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Published: September 10th 2014
Any day on the Golden Horn
And underneath this bridge are the many fish restaurantsIstanbul, Turkey
August 31
st 2014
“
I suppose it's really the only reason people travel – to feel more beautiful and exciting than they really are” Lady Penelope in Brendan Shannahan's travel epic 'In Turkey I am Beautiful' "...But if a mirror ever makes you sad, you should know that it does not know you."
Kabir In a fit of judgementalness and unfounded superiority (is it ever well founded?), I swear to myself that if I hear just one more backpacker in Istanbul on their way through their hurried trip through Turkey say how they 'did' a country or a tourist attraction, or plan to 'do' same, I will scream. And I had only been back in Istanbul (the beaten trail) for about an hour.
“
Well, we did Spain and then Greece, and I really want to do Cappadocia here. I have been travelling for a month and need to get back home next week” relates a young South Korean girl on the tram from the
otogar to Sultanamet.
But even if I might not have used these words myself, there go
Blue Mosque
Not to be visited on the days when more than one large tourist ocean liner docks at Istanbul I in a different time and place, flitting around trying to squeeze in the most sites and experiences and countries possible before I started to realise that the 'main attractions' in travel were something other than what is listed in the brochures and travel guides. But in the end it's all relative how we get our rush out of travel. Having said that there is one thing for sure.... wherever you go in your travel, when you get there and unpack there is a certainty that you can never escape: YOU are still going to be there (with all your fickleness and flaws). And yet there is at least a better chance when travelling (specially when alone) that you can 'play' with new personas and ways to be..... a kind of experimentation with how you present yourself in the world, a trying out of new responses and approaches to what lays outside the mind. Ah, and then, when time becomes not as big an issue and when you get to slow it down, there is also perhaps more chance to 'play' with the mind itself (at least to explore through observation the reactions that often occur more frequently to the
Grand Bazaar
The largest covered bazaar in the world different and bizarre and unfamiliar things that crop up in foreign and unfamiliar contexts – taking one outside one's comfort zone).
So I was back in Istanbul for the last leg of my 3 months in Turkey interspersed with my 3 week (mis)adventure into Georgia and one week in Lesvos (all of which by a relative measure has also at times been 'hurried'). I was keen to see Huseyin again.
Let me tell you about Huseyin. My eldest daughter Leah had met Huseyin about 5 years ago when she visited Istanbul. She had read a book before leaving Australia written by an Australian journalist and author named Brendan Shannahan: 'In Turkey I am Beautiful'. In it, Brendan's Istanbul carpet shop friend Huseyin and his brother Mehmet are featured and so Leah had sought out the shop and met the brothers. Huseyin, aged around 45, is larger than life, an extremely charismatic maverick character who parties and plays at a furious pace , and who up until the recent death of Mehmet (in a car accident returning home from a wedding) might be described as a person burning the candle from both ends. Mehmet's death threw Huseyin into a
Taksim alive
The tram that runs down the central drag of Taksim is 140 years old mournful and depressive stupor for about a year and, it would seem, mellowed his character and behaviour somewhat. He is a shrewd businessman who knows carpets like the back of his hand, and he combines these talents with the art of enticing potential buyers (many of whom seem to be young attractive foreign women, some of whom he becomes romantically entwined with) into his shop where he charms them with his genuine hospitality and entertaining personality. Being the bachelor still (despite claims that he will marry a good Turkish girl and settle down and have kids), it escapes me how he has not come seriously unstuck through short-term affairs with besotted foreign women who might have wished for a more lasting relationship. But overall he is lovable and fun to be with, and is not an overbearing carpet salesman. I would describe him as a talented albeit shrewd entertainer with more than one agenda, and intelligent enough to see the long term personal and business benefits of just being genuinely friendly and generous to people.
Earlier this year, Huseyin visited Australia for the first time (he has travelled widely), having shipped about 150 carpets there. He bought a van
To Europe
End of the line for the Orient Express and within 3 months drove over 40,000 km up and down and across the vast island continent visiting people he had met (like my daughter) in his shop over the years and kept in touch with. There he would throw 'shows' or what he calls 'Tupperware parties' in these people's homes and sell his carpets. He now will go again to Australia in October where through a good friend he will launch a carpet business in Byron Bay. While in Australia, over a beer with Leah in Sydney, he had messaged me (then in India and about to visit Istanbul) saying “
Paul, do not book anything in Istanbul... you are a guest in my country”. True to his word, he had arranged and paid for accommodation at a friend's hostel for me for a week, and generally spoiled me.
My trip through east Turkey had largely taken me (not by design) on the route that Brendan had taken 8 years before which formed the basis of his book. I read his book towards the latter part of my journey, realising how much Turkey had changed in those 8 years. Then the Kurdish separatist PKK was very active and the
Taksim Square
Complete with statues of Attaturk places in Kurdistan I visited sounded much more untamed and potentially dangerous. On my trip, things were extremely peaceful (there is peace between the PKK and the government after recent talks where deals were struck, albeit there are claims that this is now a stalemate which could reignite) and the mood of the country in general seems buoyant in terms of economic development and general prosperity. Turkey has a very large young population, and one could feel a progressive energy afoot.
But … back to Istanbul, Turkey's largest city with a wider population nearing 18 million. It is certainly the heart of Turkey, a transcontinental city astride one of the world's busiest waterways. It dates back to 660 BC (Byzantium) and was known as Constantinople and the capital of the Roman Empire, Byzantine Empire, Latin Empire and Ottoman Empire spanning sixteen centuries to 1922. Istanbul held a strategic position along the Silk Road with rail networks to Europe and the Middle East, and the only sea route between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. It has an eclectic populace, a mix of races and cultures from across Turkey and beyond. It has in recent times become one of the
Huseyin Sahin
With two of his life loves: Zazir and his carpet collection Meccas for western tourists, with around 12 million visitors per year. Business is done at a frantic pace and in contrast to the rest of more lay back Turkey, with certainly a reputation for less personal and more business driven relationships. The biggest attraction is its historic Sultanamet area but Taksim across the harbour is the cultural and entertainment hub. Having said that, there is so much more in Istanbul to discover and explore and I only really had time to scratch the surface.
Istanbul is by my standards an expensive place to stay. I thought I had my accommodation sorted through various contacts I had made on my travels, but my arrangement to stay with one friend collapsed when I got a
txt from him saying he had left Istanbul on a short notice holiday. I managed to rebook for 2 nights in the same windowless room Huseyin had arranged for me on my first visit, with shower across the road, at a hostel in Gulhane for 70 lira a night. Outrageous but the cheapest I could do short of a dorm stay. At least breakfast was included and wi-fi was good. Oh, and it had an excellent
Cay and Nargile (hubble bubble)
One of the more traditional joints... this one in Sultanamet area inside a converted medressi roof terrace for morning yoga. From there I was a guest of a lovely German couple who lived and worked in Taksim with whom I had hitched a ride to Ani in Eastern Anatolia some two months earlier.
Taksim is an amazing enclave of culture and action and street life. The area I am staying in abounds with musicians and instrument shops. From my friend's flat, the view over the Golden Horn to the old city of Istanbul is fantastic, specially at night with Galata Tower in the foreground and the many mosques across the waterway lit up.
I was marking time.... travel in Turkey had been exceptionally good overall, but I was ready to get back again to Gladys the wonder bike and my love affair with India. I go for my appointment at the Indian Consulate to lodge my Indian visa application. Always a process.... and always something is different. This time they want a bank statement to prove that I have the means to support myself in India (if only they knew how little I needed to support myself in India...). And they say (again, just like last November in Kathmandu) that I can only
The view from the terrace at Taksim
The appartment where my German hosts live have a 3 month visa because I am applying outside my home country. Ho hum. I appeal and am asked to go and write a letter about why I need and want 6 months. Off I go to an internet cafe to print off a bank statement and do a grovelling letter about how wonderful India is and how much I love it and a whole list of reasons why I need more time to be there. For good measure I throw in that my daughter is planning to visit India in February and that is the only time she can get time off work. This of course has no real factual basis but it might be true. In the end they say they will give me a 6 month (but not multiple, only single entry) visa and that I should return next week to pick it up. So I am without my passport for a week.
I go back again to the raw food organic farm near Izmit as a volunteer, and again witness my system's reaction to 6 days of no rice, gluten foods (bread), cheese, meat (this part not hard), and dairy. And again I play
Taksim
Looking west from the eastern end of the Golden Horn witness to the amazing personality dramas in this community where membership is constantly changing and where Mehmet, the owner and leader deals with his many unfinished projects and his personal pressures and responsibilities. What I also witness is my own reactions to all this.... bringing up frustrations and anger and resentments that I thought I was capable of transcending. This is good... I observe these things, accept them while noting that apparently I am still a flawed being, smile and let them go.
When I get back to Istanbul to pick up my visa and prepare for my flight to India, I get to spend a day with sea-swimming buddies and good friends from Australia who are visiting the city. All of a sudden I am the 'expert' who can show them Istanbul, teach them some Turkish words, and discuss wider Turkey with them.
My time has been marked. Turkey, I will miss you, specially the openness and generosity of your people. I might not miss the abundance of Turkish flags and pictures/ statues of Attaturk, but there is something very special about this country which seems to hang together amidst so much diversity.
I am ready again for my beloved India. Bring it on.
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taracloud
Tara Cloud
A fine visit!
Congrats on spinning a good yarn to get that six-month visa! Your time in Turkey has sounded lovely--complete with great meetings with people and your inner dialogues. I visited for several months many years ago when the PKK were bombing Istanbul, etc. Western governments had issued warnings against going, which didn't phase me. I went and found people so happy to see me and prices greatly reduced. Best wishes on meeting equally lovely people in India.