"It took 4 hours on the bus to Konya across an almost barren and featureless landscape. At 10 am the bus pulled into a large and most impressive modern bus station, and looking around at the many well designed modern buildings in the area, I got the feeling that Konya was some kind of showpiece.
The bus station was about 2 miles from the centre and I was beginning to wonder whether there was anything of this ancient city left that had been so highly praised in my guide book. I found only a few streets with character not yet claimed by the developers.
I booked into a small hotel then walked to the top of the main street where stood the Selimiye Mosque, and behind was the  Mevlâna Müzesi, the centre of the Dervish order till 1924.
The order was started by Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (a Persian Sufi mystic) in 1240. The building is now a museum and mausoleum containing the tombs of Rūmī and his disciples, as well as many other aspects of the religion.
It is a beautiful building inside and while I walked round, the strange but soothing music used by the whirling dervishes, which I found very relaxing, was being played.
Relaxing was more than I could say about the main street, for Konya's other claim was that it was the centre of the country’s carpet industry and about a quarter of the shops seemed to be selling carpets, their proprietors standing outside trying to persuade people like myself to come in and have a look. "You don’t have to buy" they would say, "just come in and have a cup of tea" Some of the carpets were very nice, though most I found very dull and I did not buy any, but it made for an entertaining evening" - MH