Our ANZAC Heritage

Arriving back in Istanbul, our group found themselves amongst the touts and taxis-eager to begin their next stage of travelling, everyone quickly dispersed. Knowing that our mother hen would be leaving us, her little chickens, Tony used his last opportunity to get her help and she kindly organised our bus tickets and packed us into a taxi before she walked briskly (was that running???!!!) away. We were on our own. Whilst Tony's eyes glazed over in terror (he has looked over my shoulder and told me to correct it to 'concern'), mine lit up, eager to embrace this solitude and independence and be amongst it all. We headed off to our hotel that I had picked out not so much for our benefit, but of that for our beloved Alex, son of our wonderful friends Wendy and Greg. Alex is a clever little cookie and loves to read-he devours library books and happened upon a non fiction book on the 'Titanic'. Memorising the facts cover to cover he knows more about it than most salty seamen so when I saw a hotel named after such an ill fated ship in Istanbul, we had to stay. We weren't sure what to expect. What we happened upon however, was pure delight. It was a five star hotel, complete with a free Turkish bath and gym. Admiring the birds eye view we had over the skyline of Istanbul, we excitedly checked out the facilities. Not only did we have a bath, but we had a.....wait for it.....kettle! You know you're in five star luxury in Turkey when there's a kettle. Actually, all of the European countries I've visited never seem to have kettles, not like our trusty Aussie motels. I guess, why sip tea in your room when you have so many amazing cüy shops to people watch from? I love nothing more than to dive deep into my steamy hot bath with a nice cuppa at the edge so this was heaven. Or, so I thought. Wandering around our new home for the night, we found the Turkish bath. Segregated, Tony waited whilst I went into the female section. It was so beautiful. There was a large spa, two walking baths, one cold one warm, a sauna, steam room, a massage section and a snow machine as well as an indoor and outdoor pool. Excitedly, I headed in and to my delight, found the

coolest shower ever. It was half a wine cask with a white rope hanging down. Encased in tan marble, I felt like cleopatra as I tugged on the rope feeling the cold water cascade heavily over my tired body. Shocked awake, I giggled audibly and had another go. I was hooked! Justifying a tug after each spa session, I felt my body come alive again as I alternated between hot sauna, tug, spa, snow rub, tug, foot bath, tug, snow rub, steam room and one last tug. I also made friends with a lady from Uzbekistan who tried to convince me to have children. She left with a crying child and I slipped further down into my warm bubbly abyss. Returning reluctantly to our room, we quickly went off for dinner as we were both keen to get into the gym. I had seen a session of 'Cardio Dance' and Tony had spotted the treadmill. Dinner was an awkward affair. Ramazan or Ramadan as most westerners know it as, had begun. The first restaurant refused to serve us until the sun had set (8:45pm) but the next one said we could eat. They said it reluctantly and we had suddenly lost the familiar Turkish smile. They were setting up for Ramadan, filling the tables with bread, getting the musicians settled and inspecting the waiters fingers (yes, I actually saw the manager line them all up and demand they produce their digits). They didn't want us there, we didn't want to be there however we were starving and they agreed to feed us. What to do? We quickly shoved down a döner that neither of us wanted but felt grateful to have had some food in our bellies. Reclining in our room, we recovered enough to head back to the gym and I excitedly went to my cardio dance class. A mix of Zumba, aerobics and crazy fast stretching, I was the only one getting into it. There were only 4 of us though in fairness. A testosterone filled gym junky who could barely jog with his heavy muscles, an elderly lady and a younger girl. After 20 minutes the lady called it quits so I joined Tony on the treadmill and ran a kilometre before realising how sedentary I'd become. No more kebabs for me! I quickly forgot it though as the next morning as we ate our way through the amazing breakfast. The croissants had only just come out of the oven and the chef would've thought me rude if I didn't take one.....so I took two. YUM!!!!!

Gelipolu or Gallipoli as the Aussies know it as, is more of a pilgrimage destination than that of a holiday yet I felt compelled to visit. Being 100 years since our troops and the kiwis landed in ANZAC Cove and being in Turkey already, we had the perfect opportunity to see for ourselves what these poor men (and women behind the lines) endured.
Joining a highly commended tour, we were taken around numerous sites and cemeteries. Our guide had an impressive amount of knowledge and helped to explain why it was that Gelipolu was such a strategic choice. The beach where the ANZACS were meant to land, Brighton Beach, was calm, flat and had an easy meander out of the sea and overland. Where they actually arrived was a ridiculously high, unforgiving climb up a gravel hill.

Had they of landed where they were meant to, it's possible that history may have be different although when we got to the top of the ranges at the Turkish 57th Battalion memorial, we soon realised that we really had little hope. The Turks held the high ground and could see for miles, even a 4am strike would've been spotted from where they were. Our trip here was never going to be fun but being a visual learner I knew that seeing for myself would help me gain (an even greater) appreciation for what the young men endured. What is astounding is that some men actually survived and they stayed for 8 months in such terrible conditions. Some of the trenches remain, particularly around 'Johnston's Jolly' and what is now a bitumen road for visitors used to be a no mans land between the Turks and the Allies. Imagine being separated from your enemy by only the width of a road. We heard some amazing stories of diggers writing notes to the Turks and also sharing tinned food between each side. Funnily enough, the tins of 'Bully Beef' were thrown back by the Turks as they weren't much into it. If it tastes anything like Spam, who'd blame them. One particular story was of a Turkish soldier carrying an ANZAC to safety as he was injured. It seems to change regularly as to the nationalities of the soldiers involved but regardless, it is a story of compassion and kindness towards ones enemy that is indeed the essence and inspiration. There's also the story of Atatürk woven throughout this-insisting on fighting himself and being shot in the chest; he managed to survive as he was shot exactly where he had been keeping his watch in his pocket. Showing his broken watch to a German major, they were amazed at his luck and immediately swapped watches. The German gave Atatürk his gold watch which is now in Atatürk's mausoleum in Ankara and Atatürk's broken one is in Berlin's museum. Fighting in a war of which they had not wanted to participate, the Turks were of course protecting their own land from invasion and their tenacity and personalities were embraced by the ANZACs who apparently respected them immensely. Everyone would be familiar with Atatürk's famous speech regarding the bodies of those who lost their lives fighting and the relationship between the Turks and Australia and

New Zealand today is a tribute to peace and respect. To bring more awareness to empathy, tolerance, connectedness and respect is worthy of a visit in itself.
Saying goodbye to the peninsula, we've once again hitched a ride on the trusty camel. On our way down to Gallipoli, we didn't realise that the bus would drive through Eceabat first so had booked our ticket to Cänäkkälé. Tony had been busy playing hours of 'Angry Birds' but I'd been looking out of the window and spotted we'd arrived and were in fact waiting for the ferry to take us to Cänäkkälé. We stopped the bus and they let us off early so we'd asked at the guesthouse if we could be picked up in Eceabat. They kindly rang ahead and organised the new location even sending a family member out to flag the bus down if it didn't stop. He was waiting at one terminal and we were having Turkish coffee at another so we had all bases covered. I'd made friends with the shop keeper, taking photos of his beautiful copper coffee machine and buying up loads of his deliciously fresh home baked cookies. Even he was flagging the bus down for us! Turns out it wasn't needed though as the waiter on the bus was already looking for us and was efficiently putting our bag in the hold as the bus kept moving. Ah, the Kamel, is there nothing you can't do? If only we had such efficiency back in the UK, our lives would be so much easier!
With an unexciting stay at the Ibis planned before our early morning flight back to the UK, we aren't expecting too many stories to tell thus conversation has turned to our trip and a postmortem conducted on the value of group travel versus independent travel. We have both noticed that our blogging becomes much less during group travel for two reasons. The first is we are so busy doing things and the second is most of our funny stories come from working things out the hard way and having to interact with kindly locals. However, we had numerous moments on this trip where we were interacting with the locals in situations we would never have come across ourselves had we have been travelling independently. We needed someone with local knowledge to show us these amazing experiences, otherwise they would've passed us by. Travelling independently, we go at a much slower pace, taking our time to explore each destination before moving on, trusting our intuition and taking time to smell the roses. (the roses in Turkey smell divine I might add and they are prolifically planted meaning I sniff them happily each day). Sadly, we haven't picked up as much language as we would normally have as our leader has done all of the negotiation for us and whilst the desire to turn our brains off and have a holiday was necessary, we could've researched Turkey more. So, a quandary exists. Personally, I love Intrepid travel for their itinerary, leaders, local knowledge and responsible travel which is why I keep travelling with them after all of these years. I also, love independent travel and the wonderful moments of 'flow' that Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi wrote so eloquently about. Meditation through travel, that's my kind of meditation! Being the eclectic human I am, I've decided that I'll do both from now on. A trip to get some cool experiences and independent travel to sink in my teeth, soak up the culture and immerse myself in a new way of being. Here's to Morocco in three weeks time!
Post script: we have returned to Manchester and it's 11 degrees, blowing a gale and raining. No, I haven't repeated my first paragraph, it really is this cold.....and today is summer solstice!