Ankara, the capitol of Türkiye Cumhuriyet

Arkadaşlarım iyi akşamlar. We left Istanbul at 8am and began the 5 hour bus ride to the capitol of the Turkish Republic, Ankara. It's a city of 5 million that about 90 years ago only had 50,000 or so. After the Turkish War for Independence a famous general by the name of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk stepped up and literally became the father of a new nation in the ashes of the fallen Ottoman Empire.

I had no idea what to expect from the drive. I sort of figured it would be desert and scrub and that's about it. I was wrong. This part of Turkey, the stretch from Istanbul to Ankara shares a lot of similarities with the eastern foothills of our Central Valley in California. Small villages dotted the landscape and were easy to find as they each had their own mosque and in the larger villages you could see that each neighborhood had its own. How? By the minaret sticking up above the rest of the village. Some were tiny and some were huge but they were all easy to find.

Our first stop was the Tomb of Atatürk. This structure was huge and very imposing. Atatürk is remembered and honored here unlike anything we see in America. We don't celebrate the life and sacrifices George Washington made in order to create our nation the way Turks celebrate Atatürk, and it shows in how he is memorialized. The edifice is so humbling that I found myself walking slowly so as not to disturb the peacefulness of this monument. The Türks who were visiting, and there were a lot, were lining up to see his possessions, his tomb and at the gift shop to capture memories of this truly great man. I suggest you wiki him.

Next was the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations. I don't think I had seen anything from the 13th Millennium B.C. before today and I was blown away. The Turks are well aware that the earliest archaeological discoveries showing the existence of man are all here in Turkey and as a people they appear to take pride in that fact. This is an ancient place. Older than Rome, older than the Greeks, more ancient than China and far older than Egypt. Below I have attached a picture of the small statue dating back to 13,000 B.C.. It is a woman sitting on a throne giving birth. The small knob between her legs is the head of a baby coming out of her womb. This was likely a fertility idol.

We ended our day here with a nighttime stroll through the town center. Just the two of us listening to locals speak, smelling the city and avoiding the calls of street vendors. Holly drew quite a lot of attention from the men and I'm not surprised... she looked beautiful.

Quick anecdote. The cabby who took us to the Anatolian Museum didn't quite know which place we were going. Holly busted out her Turkish and got us to the rest of our group safely. Harika!