Greece to Bulgaria

7/22 to 7/23

7/22

This afternoon we passed through the Dardanelles with Europe on one side and Asia on the other. A pilot boat came and helped our captain guide the MV Explorer through the straits. At one point, you could see Troy on one side of the strait and Gallipoli, the site of a major WWI battle, on the other. A little eerie.

We then entered the Sea of Marmara, the lake-like portion of ocean sandwiched between Bulgaria and Turkey and linking the Mediterranean and Black Seas, and passed through for several hours. 

Then, around 9pm tonight, we entered the Bosporus. At around 8:45, I grabbed my books, mug and hot chocolate mix and went up to the top decks, intending to make myself a hot chocolate (my first since Italy…Croatia and Greece were just too hot to drink hot chocolate) and study a little for my quiz tomorrow. No studying happened whatsoever. At first, the sun was just finishing setting and the sky above the western part of the city was lit up in pinks and purples. The Bosporus is about twenty miles of twisting and turning waterway, with the city of Istanbul hugging the water almost the entire way. Near the beginning, when some of the colors of the sunset were still visible, we passed by the Hagia Sophia. It’s not right on the water, but near the top of a hill close enough to have a great view. First of all, it’s huge and dwarfs all the surrounding buildings (except the great Blue Mosque, just a mile or so to the left). It was completely lit up so it almost glowed in a city which was already a mass of different colored lights twinkling against the fading twilight. I tried to get pictures, but most of mine are pretty blurry because the ship was always moving so the camera could never quite focus on the land. Hopefully some of my friends got better pictures than I did, and I took a video of both sides of the Bosporus.

What felt like (and what I hope was…nobody should have missed this) the entire ship was packed onto all the decks outdoors, and my friend and I made out way to the eighth deck at the bow, definitely the best vantage point, in time to cross under the first bridge. It was strung with huge blue lights in a diagonal zigzag pattern, and as we got closer everyone started going crazy. I took a short video here and everyone is cheering and taking pictures (even though almost everyone’s pictures were turning out at different colored blurs or bright city lights). Once we were on the other side of the bridge, fireworks began shooting off from the water where we had just passed, causing waves of new cheering and a mass relocation of people looking toward the fireworks. Just after the fireworks, the zigzag lights on the bridge began a lightshow. The changed colors and danced around just like you would expect at a hotel in Vegas. I have no idea if it was a holiday or if this is just what happens in Istanbul on a Friday night, but I intend to find out.

Buildings came down to the very edge of the sea almost everywhere along the Bosporus, and most of these buildings at the water’s edge were lit up spectacularly…I really hope some of my (or some of my friends’) pictures came out well. We then approached a second bridge, also lit up but in a more classic outline of the bridge and in a deep blue that did not change colors or dance, but was beautiful nonetheless. At this point, people started clearing off the eighth deck, so I could get a good spot at one of the handrails and not have to fight to see the city. Also it was completely dark, so the sky and ocean were almost the same color with the land between only a slightly deeper black covered with the glittering lights of Istanbul. At the risk of sounding sappy and overly romantic, it was as if all the stars in the light pollution-free sky had descended to the surface of the ocean and formed into the shape of land all around the ship to separate the sea from the sky. That is exactly what I was thinking when I was up watching this about an hour and a half ago…probably because I was so overwhelmed by Istanbul at night that I couldn’t help thinking like a Romantic. About twenty minutes after we passed the second bridge, there were only five other people on the eighth deck with me, and I was so happy to just lean on the rail and stare out at the city. I guess those feelings must have shown, because one of my friends came by to say hi, and then left after a few minutes because she said she could tell I was having a moment. I was expecting to enjoy passing through Istanbul at night, I was not expecting to be so overwhelmed that I now must do a Bosporus tour by night when I’m back there in a week, and really hope I can come back later in life. I haven’t even set foot in the actual city, and I know that in a week I will be there for five days, but I already know that won’t be enough.

Love from the Bosporus,
Ginny


7/23

Today we actually arrived in Varna around noon. But, our berth in the port does not open until tomorrow morning, so right now we are just chilling out in the harbor, salivating at the beaches on shore. I first noticed this during my marine biology class, and had a quiz in my history class afterwards, so this new knowledge made studying more difficult.

Every evening at 8pm before we debark to a new port, we have a “preport” where we learn about the country and city we will be exploring the next day. Several people (usually professors) give brief presentations on the history, culture, economy, modern politics, and whatever else seems important about the country. One of these presentations is always by the interport student, a student from the country to which we are headed, in this case, Bulgaria, who came onto the ship in our last port (in this case Greece) and will debark once we get back to his/her home country (in this case Bulgaria). They are great resources for us on the ship, or they would be if they were easier to find…I have only managed to track down the Croatian interport student to ask questions about Croatia so far.

I have a little bit of the preport on Bulgaria here just because I figure that, like me, you might want a little background.

History wise, Bulgaria was originally home to a fairly advanced, military, horse riding civilization contemporary with the ancient Greeks (and therefore influenced by the ancient Greeks) called the Thracians, who did not have a written language but who left beautiful artwork, especially in tomb paintings and gold sculpture. Then Bulgaria was wiped into the Roman Empire, meaning that there are Roman ruins scattered throughout Bulgaria today. Bulgaria was always as a crossroads of the world, a place where different cultures met (and meet). The Slavs swamped this corner of the Byzantine Empire (the east half of the Roman Empire) in the 5th and 6th centuries and set up the village and agrarian culture still visible today. The first Bulgarian Empire comprised a ruling class, the Bulgar Turks (who assimilated with the local Slavs linguistically), over Slav and Thracian peasants. The Bulgarian Empire was converted to Orthodox Christianity in the 9th century by the Byzantine Empire’s clever plan to send Saints Cyril and Methodius to create a written language for the Bulgarian language in which the Bible could be written. It is from this Saint Cyril that the Cyrillic alphabet was born. Bulgarians are still very proud to have their home be the birthplace of this alphabet, in modern Bulgaria, May 24th is the day of the alphabet.

The Ottomans invaded in 1393, and Bulgarians still have bitter memories of the occupation, but during this time Orthodox Christianity became an even more pronounced part of Bulgarian identity. In 1876-8 and sparked by the Greek independence movement, Bulgaria fought for its independence from Turkey and succeeded with help from Russia. A Bulgarian professor on board told us the joke “no empire or alliance survives Bulgarian membership.” They were part of Alexander the Great’s empire, the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire and the Ottoman Empire. They sided with Germany in WWI and WWII, were part of the Communist Bloc, and he jokingly wondered if the EU would make it much longer after Bulgaria joining them in 2007.  I guess that just comes with the territory of being a cultural crossroads.

Today, Bulgaria has about 7 million people, about the population of Virginia with similar land size as the state of Virginia. It is part of the EU, but is not in the euro zone and is supposed to begin using the euro in 2013 or 2014. Bulgaria has both a president, who deals with the foreign relations, and a prime minister (Boyko Borisov, who supposedly has a kind of “Batman” persona and is the coach of the national Bulgarian hockey team), who runs most of the internal government. There is a presidential election in the fall, so we may be hearing about that while in Varna. Also, recently the EU has been expressing a lot of concern about the drug trade and strength of organized crime in Bulgaria, which is one of the main reasons Bulgaria is not yet a part of the no-visa travel zone within the EU. Our interport student advised us to avoid nightclubs with lots of fancy cars parked out front because this is where organized crime lords will be. Right now the opposing party is trying to pass a vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister Borisov, possibly because he has not followed through on his promises to clean up the government.

Bulgaria borders the Black Sea, Turkey, Greece, Romania, Serbia and Macedonia, and the major cities in Bulgaria are Sophia, the capital, Plovdiv, and Varna (where we are now). It is marked by the Balkan mountain range running through a portion of the country, and had beautiful sandy beaches (win).

Whew! So I hope that helped…I’m much more familiar with Bulgarian history now anyway. I can’t wait to see it tomorrow!

Love from the Black Sea,
Ginny