Day 1121: Angawi house

[eve_prime]

A couple weeks ago I found an interesting travel show about the Canary Islands on PBS, so I looked and found that the same guy had a show the next week about the Aegean coast of Turkey. I'm especially interested in that region, so of course I watched - only to be quite irritated with the host when he acted incredulous that ancient Troy was located there, since "Greek mythology" like the Iliad should of course take place in Greece. He practically got into an argument with the Turkish archaeologist currently in charge of the Troy excavations. I thought, if my mom had watched this, she would have refused towatch anything else by this guy, ever. (That's what she did with Burt Wolf.)

So my expectations were pretty low for this week's show by the guy (who happens to be an Emmy-winning travel journalist, so I can't explain his ignorance about ancient Troy). But I'm really glad I did watch - otherwise I would not have known about the misty forests of Saudi Arabia's southwestern mountains (with waterfalls, even), and I wouldn't have learned about the Angawi house. Dr. Angawi is an architect who designed his huge house to exemplify the architectural traditions of his region of Saudi Arabia, the Hejaz, including his city of Jeddah. It was pretty amazing. I found these photos online:

Comments

[kaishin108]

That Angawi house is amazing. I love courtyards like that. And all the plants, wow. I just googled it, wow - let's go! :D

How odd the guy was so ignorant and argued a bit, that is disappointing. But I did just read that area of Turkey used to be part of Greece? But that might have been wrong information as that was in only one article I saw when I googled it not the other article I saw.

[eve_prime]

Back thousands of years ago, there wasn't "Greece" but a lot of cities that happened to speak Greek, on both sides of that sea. Each city had its own king and was an independent country, and sometimes the kings would work together, like when they wanted to fight Troy back in the mists of time, or more recently when they needed to hold off an invasion from Persia 2500 years ago. More recently, Germany and Italy were the same way - a bunch of separate little countries that happened to speak the same language.

This guy was claiming that in the Iliad for the Trojan war, Troy must have been part of Greece since it's a Greek story. But in the Iliad it explains specifically that all the Greek kings got in their ships and sailed to that specific place across the sea and camped on the shores - so that when archaeologists wanted to find Troy they knew exactly where to look, right there on the coast of modern Turkey. I don't know what that guy was thinking.

I was so amazed with that house that I saved the episode to watch again!

[kaishin108]

Ahh, I see. That was bold of that guy to claim wrong history!

That house, I would love to go see it...

Thanks!

[eve_prime]

The guy has an irritating attitude in every context! J suggested I just turn the sound off, but if I did that then I wouldn't have gotten the name of this amazing house. I wish there were pictures online of more of the rooms, but this room was the most beautiful. I bet it takes a lot of work to clean up the leaves that fall in that pretty pool.

[kaishin108]

Yes, can you imagine the maintenance!
Did the bottom of that pool look like a rug in one photo I saw, I wonder....

Oh that is awful he was so irritating.

[eve_prime]

Yes! It's like a Turkish rug!



And from the side:

[kaishin108]

That is insane!
Let go for a swim there in a few months! LOL
Could you imagine... :)

[eve_prime]

And imagine how much more delightful it must be for Saudi Arabians - you and I are used to having fresh greenery and ample water, but for them it's a luxury. :)

[kaishin108]

That is a very good point!

[claidheamhmor]

Wow, that looks absolutely amazing!

[eve_prime]

Yeah!