Sliczne masz oczy” (usually addressed to Julita). With that attempt having failed I would begin to answer in German, but their response was equally fluent. We tried the same with some basic French to no avail. I think Greek was the only language we tried which didn’t receive and equally fluent response.