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The City Of St. John

Kathleen Peddicord by Kathleen Peddicord
Aug 01, 2013
in Retirement/Living
0
The city of Ephesus and the St. John Citadel are a must see for tourists and locals alike.
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Like Anthony And Cleopatra On Turkey’s Coast

For me, nothing compares with the sense of excitement I feel when approaching a new city…anyplace where I haven’t been before. Especially if that place has a past.

Few places on this earth have more of a past than Izmir. Originally called Smyrna, this is one of the oldest cities in the world, dating back more than 8,500 years. Today, it’s the third-largest city in Turkey and a big resort destination for Europeans. Its population doubles come summertime. Unlike across the border in Greece, where local tourists are thin on the ground, Turkey’s holiday trade progresses as usual this year.

We, like all the other tourists, have come to this historically important spot along the Turkish coast to see the ruins of ancient Ephesus. What a place this must have been in its day. The Roman emperor was here, and Roman soldiers came on holiday. Anthony and Cleopatra honeymooned in this chic metropolis with a population of 250,000 at the time.

It wasn’t only the jet-setters of the day but also some of the most important characters of early Christianity who sought out this port city. John, Christ’s favorite apostle, built one of the first Christian churches here, with a baptistery and a garden, the remains of which can be wandered today.

John came to Ephesus with Mary, Jesus’s mother, who lived out her days, it is believed, in a small stone house on a nearby hilltop. John traveled back and forth between Mary’s house and the place where he built his church and then wrote his gospel. He was buried beneath his church, but his body was robbed. No one knows for sure where it lies today.

Tourists come to Ephesus to see the ancient Roman city and St. John’s church. They also come to shop. Some of Turkey’s finest carpets are made by girls from villages in this part of the country.

Not ones to shirk our tourist duties, Lief and I spent the morning exploring the ancient ruins…then the afternoon haggling with a carpet broker. We have shopped for carpets in Turkey before. We know the drill. You are seated along the wall in a big room. You are served tea or coffee, maybe a snack. A demonstration of how a Turkish carpet is made follows. Then the carpets come out.

In Fikri Caglayan’s showroom, the experience had more than the usual flair. We would-be buyers sat on wooden benches enjoying our drinks and our pastries while Fikri’s staff carried out carpet after carpet. They laid them one after another, one upon another, diagonally, in patterns, showcasing all colors, designs, sizes, and standards of quality. They threw the rolled-up carpets from one man to another as though they were tossing so many balls around the room. They tossed the carpets, then laid each one out on the floor with a swoosh. One of the staff finished off the presentation by sending a small rectangular carpet spiraling into the air. It spun around and around then landed with another swoosh in the center of the thick pile of rugs all around.

“You see”, Fikri explained. “We even have flying carpets.”

“It used to be,” he continued, “that the magic word to make a carpet fly was abracadabra. Today it’s Visa or MasterCard!”

When the show was complete, the great room was layered with all manner of carpets, red, gold, blue, green…every color of the rainbow and all shades in between, like brush strokes on the canvas of the wooden floor.

“We can ship for you,” Fikri offered, “to anywhere in the world. We handle the shipping and the customs, door to door. Once we agree the price of a carpet, that is the final cost to you. You won’t have to spend an additional dollar to take receipt of your purchase.”

“He can get a carpet through customs and delivered to us in Panama without any hassle or cost to us?” I whispered to Lief. “I’d like to see that.”

“Do you see anything that interests you?” one of Fikri’s staff asked us. Lief must have been feeling especially generous, for he responded to indicate two rugs.

“We can use them in the Founder’s Lodge at Los Islotes,” he said.

Thirty minutes of haggling ensued. Lief finally got a price he was happy with, and Fikri’s staff finalized the paperwork. We have our receipt for two red carpets said to be on their way now to Panama City to greet us upon our return in a few weeks.

If not, Fikri has given us his cell phone number.

Kathleen Peddicord

P.S. Fikri’s shop is Matis. His website is here.

Continue Reading: How Do I Figure My Tax Home If I Spend Time In Different Countries Overseas?

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Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord has covered the live, retire, and do business overseas beat for more than 30 years and is considered the world's foremost authority on these subjects. She has traveled to more than 75 countries, invested in real estate in 21, established businesses in 7, renovated historic properties in 6, and educated her children in 4.

Kathleen has moved children, staff, enterprises, household goods, and pets across three continents, from the East Coast of the United States to Waterford, Ireland... then to Paris, France... next to Panama City, where she has based her Live and Invest Overseas business. Most recently, Kathleen and her husband Lief Simon are dividing their time between Panama and Paris.

Kathleen was a partner with Agora Publishing’s International Living group for 23 years. In that capacity, she opened her first office overseas, in Waterford, Ireland, where she managed a staff of up to 30 employees for more than 10 years. Kathleen also opened, staffed, and operated International Living publishing and real estate marketing offices in Panama City, Panama; Granada, Nicaragua; Roatan, Honduras; San Miguel de Allende, Mexico; Quito, Ecuador; and Paris, France.

Kathleen moved on from her role with Agora in 2007 and launched her Live and Invest Overseas group in 2008. In the years since, she has built Live and Invest Overseas into a successful, recognized, and respected multi-million-dollar business that employs a staff of 35 in Panama City and dozens of writers and other resources around the world.

Kathleen has been quoted by The New York Times, Money magazine, MSNBC, Yahoo Finance, the AARP, and beyond. She has appeared often on radio and television (including Bloomberg and CNBC) and speaks regularly on topics to do with living, retiring, investing, and doing business around the world.

In addition to her own daily e-letter, the Overseas Opportunity Letter, with a circulation of more than 300,000 readers, Kathleen writes regularly for U.S. News & World Report and Forbes.

Her newest book, "How to Retire Overseas: Everything You Need to Know to Live Well (for Less) Abroad," published by Penguin Random House, is the culmination of decades of personal experience living and investing around the world.

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