Alahan Monastery

via recepmemik @ Flickr.com

While Alahan Monastery is too old for me to use in my circa 11th century inspired MS, it is worth taking note of the beautiful architecture. The 5th century building was made by Isaurian stonemasons and is a key structure of early Byzantine architecture.

Technically, I should use the monastery of Trazarg, except I haven't found a trace of it anywhere. Anyone know anything about Trazarg? When I Google it, a bunch of images from my own site pop up. Hmm...

Alahan Monastery is in Mersin's backyard and worth the day trip. Sigh. This is where I shoot the tour guide (Sorry honey, I'm still mad at you.) for skipping it. Did you notice the list of things I did not see in my own neighborhood is getting longer the more I research? Probably not good for my marriage. Again: Hmm..

Anyway, lovely arches don't you agree? Wait till you see the view from the outside. Who cares if you have to walk (an hour?) from Alahan to get there. It's amazing and how many views are there like this? OK - DH objects. There are lots of places in Turkey with an amazing view -that you can drive to- but I wanted to see this one. :(

via kaliteliresimler.com

It's even a UNESCO World Heritage,Tentative Site. See? I'm not the only one who wants to head off the beaten path to find cool stuff. Who's coming with me?

And....last week in my rush to go on vacation, I totally forgot to post the contest results for Tracy Marchini's new e-book: PUB SPEAK: A WRITER’S DICTIONARY OF PUBLISHING TERMS. So without further ado, the winner is......


Jules!

I loved the all answers about what to do with the exquisite corpse, morticians and ebay auctions alike, but here's the official answer from Tracy's book:

exquisite corpse – A technique for creating art where several collaborators create a piece, but can only see so much of the previous contributor‟s work. For example, one author writes a chapter and gives it to the next. The second author writes a chapter and gives only the second chapter to the third author, who gives only the third chapter to the fourth author, etc.

Now, iff you've got a few minutes, check out this clip of Alahan.


Alahan Monastry Mut-Mersin-Türkiye from umut cor on Vimeo.

A Grandmother's Djinn Tale



Gezende Gorge
via Facebook.com/Mersinliyizbiz

So wishing I was still at Hogwarts. If you haven't been yet, you should go...

I'd like to say thanks for all your help last week with the parallel world/dimension dilemma. I was always leaning toward a "shadow world", but I just had that moment of self-doubt. You know - the one that knaws at you for a week until you work it out. Maybe I should re-definine "moment" in the context of self-doubt? ;)

Alesa mentioned Barzakh, so I thought I'd toss that idea around and compare the eschatology (death sequence) of the east and the west. They are actually very similar. Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent.

1) You die and your soul separates from your body.
2) You examine your life. Probably some atonement here, or what is the point of examination. Yes?
3) Your soul enters a sleep state that lasts until the judgement day.

I suppose Barzakh is another word for Purgatory. Since this is a sort of soulful hang-out spot for the ages, the idea that djinn might exist in Barzakh makes some kind of sense, if you believe them to be purely spirit. Jonathan Stroud uses something like Barzakh for his djinn dimension. (I say dimension because it's not a fully developed world. TY Holly Ruggiero. :) ) From what lore I've heard though, the djinn don't exist in a half-state of being at all - and that is the root of my djinn world.

I'll just tell you a short story I heard:

In the middle of the night (of course) a strange woman comes banging at the village midwife's door, asking for help. The midwife rouses her daughter to let her know she'll be gone for a while and the obliges the waiting woman. They follow a path up into the hillside, going through ever more treacherous and narrow passageways of the rocky gorge (imagine the one in the picture - sans the kayak), until they reach a yurt where a woman is in labor. After a long night of wailing and misery, the child is born and the midwife is compensated for her excellent work with a bag of gold. Then she's led back to her home. In the morning, the midwife wakes and when she opens the bag of gold, she discovers onions instead.

This story was told to me by the daughter, who was herself a grandmother when she told it. She believed every word she said, or at least she convinced me that she did. She also told me that the djinn use your things when you're not. For example, (her example, actually) if you wash and fold your sheets and they're soiled when you open them up the next time, a djinn has used them in your stead.

So I came away with the idea that, in eastern lore, djinn are not just floating around in their own dimension. They are in fact sharing ours. Sometimes even drawing us into theirs. Also, whenever we interact with the djinn, there are glamours involved so that what we see isn't what we think. I'm not sure if it's done intentionally as a trick, if djinn sensibility is skewed based on their reality, or if we just can't bring gold from their world back into ours. The grandmother seemed to think it was a trick, even though she didn't blame the dinn. It's just the way they are.

Contemporary. Turkish. Art.

via TurkishCulture.org

I'm just getting back from spring break and tons of work is piled up for me here, so for a quick post I'd like to direct you to the recent Sotheby's Auction of Comporary Turkish Art in London.

Burhan Dogançay (at right) really brought home the prize. The hammer price for his work, Whispering Wall II was over 277,000 GBP.

Related Articles:

Turkish Master Artist Volkan Diyaroglu at Sotheby's - artmarketblog.com (artmarketblog.com)

Turkish Paintings Fetch High Prices at Sotheby's Auction (hurriyetdailynews.com)

Cappadocia Cave Hotels

via Yunak.com

The Turkish cave hotel is my hands-down favorite boutique hotel experience. Ever. Look at the photo on the right...each room was originally a single family home in the cave house village. Now it's a furnished luxury retreat overlooking the moonscape of Cappadocia.

Yunak Evleri was even listed in The 1000 Places to See Before You Die, featured several times in Conde Nast, and countless other international magazines and newspapers.

There are other less expensive cave hotels in the towns all over Cappadocia and I recommend trying one of them instead of the giant tourist hotels on the outskirts.

Activites of the area are amazing - from the Goreme Valley Open Air Museum with UNESCO heritage site monasteries and frescoed chapels - to the hot air balloon rides, underground cities, wineries and carpet shops.

I had an entire chapter set in Goreme that got nixed from Burnt Amber, but I'm holding out for an opportunity to use the setting in another outline. It really is so bleeping inspiring.

Parallel World or Dimension?

Image via Wikipedia

My djinn world uses the same physical world we live in, on a different plane. Maybe I can explain it better with this example:  The djinn world shadows ours, and in someplaces it overlaps. They don't see us and we don't see them, except in the overlap.

Isn't a parallel world something separate entirely? With a copy of everything, including the people?

The other day I was editing and I hit a roadblock. (Sci-fi and Fantasy writers: Help me out here!) I keep writing about a parallel world, but do I really mean dimension?

Sesame Simit

via Uniglobalexotic.wordpress.com

Growing up I knew three things about sesame : Sesame Street, Open Sesame, and a rhyme about a sesame seed bun. What else did I need to know? Right?

Ummm....Tahini?

Yeah...tahini is made from ground up sesames. It's very important to middle eastern cuisine. You can't make yummy halva (confection) or hummus (chick pea spread) without it. I dare you to eat a falafel sandwich without tahini sauce. (Lemon juice, salt, garlic, tahini = yum!) Actually, I put that sh...

Sorry, wrong commercial. :)

As I was saying, sesame is an ingredient in tons of things that I love. My two Turkish favorites are Tahin Pekmez (Turkish spread, sort of like peanut butter) and Simit (pic above). Simit and çay are standard fare for every Turk, from all walks of life.

What variety of sesame do you crave? And what does this have to do with writing?

Well, I was thinking about my first post. There are so many ways I could have gone with this blog, with my manuscript, and they all would have been fun. There was one message that I kept coming back to: Tales of Turkiye, from my American-bride perspective. And it all started from one small seed.

Related articles

• Open (Black) Sesame! (online.wsj.com)
• A Turkish Classic , Simit….
  
  
  
  

Tree House Hotels of Olympos



via TurkeyHostels.com

The past couple of days got hijacked by industry related posts, but today we go back to our regularly scheduled programming. :)

In Turkey, boutique hotels, inns and small establishments like the pansiyon are a popular choice for travellers. I prefer them over large, impersonal hotels because you get much better immersion in local culture. The majority are independently owned, so standard of service varies.

I've found a great resource on chosing a good, affordable option is The Little Hotel Book by Nisanyan. The writers are small hotel owners, and they actually stay in each hotel at some point, so you know the ratings are honest. If nothing else, this bible of Turkish small hotels is an amazing armchair retreat. I've spent many hours daydreaming about my perfect itinerary with it. Online, there are many sites with ratings and recommendations, such as Hidden-Turkey.com.

We've been following the Cilician Pirate thread to Olympos and I thought we'd explore the tree house hotels there. Next week, we'll try cave hotels of Capadoccia and then maybe an amazing place in Datça I've wanted to visit....we'll see where it goes from there.

While a tree house is not the choice for someone who likes plush slippers and towel origami, it has a certain Swiss Family Robinson appeal. Tree house hotels could be part of a really cool family trip, or a nice romantic getaway. (Follower Tracy Darchini says she spent part of her honeymoon in a treehouse hotel and loved it. She also says you can catch a free ride to the chimaera flames with some hotels.) If you're trekking, the Olympos tree house hotels are legendary. Many hikers enjoying the Olympos National Park stay here because it is ridiculously affordable - like 11 Euros ridiculous - and breakfast is often included.

Note: Make sure you book what you expect, especially if you want a room with air conditioning. Also, some of the treehouse hotels are a known for their "no curfew" approach to life, which is awesome, IF you don't need a full night of sleep. But if you're a pirate (from the manuscript in my head), this is a deal you can't refuse!

Related articles

• Chimaera Flames - Olympos, Turkey (travelpod.com)
• Trekking in Turkey - Turkey (bootsnall.com)