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Sunday, November 10th - Polatli to Kulu - 14,030 km
Coen and Vincent have just left on the bus to Ankara. I have cycled so long on my own but now, after only cycling together a week, I feel anxious about doing today on my own. It’s ridiculous. After all, it has been perfectly safe here, as safe as Europe, although it looks different. I can’t imagine anything could be as dangerous as the war in Croatia.
I stop at a caravanserai, a walled courtyard meant to protect the caravans following the Silk Road from the shores of the Aegean to Uzbekistan and eventually China from thieves. There is not much to see but it is a thrill to know that I am actually on the Silk Road. I used to call the roads I rode on with Mike Silk in the first three months of my trip the Silk Roads. Too bad he isn’t here riding with me now (Not!).
I have set off on a south-east diagonal called Hwy 260 towards the town of Haymana. The terrain is fairly flat with a few low hills outcropping across the landscape. It is definitely desert this patches of irrigated fields on the lowest parts, the soil exposed after harvest and waiting for the first frost. It won’t be long. I can’t see why Europeans cycle travelers love this terrain. Yes, it’s different from Europe but not in a good way. It is empty, dirty, bleak and the towns are not designed for livability. I guess I am not used to poverty. I will need to change my perception to deal with these changes.
I cross a couple small ridges and the valleys between to reach Haymana. It has taken me two hours. It’s definitely a small town without notable attractions, but there is a market here. I am hungry so I stop to buy some fruit. A couple Kurdish men stop me to say hello and ask where I am going. They are impressed that I am from the other side of the world. Most of Turkey, including this part, is free of tourist so I am an anomaly.
I give them my best wishes and set out again. The way beyond Haymana is not as clear or direct as before. When I have stopped to check my map, a truck pulls over to offer me a ride. They seem like honest men so I accept their offer. They say they want to show me their village. I explain I am on my way to Kulu but I would like to see their village if it is not too far. They are pleased by that and set of on a road to the south-west, not exactly the direction I am headed. They roll on and on and I tell them this is too far out of my way, but they will hear nothing of it. They make it sound like I am insulting them to come this far and change my mind.
I accept the fate I have chosen and endure the ride, having lost all sense of where I am on my map. At least I can see a more traditional village and see how they live, I tell myself. The Kurds let me out in a dusty, unpaved hamlet in the middle of nowhere. There’s nothing at all worth seeing here. They are really pleased I have let them bring me here, but then they disappear without introducing me, telling me about the town or how to get to Kulu from here. I guess they have work to do.
I have no idea where I am but I figure it I head east I will eventually get to Kulu. I am two hours on these roads, making several turns but trying to keep myself pointed to the east. Finally I reach a paved road. What a relief, but I am at a crossroads and it is not clear which way I should go.
There is a family working and playing in their front yard across the street. I see a truck coming so I wait for it to pass before crossing, but at the last moment a kitten belonging to the daughter runs into the street and is hit by the truck. The cat jerks in spasms for a couple seconds then it is dead. A family drama begins to unfold before me, the young daughter running into the arms of her mother and sobbing, the father stopping his work to come over to tend to her too.
I am upset too, but I am running out of time to get to Kulu before dark, if that is even still possible. There is no perfect moment to approach the family now, so I don’t wait. I cross the road and, forgetting my manners, ask the mother which way is it to Kulu. She looks at me impatiently, and calls her husband over to talk to me. He points the way to Kulu, just to get rid of me.
I know where I am now. It is a straight line east from here to Kulu. The land is flat or, if anything, slightly dropping. The sun is setting behind me. It is still an hour to Kulu but if I can keep moving without interruption I will reach the edge of the city before it is totally dark.
Suddenly, I am spotted by a couple of guard dogs a half a kilometre away from me. They jump to their feet and take after me. This is ridiculous, I laugh to myself. I can easily outrun them. I crank my speed up to 30 km/hr, figuring they will tire before they reach me, but I am wrong. They cut me off 20 m in front of me and come towards me. They mean business. They are very, very large – mastiffs with huge spiked collars each weighing more than I do, each capable of killing me. The best I can hope for is being left half-alive after a serious mauling.
I suppose one never knows himself until he is caught in a life threatening crisis. I transform into the Chief Admiral of the British Navy responding to an attack by an enemy fleet. I begin issuing orders to the dogs like every life depends on it. They know they are working for humans, that inevitably we are ultimately in command, so I make it very clear that I am not afraid, that they have done something bad and that I am not happy about it. They continue towards me a step at a time, barking their heads off and displaying awesome sets of teeth, until they are about five metres away. They stop and stand there barking and growling at me. The rhetoric dies down but all three of us are silent, just looking at each other.
I have proven one point. They need my ‘permission’ to attack, a signal that I am vulnerable and ready to run. I won’t give it to them. We stand there awkwardly for about a quarter of an hour. They are no longer looking me right in the eye, not wanting to let me go and not sure if they want to challenge my dominance. I decide to move away slowing but they take this as me running away. They don’t even let me get a metre before resuming their attack.
I can’t allow them an inch. If they get too close they won’t stop. I turn on them angrily and say, “GET OUT OF HERE!” at the top of my voice. They stop again, a metre closer than before. The exchange of barking and shouting continues for a minute more and the we are back to the same stalemate. Without turning away I check the flat fields around me. There is no one in sight and no headlights of vehicles coming either way. Ten more minutes pass. The sun has just set and I am still over half an hour away from Kulu without lights. I can wait here until some vehicle comes but that may be an hour or more and I am at a further disadvantage when all I can see is their eyes.
I am fed up now and very anxious to move on. I give it one more try, inching my bike away. This time I get two metres before they come at me again. I whirl around, pissed off to the point that I am no longer acting. “What the FUCK is YOUR PROBLEM?” I scream at them. “This is MY ROAD,” I point dramatically at the pavement, “so SHUT UP and SIT DOWN!”. I am so worked up that I am moving towards them and shaking my arm, pointed for them to sit down.
O, this isn’t turning out right, I can see them thinking. They are upset and perhaps afraid that they might be doing something gravely wrong. One of them groans out of frustration and resignation. They both sit down and turn their heads away in opposite directions. They are deliberately ignoring me in the hopes I won’t be there when they look back. I take my cue. I mount my bike and ride off. I glance back to see if they are responding. They are still sitting on the pavement with their heads turned as far away from me as possible without turning their bodies. In a strange way, they actually look cute.
So it is finally pitch black and I am going about 25 km/hr through the blackness. The lights of Kulu are 10 km away and their faint glow off the pavement in front of me is all I need to see the edge of the road. The glow slowly gets brighter as I get closer. Then coming up behind me I hear a tractor. Glancing back I see it loaded with Kurds and slowing gaining on me. I am exhausted, physically and emotionally, but I give it all I have to outrun them. I am not afraid of them robbing me. After this afternoon, it’s their help fear.
It is no use. They are moving too fast. They catch me and won’t take no for an answer when I refuse their ride. Two men hoist my bike onto the top of their hay load and another grabs my hand and helps me up. He clears an oil drum for me to sit on. Gawd, I hope they are going into Kulu and not to some farm off a dirt road, I pray. But as the city grows closer it is clear that they are taking me there. I am so relieved and even grateful, for I am now really spent after that last burst.
I mention the name of the hotel where I am to meet Coen and Vincent and they know where it is. They drop me off right in front of it and I thank them profusely. How stupid of me to want to reject their help. I walk to the front desk and ask for Coen and Vincent. They are there, all right. The proprietor shows me to the garage where I can lock my bike. I take my panniers and sleeping roll inside.
The proprietor leaves me with a very disapproving look, so contrary to the friendliness I have met everywhere in Turkey until now. Coen and Vincent and relieved to see me. “We were about to give up on you,” Coen says. “What happened to your cycling shorts?” Vincent asks. My beautiful yellow cycling shorts with shoulder straps, the ones I bought in Belgium, are soaked with crude oil. The oil drum the Kurds gave me to sit on was leaking. There is no way to salvage them now. I carefully remove them in the bathroom and tuck them into a garbage bag. What a day this has been!
PHOTO 1: between Polatli and Haymana
PHOTO 2: the land turns to desert beyond Haymana
PHOTO 3: landscape on the way to the Kurdish village
PHOTO 4: two boys on a donkey
PHOTO 5: the Kurdish village
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