Ilhan Otel Urgup

... two years after me. Oren walked in with another American who saw my Williams Football shirt and asked me if I knew Brian Morrissey, our former star tailback and the all-time Williams rushing leader who I played with for three years in college. That kid had gone to high school with Mo. Small world. I never learned his name, but anyways the two Americans sat down with us.<br><br>In any international setting among a group of people from various countries, much of the ...

... about my speed. The geography and geology here are really amazing and beautiful. People here live in caves. They hollow out these rock formations and the hills and build houses and hotels in them. It's not a great place to stay if you don't like stairs or need a lot of light. This hotel is up on the hillside, and there are windows on the front wall, but the rest of the room in underground in the hill. I grew up living in the basement, so I ...

I am writing from the centre of Turkey, 30 feet deep within my very own cave. I have an 'ADSL' internet connection and I am sitting at a pentium powered 'DELL' industries personal computer. 'Manuel' has brought me a soothing hot glass of apple tea (after all it is rather chilly outside) and has just adjusted the central heating to a balmy 24 degrees centigrade. My toes have feeling and my nose is not leaking like a Labour ...

... a bottle of water and slammed the door. He apparently had a leg problem and could not sit in a regular seat. What is going on? We were further befuddled when the bus made numerous stops at ghetto gas stations that demanded 1ytl for hole-in-the ground bathroom stalls with no toilet paper. Then a French guy started arguing with the bus driver about his seat and not being able to sit with his girlfriend. He wanted an explanation ...

... but supposedly could hold more than 2000 people! We then hiked the Ihlara Valley which is famous for the tiny churches carved into the hillsides. The churches have remnants of beautiful frescoes. I enjoyed the 3 km hike along a creek at the bottom of the valley where we had good views of cave houses. We were told that the cave houses were formed naturally although many sure don't look it. The houses often have groups of small cubbyholes around the ...

... to the "EuropCar office". I couldn't help but feel that as soon as we left, the sign was going to be changed to "Avis Car" or some other agency name that met the needs of the next customer. The service was excellent and they treated the car as it was "one of their's". I got the sneaking suspicion that we were driving off with the owners family car. Our ...

... nearby and showed them the ladder. One of them immediately started to climb it and continued up some really worn-out stairs (so bad that they required him to slide back down on his butt since they were too dangerous to walk down). The other Aussie and I chickened out and didn't follow him up, though it sounds like we missed out on some incredible views from the top. We were only supposed to be at the monastery for 20 minutes, but that wasn't nearly ...

... the amazing and beautiful fairy chimneys. We roamed around these magnificent structures until we realised that we were never going to get through our schedule unless we kept moving. Next stop, Zelve Valley. Suha had suggested that we might want to spend at least an hour here. As it turned out we spent almost four hours and still we could have stayed for longer. This valley is a village made entirely of cave houses, cave churches, meeting halls and other ...

... on how thick your thread was going to be. We also saw how the dye was mixed into vats and how the weaving was done. We also found out that the lowly silkworms, after being boiled to death in their own cocoons, were shipped off to Scandanavia to become skin products. Also, here are the two carpets we bought.<br>

... the next day. Not wanting to waste time, we spit on our palms and shook a manly handshake to seal the deal in the traditional Turkish style. (that's a lie) That day we saw an underground city. You haven't seen anything until you've seen Barbara going down into the earth forty meters through tunnels half her height. The next day we saw the Göreme open air museum, which is the site of famous rock-hewn chapels in which ancient Christian frescoes ...