entering Erzincan from erik ekedahl on Vimeo.
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Erzincan and the knee
The last few days have been a real test of my motivation. From Sivas the road climbed up the hills to a desolate country where the people in fact were nothing like the ones I have met inte Turkey so far. Short tempered and not at all interested in a lonely traveler, much like the people in northern Europe in fact. 
into the
I set out in the morning, stocked up on choclate before long and then started the long climb past the first three passes. up on the plateau i quite enjoyed having a day with favourable winds and some good sun.
Night arrived, along with four angry dogs. After fending them of with my new stick I found a restaurant where I though i could get some help finding a camp site. The mafia style employees merely laught loudly at my concern about the dogs, except one of them that helpt me find a parked semi trailer to pitch my tent in, great stuff. Apart from the shaking in the trailer when cars passed on the road I slept undisturbed and woke up to a new day.
I took the first pass at 2190m before brekky and stopped in the vally to enjoy corba, turkish lentil soup with some week old bread. old bread makes me loose trust for a reaturant.If they can not afford or do not care to have fresh bread I feel pretty sure that they do not care too much about the rest of the kitchen and I therefore stay clear of all meat.
My knee started to ache badly after breakfast and I tried several tricks like biking with only one leg but this was all in vain, when it comes to a 15% incline and a 50kg bike, one needs two legs, or I do at least. I made it over the last pass, stopped to fill up on water by one of the numerous water holes along the way and was met by a busload of men who looked at me smilingly, I was in no mood for mockery and shot down the hill with the wind in my hair that sprinkled with two day old sweat was just as formable as pottery clay. Funny.
I arrived in Erzincan, had a shower, a feed and a beer and broke in my new linnens with a snore. Good night.
Q¨s
Turkish TV, what it lacs in quality it makes up for in breast size. As my friend in Ankara said “I like the Swedish TV, the hosts are not taken for their looks, you can go out on the street and see someone more good looking right away.”
For starters, there are several channels broadcasting music videos, of varying quality. The best features nice cars, some impressive settings with proper light work while the videos on a tighter budget scheme might be set in a shady room with bizzare light work. What these videos all have in common is the ladies, weather they are the lead role singer or just an act they have drop most of the cover and appears strangely big breasted.
This is not uncommon anywhere I guess but I get the impression that here it is mandatory. The hiphop vidoes are as always vanguard when it comes to public expo and this with complete lac of rythm in the dance. There is usually a number of guys in the background looking luke perry over their sunglases and are trying to look brilliant while spasticly moving.
Moving on to more serious matters, like the news we again encounter the big breasted beauty queen in all her glory. I’m not saying you can’t be a great journalist and still look like barbie, but here it is rule, not an exception.
Furthermore and to something compleatly different, why does everyone in turkey have two or more cellphones? I have seen farmers with two flashy cells mustering their cows with a stick. Is advertising that good, god i got to learn turkish!
back out again!
check out Paolos trip!
I was a long day, much due to my stomach making me slow down a bit and make regular stops at the road side. Pushing up hills, the road covered with what seems to be macadam and tar, was even harder than usually. Finally found a gas station where I could pitch my tent and get some supplies. Not the most glamorus camp, but in Turkey the gas stations have a sense of oasis, often with trees planted and heavily watered green grass as a sharp contrast to the dry and desolate surroundings.
What also must be noted is that almost always they have a real friendly staff, people always smiling handing me a tea as soon as my glass is empty. Yesterday, also a gas station night I spent some hours trying to communicate with an odd group of individuals. there was the two car washers that looked like something out of the movie “Fresh”, real hiphp style, not sure they even knew it themselves. More, a man with a wild stare, and a panting, alkohol smelling breath who told me about the philosophers in Europe, in Turkish, from which I understood nothing of. But it is beautiful, they have the interest and they really give it a shot. One of the hiphopers, who was about fifty and who constantly was trying to drag me along to a neighbouring bar for a crawl had been a singer, in a former life. He showed me a CD with a picture of a young man. and he gesticulated that he was playing a string instrument and drinking a lot. Great fun it is to meet people on the road. Even more so whenthe landscape is not so interesting.
I’m somewhere between Ankara and Sivas now and the landscape really is quite flat and farmed. all day I have been spotting trucks loaded beyond the rims with onions and parsnips. Women,men and childrenworking the fields from morning til night to get the crop shipped and in a couple of places I have seen massive mounds of parsnips.
photo or fly with me
when sick, I do not really know what to do but to mess around with my photos. I took these three in a park close by to where I stay in Ankara. Little girl, birds, parents, all the essential elements of a poetic renaissance. In my opinion that is.
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what is you opinion?
Still in Ankara
My new Tubus rack was not designed for the Carradice bags, that is for sure but with a mix of will and violence I managed to get the packs on the rack. However when everything seems to be all set the little stomach starts showing of, circus style. My plans are changing, again, I stay another day to monitor how my bowl is behaving and then I set of for the green green grass in Georgia, some Russian studies and planing for the spring!
Interested in photography and always with high expectations on myself. I’m comparing the photos I take with the work of magnum photographers, it can kill the motivation on a bad day but now it has boosted my crave to take photos.
I watched a documentary on Araki, the japanese photographer that has teared down every convention and tabu. I can’t really make up my mind on what to think about some of his pictures and I see that as a very good quality. It is not always clear what he wants to say or if there is anything to understand except that the moment has some importance to him for some reason. In any case, it does not leave one undisturbed. I love that.
great inspiration he is anyway, for looking at things in a different way. For sure the debate about the role of women in his pictures is important. It is not possible to overlook the disturbing roles they play. A woman spread out naked on the floor with a watermelon crushed between her legs is difficult to cope with, that is all I can say and that is why it is interesting. It can’t be comprehended.
Realised last night that i had erased a couple of hundred photos from the south east of turkey before backing them up. That hurts. Lesson learned.
Ankara revisited
Friends in Ankara
Days are passing quickly in Ankara. Temperatures outside has leveled out at some 15 degrees after plunging to 5 from the summer heat. It looks like a dry and sunny fall is arriving in Anatolia. All for the better, since I’m moving north. From being quite indecisive about the winter route I have decided to head to Georgia and spend the cold month in a cold country. Leaving some room for winter camping trip into the Caucasus back country.
A week has passed since I arrived here. Apart from fixing my wheels I have been very inactive physically, which is quite interesting. Reading book and just laying around talking to someone is one of the things I have not been able to enjoy the last few years. Learning to relax and just gathering information, it is quite nice.
The south east was different. What people warned us of in Istanbul seemed when there to be mere exaggerations from people who only gather their information from the Turkish television. Finding the hospitality to be greater, the arms to be plentiful, one in every car and house and the military in jeep convoys as we reached Siverek. It never though gave the impression of being tensed, as I remember from the US, many had arms in their houses without this meaning that they were guerrilla or crazy. The relations between man and women more segregated than in the west, that is for sure. When invited to people we spent the evening with the men, on the floor in the living room. the only glimpse of the women we would get was when they arrived with food, tea or cleaning of the dishes. Helping out as a guest was out of the question. It is hard to accept in hindsight but while in the moment, it seems to be quite natural to the people involved.
In the next few days I move on, My nomad genes, or what ever it is tells me it is time to move north. Probably would not have been a good nomad some 1000 years ago when moving north meant freezing to death. times are changing, which is all good.
Read about homoerotic Haman here, about bikes breaking down here and about traveling in southeast Turkey here
Kurdistan
I left Elbistan as the dark clouds blew in from all sides but I was surprised to find myself in a beem of sunlight, shooting through an opening in the clouds, rather than drenched in rain. Had a few drops but after climbing some hills i was rather struggling against the heat, as I’m now getting used to. Feeling a bit lonely after having two weeks of company I let my mp3 player keep me company through the day. I was invited to lunch by some electricians working by the side of the road. Sitting in the gravel eating melon and tomatoes from a spread out newspaper was the highlight of the day.
At night fall I met Leon, a British biker coming from South Korea heading home. We decided to camp togheter and that night we decided, since we now had company to hit Nemrut Dagi, a stone head mountain just south of Malatlya. The morning after I realized that my back rack once again had given up and cracked in yet another place. bugger, luckily enough the Turks are skilled aluminum welders and I got it fixed for free in 5 minutes.
After a late start we only manage to climb the first hill, at the top we realize that there certainly would be more to come before we would reach our destination, only 40km on the map but for sure a hell lot more considering the serpentines. Kids along the way started to be annoying, constantly asking for money and things while pulling our kits got on our nerves. We had heard about people getting rocks thrown at them but we had nothing of that and luckily no dogs either. Just uphill, sun and a flat tire.
last bit to the top can be seen in the background
We reached the top of the ridge at 2000m on the second day out and we were celebrating what we thought was the end of the climb. After a short downhill and around a bend we looked up to see how the road turned and kept going up, seeming to aim at the top of the very highest peak around. That was a shock for the motivation. A deep breath and we climbed the last 400m gravel road while swearing and hoping that the sight at the top would be worth the two days of climbing.
So, however, we had to go down again, 10km of hand layed garden stones led us to our stormy camp site for the night. We had to snuggle into my tent both of us when Leon’s tent just about gave up for the gale force winds. Not much sleep that night, waking up just about every minute when the wind gusts lifted the tent.
The next morning we both realized that our rims were broken, we had to solve that and we stayed a night in a hotel in Siverek to figure it out. Siverek seemed to be a PKK stronghold and while asking the people on the opinion on Atakturk vs PKK the first got thumb down. It nowhere resembles the west of turkey, the people are different, they are more open and friendly but at the same time less considerate. My poor foot got ran over by ca car and the driver just shuddered his should like saying I should have watched out better.
Siverek
We decided in the end that we had to back to Ankara to fis the wheels, here we are after a night on a bus driven by a man with a death wish. We had to argue for a while before they would let the bikes on the bus, we were persistent and at the end they had to give in. Still makes me happy I only have to deal with that very rarely, on the bike there is no one to tell you what to bring on and what not. just the rim giving up occasionally when not considering the force of gravity
Alone again or
Love phrased it.
Filip, my partner in motion, my moving friend on the long lonely roads has decided his body took one to many for the team and is heading home. knees, stomach and other issues were starting to get nasty. I appreciate the time I had his company, now it is back to solo riding. We stayed the day in Elbistan, not the sweetest spot on the planet but there was the guy who welded my aluminum rack without safty glasses in two minutes for three liras, a bit over a euro.
Elbistan, moments before adhan
Listen to a short check up type interview at swedish radio SR.
Anyways, heading to Mardin, it is supposed to be a hot spot, after that i have to decide on a route north, there are plenty of choice, anyone with an idea, east or west of Van? what could be the best?
