Update!! Macho mentality

Oh! How I hate the macho mentality!

I am doing a workaway at a cafe-restaurant in Crete, all the tourist are very nice. However, the local men think that women are here to serve them. They do not ask, they demand, and they expect you to serve them with a smile.   And of course, none of them tip.

It is good that they don’t come that often, once a week is more than enough for me. Only four of them come every day, and they don’t complain, they eat whatever I give them.

Well, when I cook the tourist do not know if it is done right or not. However, the local men know the Cretan way, so if I cook something a little different, they let me know.

Like I told them more than once, I am not from here!!! So they can eat what I cook or they can go someplace else.

 Jaja… there is no other place in town.

At least now the owner is back, so he is cooking, I just serve. YEAH!!!

As long as I am bitching: everybody smokes inside.

Three more days and to Santorini I’ll go…

Update

Today there was a memorial service at the church, from 8 AM to 10:30 AM.

After the service, everybody came to the restaurant to eat and drink.

I had all the tables ready and the food was in the refrigerator or on the counters. I thought I was so organized…

As soon as everybody arrived, the men sat at the tables, and the women run into the kitchen.

They run here and there, serving the men. They put the food on the tables, they served them.  They made the coffee, they took care of everything.

There were way too many women in there, one on top of the other, taking care of everything. Obviously, I left the kitchen as soon as they came and I saw what they were doing. After all, who am I to tell them they cannot do it. The way I look at it, less work for me.

They even washed the dishes and glasses and cleaned the kitchen, while I sat in the patio with a very nice man from Norway. He was bicycling through the area and stopped to get a drink. Well, he ate a lot, because they kept on feeding him too.

So, now I understand why the men act the way they do.

They are not allowed to do anything, it is the women job to serve them and take care of them.

And to top it all, some of the women put some chairs in the kitchen and eat there. Incredible!  

The mineral thermal waters of Pamukkale, Turkey

I have seen pictures of Pamukkale so of course, I wanted to go there, and I am so glad I did.

Pamukkale which means “cotton castle” is a hill full of terraces formed by mineral thermal waters in the center of Turkey.

                As you get to the park (35 TL = $ 11.96) you walk up the white mineral formation toward the natural pools in the terraces.

As the walk is over the mineral, you have to walk bare foot. I don’t like to be bare foot, much less walking on stones, so I put my river shoes and I went up.

                The white mineral waters in the pools are only one to two feet deep, just enough to sit in the water and get wet.  These waters are rich in chalk, calcium, travertine and limestone.  These are slightly radioactive minerals and they are supposed to be great for ailments, as arthritis, muscle aches, and many other aches and pains. Of course just one day and a little dip won’t do anything to you. You will need to go there for at least one week to see any results, if there are any.

Of course, where there are thermal waters, they were Romans.  They built a spa circa 190 BC next to the terraces.

There are ruins of a Roman Theater, a necropolis (5 TL = $ 1.71) with some sarcophagus and an antique pool with submerged Roman columns as the result of an earthquake (32 TL = $ 10.93). Of course I went swimming in the thermal waters of the antique pool. I sat at one of the columns until my fingers stared to wrinkle and to look purple. Event that I did not want to get out I did.  I was so relax, I felt great!

I did some more walking to see the ruins of a church and some of the gardens, and then back to the terraces.

On the way down I took a dip in all the terraces once again.

It was a great day, very beautiful and relaxing.

Fairy Chimneys of Cappadocia

In the center of Turkey in Anatolia, at the foot of the Taurus Mountains, you find the most amazing natural site.

Formed by volcanic erosion over 4000 years ago, are the most breathtaking cones and towers formations known as fairy chimneys.

Since the Bronze era this area has been inhabited by Hittite.

These fairy chimneys were used by troglodytes (cave dwellers) and later on by Christians.

 There are many underground cities, and tunnels with churches, monasteries and chapels, with beautiful frescos or rudimentary seccos.

You can also see the influence of Byzantine and Islamic eras in the paintings.

Due to rain and wind eroding the soft rock, the fairy chimneys lose 2 millimeters = 0.5/64 inches a year.  At the same time new fairy chimneys are formatted. However the change is so miniscule that it is impossible to see. It will take one million years to see a different landscape. So, I guess I won’t’ see it.

There are many different types of formations, and all of them are dramatically beautiful.

From the beehives to the mushroom tops, varying in color from cream to gray, to peach, they are amazing.

This is a must see place.

Backpacking my style: Sunday March 13, 2016, attack in Ankara, Turkey

Backpacking my style: Sunday March 13, 2016, attack in Ankara, Turkey: You know when all over the sudden you want to do something without know why? Yesterday was one of those days. I went to the mall to...

Sunday March 13, 2016, attack in Ankara, Turkey

You know when all over the sudden you want to do something without know why?

Yesterday was one of those days.

I went to the mall to buy a new pair of jeans, because the ones I have are more holes than jeans. I walked one mall, and then I went to another one and nothing. All over the sudden I felt very tired.

As I was going back can forth in my head:

“I am tired. I want to go back to the hotel.

But it’s only one more floor to see…

But I won’t’ find anything anyway, so why go”.

And so on.

So, I decided to go back to the hotel.

I took a bus instead of the metro because I wanted to see some of the city.

I walked the three blocks from the bus station to the hotel, stopping at the park to take couple pictures.

After arriving at the hotel, I stayed in the lobby talking with 3 guys. All over the sudden, the building shook tremendously, for what seemed an eternity.

The noise of the explosion and the trembling of the building felt like if the explosion had been next door to us.

A suicide car bomber exploded by the Kizilay Square on Ataturk Bulvari, between the bus station and metro station, three blocks from the hotel I am staying, right in the center of town. There are some government ministries on that street too. I guess that was the reason of the target location.

Many people were running, crying and screaming. Cars were backing up as the sirens kept getting louder.  

Total chaos.

I was amazed about the speed that the police, the fire department, ambulances, and some police with a different type of uniform, responded to the bombing. It was less than a minute by the time we heard the sirens.

So far there are 37 dead and 153 injured.

Two Kurdish militants, a man and a woman, orchestrated the attack. However, no group has claimed responsibility for it.

Three weeks ago it was another attack by a Kurdish group also in Ankara, which killed 29 military personnel.

Just to think that that is the metro I take all the time. However, today, after only walking for 6 hours, I was tired and I came back earlier than normal. And I decided to take a bus so I could see the city. The bus terminal is one block from the metro station in the direction of the bombing.

Just to think that one hour earlier I was there, crossing the square and stopping to take some pictures…

I guess it was my lucky day. But not for the people that died. Many young people, teenagers died.

And for what?

And where is the outcry of the people?

This is the third attack in Ankara in the last few months.

In the first one 102 people died, the second one 29 and now, 37 as far as I know.

And still no outcry for all these lives lost.
 My daughter was trying to find some information in the news about the attack, and nothing.
Only a little mention  in CNN about the fact that one of the perpetrators was a woman

i guess people in other countries are more important than Turks.

Kizilay Square before the attack