Spring Break and Vienna

So I did it again. I waited three weeks to write another blog. I know you were all eagerly sitting at your computers just WAITING to hear what Julia’s been up to next, right? Clearly I’m kidding, but I do apologize for the delay.

Anyway, lots has happened since I last wrote, one major thing being spring break in Turkey. Let me first say it is an amazing, beautiful, fascinating country; if you ever consider going, I’d say “Don’t think, just book it.” Our group (six girls and myself) started our trip in Istanbul where we stayed for three days. This is one of the coolest cities I’ve ever been to. It’s so fast-paced and exciting, but really magical and exotic at the same time. It took a little getting used to in the beginning—Turkish men were pretty shamelelss in the way they gawked at us. It made me extremely aware of my self as a female and foreigner, but I eventually got over it and it seemed to get better as time went on. In Istanbul, we did all the big stuff— visited the Blue Mosque, Hagia Sophia, Topkapi Palace (though I didn’t go in), shopped at the Grand Bazaar and took a boat tour on the Bosphorus. We also stayed at this awesome hostel right o
ff
Istiklal Street, which is one of the coolest areas in downtown. At any time of day, it was entirely packed and amazing smells came from every direction. Sensory overload, for sure.

After Istanbul, we took a bus down to Izmir, which is right along the Aegean Sea, and hung out for two days. I really liked the city—right on the water, not too big or touristy, but there definitely wasn’t as much to do as in Istanbul. One of my favorite memories of the trip happened here though: the Turkish baths. Oh man, if you’re not familiar, basically you get completely naked and sit around in a spa with other naked women and pour hot water on yourself. Then, you lay down on a marble slab in the middle of the room while another woman exfoliates and massages you from head to toe (and I mean head to toe, they miss nothing) while others are free to watch. All privacy and shame goes out the window during this hour and a half, but it was actually a wonderful and comical experience. It was disgusting how much dead skin she got off me, and my skin felt so smooth afterward!


After Izmir, we went to Selçuck to see the Ephesus ruins. And this is where our story with Ali begins… upon arrival, this Turkish man with a mighty unibrow and slicked back hair immediately approached us, saying he had a great deal for a hotel and transportation. He reminded me of a cheap car salesman and I was pretty skeptical of him. But anyway, we decide to trust him, and initially he didn’t let us down. The hotel was nice, and it was convenient having a private taxi drive us all around. Through out the day, we also took us on various excursions hoping we would buy stuff like Turkish delight and fruity wines. It was kind of humorous. Things changed the next day though—he convinced us to go to this “natural spa” in Pummakale, which turned out to be pretty far away and a total dump. It was just a pool of sulfuric water with algae and other crap growing in it, and a mud bath that was unbelievably far from luxurious. THEN at the end of the day, w
hen we
were going to pay him, he changed the price on us saying it was 30 euros not liras we owed him. I was PISSED. But looking back on it, Ali was one of the most absurd/funny encounters of the trip.

We decided to take an 11-hour night bus back to Istanbul that night, where another ridiculous thing happened: There is a portion of the ride where the bus gets on a huge ferry to cut across the water. It was early in the morning and really foggy, and needless to say, our ferry ran into another boat. We were still sitting on the bus when it happened, and then all the sudden we heard a horn and then felt/heard a huge smash. The front of the ferry had a good chunk out of it so we had to get back on land and drive around, but it turned out OK.

With two days left in Istanbul, we went to the Hagia Sophia, which was really grand and beautiful, and mostly just wandered the city. We were all beat from traveling and seeing so much the past week. My friend Ana and I also went to the Istanbul Modern Museum on our last day which had some really interesting contemporary Turkish art. I’ve had very little exposure to art from this part of the world, so this was really cool for me.

To sum up Turkey, I saw a lot of amazing things, met some awesome people, ate a lot of delicious food, smoked a lot of hookah and had some really good laughs. Wooo spring break 2008!

I don’t blame you for not reading anymore because this is becoming far too long, but I’ll just quickly tell you I went to Vienna last weekend with my program. It’s a really beautiful city—great architecture, super clean streets, lots of parks and really chic people. We went to the Schönbrunn Palace, which is where the royal Habsburg family lived for so long. It was unbelievably huge and decadent. And Sunday was great in Vienna. My favorite part was probably visiting the Albertina art museum that had an AMAZING private collection of modern art. So much good stuff: Kandinsky, Rothko, Picasso, etc. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen so much work I liked in one place.

Then I laid in a park for about an hour, and later had an awesome latte and chocolate marzipan cake. Yumm… As much as I enjoyed Vienna, I still like Prague more. While Vienna is super charming, it was a little too quaint and sweet for me—it made me appreciate the seediness, mysteriousness and unusual darkness of Prague.

OK, to wrap things up, I only have a little more than five weeks of my program left! I can’t believe how quickly time has flown here; it’s insane. There’s still a bunch of things I haven’t done yet that I need to check off my list soon. Hopefully, the next time I write, I can tell you about them.

Until then, take care!


J.

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