White F..f..frreeezzing Christmas in Türkiye

Oh, my family and I had soooo much fun in Turkey this Christmas!!! We knew that the weather would be cold, but we certainly did not expect snow! Boy were we surprised when we arrived the hotel in Bolu on first night only to find it snowing.....it was the FIRST white christmas for all of us and despite the cold, we were hopping around in the snow and taking lots and lots of pictures. The first night, the temperature reached -11 deg Celcius during the night, and next morning was about -2 to -3. Our poor li'l fingers and toes almost turned into icicles but we didn't care (we do look like a bunch of jakuns though...hehehe).

I was really amazed with the friendliness and hospitality of Turkish people. Almost everywhere we went, we were sure to be greeted with smiles, adults and children alike. Our tour guide, Sinan was like our history teacher as well, giving us all interesting information about the history of Turkey. We also had a wonderful driver, Ugur, although he had to drive on ice for few days, made it seem effortless. Not to mention the those at the souvenir shops, they really must be applauded for their iniative. First they thought we were Japanese, and greeted us with Konnichiwa, but when they saw no response, they asked where we were from. Upon knowing that we were from Malaysia, they all chanted together, "Mari, mari....lelong lelong!" That really caught our attention ;)

There were several highlights in our itinery, to mention a few, Cappadocia, Troy, Ephesus, and Istanbul. But for me....one of the interesting highlights of the trip was WC visits :P We spent lots of time on the bus travelling from one end of Turkey to the other, and we had toilet stops every 1.5 - 2 hours. Couldn't help but took pictures of some of the interesting WCs, dating from 200 AD till today.....hehehe...


Anyway, I was hoping that I could meet up with Zeynep in Ankara, but our trip itinery was really tight, so we didn't get to meet. Next time perhaps!

Here's the link to the rest of the photos taken in Türkiye.