Izmir, Turkey

Our next stop was in Izmir Turkey on the Asian continent! We had wanted to go to Epesus (the Epesians in which Peter wrote an epistle to), but we were a little short on time. We decided on a tour of Izmir. We were lucky to have discovered that our cruise line offered child care, for free!!! Our first stop was to the Agora of Smyrna. An Agora is bascially the city center, Smyrna is the ancient city, and it's actually mentioned in Revelations. Wikipedia mentions that this city was thought to be destroyed due to pride.

The above and below picture are the toilet rooms. You would sit on a rock and a little stream would wash away your business. Very clever.


Our tour guide said that this city was built underground in case they were attacked. Below you can see a picture of there market streetn underground. They also had little streams throughout this underground city.

Smyrna is thought to be originally settled in 600's BC by Greece.

Here I am holding Lyndi standing by the columns of the Agora of Smyrna

We were brought up to the site of an old castle ruins. We weren't given any history on this particular area, but we were given an incredible view to look at.

Justin, Lyndi and I in the courtyard of the famous clock tower and a tiny mosque behind us.

Below is a picture of our "Good Friend" Erol and Lyndi. He said he wanted a picture with Lyndi so he could show his wife. This picture is taken in the leather shop. See story below

Erol was a wonderful tour guide he answered all of our questions, laughed and took our pictures. After seeing the major sites he took us to the local market. I told him I wanted to buy some ceramics, he then took us to a leather shop.

Before entering he said these were his friends and they would give us a good deal. I certainly wasn't in need of a leather coat, but I also thought it didn't hurt to look. I started browsing and immediately I was swarmed with salesmen. I asked several times "what is the price" and they refused to tell me. By this time Justin was also trying on Jackets and having salesmen show him how wonderful the leather was. I enjoyed being pampered, they brought out water, held the coats as I tried them on, googled at Lyndi and jumped to attend to any prefrence according to size or length. Finally, Justin and I found the perfect leather jackets mine was a black button down that slendered my waist when I cinched up the belt. Justin had found a beautiful fine leather camel colored coat. We had found our coats and the men were ready to give us the price.

They brought a calculator over to me and typed 1100, but for you a good price 900 Euro (1250 dollars)! I was in disbelief, so our good friend Erol came over and verified 900 Euro. I had to keep myself from laughing as we told them there was NO WAY we could afford those jackets. They typed another number on the calculator 700 Euro, still we assured them that these jackets were not in our price range.

They turned to Justin and asked "what would you pay for these jackets?"

"400 dollars"

They said there was no way, that beautiful jackets like these could be sold for such a low price. We were happy with that answer and began pushing our way through the salesmen to get to the door. As my fingers touched the door they cried out

"wait, wait"

I saw a large, white haired man walk down the stairs and speak to the salesmen and then Erol translated.

"This is the boss, he said to give you the coats for your price 400 dollars"

They began putting the coats into the bag and handed it to Justin, Justin began discusing payment options. They wanted cash and wondered if he could go to an ATM to get the money. My stomach started hurting and this adventure was starting to seem like a nightmare. I began thinking about all of our expenses and seeing our savings diminish. A new computer, a trip to the states a practice. I couldn't keep quite a moment longer.

"I am sorry, but we don't need leather jackets, we didn't come here to buy leather jackets we need to save our money for other things, we cannot buy those leather jackets."

Justin and I walked out the door, we had finally escaped! We followed our sadned "friend" Erol who then took us to a cermaic shop.

We had a delightful time at the ceramic shop. We sat and drank apple tea in the ceramic shop (a common Turkish Tradition) as I decided on the pieces that I wanted to purchase. The salesman gave me what I wanted for a fair price with zero pressure!!! My type of shopping!!!

Erol was never the happy Taxi driver that we intially hired, I am sure he was hoping to get a percentage of the coast they hoped we would purchase, but we got over it.