One of My Best Days in Turkey - July 9, 2010

My visit to Bursa began with a grueling, 13-hour, cross-country bus ride from Sinop, but yesterday easily made up for it as I enjoyed one of my best days in Turkey.


Bursa is Turkey's fourth largest city and the center of the country's automotive and textile industry. On a map, look due south of Istanbul.


In addition to its current economic importance, Bursa is also known for its past. The first capital of the Ottoman Empire was located here in the 1400s. Yesterday, I went to tour some of the sites from that time period.


In the photo below, this might look like a tapestry on the wall in the Yeşil Mosque, but actually the wall is covered with hand-painted tiles.


The architecture here marked the beginning of a purely Turkish style that later spread across the Ottoman Empire.

Also, check out the exquisite tile work adorning the Yeşil tomb. The walls, too, are covered with tiles.

O.K., you might be thinking this is just an ordinary bridge.

Actually, it is only 1 of 4 bridges in the world with stores. The original from the 1400s was destroyed but eventually rebuilt.

Bursa's Ulucami (Great Mosque) also dates back from the 1400s.

One of my favorite things to do abroad is to walk through local markets. Some in Bursa are 700 years old.

My hosts in Bursa are Mehmet, his wife Yeşim, and their daughter Deniz.

They are not Couch Surfers. Instead, I met the family through a friend of a friend in America. Like all my other hosts in Turkey, the family made me feel welcome immediately.

In fact, when my bus from Sinop pulled into the station at 3:30 in the morning, Mehmet was waiting with a smile on his face.

After I did my sightseeing yesterday, Mehmet had a wonderful surprise - my first trip to a Turkish bath. In the picture, I am somewhere underneath all of those towels.

Here's how it works. A bather strips down and wraps himself or herself with a cloth (men and women bathe separately).

First, the bather goes into a marble-covered room....

where he dips a small pail into these basins lining the walls for water to lather up and rinse off.

Next, the bather goes into a type of steam room, which also contains basins with hotter water and a hot tub in the middle.

This part of the experience alone is exhilirating. but there's more.

Now, a bather walks into another room where an attendant, armed with a coarse cloth mitten, scrubs down the customer from head to toe, washes his or her hair, and repeatedly rinses the customer with soothing hot water.

It is an unbelievably relaxing sensation.

Finally, the bather is led to a meditation room, where he or she is toweled off by another attendant and left to soak in the atmosphere and listen to the hypnotic sounds of water bubbling out of a fountain. Beverages and food are available on request.

The Turkish bath is a centuries-old tradition, which the Turks picked up from the Byzantines, who got it from the Romans.

The Kervansaray bathhouse that I visited was renovated in 1389. No one is sure how many centuries it was in operation before then.

Do yourself a favor and experience at least one Turkish bath in your lifetime.

Later that evening, Mehmet and his family took me to a dinner meeting of the Bursa-ULUDAG Rotary Club. We dined aboard a ship that has been converted into a restaurant and hotel.

Once again, everyone welcomed me, as if I were a longtime member.

When I arrived, I was honored to be asked to speak at the meeting. With Deniz at my side translating, I shared the background of my trip and shared stories of the tremendous kindness I had experienced throughout Turkey.

Afterward, as I was savoring the fine food and relishing the fine company, the feeling surfaced once again about how truly lucky I am to have been invited into the lives of so many Turks.

This is why I travel. Sites are great, but I will forever treasure the memories of time I've spent with people around the globe, memories like the ones from last night with Mehmet's family at a Rotary Club meeting aboard a ship in Bursa.

I felt true joy.

Last night, I also thought back to a year and a half ago when I questioned whether I should set up my blog, for fear it might be a silly idea or might not work. Fortunately, I said "yes," which has led me on this magical journey through Turkey.

Many times, I've said "no" to new experiences life offered me, mainly out of fear, but this trip is teaching me that when we say "yes" it just might open up the door to a series of wonderful events beyond what we could have ever imagined.