Turkey, Part 2 - Ankara

I'm a little (lot) behind on my blog posts. I meant to write this one upon leaving Ankara, which was five weeks ago! Luckily I had jotted down some bullet points so I haven't forgotten everything! As a result, this will be largely in bullet form, giving you the random bits of things that left impressions on me.

Running & GPS
GPS does not work in Ankara. I swear the government is blocking GPS in large portions of the city, particularly in the centre where I was staying. Since Ankara is the capital city and centre of government, there are a lot of high security locations. Google maps was useless when I was trying to find my way around, and--most annoyingly--my running GPS was useless for basically all of my runs. This resulted in my getting lost on numerous occasions.

Language
No one in Ankara speaks English. Alright, not no one. But maybe.... one in a thousand people? And since I was staying in a private lodging for the first time on this trip, this meant that I was completely isolated. Not a

soul to talk to in the entire four weeks that I was there. So on the rare occasion that I did find someone who spoke English, I latched on to them like they were my long lost best friend. One of those people was an American fellow who I randomly met at one of the tourist sites. He probably thought I was a bit of a stalker since I basically wouldn't let him go for awhile; I just needed someone to talk to! :) There were also a couple of my ESL students who I finally met in person, so that was fantastic. But for the majority of the month I was and felt extremely isolated. Aside from not speaking the language, I found that the people in Ankara just ignored me completely. I felt completely invisible.

Getting Meds
One of my missions in Ankara was to restock my medications. One of my ESL students is a doctor there and had confirmed prior to my arrival that my meds are available. What neither of us knew was that

one of my meds is a controlled and restricted medication in Turkey(!) and extremely difficult to access. I had to get a special type of prescription and then go all the way across the city to a special dispensary to have it filled, and they would only give me one month! This created some stress for me since I had been hoping to stock up for several months... and I wasn't sure whether I'd be able to get more in Izmir. (Spoiler: I was able to get three months worth in Izmir, thankfully!) Luckily, even though it was harder to access, all of my meds are dramatically cheaper here than in Canada or Europe, so I have stocked up for several months. :)

Pedestrian Problems
Ankara is NOT designed for pedestrians! It's as though the city planners(?) did not even consider that people may wish to walk anywhere. There are cement overhangs sitting conveniently at face level so that you can smack into them. There are crosswalks that end

nowhere. There are giant intersections that are not possible to cross at all, so you have to walk a km or two to get around. Do yourself a favour and take a taxi.

Places to See
If you can manage to navigate through transit and/or on foot or taxi, there are a lot of cool things to see and do in Ankara. I don't know why it gets such a bad rap from Turkish residents. There are a number of neat museums (my favourites were the Roman Bath open air museum and the Anatolian Civilizations museum). There are a lot of beautiful parks, and many monuments and mosques. There is also the Mausoleum, which is an impressive structure (and eater of GPS signals).

The Dogs
I've mentioned Turkey's feral dogs and cats in other posts. What I haven't mentioned is that the dogs are werewolves. I discovered this accidentally when I got up very early one morning and went for a walk. Normally in the daytime the dogs are all chill, laying around under trees and benches, snoozing away and gazing pitifully at you for pets or treats. But this particular morning it was quite early--still night time in the dogs' minds, apparently, and I half-noted that they were hanging out in groups instead of singles. I didn't think too much of

it at first, and kept walking. But I kept seeing more, and soon realized--the dogs were in packs! They don't do this during the day. In the day, they are solo. But they were hanging out in packs. This still didn't worry me, until I approached one of these packs. It wasn't intentional. I was simply walking down the sidewalk and a pack of about 5 or 6 large dogs happened to be on the same sidewalk. But as I approached them, one of the dogs started rushing at me, barking! For a moment I actually thought he was going to attack me. I spoke to him firmly and walked around, giving them a wide berth. Luckily he left me alone. But it startled me. These dogs are normally so chill. I asked someone if this is their usualy behaviour, and she confirmed that yes, they do this at night. They change into pack dogs! I had no idea.

Frogger
Since Ankara isn't made for pedestrians, the pedestrians have to fight back with their own devices. You would have to see it to believe it. There are many cities where pedestrians jaywalk across streets against the traffic; that part isn't anything special. But in Ankara, they're basically playing Frogger. On the busier streets you'll see people crossing 8 or 10 lanes of full-speed traffic, weaving their way between the cars. The cars don't slow down, and the people don't care. I wish I'd taken a video of it, because it's quite a sight to behold.

No coffee in the morning
This is one thing about Turkey that I just can't get used to. They drink coffee at night instead of in the morning. I just can't buy a coffee before 10am. But I could buy a coffee at 10pm if I wanted to (I don't). Even Starbucks isn't open first thing in the morning. What's that about?!

Ok, so that's Ankara. I'll be more prompt with Izmir. :)