Random Wonderings

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As much as I love aimlessly roaming the streets of a new city, sometimes it means that you end up on the side of town that sells nothing but industrial kitchen supplies. No matter how far you walk, or how many corners you turn, you are confronted by store after store of coffee makers, deep fryers and pots big enough to take a bath in. After several long minutes (or in rare cases up to hours), just when you start to see the practicality of purchasing a buffet set-up, you finally see another human being and breathe a deep sigh of relief. Civilization can’t be too far away. In the past few days, I’ve been exploring the Asian side of Istanbul, either lost in a maze of random merchandise or hiding from the rain.

As opposed to its European counterpart on the other side of the Bosphorus, most of the Asian shore of Istanbul has a much more lived-in feeling. Most of its small towns are centered around fishing; they lack the tourists of Sultanahmet and the high-fashioned modernity of Beyoğlu. My first day on this side, I couldn’t wait to drift freely without bumping into anyone else. I decided to walk from Pınar’s flat in Kanlica to Üsküdar’s center, where we were meeting for dinner. Unknown to me at the time, the near 15-kilometer walk lacked much to see beyond the gates of multi-bazillion dollar homes. The day’s overall damage: four hours lost, a chafed neck, and a stressed bladder.

The next day, I didn’t do much better. I went to Ortaköy, where I had been assured that I could find a pleasant walk along the iskele (the pier that runs along the Bosphorus) through quaint waterside cafes and boutiques. What I found instead was a pleasant suburb made entirely unpleasant by a heavy rain. Instead of walking and exploring with my feet, I sat and explored with my tongue. I sampled the popular elma çayı (apple tea that is very reminiscent of hot cider) and kumpir (the Turkish version of a baked potato). Hiding beneath a mound of couscous, olives, sausage, cabbage, peas, corn, carrots, parsley, cheese, mayonnaise, and ketchup, the only thing recognizable about the kumpir was a faint glimpse of potato skin. Far from the best of Turkish cuisine, it was still the highlight of the day.

Next on my list of places to check out was Kadiköy. Again, what should have been a heartbreakingly adorable village of cobbled alleyways and fresh produce markets was transformed into a giant puddle by a vengeful rain. The drops fell with such a force that those that missed me on their way down ricocheted off the ground and soaked me on their way back up. But, refusing to give up on a third day of being a good tourist, I decided to do some sightseeing from the relative comfort of a bus. I walked to the terminal and boarded the first bus with a familiar looking word on it. For ten minutes, all I saw from my condensation-soaked window were bridal shops and centers for orthopedic correction. Literally every other window was filled with a cornucopia of organza and prosthetic limbs. I guess it’s important to Kadiköy’s image that all of its citizens can walk down the aisle in the latest fashions. Then I fell asleep.

When I woke up, a deep green had replaced the wedding dresses and plastic body parts. An unexpected forest, complete with a river meandering through the trees, stretched as far as I could see. Where was I? Buildings soon began to speck the landscape and, half an hour later, I arrived in the suburb if Beykoz. I stepped off the bus, saw another town soaked in a gray pallor and boarded a bus heading the opposite direction, giving up on any further expeditions until the rain stopped.

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