In a high valley surrounded by snow capped mountains, between Aksaray and Konya, the potato fields seem to go on and on like a Sunday sermon. Kilometer after kilometer bump past, the sameness broken by the occasional wee village, the infrequent truck load of potato pickers or an acre or three of potatoes stacked a meter high beside the road. This is just one more of the many mysteries we’ll never have explained. Except for patatas (french fries), we never see potatoes on a menu or in a vegetable bin, but here we are watching peasant women hand pick potatoes by the million.

I think this mystery and the many others are symbolized by the many spellings we’ve seen of the country’s name: Turkey; Turkiye; Turquie; Turkye. Who knows the proper way to spell Turkey and who knows what Turkey is?

As an F16 fighter jet flies low overhead, our ultramodern Mercedes bus comes to a halt on the super highway because a couple of slow moving donkey carts loaded with potatoes are blocking one of the lanes. As this gets sorted out I watch portly women in brightly colored skirts and vests, with sashes around their waists and scarves over their heads, howing rows of potatoes. We’ve stopped in a land that reminds me of northern New Mexico with a little of the Texas panhandle thrown in and we’re just a few hours from Kas - the Turkish version of a Caribbean island atmosphere. When the bus stops later for lunch, we’ll walk into a spartanly furnished restaraunt similar to an American small town cafe, but festooned with crystal chandeliers. There will be a few blue and white glass evil eyes hanging about and at least one portrait of Ataturk (the Turkish George Washington), possibly two, and a cat curled up on one of the chairs or under the table. A couple more will wander in while we eat. We’re still eating kebabs and rice and Turkish coffee as we did in Egypt, but here it’s better. There probably won’t be any other women in there besides Mary Lynn.