July 2009

A long time ago (presumably before grenades) in a land far away (actually right here, Turkey) underground cities like this were dug with a similar goal to castles: being easy to defend and hard to attack. The place can only be navigated single-file and crouched in many sections (1 ft wide by 3-4 ft high in sections).
Underground cities were 4-8 floors below ground, the size of several city blocks, and had all amenities including baths, kitchens, churches, etc etc.

Prices in Turkey are generally not too high, but there is generally a lot of room to bargain. Tips 1 and 2 below are gleaned mainly from a couple experiences in Istanbul; the rest are observations. Here are the two main experiences I draw from:

First experience (positive)
We have found that salesmen will often lower their prices even if we don't offer a price, provided that we take enough time in their shop (enough to, say, have the tea they offer). Our best was in Istanbul, where we almost bought a rug. The starting price was 700 TL (1USD = 1.5 TL, 1 CAD = 1.35 TL), and we couldn't buy without showing pics to the person we're buying for. Over the course of more than an hour, the price went down to 250TL (550 cad to 200 cad), without us ever offering a price where we'd be willing to buy, and reducing by about 100 TL each time (each time he reduced to the price I was thinking of bidding).

Second experience (negative)
For paragliding, we paid the tour group 150TL. It was cancelled because of the weather, and could not be rescheduled for the same day because that company was overbooked. So we got our money back. To our surprise, someone in our group found a place that had spots, and which was 20TL cheaper (130 TL)! We were happy to book there for later in the afternoon. Later on we walked along the main strip, and 2 blocks away from the place where we were booked for the afternoon the guy started talking to us about Turkish baths and paragliding. We asked prices, and his offering price was 100TL for paragliding. That was 50TL less per person than through the tour group, and 30 TL less than the one we had just booked. Presumably we could have had it even cheaper had we negotiated. We tried to cancel at the other place, spending over an hour there and pretending Sue was too scared to do it; they said they'd try to find people to take our spot but that probably wasn't true. In the end they offered us to cancel with a fee of 30 TL per person, which we refused. So for that, had we walked an extra block, we'd have saved about 50 cad had we walked an extra block before booking. In the end it was a lot of fun though, so we only were bitter toward the city for a few hours.

1. Bargain (some of these tips are time-consuming, only worthwhile for an expensive piece)

1a. Accept the tea. Talk to them, listen to them, and they'll lower the price as time passes.
1b. Ask them to lower the price more.
1c. Tell them you can't buy right away, but have to check with someone back home. Take pics. Stay in the store. They'll prob keep lowering their price.
1d. Walk out of the store. They may well lower their price again.
2. Do not offer a price until they have lowered their price several times.
This becomes a lower bound for negotiations and doesn't help anything.

3. Never buy anything from the shops nearest the entrance (first shop on the street, or shop nearest the entrance to a shopping district, or closest to the hotels or attraction). The prices are generally 20-30% higher.

4. Shop around before taking recommendations.

Cappadocia looks like this, the story behind it is something about retreating glaciers and erosion.

来到土耳其，怎么都得享受一次土耳其浴。于是结伴5人，一起腐败了一把。

换好衣服（女生穿比基尼，男生穿及膝的短裤），首先进入一个桑拿房。不到10分钟，我和另外一个女生就纷纷落马了。 走到大浴室，洗澡按摩师还没有来，所以就在大理石的平台上躺下了。

一会儿，进来4，5个前胸后背，肩膀都长满了毛的用毛巾围住屁股的男人。我们俩倒是一惊。原以为都是女性给女性洗澡，没想到土耳其这么开化。既来之则安之，我们被服务者还有什么好担心的呢！

其中的一个大胡子对着我，指指他自己说”我叫XXX。欢迎来土耳其！” 哈哈，真专业。
“脸朝下趴下！”

我遵从他的指示趴下，他熟练地拿起一个丝瓜藤做的按摩刷，歘歘欻地开始刷我的后背了，然后是腿，胳膊和手脚。

3分钟搞定，他指示我坐到水龙头旁边，用一个金属盘从水池里舀出温水从我的头上浇下来。

接下来是上肥皂。这道工序倒是特别。他把一个大大的棉布口袋放在装满肥皂水的脸盘里。然后把它拎出来，张开口袋的口子，往里头吹起。口袋迅速鼓了起来。然后他把口袋凑在我身体的上方，从口子忘下挤。鱼鳞般的细细的泡沫就把我淹没了。然后师傅就就着泡沫按摩了。动作很专业，看的出是常年做惯了的。

等从头到脚按摩过以后，我就又回到了冲水的位置。师傅开始给我洗头，冲身体。还是用刚刚那个金属的器皿。等冲干净了，澡也就算是洗好了。在几天没有洗热水澡之后，来一个土耳其浴，感觉真不错！

跳伞要领：

1）坐上在盘山公路“飞奔”的小车，忽略一切感觉要被从车里甩出去的感觉。
2）车子转弯是，如果你坐在靠外的窗口座位，请闭眼。不然腿软了就不能助跑了。
3）穿上跳伞服，如果飞行员小气没有跳伞服（比如我的),穿件外套凑活也可以！
4）带上安全帽
5）背上一个大书包（这个是你在空中的椅子）
6）自己一个人走到悬崖的尽头（注意，悬崖都是有往下倾斜的坡度的）。尽量远离你的飞行员。因为这个时候他正在理降落伞上的千头万绪的绳子，玩意你触怒他了，后果你自己负责！有忧郁症，自杀倾向的同志千万别参与此活动，不然自己死了也就算了，还要连累跳伞公司，飞行员和花花草草，真是罪过！
7）等飞行员准备好了，走到他的跟前，等他把你的“书包”用他的挂钩挂住。
8）等待风向
9）飞行员一声令下，开始助跑。抱定视死如归的精神睁开眼睛跳悬崖
10）坐下，享受美景！拍拍照，哼哼小曲都可以。（注意，唱歌五音不全的别出声，把飞行员惹恼了后果比较可怕！）
11）快降落了，抬起双腿。如果你的双腿不着地，飞行员的总会着地。万一降落不稳，把膝盖磨破的也不是你！
12）站立，向前走3步！

跳伞的后遗症：
1）跳之前精神高度紧张，容易得精神分裂。
2）起跳助跑时，生怕身子从“书包”里掉下去，所以双手紧握“书包”把手，第2天肌肉疼痛！