Village Voice December 2013/January 2014 | Seite 23

BELLE’S JUST
WILD ABOUT
SAFFRON …
Five go exploring in Turkey
It was one of those impulses that you just
can’t resist: an ad in May with English
Heritage magazine (yes, Belle has achieved
that age). Eight days in Turkey in November,
tours and meals included, for a ridiculous
price. I rounded up four of my favourite
relatives, age range from 25 to 83. All were
up for it, and bookings were made.
We arrived at midnight. “Please be on
Coach 16 by eight thirty tomorrow,” said our
guide Bülent, “we have a long journey.
Please don’t get onto Coach 17 by mistake.”
It was pouring with rain. All day. Our lunch at
a coach-stop cafeteria would come back to
haunt all five of us by three o’clock the next
morning and all the following day. Could it
get any worse? Some of us shared a dinner
table with one of life’s victims. Charming for
the first five minutes, she quickly became a
person to avoid. A frequent traveller, or FT
as she became known, she talked non-stop
and didn’t like Turkish hotels, cafes, food or
people apparently.
Apart from flooding the bathroom several
times, we liked the hotel and loved the
people. Waiters buzzed around us like bees
round a honeypot; probably something to do
with our pink-haired 25-year-old, addressed
by more than one as ‘Marilyn Monroe’.
“Photo?” said some foreign tourists. “Sure,”
said our girl, holding out her hand for the
camera, ready to take their picture. “No,
you!” they said, snapping away at her.
Cappadocia was stunning, a moonscape
with tufa cones and cliffs containing carved-

out houses and churches from the early
Christian days of the 7th century. Although
isolated, the place, even out of season, was
teeming with visitors, but well supplied with
the ‘comforts’ you need when away from
home.
Every day Bülent insisted that the weather
was clearing, and gradually it did. By day
three we had cast off our rainwear and
broken out the sunglasses. A visit to a carpet
factory found us all in good spirits. The
demonstrations were fascinating: ask me
anything you want about carpets! Afterwards
we sat round the edge of a large room and
were invited to take apple tea or raki as we
were shown lots of rugs. At this point the
room was invaded by an army of salesmen
and we spent some time fighting them off.
FT was almost reduced to tears in her efforts
to escape, apparently unable to voice the
word “No”. It’s a cultural thing of course: as
long as you politely listen, they think you
might buy. Of course, being used to cold
calls from double glazing salesmen, we felt
quite at home!
A visit to a jewellery workshop was on the
agenda for next day. We listened to the talk
on precious stones, whizzed round the
showroom with its plethora of diamonds and
persistent salespeople, and escaped out of
a side door. FT told us later she’d been
pressured into buying something she didn’t
want just to get out of there.
Turkish Night was great fun. This was an
evening of dance acts from all over Turkey.
We had promised Bob, our elder statesman,
that there’d be belly dancers but he had to
content himself with only one (but a very
talented one). At the end of the evening,
when everyone got up to join in we were
amazed to see the one-legged man from
Coach 17 hopping down to the dance floor
without his crutches and proceeding to
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