typefaces in stone

a feaste

very nice.

lunch under the storks

the ephesus museum was dry and we only toured the gladiator exhibit and its matter of fact statement that, "stadium and circus, in no other circumstances (other than sex) can emotions _soar to such heights." but what about chocolate?

marble sculptures of bulls wearing wreaths that made me think the old civilizations had as little sense of what to do with death as we do. reconstructed skeletons from a gladiator cemetary detailing injuries to elbow, jaw, wrist, and with diagrams showing with red arrows how each one died: one executed by a blade under the back of the skull, one sliced under the shoulder blade, one stuck with a four-point spear through the femur -- terrible way to die, and the walls of the exhibit painted red.

lunch in selcuk under the ruins of an old aquaduct atop which storks return every year to build their nests, big wide swaths of swoop and backbending knees, big black eyes and long beaks.

we followed the aquaduct up to the basilica of saint john, built in selcuk because saint john brought the virgin mary to ephesus after the death of christ. forgot my camera! made me realize i have fallen a little out of practice finding the exact truth of a scene, such as how the walls of the baptistry alone were intact, red brick and red mortar, and the domes of course fallen, but how the foundations and the columns allowed you to feel the math wrapping the cupola up over your head, or how the tourists kept interrupting the muscled black cat intently waiting by little burrows, not moving a muscle, eyes down, or how the walls were made of even mud bricks with a layer of irregular stones at shoulder height and how every now and one of the irregular stones would be a broken piece of sculpture, vines or leaves or fruits, as if they broke up imperfect sculpted pieces to use elsewhere in construction, or how swallows swooped through the standing colums of the basilica tracing through the air like a conductor's expressive left hand under the baton, or how random green and colour choked the cracked terracotta wine jugs, or how the snake plants were so big and meaty they had to be pruned with a scythe, or how astrid kerr drew me through the weeds to see a persimmon(?) tree using just her index finger and saying, "come."

then walking back down as a stork flew up the hill high overhead, nest branches in its mouth, back down to ephesus for pickup.

loving my inner photographer (3) : the church of the virgin mary

just removed from the main ruins at ephesus is the church of the virgin mary, where purple bell flowers grow out from the bricks in the walls and where a digger tried to sell us some fake antique coins. now that the ceiling is gone, rainwater collects in the baptismal font.

mulberries at ephesus

wild mulberries right off a tree that shaded one of the paths through the ruins at ephesus.

loving my inner photographer (2) : patterns in tile at ephesus

tile patterns in the sidewalks leading up to the terraced houses of ephesus.



and look!

loving my inner photographer : the ancient city of ephesus

three nights at attila's getaway

definitely a misadventure meeting astrid kerr at the grubby and small-town izmir airport with its counterintuitive layout.

"A Comedy Of Errors," i said.

"have you actually read that play?" said she, twenty straight hours of travelling, four connections, and a seven hour stop in gatwick, all of this with an injured knee. "it's not actually very funny."

"no, i haven't." (pause) "but i guess All's Well That Ends Well."

"have you actually read _that one?"

in truth i do not much like plays, i prefer novels.

from izmir to selcuk. selcuk is one of the major tourist attractions in turkey because of the nearby ruins of ephesus. because so many tourists come to visit, and competition is fierce for their business, hotel rates are cheap even in the high season and many of the hotels and hostels offer all sorts of little incentives to sweeten the deal.

so, arriving in selcuk, and having phoned ahead to stay at a little campground and hotel called Attila's Getaway, we stepped off the bus to find attila there waiting for us with a shuttle to take us in to his resort which was a few minutes removed from the town.

once we got there, deep breath and the resort was conducive to deep breathing and a cup of tea. the van pulled in and stopped, and we stepped around the corner into a view of the blue-bottomed pool and the little patio with covered decks and low cushions where we would each lunch. the pool was framed on two sides by plaster columns, and rose gardens, and you could look out the other way to an open vista of patchy mountains with round shapes of pine and more linear straight up and down shapes.. there was a bar with water pipes and austrailian kitsch that hung unobtrusively -- flags, koala bears, a kangaroo crossing sign. bamboo wind chimes, and several backgammon boards as well as checkers and chess. at the head of the pool was a doric statue holding a vessel from which water poured making ripples across the water. at the other end was a stone fountain that ran into a little channel and under a foot bridge to empty into the pool, also making ripples. in the mornings when the fountains were off and the water was still, little forked-tail swallows would circle over the pool then quickly swoop in for a splash. blue cat paw prints on the cement pavestones from where a cat once walked in the wet paint at the bottom of the pool.