(Photos to follow)
Back a couple of weeks now but have been overwhelmed with Rotary Treasurers job and the AGM of SeniorNet, so much so I haven't even looked at my personal stuff as yet.
The Travels:
Flew to Dubai via Auckland (stayed 3 days there) and Brisbane.
Dubai: A false city of newness and money. Hot as anything (in the 40's) and we noticed the lack of women on the streets. Christine got a bit sick, probably due to the heat.
The Malls in Dubai and the buildings are fantastic but ......
We went on a 1.5 hour bus trip to Abu Dhabi that took 3 hours due to an accident. Only cost NZ$5 each and once there we again got the bus tour and visited the Grand Mosque which is magnificent; although one would have to question the waste of money - but is it a waste as it is really a work of art. We had a photo taken by a chap but had to delete it as we were told off as we were touching and so he had to repeat the shoot as a non-contact version!
It was a long day.
Leaving for Turkey our pickup didn't arrive so upon our return we had to claim back the money from the Travel Agent. Just another addition to their foulups.
Turkey:
Istanbul: A fantastic place and a fantastic country that is really booming and one we would go back to any day. The people were great and polite (stood for us on the subway) and English is everywhere- even the subway announcements are in English.
We flew into Istanbul 3 days ahead of the tour starting. In Istanbul we had a ball.
When we arrived at the airport we thought we heard our name called and we were worried that our bags had got lost but the stupidity was that the desk we had to go to was outside Customs. So if the bags had actually arrived then you couldn't get back to them without a hassle. But for Turkey this was odd as they were generally very efficient and organised.
So we waited and they did turn up. We now think it may have been our pickup looking for us although he didn't say anything. The traffic was incredible - they obey the rules reasonably OK but there was just so much and all with newish cars. We never saw a car over 7-8 years old in the city.
Before the Tour got underway we went on the subway, the funicular (a girl we asked directions from said this word - I thought her English was wrong but she was right; although we would probably call it a Cable Car), saw the great views over the city and the Bosphorus, we walked the bridge, took a ferry ride to the wrong place (but that was OK), visited the Spice Markets (twice - went again with a couple of Aussies upon our return), did the Bus Tour and got off at the fish markets, went across the road and almost a hundred restaurants all hidden away. It is a city of restaurants - literally thousands even under the bridge across the Bosphorus. Of course they all smoke.
The streets were like Rio, especially around Taksim Square - just full of life and action with lots of stalls. They sell ice cream and the toss it about and put on a show. We got some and then realised why it sticks like glue so they can do the show - it had a different taste which when we saw the picture we realised why - it was made from goats milk - not cows.
In the hotel they had signs that Rotary met there but they claimed that the two meetings we could have attended had been cancelled. We will never know as the websites say they do meet there??
One night we saw a sign about Florence Nightingale so we wandered down and I poked my head over the fence. A soldier with a machine gun poked his head back. I started talking to him as in the dim light I thought he was the gardener with a funny hat. When I saw the gun I realised we were not really welcome. He didn't speak English and we knew no Turkish so we went on our way. I think he was more surprised than us.
Gallipoli: The tour started and before we left we went to a briefing with our guide, Mustafa. He was brilliant - previously Malcolm in South Africa was the best; but this guy was even better. Knew everything and had views that he was willing to share. Upon my return I spoke to a chap at Rotary who had done the same tour 2 years earlier and he also had him as a guide and he also thought he was simply brilliant. The group was small, only 18 of us which was great - a mixture of Australians (9) Canadians (2), Americans (5 one of whom spoke Turkish), South Africans (2) and us two. A wonderful group.
On day one we went to Gallipoli - of course along with the rest of the Kiwis and Ozzies this was a personal highlight and as for the magnificent Memorial - only the great words of Ataturk carved in both Turkish and English can describe it -
"Those heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives…
You are now living in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side here in this country of ours.
You, the mothers, who sent their sons from faraway countries wipe away your tears; your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace, after having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well."
Ataturk, 1934
Lone Pine, Chunik Bair, Anzac Cove, - all worth going back to again.
Rest of Turkey: We then did the rest of the 14 day tour, Troy, Ankara, (where we saw the changing of the guard), we went to the grave of King Midas, various Colliseums, Antalya, Cappadocia (where we did a balloon ride), Izmur, Topaki Palace (huge), we visited an underground city (like the tunnels in Vietnam), etc. We were lucky at one stop when Mustafa spotted a Gypsy wedding taking place in a small park and we went and looked at the show of dancing and food etc.
Aboard the bus the guide explained about how Turkey is completely secular - no aid to religions, no church schools, the Presidents wife is not allowed into Government Departments as she wears a head scarf, and so on. We had a slight 'discussion' aboard the bus when a couple of Americans got a bit agitated about others views on Christianity and who was the Son of God. They are a strange bunch as they take it (religion) so seriously- I think they even believe it.
One problem is the Mullahs bleating on from the Mosques from about 4AM onwards and then throughout the day calling the faithful to prayer. They tended to drive you mad but I guess the locals get used to it. The real problem is timing - if they all started at the same time instead each one being 3-4 minutes apart it wouldn't be so bad. This delay causes the bleating to go on, and on, and on....
We saw a lot of ruins and I learnt that Greek statues have feet - Roman ones don't (they are always covered) - in Roman pictures etc - scarf = Citizen; no scarf = a God.
Surprisingly we didn't visit many Mosques and when we did we had to put on plastic 'galoshes' so our shoes wouldn't touch the floor.
One of our party, Jim an American (who had surprisingly leftish views; but he had travelled a lot - probably 30 countries) was arrested in Russia because his Visa was a day out. He got let go after about 3 days and it was a sign of what we saw in Russia and had already experienced with our Visa problems. We found later most Australians didn't have problems but it took 6 weeks; those from the UK all had problems.
In one Museum they were sniffing a display, which was said to have the Prophets mustache; so much that they had worn away the edge. As Mustafa said - one of dozens.
Our trip ended back in Istanbul for 3 days (we also stayed on a another day) where we did a boat trip and went past the spy Kim Philby's house. It was bright pink then (now white). The Soviet boats used to come down the Bosphorus and he would signal them from his house.
On our return to Istanbul we went to the Grand Bazaar but we (and others) didn't think it was as good as the Spice Markets as it was too commercial. On our last day we went to the largest Mall in Europe which had an inside Roller Coaster.
Overall my impressions of Turkey were really positive. The economy is booming; big manufacturing plants like cars, whiteware, electronics etc everywhere and it is busy modernising with the tax take rising from 30% paying to 70% paying in 9 years. Meantime across the border Greece is a basketcase.
Russia: Turkish Airlines to St. Petersburg. It was not the best airline we have travelled with.
St. Petersberg: We arrived 3 days before the tour and after modern efficient Turkey it was an eyeopener but what I expected. A tired society. Although relatively clean it had a decayed look about it and few spoke English. The buildings are falling apart, graffiti abounds and the many of the roads were in poor condition with little chance of them being fixed as corruption seems to be everywhere.
However the young girls are simply stunning - all Maria Sharapova lookalikes but I think they quickly go down hill at about 35. The McDonalds are all flat out and you could wait 15 - 20 minutes to get served.
It was the 'White Nights" when we arrived with daylight at midnight and as hot as Turkey. When we were in St.P it was fine although they have only about 30 days of sunshine a year. Later we did strike a morning when we had a few showers.
We used the Subway and saw a sign in English (which was unusual) saying we could buy a cheap ticket. However the frumpy woman selling tickets was a Soviet style person who was not interested in helping us. We saw a guard who spoke English and he spoke to her.
She had run out of the special tourist tickets and didn't want 'top up' the standard cards. He went on at her and she finally did as he asked. He said to us she saw it as an imposition. We found that this attitude towards service was quite prevalent. (it reminded us of China 20 years ago). Marketing seems to be an unknown word.
We saw there was a Hop on/Hop off bus so we found the last stop. Again not helpful in trying to sell us a ticket and we struggled a bit to find where the bus started from. However, we got there eventually; although on the morning the bus started off about 20 minutes late while everybody stopped to have a smoke.
The subway was built in the late 60's but seemed to be from 1930. No signs at the stations- you had to count the stations. Clean but old looking and noisy. Huge escalators (longest in the world) and I timed them - it took 2 minutes from beginning to end. We took a couple of trips to the suburbs and the infrastructure was even more dilapidated.
From the bus we looked at places we knew the Boat Tour wasn't going to take us and one was the No.1 ship of the Russian Navy the Aurora. The ship was great but I wasn't impressed by the sailor on duty who was just lounging about and smoking - they all smoke in Russia - and drink.
Costs seemed relatively expensive - taxis seemed dear which is odd since petrol is only US$1 per litre. With their low wages we couldn't work out why costs were so high and apartments so expensive. Maybe corruption?
The Boat: We got an expensive taxi to the boat but the instructions to find it were poor and we got on a free shuttle bus which took us to a small suburban town we had got the subway to a few days earlier. We returned to the dockside and finally found it..
The boat trip and the cabin was excellent. The boat tour took us into the areas of St. P we hadn't visited on purpose, the Hermitage, St. Isaacs etc. It would be almost impossible to see these sights unless you were in a group as the crowds were huge.
Generally we found the trip good - met some great people (178 tourists with 95% being Australians who seemed to be well off). The trip was smooth and the locks we passed through were interesting.
I found the tours they arranged to be better than I thought and we even went to the Ballet.
As an example of lack of marketing skills we went to Uglich whose main industry is tourism - but only in the summer - winter it is snowbound. The streets were clean but potholed, buildings decaying. Visiting two churches I saw they charged us NZ$1 each - they have to put up their prices. This was an fascinating town to experience as the boat arranged for us to visit in groups of 12 to a breakfast with a local family.
We were probably lucky as our girl (about 25 years old) spoke excellent English and we were able to question her about Russia today. Outside as usual the footpaths, roads and a children's playground were all in a terrible condition and the building was awful however inside the apartment they had made it very nice. She said prior to the fall of communism they couldn't buy the flat but were now doing so and it acted like a Body Corporate in NZ.
But ... a very big but .... the money they paid for the upkeep of the premises seemed to be skimmed off by corrupt officials and the Courts wouldn't be of any use. So the premises were not being maintained.
Very sad.
Aboard the boat to while away the time between towns they had various activities/productions such as learning Russian, painting dolls and a 'Professor" ( aged about 60) who spoke about Russian history and Russia today and Communism. However she was quite poor as while she provided some useful information she also provided some poor.
A problem could have been that her English was classroom while the younger guides (most around 21) were intermingling with Westerners now and were much better. Towards the end we had a round table with her and several of the guides. The younger ones were pessimistic about Russia while the "Professor" was optimistic.
She said that Russian males average age of death was 59 (drugs, booze, car accidents).
Moscow: We arrived and again apart from a thunderstorm which lasted about 15 minutes before we left for a tour, we experienced hot fine weather. A stunning city of great beauty with a better infrastructure but still lacking.
Cars are every where with many old Lada's rusting along. Traffic is a nightmare but incredibly they have no parking meters. And it seems no parking rules.
Most people seemed to think Putin had improved their lives and the country is earning huge money from their gas and oil but I think most is being skimmed off.
Saw the Metro and all the painted walls, Red Square, all the churches, the grave of the Unknown Soldier where again we saw a changing of the guard etc. We were impressed with the great beauty and did a night tour as well.
Overall - the boat was a good way to travel and the offshore excursions were great but I still found it a bit slow and 'for old people' although there were many younger people aboard. They have a billions of dollars infrastructure problem, corruption is a curse and democracy is weak. But they seem to like having a dictatorial approach.
Would I go back - probably not. Turkey - yes.
