Izmir Departure: The Aegean Turkey City Comparison, Izmir versus Istanbul, Why Izmir Is Turkey Best-Kept Secret, the Cultural Legacy of Smyrna, and the Farewell from the Aegean Gateway
The Izmir departure route covers the comparison of Izmir with Istanbul and Bodrum as the alternative Turkish city experience, the case for Izmir as Turkey best-kept secret for the international visitor, the cultural legacy of the ancient Smyrna civilization, the practical departure information, and the farewell reflection on the Izmir Kordon as the most civilized single public space in Turkey.
- 1
Izmir versus Istanbul: The Alternative City Experience
Izmir, with the same Aegean history and the same cosmopolitan heritage as Istanbul but at one-tenth the scale and with the relaxed Aegean pace that Istanbul has entirely lost, provides the most complete alternative to the Istanbul urban experience for the visitor who wants the Turkish culture without the Istanbul crowd. The Izmir Kordon is the most pleasant waterfront in Turkey, the Kemeralti is the most navigable and the most friendly bazaar in Turkey, and the Izmir food scene is the most regionally specific and the most directly connected to the Aegean food geography of any Turkish city.
- 2
Izmir as Turkey Best-Kept Secret
Izmir, despite receiving 5 million international visitors annually, remains the least internationally recognized of the major Turkish cities because the archaeological sites that are the primary draw for the international visitor - Ephesus, Pergamon, Sardis - are attributed to their own locations rather than to the Izmir province base that provides the most convenient access. The visitor who discovers Izmir as the city base for the Aegean Turkey circuit, rather than the Kusadasi beach resort that the tour operator promotes, has found the most complete introduction to the Turkish Aegean culture available without the package holiday format.
- 3
The Smyrna Heritage: The Cosmopolitan Legacy
The Smyrna heritage of the multilingual, multi-ethnic, multi-religious cosmopolitan city that existed from the Greek colonial period through the Ottoman commercial empire is the cultural foundation that the contemporary Izmir liberal identity invokes when it distinguishes itself from the rest of Turkey. The Sephardic Jewish boyoz pastry, the Levantine frank street architecture that the fire of 1922 destroyed, the Herodotus and the Homer birthplace tradition, and the Ionian philosophical school that the Smyrna region produced are the historical credentials that the Izmir cultural identity rests on and that the contemporary Izmir liberal project consciously continues.
- 4
Practical Departure: Airport and Onward Connections
The Izmir Adnan Menderes Airport, connected to the city by the IZBAN suburban train to the Adnan Menderes station in 25 minutes with the airport bus continuation, provides the most efficient single airport transfer in Turkey after Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen. The departure from Izmir to Istanbul by the Turkish Airlines or Pegasus direct flight in 1 hour 10 minutes, or to Athens by the direct Aegean Airlines flight in 50 minutes, are the most convenient onward connections from the Izmir-based Aegean Turkey circuit.
- 5
The Kordon at Dawn: The Final Izmir Image
The Izmir Kordon in the early morning before the heat of the day, when the overnight fishing boats are returning to the harbour and the first tea glasses are on the cafe tables and the bay is perfectly still and the Izmir hills across the water are visible in the morning light, is the most civilized single public space in Turkey and the image that the visitor who has walked the Kordon at dawn carries home as the most characteristically Izmir memory. The Kordon is not a tourist attraction, it is the daily life of the city, and the visitor who is present at dawn is momentarily a resident of the most Aegean of Turkish cities.
- 6
Izmir Farewell: The Ionian Soul of Turkey
Izmir, the city where the Ionian philosophical tradition began, where the most important trade routes of the ancient Mediterranean converged, where the cosmopolitan Ottoman trading city was the most completely itself, and where the contemporary Turkish liberal identity is most confidently expressed, is the city that most completely represents the Aegean soul of Turkey - the openness, the pleasure of life at the water, the intellectual engagement, and the conviction that the Mediterranean way of living is the highest form of the urban civilization. The visitor who understands Izmir understands the deepest current in Turkish culture that the Istanbul and the Anatolian interior Turkey have never entirely shared.