When we first arrived in Istanbul, I was sure I was going to fall in love. First, we were docked in the most amazing part of the city, with views of incredible mosques on top of hillsides surrounding a magnificent harbor. The air was cool, crisp and fresh, and the leaves were turning beautiful browns and golds. Finally, it felt like Fall after months of heat and humidity in Southeast Asia, and the desert heat of Egypt. I even got up to see the sunrise! Istanbul is the only city in the world that is actually on two continents (Europe and Asia), plus, it is a city that you can easily walk around, and hop on and off an extensive and convenient metro system, which has recently been added to my list of criteria for favorite cities in the world. Walking through the streets, the smell of savory kebaps roasting on each corner, and Turkish coffee brewing filled the cool, blustery air. Ancient mosques with their impressive minarets towered over the city from every mountaintop. Istanbul had at once impressed me as a city that is historical, modern, cultural, exciting and beautiful. Indeed I fell in love.
I had a pretty heavy agenda for what I wanted to see and do in Istanbul. Since there was a lot there to keep me busy, I’d decided not to leave town and simply take advantage of all there was to offer. First trip was to the largest and most significant mosques – The Suleyman and the Sultenahmet, or Blue Mosque, as it is called because of the blue tiles in the interior, and the Hagia Sofia Museum, which is a kind of church/mosque hybrid – it was once a beautiful cathedral built in 550 CE, and was later converted into a mosque, when Islam took over ancient Turkey. It made me think of the churches in the southern part of Spain that have been converted from the mosques of the early Arabian influence there. Religion plays such a fascinating part of history, architecture, culture and people. The mosques were unbelievable. They are really just so beautiful, I find it hard to explain. It was interesting, too, because here in Turkey, I saw much fewer women covered in the headscarves or completely veiled. We weren’t even required to cover ourselves inside the mosques, and I was told that the traditional custom of women praying only in the small room in the back, separate from the men, was slowly coming to an end. We did see women in this section, but we also saw many women, not dressed in the veils. I cannot lie, I am fascinated by this aspect Muslim tradition and culture.
The next day I donned my knit scarf and gloves, hat and jacket, and wandered into town with my friend Kate. We’d decided to make a day of shopping at the Grand Bazaar and touring the Topkapi Palace, a beautiful and ancient former palace of one of the many sultans in Turkey’s past. The Bazaar is a huge covered market, with nearly 4,000 shops (mostly jewelry, pottery and lamps, and mostly the same items in every store). Walking through the bazaar was crazy! We had vendors calling out to us at every step of the way, “Hello, beautiful”, “Hey there, Angels”, “Can I help you spend your money?” Yuck! I was immediately turned off. And Kate, because of her white blonde hair and big blue eyes, on her nearly six foot frame, became a huge target of their calls. She had also been through the Bazaar the day before and many of the vendors had remembered her. We ran into one really creepy guy with a Mohawk who wanted to talk to Kate, and so somehow we managed to let him walk us to his friend’s carpet store nearby. I am thinking the whole time, why are we with this creep? But it turned out his friend, David, was pretty nice, and fairly normal (I think), so the trip wasn’t so bad. Except that we didn’t want to buy carpet! But, it was ok. He gave us some apple tea (they serve this to everyone in the carpet stores) and I found out that he was also of Spanish descent, only he was Jewish and his great grandparents had fled Spain from Turkey back when the Jews were forced to leave Spain and provided refuge in Turkey. He has a brother who now lives in Barcelona and owns another carpet store there, so I told him maybe I’d go by and visit him there. He asked me to call him as well if I wanted him to show me around Istanbul. I took his card and said maybe I’d give him a call. We ditched the creepy guy who had explained that he wanted to show me a few nice guys before I made my choice of men in Istanbul. Seriously? Gross. At least David was nice.
After shopping, we hit up the Palace, which was your typical collection of ridiculously extravagant works of art and jewelry housed in a sprawling estate in the center of town. The palace was beautiful, and the collection was amazing, but when I saw coffee cups that were made of gold and diamonds, I knew I had seen too much. On the way to the Palace we stopped by a restaurant, where two men were standing and called out to Kate and me. Apparently another young Turk had become entranced in Kate’s eyes and his friend (the restaurateur) introduced him to her on the street. Herself entranced with his green eyes, Kate stopped to chat with him. Being the good wing girl that I am, I chatted up his friend (though by no personal interest, I can attest). He was nice, however. They asked us to come by later for dinner and we said perhaps we would. We had also run into another young carpet salesman outside of the Hagian Sofia Museum who gave me his number and asked me to call him for coffee later. I told him we had plans that evening, but perhaps I’d call him after (I had no intention of doing so, but thought it might be easier just to say ok, than to say, I’m never going to use this – I guess the two days in between Egypt and Turkey had me all out of practice. I mean I told a man in Cairo that I was not only married, but also pregnant – what was wrong with me?)
That evening, we went to see a performance of Whirling Dervishes. I’d never heard of dervishes prior to Semester at Sea, but knew at once, I wanted to see them. They are these guys who dance around in circles, spinning to music and aligning themselves with God. It is both fascinating and rather uniquely spiritual, and something I am really glad I got to witness. Is it bad that I found one of the whirling dervishes very attractive? Probably.
After that, we went by the restaurant, because Kate could not get green eyes out of her head. We ordered a couple of beers and some plates of hummus and other yummy treats, and chatted a bit with the two guys. They wanted to take us out later, but I was tired (and not interested), so I declined and Kate stayed out. They said they hoped I’d come out with them the following night. But I never did. I don’t know. I was just really turned off by all the overt advances and men calling out to women on the streets. I couldn’t really take any this interest as genuine, and I wasn’t really looking to find a love connection. I wanted to believe that these were nice guys who just wanted to make a new friend, or practice their English with a foreigner, but they just seemed so aggressive. I wasn’t into it. And it made me fear shopping, and a little uncomfortable going to any of the touristy areas.
The next couple of days were great. I went on a motorboat cruise up the Bosphorous strait that splits Istanbul between the two continents. It was a gorgeous day and completely relaxing. Afterwards I walked around with a couple of girls from the ship, and came home early to call it a night. The next day a group of about five of us headed out to one of Prince’s Islands, about an hour ferry ride from our port – a unique secluded little island where no cars or buses are allowed and everyone gets around on foot, bike, or horse and carriage. We spent almost the entire day there, and it was wonderful.
My last day in port, I decided to take the day to myself and maybe do a little x-mas shopping, hit up the internet café, walk around the city and get a Turkish bath. Shopping was a challenge. I did not want to go to the bazaar and I was so tired of bargaining! Shopping in these cities is intense. And, gone are the days when you could bargain items down to the equivalent of a few dollars in US cash. Turkey is expensive! My walk was nice though. I went to Taksim square where tons of cafes and bookstores line the streets, and I sauntered in and out of music stores, opening and closing my umbrella in between. Though drizzly and gray, it was a lovely morning, and I was enjoying the peace. I decided it was time to get my Turkish bath. Unfortunately, the only bath I knew of was back near the Bazaar, the restaurant and the other tourist traps. Against my better judgement, I walked through the Bazaar, and happened to run right into Mohawk guy! Boy, did he give me the evil eye! He wanted to know why my friend never called him, and to let me know that David was disappointed I hadn’t called him or stopped by. Urgh. I wanted to say, she didn’t call because you were creepy! And I didn’t call your friend because I didn’t want to run into you! At any rate, I did feel bad and tried to find his shop, but if you’ve ever been to Turkey you know that there are Carpet shops on every corner and three in between, so I had no idea which shop was his at that point. Oh well.
I made my way to the bath, carefully trying to avoid the restaurant, so I wouldn’t have to hear why I didn’t call that guy, and wouldn’t you know it, I ran into the other carpet salesman who wanted me to call him for coffee! Damn. He was looking all sad and disappointed and asked why I never called him, too. Geez… I told him I wasn’t going out at night, and I had a boyfriend. But I had coffee with him anyway, and afterwards he looked so sad. I guess Kate ran into him and the restaurateur who both told her how disappointed they were that I didn’t call. Heartbreaker!! I really didn’t mean for that to happen. I was just so turned off by their aggression, and I was really uncomfortable with people just calling out to us from the street. I didn’t want to get into a strange or scary situation. I didn’t want to feel bad about it either.
I decided to skip the bath, and make my way back to the ship, stopping at some less aggressive shops to make a few final purchases. I stopped at a little jewelry shop, trying to find a bracelet for a friend of mine, and I ran into the nicest man. We spoke in Spanish (he said that his Spanish was better than his Enlgish and I looked Spanish so he assumed I was). He didn’t have any bracelets for me (which was what I was looking for), but he took a small charm that looks like a blue eye and is said to ward off evil or jealous eyes from looking your way, and he put in on a chain around my neck. He asked if I like it, I said it was nice, and he said. “No dinero. Es un regalo para ti”. How sweet. A gift! His generosity worked, because I immediately wanted to buy something from him. I looked at a pair of earrings, perhaps to give as a gift to one of my friends. And do you know what he did? He gave me the earrings as a gift! At this point, if I’d had a ton of money, I’d have bought everything in his store. He was so sweet. And he didn’t ask for a thing. He didn’t even care if I bought anything. He just enjoyed our conversation. And, you know, so did I. I found out that he was a Kurdish man from the Southeastern part of Turkey and that he’d come to Istanbul about five years ago to start a new life, with greater opportunities. His homeland has been in such turmoil and the economy so bleak that he decided to come to Istanbul and start over. I really enjoyed talking to him and learning about him, and it was a nice breath of fresh air compared to the other guys I had perceived as being less than authentic. I’m not sure who was more heartbroken by the interaction with the guys in the streets – them because I didn’t call, or me because they had called out in the first place. But my heart felt warm when I came back to the ship. And I really did love Istanbul.
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