Here and there, in the villages, manure has been laid to dry in the spring sun. Cut into squares and stored until the following winter, it will serve as fuel in these desolate lands.
I head through Kurşunlu, and then Ilgaz the following day. In and of itself, walking no longer requires that I think about it. Like anyone in good shape, fit walkers are an ungrateful lot, hardly giving their body a thought.
The landscape has changed. I’m now back under an elevation of 1,000 meters, and the forest covers the slopes once more. I was more partial to the steppe with its endless horizons. In downtown Ilgaz, two old-fashioned pieces of equipment are on display that, in a few more years, will be bona fide antiquities: two driving carts and two ard plows. Here I have proof that in prioritizing the use of sturdy camels to transport goods, the peoples of Asia simply gave up trying to improve the cart. These particular vehicles, which must have been built fifty years ago, are so rustic that back home they’d look like something from the late Middle Ages: solid wheels, wicker bodywork, and no springs to dampen the impacts; they are neither sturdy nor lightweight. The wooden axles are still lubricated with beef tallow. Not a single piece of metal was used in their construction.
Starting in Ilgaz, I try to overnight in cities. It is simply easier to take care of my feet—yes, them again—in a hotel. Moving from city to city, without venturing into the villages, also lets me to cover ground more quickly. Paradoxically, slowpoke though I am—the same man who refuses to get into a truck, let alone a tractor—I’m in a bit of a hurry . . . and it’s the Iranians’ fault. Since to cross Turkey on foot I require at least eight to nine weeks, the Iranian Consulate in Paris made an exception and gave me a visa valid for two and a half months, instead of the usual two. But given the woes I’ve already experienced, I’m afraid of being delayed by another episode of poor health. In that case, I would run the risk of reaching the border after July 29, and my visa would have expired. An unthinkable scenario: it can take anywhere from two to four weeks to obtain a new entrance permit. Ideally, I ought to leave Turkey around July 14. Today is May 31. So I have a month and a half to cover from one thousand two hundred to one thousand three hundred kilometers (750 to 810 miles). That’s doable, provided my guardian angel takes good care of me and I get ten days ahead of the walking schedule I set for myself. These complicated calculations keep me busy and tire me out at the same time: must the sweet and free folly of following the mythical Silk Road become so constraining and a source of such stress?
The distance I hike each day keeping as close as possible to the old caravan trail is determined entirely by the Silk Road’s geography. To get to Kurşunlu, I walked thirty-three kilometers, and to reach Ilgaz, thirty-six kilometers. These are not arbitrary distances. Caravans traveled between thirty and forty kilometers a day; that is, nine to ten hours at the slow pace of a fully loaded camel. Yesterday’s stopover cities were therefore spaced a one day’s journey by camel apart, before motor vehicles shortened distances. Ever since a traveler can cover from five hundred to a thousand kilometers in one day (310 to 620 miles), the infrastructure intended for caravans is no longer needed. So the deserted caravansaries, now useless, have been allowed to fall . . . into ruin. The phenomenon is not limited to Turkey. In Europe, in France, starting in the early twentieth century, big cities experienced steady growth to the detriment of smaller communities. And in the villages where hotels have disappeared for lack of guests, town planners have built, thanks to the rebirth of rural tourism, guesthouses offering those who love to walk shelter at reasonable distances, a one-day journey on foot.
Hot weather has arrived. In the valley of the winding Devrez River, marshes were transformed into rice patties some thirty years ago. From the road overlooking the plain, the small, geometrically arranged squares of water are like mirrors, and above them glide storks and herons. There are great numbers of them throughout the region. Peasant farmers armed with shovels perform a tightrope act on the embankments around each parcel. In order to maintain the water level in each square, they’ve developed a clever grid of small drainage channels. The women, up to their knees in water, their broad dresses floating around them, are either planting fresh rice seedlings or pulling weeds. On the road, I catch sight of a young woman striding majestically toward me: she’s leading a horse fitted with a packsaddle to which two huge wicker baskets have been hitched. The scene has a classic, even royal gracefulness about it. As I prepare to take her picture, she throws me a black smile: her mouth, completely toothless, is like the dark abyss of Hell.
The stretch from Ilgaz to Tosya is rough. It promises to be hot and long, if I’m to believe my map, which tells me it’s a distance of thirty-eight kilometers. Overhead, a buzzard is lazily flapping its wide wings in the still air, looking for an updraft to glide on. I get what it’s going through!
In a service station where I buy a bottle of fruit juice, a local farmer stops his tractor and rushes over to me pointing at my pack. “What is this motor on your back?” he asks. The Turks love machinery and know nothing about walking.
The road seems long, and I suddenly realize why. The distance shown on my map between two cities is the distance separating two crossroads, heading, for example, to Ilgaz or Tosya. But the centers of these two cities are themselves several kilometers from the main road. All in all, I’ll have walked forty-six kilometers to reach Tosya. The last few are the toughest. It is a long, steep, straight climb to the top of the hill where the city is perched. One, two, then three kilometers go by, and I still don’t see the city center. I’m thirsty. I filled my two-liter water jug twice today and bought several cans of coke and fruit juice. In all, more than six liters to fight dehydration—despite the salt pills I dutifully ingest. I’m crushed beneath my gear. If I find a comfortable hotel, I’ll stay the day in Tosya to get some rest. But is there, in Tosya, a comfortable hotel?
Most often, in the smaller cities, there’s only one hotel. So the choice is easy. I ask questions that I would never think to ask in France: Is there a shower? If so, does it have hot water? Even if the reply is yes, you still have to check. On one occasion, a hotel manager described a cold-water tap over an antique washstand at the end of a hallway as a “shower.” And even when there is hot water, it’s not always available. At seven in the morning, it may be boiling, at eight tepid, at nine it’s cold, and in the evening, just as you check in, it’s ice cold. Most often, rooms are shared, and so there’s no key in the door. This is problematic: since each object stowed in my bag is absolutely indispensable, I can’t risk having something stolen.
All climbs finally end. In Tosya, the first signs are a series of concrete buildings with dirt courtyards that have been raked and oiled and are heaped high with scrap metal. A common sight at the entrance to midsized towns: a hundred machine shops or auto repair garages for tinkering with cars, motorcycles, and agricultural machinery. As I crest the hill, I’m rewarded for all the effort. Off in the distance, Tosya’s mountain is still covered in snow. The city, shaped like a cirque, backs up against a rocky cliff that protects it from the north wind. At this time of day, a blood-colored sun colors the walls of the city’s little white houses with purple roofs, terraced like the steps of an ancient theater all the way into the center of the cirque where I am standing. Stage left: small grapevines enclosed by low walls provide a touch of green to the landscape. Stage right: a barren valley, long and narrow, sinks, beyond where the eye can see, into the heart of the Earth. It’s magical. A harmonious balance between nature and manmade structures. This is the prettiest town I’ve seen since Istanbul.
The hotel—whew!—is comfortable. The pen pauses before scrawling the rate: regular or tourist? The tourist rate it is. But I could care less. The soles of my shoes are digging into my feet. My hips are bleeding, stinging from sweat and the friction of my hip belt. I unwind by taking a long shower, and the water is nearly hot. Then I tend to my wounds and stretch out for a half hour on the bed, allowing my strength to return little by little. The
lamb bulgur I’m served gives me the rest of my energy back, and I scurry off in search of a cybercafé like a young bride to meet her betrothed for the first time. Unfortunately, for the fifteen computers, there’s but one line. What’s more, the lack of telephone infrastructure in the city means you can’t always get a dial tone. But given how ready I am to overcome all the hassles that “civilization” has brought us, the God of communications grants me a connection for three seconds. Enough to find out that I have four messages. To hear them, I’ll have to try again tomorrow. I turn in early. At 7:00 a.m., I’m awake, but so tired that I jump back to bed at eight and don’t resurface till noon. I’ve slept for one full turn of the dial. That hasn’t happened to me in thirty years.
In the afternoon, I set out to gather information on Tosya and the Silk Road. Jean-Baptiste Tavernier—yes, him again—states in his memoirs that he saw in this city “a beautiful mosque and one of the most attractive caravansaries.” Tosya (the word means “three waters”), originally called Docea and then Zoaka during the Byzantine Empire, was invaded twelve times in twenty centuries. Incidentally, a conference is being held in the city to commemorate the seven hundredth anniversary of the Ottoman invasion of Anatolia. A retired professor, author of several historical studies on the city, tells me that a local tribe, the Lidyalı,* invented currency and minted the first coins. South of the city, but too far for me to make a detour, is the small village of Boğazkale (boh-ah’-zkuh-luh), the former city of Hattusa, the capital of the Hittite Empire.
Kürşat Konca (kur-shaht’ kon-djah), a mechanical engineering student whose English is quite good, offers to be my guide. The beautiful shrine described by Tavernier still exists. Although called “the new mosque,” it was constructed in the sixteenth century by a student of the famous Turkish architect, Mimar Sinan. It is he who, among other things, built the Süleymaniye Mosque in Istanbul. The imam proudly shows us around the edifice, which has undergone considerable maintenance and consolidation work, especially after a fire in 1913 as well as several earthquakes, the last in 1946. The temple can hold seven hundred of the faithful, a thousand on feast days. It boasts two curiosities. The first is a small column, flanking a window and neither cemented nor load-bearing, that can be made to rotate in place by hand. The legend goes that as long as it continues to turn, the mosque will be protected. The other oddity is a clock, whose walnut woodwork was recently restored and which recites its tick-tock litany next to the mihrab, the niche indicating the direction of Mecca. The imam doesn’t know how old it is. No date has been found, either on the original frame or on the movement. The dial bears a name in its upper part—either that of the manufacturer or of the merchant: “Makoulian.” Beneath the spindle of the clock’s hands is written in French, in beautiful, ornate letters: “À Constantinople.” It appears, therefore, to have been constructed before the city was renamed Istanbul, in the early fifteenth century. This is borne out by the fact that the reference is in Latin letters and not in Arabic characters. This is not surprising: in Constantinople, craftsmen working on clocks or other mechanisms in the Greek tradition were highly respected. I look over the piece carefully: the “nails” indicating the hours differ as a function of whether the top of the symbol is turned toward the outside, or the inside, of the dial. It is, indeed, extremely fine workmanship.
On the other hand, and despite how hard I look, I find no sign of “one of the most attractive caravansaries” described by Tavernier. It has undoubtedly gone the way of the Ottoman houses, which, here as elsewhere, are crumbling for lack of repair. Still, I learn that, an hour and a half from Tosya in the village of Safranbolu, there is a kind of open-air museum, toured by a great many Turks because of its very beautiful traditional houses. Proof that the country is indeed capable of celebrating its rich past. Why does everything take so long and happen so chaotically? This infuriates me, since—as if you didn’t already know—I have a particular interest in the preservation of caravansaries.
As the afternoon draws to an end, Kürşat and I go to the hammam where, once again, I see just how modest the Turks are. It’s a bit of a surprise, as I’m used to locker rooms in the West where, in communal showers, nudity is the rule. The Turkish bath shower ceremonial takes place in very prescribed manner. We undress in a small room, then, covered in a pareu-like towel from waist to toe, we enter a first superheated chamber, and then a second, which is like a steam room. The walls and benches are made of white marble. We splash ourselves, while chatting away, using a small dish, scooping up water from any of several different basins, also made of marble. After a half hour, a masseur drowns me in a deluge of soap, using a horsehair glove. In the changing room, lying on bunks and drinking a carafe of ayran, we continue gabbing away after an employee has bundled us up in thick terrycloth towels from head to foot. The caravanners, who, like me, took a good sweat bath out on the road, must have gone to the hammam: not a single caravansary that I visit throughout my journey has a washroom.
The city has one unique feature: almost all the vehicles are motorcycles equipped with sidecars. They’re used for everything: to transport people and cargo, and, by and large, their owners manage small vineyards. They’re all, of course, equipped with horns, and their drivers overuse them. A few young show-offs amuse themselves by driving about with the third wheel—that of the sidecar—in the air. Lightheartedness floats in the city air tonight, a noisy, generous cheerfulness.
In the evening, my guide’s mother invites me for dinner. The family leads a European lifestyle. Neither the mother, a retired teacher, nor Kürşat’s sister wear headscarves. Seated at table—and not on the ground, as in villages—we eat delicious meze: profuse, diverse, and colorful, in a word, royal. Emel, a slender teenager, is obviously thrilled to meet a Westerner, and his curiosity knows no bounds. Our discussion focuses primarily on the economic and political situation. Could the trial of the PKK’s leader, Öcalan, be the first sign that the situation of the Kurds will be resolved? The Turkish economic crisis and double-digit inflation can be explained to a large extent by the considerable sums needed to maintain one of the world’s largest armies. It’s a well-known vicious circle: the soldiers earn double pay, owing to the conflict with the Kurds. So, quite naturally, they side, along with others of course, with the powerful and determined war party. Ruinous inflation is turning the poorest of the poor into street dwellers. And although the military’s reputation remains positive, the prospect of having to do two years of service is no longer the source of any real pride among young intellectuals.
This dinner party revitalizes me: the limited exchanges that I’ve had in the villages, although they were often warm, did nothing to quench my thirst for connections and communication. Here, we have real conversation, all four of us, in a comfortable atmosphere of trust, and it’s as though we all have something to gain from it. When it’s time for farewells, Emel gives me a kiss. It’s the only opportunity that I’ll have during my entire journey to brush my stubbly beard against a woman’s cheek.
As I leave the city very early in the morning in the direction of the large valley I saw at my arrival, I travel through the concrete-clad districts of the lower city that, fortunately, I hadn’t seen two days prior. And so, for a time anyway, I was able to believe that I’d arrived at heaven’s door. After four hours on foot, I finally locate what it would be a stretch to call a grocery. I buy a few cookies, which I nibble on farther down the road on an embankment. Meanwhile, a herd of cows grazing on grass in the shadow of a high cliff intrigues me; the animals seem to simply vanish, one after another. Too bad if it means a slight detour, I want to get to the bottom of this and figure out how the mountain can swallow up batches of cattle. Well, it is quite simple: there’s an opening in the cliff such that, once their bellies are full, they can go digest their meal in the cool air of a troglodytic stable: their very own Ali Baba’s cave.
The valley narrows as it climbs to the top of a mountain pass. Along the roadside at the summit sits a human torso. That of a
legless old man who lives here, ten kilometers from the nearest occupied house. Beside him, a teakettle, black from soot, is purring away over a few sparse coals. He sleeps under the stars in a nearby thicket into which he drags himself at nightfall. A few good souls bring him water and food from time to time. Truckers toss him coins nonstop. I give him a note worth 250,000 liras, which he presses against his chest, and he launches into a long speech. I think he says something about Allah repaying me a hundredfold. A sum that, alas, still won’t be very much. I’d rather He take better care of these beings who have so little. The image of the old man with his eyes turned skyward comes back to me: it would be fitting for the two of them to be able to keep each other company.
On the other side of the pass, I discover another plain of rice paddies, shining with the light of a thousand suns reflected in the water. Surrounding these perfectly aligned, flat parcels, rise up, in confrontational chaos, the Kös Dağı (kuhs-dah’ ) Mountains, still covered in snow. On the foothills of this massif, green soils supply an inexhaustible source of clay, which explains why so many brickyards lie along the road I’m traveling.
In late afternoon, I arrive in the village of Hacıhamza (ha-djuh-ham’-zuh), which was an important stopover along the Silk Road. The village is laid out in an unusual, interesting way. Unlike other places, there was no distinct caravansary in the village or anywhere nearby. Here, the caravansary was the village itself. It’s still enclosed with walls made of a mix of earth and stone. It’s a small, square fortress, about one hundred meters (328 feet) on each side. The houses built inside are supported by the perimeter wall. Each one has a balcony-like structure jutting out in corbelled construction, thus forming a tower for observation and defense. The village portal has disappeared. Inside, I find an immense, partially collapsed stable, about twenty meters (66 feet) across. The part that’s still standing, a large brick archway of surprising finesse, is a good thirty meters (100 feet) long.
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