It's Istanbul, not Constantinople

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There are some cities in the world that seem to hold an air of mystery about them, a secret attraction that brings visitors inside and moves into their veins. It's an attraction that you can't really express or define, but it's immediate and visceral. It happens in cities like Bangkok, where you might find yourself having breakfast along the Chao Phraya river and feel totally at peace, or in Paris, where you can be having a coffee at a little cafe on the Champs Elysees and feel as though you've really arrived. You can also find it in Istanbul, where it crept under my skin as we drove to the hotel from the airport, and my whole body said, "Yes. Adventures can happen here."

However, I wasn't totally sure I was even going to get here - on Monday as I was packing and getting ready to leave, I had this terrible sense of impending doom. Everything was saying to me, don't go on this flight, this trip. I felt as though I couldn't breathe. But I didn't want to be silly, so I just took a deep breath and left. We were flying out of JFK (yuck), but at least it was on Delta, which I was fairly sure had more comfortable seats than Continental - and that turned out to be true when I realized midway through the flight that I felt a lot less fidgety than normal. I got on the plane and found my seat, 37B, an aisle seat just the way I like it. After a few minutes of settling down, a guy came up with his boarding card insisting I was in his seat. I showed him my boarding card to prove that I was in the correct seat, and he showed me his, which seemed to say that he was in the same seat. Since I'd switched my seat when I arrived at the airport, I was convinced I'd screwed something up, and went to find a stewardess to help sort it out. She was super polite and pointed out that his ticket was actually for the next day! I couldn't believe that NO ONE up until this point of the trip had noticed that, but she worked it out so that he could fly with us anyway in a different seat. My seatmate wanted to kick this guy right off the plane, and I was inclined to agree, but we took off with him aboard.

I think a lot about what I can and can't control, and I certainly understand that being a passenger on a plane, I have no control over whether that plane stays in the air or not. That doesn't make me want it to arrive any less, so although I'm usually pretty confident in the pilots and relaxed on the flight, this time, my earlier nervousness was really grating on me. Then, not too long after take-off, the turbulence started. I'm not a nervous flyer by any means, and I've certainly been on flights with turbulence - in fact, I'm not sure if I've ever been on a flight without it! But this was some pretty bumpy flying time, to the point where they ended the cabin service and had the flight attendants strap in. I actually grabbed my armrest at one point and it was really unfortunate that the worst turbulence took place while we still had our dinners in front of us. Luckily, my seatmate was pretty funny and chatty, so his chatter really helped to distract me and keep me calm. It turned out that he's a former member of the Turkish national swim team, and set records in the 200 butterfly in the late nineties (though we're the same age). He now lives and works in Florida, and apparently enjoys speeding so much that he once had over 12 points on his license and got arrested for driving with a suspended one (yes, I was endlessly glad that he wasn't actually the pilot of the plane). I did manage to get an hour of sleep on the ten hour flight, and we arrived right on time at Istanbul's international airport.

I have to say that I was surprised by Istanbul's airport - with all the talk about how Turkey shouldn't be members of the EU, I was expecting much less infrastructure. But honestly, it looked like any other European airport. And as we drove into the heart of Istanbul, and towards the Bosphorus, I felt like we were driving along in Portugal - I think that anyone who thinks Turkey shouldn't join the EU just hasn't been here! Although, that's just my opinion, which is based on being only in Istanbul and not the rest of the country.

We headed to the Ciragan Palace, a Kempinski hotel in the same family as the one from our Annual Meeting in Berlin. The hotel is truly magnificent, seated right on the Bosphorus with an infinity pool that leads you to believe you're swimming right in the beautiful river. It's been sunny since we arrived, so it seems that the sun glitters like diamonds in the water and the call to prayer five times a day sets a magical tone. A lot of women do wear headscarves, but most do not, and so the call to prayer seems to be one of the only reminders so far that this country is 90% muslim.

But I am truly in love with this hotel, and could just stay in my room the whole time and be perfectly happy. The hotel dates back to 1538, when the Ottoman state realized that it would be safe (and lovely) to build summer palaces along the Bosphorus. The area around the palace was known at that time as Kazancioglu Gardens (excuse the spelling, I can't add the proper Turkish characters), and over the years, the palace and surrounding gardens were purchased by various Sultans. Sultan Murat IV and then Sultan Ahmet III both gave parts of the land to their daughters as wedding gifts, and their husbands (both Grand Viziers) built magnificent homes along the shores of the river. The first palace constructed here was in 1731 by Grand Vizier Ibrahim Pasha of Nevsehir for his wife, Fatma Sultan. She freqently organized torchlit celebrations, called Ceragan Festivals in the gardens of the palace, which eventually became the palace's name. After many subsequent owners and a number of renovations and refurbishments, the palace was unveiled in 1871 in an islamic architectural style by Sultan Abdulaziz.

In 1909, the palace, now the Ciragan Palace, was selected as the site for a significant meeting of the Turkish Parliament, and was refurbished in a grand style to include paintings by such masters as Rembrandt and Ayvazovsky. However, shortly after the conclusion of this meeting in January 1910, the palace interior was destroyed by fire. It lay in ruins until 1987, when it was restored to its earlier grandeur and reopened as a hotel, finally in 1990.

Today, it remains a stunning location and is considered to be the best hotel in Istanbul (and for only $300 a night, how can you beat it!). I made sure to test out the bed yesterday with a three hour nap in the afternoon, followed by my usual routine of unpacking and ironing. I'm also particularly fond of nice hotel bathrooms - not your usual creepy Chicago hotel bathrooms, where you're not even sure you want your bare feet to touch the tub. This bathroom is beautiful, though it still doesn't hold a candle to the hotel bathroom at the Hotel Arts in Barcelona - hands down the biggest and best bathtub ever. But here, I figured I would test out the tub, so I took a bath with my book and a glass of Orangina, and thoroughly enjoyed myself.

This morning, it was up for a meeting with the hotel and our host and then a free afternoon to prepare the welcome documents for our delegates. I checked out the hotel gym for a training walk, and it took me almost thirty minutes to realize that my speed was in kilometers and not miles - in all fairness to me, there was a glare blocking the "km" notation!

This evening, it was off to Poseidon with some of our lawyers in advance of the official start of the conference. I was warned in advance that Poseidon is a strictly fish restaurant and for anyone who has ever joined me for a nice meal, you know that I don't eat fish. It's not even one of those things that I could try to eat it and just muddle through the meal - I don't like it, and I just can't eat it. But I had hope that I would find something else there. So we grabbed a couple of taxis and our taxi driver tried to drop us off at a different restaurant first. Luckily my dad had been to Poseidon before and knew this guy was confused. We finally made it there and walked down what appeared to be a little side street in Belak, a neighborhood in Istanbul. Apparently, Belak means "baby" according to our return cabbie. As we got closer to the restaurant, we could see the evening's fish laid out in slabs of ice by the doorway, posed as though they were still swimming. We spotted our host for the evening and his new wife, and headed out to the deck where we would be eating dinner right on the Bosphorus. Our table was perfect, just in the corner of the deck and I very much enjoyed being right next to the water, even if that meant I was cold. The weather in Istanbul has been beautiful with warm, un-humid days, and very cool nights. There were nine of us at dinner, so I mostly chatted with the people right next to me and we quite enjoyed guessing at the various appetizers that the waiters distributed somewhat family-style to us. I had some hummus, but everything else was fish so I tried to avoid it. I did have some rather tough pieces of octopus (covered in hummus to mask the fishy-ness, unsuccessfully it turned out), and some salad minus the added tiny shrimp. I declined to have the large shrimp which arrived with its head and tentacles still on - ugh. The moon was full and shone beautifully on the water, where we could see a number of fishing boats and pleasure craft floating around. I could also see jellyfish floating by in the water as I watched closely, and we mused about how jellyfish look so beautiful and magical in a tank of water where they can't hurt you, and yet they can be so dangerous.

The restaurant managed to find some steak to give me, right off the kids menu - yes! It did taste fishy, probably cooked on the same grill after all, but the french fries were delicious. We had fruit for dessert, and I was delighted to see that they gave us pears - I love pears and almost never get to eat them. I also sampled a cup of Turkish coffee - for those of you who don't know, Turkish coffee is the real deal. It's prepared by boiling finely powdered coffee beans in a pot, turning them into a thick syrup of coffee. Sometimes, sugar is brewed with it, and I think that's probably the best way to have Turkish coffee. The dregs settle to the bottom of the cup, so you don't actually want to finish it. It's coffee that isn't for the weak (and you know how I hate to appear weak in any way!), but I truly enjoyed it - better than an espresso!

The most exciting part of the evening came as we were chatting amongst ourselves and saw that the waiters were preparing the gateway just next to our table. A boat was coming in to dock and we supposed they would be dining and the restaurant, and we thought, oh what a lovely way to arrive! The driver of the boat virtually parallel parked the boat in one move, reminding me of the television commercial where a car comes in fast and spins around to perfectly parallel park on the street. He made one wrong move though, and ended up crushing the poor plastic planter and geraniums that were just next to my arm. Fortunately, I hadn't been dangling my arm over the railing! It turned out that they weren't eating there, but were only picking up take out to have on the boat! It was the coolest "take out" I've ever seen, and someday, I'll have to give that a try.

Eventually our lovely dinner was complete and everyone was stuffed - except for me, because I had missed the appetizers! We parted ways and returned to the hotel - tomorrow the craziness officially begins with our Directors' Meeting at noon. The next few days should be a true adventure! Maybe I will even try my hand at bargaining at the Grand Bazaar on Friday - we'll see how brave I am!

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