Istanbul

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As we crossed Bulgaria into Turkey we stopped at the border checkpoint around midnight. Everyone left the bus to go through passport inspection. Then everyone grabbed their luggage until the bus was empty. We all lined up our luggage on top of a long table and opened it. Border guards went down the line making spot checks through luggage. I’m sure there was no racial profiling involved… While luggage inspections were taking place, the bus was inspected. Once the inspections were complete, we were allowed to put our luggage back on, get on the bus, and continue towards Istanbul. We arrived at the University of Istanbul, where the bus stopped, at about 3:30 in the morning. The city seemed dark and empty. We were given a snack and led to a small ticket-sales booth where we would spend the night. A heavy aluminum door was pulled over the front of the booth to keep us safe for the night. Lying on a row of chairs, using my jacket as a pillow, I could hear the call to prayer a few minutes later. This involves singing over a loudspeaker at the top of the mosques. The prayer can be heard from many blocks away. I understand the call to prayer is a signal to Muslims that it is time for prayer. To me it was a signal that I am now in a city so far east that half of it is in Asia. I am now in a country that borders Iraq. I am… very far from home.

We awoke early the next morning and set out to find our hostel. As I walked down the main street I began to feel comforted by the large population emerging. Trams were running, vendors were selling hot food, taxi drivers were eagerly awaiting to provide service, and fashion stores proudly displayed their latest styles. I heard the call to prayer again, but I didn’t see the scene I expected. I guess I was expecting to see Muslims start running in different directions, laying down rugs, asking each other the direction to Mecca, but no one even seemed to notice. My impression is that they must be just as relaxed here as most Catholics are back home, but I could be wrong. I thought we were near the main bus station, which was a few miles from our hostel. However, we had only walked a few blocks before we got to the landmark I was looking for, the Blue Mosque. Our hostel was just around the corner, near the coast of the Golden Horn, in Sultanahmet. Breakfast was served on the rooftop where we could see across the Bosphorus river into Asian Istanbul. Since I didn’t get much sleep I ended up taking a long nap that day. That evening we went to dinner with a couple guys from the hostel where we watched the European Soccer Finals.

The next day we set out for Asia. Sanne, a Dutch man from the hostel, joined us in our trek. We took a ferry from the European side across the Bosphorus. The river water was a very nice shade of emerald all the way through to the Sea of Marmara. As we rode the ferry we saw the vast coastline of Istanbul. Not one, but two rivers empty into the Sea of Marmara yielding 3 peninsulas all coming together. Houses, mosques, and other buildings flooded the hillside of each peninsula. The trip was short, and we soon docked in Asia. As we walked around I could tell this was not going to be as nice as the European side. It wasn’t bad, but there were noticeably less tourists, and fewer hostels and hotels. However, the mosques were still quite impressive. We sat down at a small restaurant where I had a cup of hot chocolate. We saw fisherman just ahead of us packed along the coastline. Watching them cast a lure was quite a sight. Each one carefully positioning the lure behind them before throwing it perfectly overhand so as not to “catch” one of their colleagues. There didn’t seem to be much else to do in Asia, so we took a ferry to the other European peninsula, just north of where we were staying. We walked up a steep hill to an area known as Taksim. A square at the peak of the hill was at the top of a very popular road filled with shops and restaurants. We sat and ate on a balcony of a restaurant near the square, and watch as a small group of protestors chanted. Police gathered in an area just around the corner from them, and we thought we might see a show. However, the protestors almost immediately dispersed when two busses full of police pulled through the square. After lunch we continued down the street, which was all downhill, toward the bridge that led back to our hostel. I stopped and bought a slice of freshly cut pineapple. It was about an eighth cut of a pineapple, and it was delicious. The final stretch down to the bridge was a steep 30 degree decline through 3 or 4 blocks. We only saw cars driving down this hill. Metal barriers about the size of parking blocks partitioned the street from the sidewalk. Some of them were heavily bent backward, probably from being rammed by a truck with failed brakes. The street was narrow and filled with shops and vendors leaking into the street. I don’t know what else you would do if you lost your brakes going down this hill. An interesting pedestrian bridge stretched between the European peninsulas having an upper deck and a lower deck. The upper deck was filled with fisherman almost shoulder-to-shoulder while the lower deck contained fish restaurants. It was a micro-economy complete with production and sales. The view from the bridge gave even more features of the coastline.

We started the next day by walking through the Blue Mosque. We were asked to remove our shoes, which we expected, and were handed plastic bags to carry our shoes. The women were also asked to cover their shoulders, and were given small scarves to wear inside. Unlike the mosque in Asia, photography was allowed here. Like the cathedrals we had seen throughout Europe, the inside of the mosque was basically on large room. The structure was supported substantially by the outer structure. Very few pillars were on the inside, and you could see right up into the center dome. It was decorated with marble and gold, and paintings hung from the walls. A model of Medina was encased in glass on a small platform to the side. A sign said the model was a gift from Saudi Arabia. We left and walked toward the coast of the Sea of Marmara. Huge vessels filled the sea as far as we could sea, and a very large port sat on the shore in the distance down shore from us. From there we went to a shopping area known as the Grand Bazaar to find some souvenirs. Security guards bearing handheld metal detectors stood at every entrance to the Grand Bazaar. Inside it was like a mall. Shops were tightly packed along the hallways, so much so it was hard to tell where one shop ended and the next began. Not that it mattered, for as soon as you showed the slightest interest in something you would have a salesman immediately telling you all about it. They loved to engage in conversation about where you’re from and what brought you to Istanbul. However, there was one drastic difference between the Grand Bazaar and every shopping mall I’ve seen. There were no prices on any item anywhere in these stores. This was a little weird at first, but I had heard stories of bargaining from people at the hostel. I took interest in the backgammon boards on display. Many stores offered backgammon/chess boards for anywhere from $15 to $200. I talked to many of the salesman and found a few different styles of bargaining on their part. Most of them wouldn’t budge much until you walked out of the store, and that’s when the price really started to drop. One older salesman had a different game, however. The moment he noticed you wanted to bargain he dropped the price about 25%. If you still showed hesitance he said, “If you don’t find a better price, then come back, now go” and he almost shoved us out of the store. Compared to the other tactics I encountered, I found this to be respectable. I ended up finding a nice wooden design with inlaid mother-of-pearl. The starting price was about $75, and I bargained it down to about $35. Meanwhile Travis was having quite a good time making outrageously low offers just to see the reactions.

I went by the post office to mail my Turkish souvenir back to the US while Travis walked back to the hostel. On my way back I found myself in the footsteps of a shoe shiner. After a few steps I noticed he had dropped his brush. I grabbed the brush and handed it to him, which he was very thankful for. So much so that he wanted to shine my shoes. I respectfully declined, but he insisted saying it was ok. Reluctantly, I allowed him to polish my shoes, which took about 10 minutes. When he finished, I thanked him for the favor, to which he replied he wanted $17. I was disturbed, confused, and speechless. Even more reluctantly I gave him $15. He wanted more, but I told I simply didn’t have any more. I felt very confused, and a little bad about the situation… until the next day. As Travis and I set out to go to Taksim again I saw the same shoe shiner walking along the same sidewalk coming towards us. As we neared him I saw the same brush fall to the ground, and I immediately felt a rush of anger sweep over me. It was all I could do to just keep walking and ignore the fact that I had fallen for a scam, but Travis picked up the brush and handed it to him. As I watched the initial steps of the scam play out I said in a very stern, commanding voice, “Travis, Let’s GO!” Travis had nylon tennis shoes on and wasn’t about to let him shine them, but I wasn’t going to take the chance. Believe me, he was ready to shine them anyway. Travis asked me if I thought that was a scam, to which I replied, “Yes, I know it’s a scam, I fell for it yesterday.” This left a particularly bad taste in my mouth and the last evening I was ready to stay inside the hostel all night, but I’m glad Travis convinced me otherwise.

For our last dinner we picked out a restaurant close to the hostel with decently priced meals and nice couches to sit on outside. A large table was surrounded on 3 sides by a couch that could sit about 12 people. However, we had a whole side to ourselves, and there was no one else except two well-dressed gentleman opposite us. We talked to them and found one had lived in Cozumel, while the other lived around Capitol Hill in DC. After reading the back of the menu, which told a bit about the owner, Ibrahim, who was “equally comfortable in Istanbul and Washington DC”, I called him out. They were enjoying a hookah while we were waiting for our food. As they smoked, some of the exhale came our direction. Normally this would disturb me, but for the first time in my life I didn’t mind. Not only did I not mind, but I found the smell to by quite good. I asked him what flavor they were smoking. He said it was a blend of apricot, caramel, and rose. When we commented on how good it smelled, he had the server bring us one of our own after dinner. We talked some more with the Ibrahim, who also told us about a special sherbet drink that was not on the menu. We each ordered one of these, and to our delight, these were very delicious. The taste of fruit was overwhelming. After dinner, the server brought the hookah to our table. The bowl sat atop a long stem leading into a glass base where you could see the smoke bubble through the water filter. A long hose stretched from the side with an soft, intricately-designed handle just before the mouthpiece. We were given smaller individually packed plastic mouthpieces to place inside the hose. We passed the hose back and forth, each of us keeping our own plastic mouthpiece. Now I have smoked hookah before, and I didn’t really enjoy it, but this was different. The scent made me want to figure out how to maximize the enjoyment, and after some experimentation, I found it. I think the hookah smoke is enjoyed during the exhale, not the inhale. So I would take large quick inhales, then let the smoke leak out my mouth across my tongue. Also, I found that allowing the smoke to flow out my nose increases the sensation. The combination of olfactory senses was intense. However, I could not smoke very much. It was not long before I was feeling very light-headed. I attribute this to the fact that I am not normally a tobacco smoker by any means. And though I don’t see myself forming a habit of this, I would definitely recommend the experience.

Istanbul is a huge metropolis with about 12 million people living in the greater area. Sultanahmet, the area where we stayed, is a very touristy place. The constant pandering to tourists and the lack of set prices reminded me of my visits to Cancun. The rivers and ocean are beautiful, but there are no beaches in the city. One of the most unique things about the city to me was the presence of stray cats in addition to dogs. Maybe this is a trend that would continue if I were to travel farther east, but I found it gave the city a lot of character. I found the strays to be fairly friendly too. Sometimes you can see the cutest little kittens just walking around, climbing trees, and playing with each other. The trend of falling prices as I crossed Europe was brought to a halt for the first time, however. It was definitely still cheaper, but these prices were more like Berlin or Vienna rather than neighboring Romania. Sure, I got burned here, but I’ve been burned before, and I’ll be burned again. I try not to let one person ruin the whole city for me. On the other hand, I met some really nice people who made me feel right at home. It really is a nice place, and overall I felt just as safe as anywhere else I’ve been.

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Photos

Hagia Sophia
Across from the Blue Mosque

Istanbul Coast
Northern European Peninsula

Bosphorus
Bridge connecting Europe and Asia in the distance

Protest Control
Add another 2 busses full and watch the protesters run!

Blue Mosque
Inside

Stairs
I don't think these are OSHA approved

Pedestrian Bridge
Production up top, sales down below.

Comments

[David Miller]

Istanbul was once Constntinople, and why the changed names, nobody knows but the Turks......Did you ask?