h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

We'll go on a holiday to Turkey from 2nd to 9th March, and and so I called the tour operator today to enquire when we'll get the travel details.

A nice man with an accent I couldn't allocate to any country told me that they 'are on their way and will arrive about mid next week'.

I uttered my surprise that the post should take *that* long; then a thought occurred to me and I asked: 'or did you mean they're 'on their way' within your business?'

He confirmed that. I bet nothing had been processed at all, but I hope it will be now.

Anyway, he asked me if I wanted him to tell me the flight details, and I did.

He then told me that we'll depart form Frankfurt on 2nd March at 19.15 with Corindon Airlines, Terminal 2, Halidora.

I was puzzled, I had never heard of Halidora, but I thought this might be a specific area at the airport for flights with that airline or tour operator, so I didn't ask. I just wrote it down and decided we'd find out once we're at the airport.

Apparently, the man was from Turkey, because he wished us a pleasant stay in his country, and we ended the call.

I then looked down on the scribbled 'Halidora', and suddenly it dawned on me:

It is Halle D (hall D), and you'll often hear somebody say Dora for D (like the Police Letters Alphabet, only the German way). Had he said Halli Delta, I might have known right away - or not, it's hard to tell.

The airline is called Corendon, too, not Corindon as he pronounced it.

It really made me laugh that I had wondered about this mysterious Halidora for so long.

Plenty more phonetics to learn:

Halibut, halitosis, haliorchestra...

You know, I did wonder whether my failing to understand what he said is to do with the fact that I spend the most part of each day writing, reading and thinking in English.

Learn Turkish, Bel.

halli-hallo, mir juckt der po

Which part of Turkey are you going to, Bel?

South-west Turkey, Gnomon. Turkish Aegean.
We'll see Izmir, Troja, and Pergamon – Kusadasi, Didyma – Milet – Priene,
Sirince (Selcuk) and Ephesus. I'm really excited.

Sounds great!

I'll try to take lots of photos. I'll ask my husband to take his netbook, so I can write a diary. If he doesn't want to take it, I'll have to make do with and paper.

I haven't been to the Aegean in a few years now. Last time I was there was a rather sad holiday - we spent a week in Greece, but it rained most of the time and it was just 4 days after Mrs G's father's funeral, so we weren't much in the mood for celebrating. I hope to get back to Greece again. I've been told that the Aegean coast of Turkey is very much the same.

I've never been that far east before. It's a three hours flight, which is more than twice the time it takes me to fly to London.
The man on the phone said the weather is very nice there. We'll see. I hope it will be dry and not too cold. It's snowing here today.

It's 17 degrees there at the moment.

http://www.accuweather.com/en-us/tr/izmir/izmir/quick-look.aspx

That sounds good. Like spring weather.

That's going to be great!

We were on Patmos a couple of times. But we didn't make it to Ephesus.

Did you eat any magic mushrooms when you were there, Dmitri?

It's all so close, isn't it? I associated Troy and Pergamon end Ephesos with Greek mythology. I never looked them up, and I'm not good at geography anyway, so if somebody had asked me before we booked this journey I'd probably have said they were in Greece.

They were in Greece, which was part of the Ottoman Empire, until about 1920. Then there was a war.

Oh well, my knowledge of history is as bad as that of geography.

I knew about Cyprus being split, of course, but a look at the map just showed me that practically all the Greek islands are next to the Turkish shore.

It was called Asia Minor, Bel. Some friends of mine in Germany were from Pontios, which was in Turkey, but used to be Greek.

The Greeks tell 'Ponti jokes'...

No mushrooms, Gnomon. But I had a cheese pastry the baker claimed was a favourite of the writer of Revelation, when he was in exile there...then they showed me the cave he had the vision in...some rude American tourist asked how they knew...

It's funny, but I associate Asia Minor with Turkey.