istanbul, turkey

We arrived in Ataturk Int'l Airport on Saturday afternoon and took the tram to the old city. Our directions to Hostel Istanbul told us to get off in Sultanhamet and walk between the Aya Sophia and the Blue Mosque, turn right and then left and pass the Four Seasons Hotel. This sounded promising, and as we navigated our suitcases over the cobblestones we agreed that it was great to feel no hurry, that we could move slowly and take in the city. We left the metro station and became immediately disoriented; our directions didn't account for a major highway and multiple bus stations. Two Turkish men spotted our confusion and asked if we were lost in spotty English. I looked at Jordan and we tried to silently agree upon the right answer, but the men pushed forward and offered to help--Yusuf Pasa? This way? He nodded and said, Yusuf Pasa, yes. We rounded a bend and saw the walkway mentioned in the Hostel's directions--and he pointed and stuck out his hand to shake goodbye. It was a nice welcoming experience to Turkey, helpful and friendly even after seeing that we were Americans.

As we passed between the mosques we couldn't take our eyes off the strikingly different architecture; it was like nothing we were used to seeing in the United States, or even Western Europe. The dome crouched like the body of a spider, its spindly tower legs protruding toward the sky. Boxy buttresses pushed against a wide, broad dome and gold accented the uppermost spires and domes. The gray sky made the stonework appear colorless and it couldn't help but remind me of an evil fortress in a thriller movie. We found the hostel and checked into our dorm room, realizing that it may not be much longer that we can do the hostel--thing; it's fine now, but I forget how important it is to have your own space after a long day of walking and a backpack full of semi-valuables. We had dinner and came back to the hostel's basement-level bar, already lively with Aussies getting drunk and ranting about American malpractices abroad. You can't blame 'em; America is oil-greedy and has caused some major world problems. Jordan and I set up the backgammon table to celebrate Turkish gaming traditions but realized that neither of us could remember how the board was set. We played chess instead, working through half-liter beers and a jetlag haze that resulted in a fairly long and uninspired game (yes, he won). For the next game, I asked one of the hostel workers to set the board for us and he quickly dropped the pieces in the right place, pushing them into straight lines of two, three and four and stepping back to admire his work. The backgammon match was a brilliant display of skill and cunning, in which one player emerged as a true master of the sport (yes, I won). We also made a friend--one of the Hostel workers, in his second day on the job, pulled up a chair and chatted with us in English. He asked about New York and about travel, and said he'd never left the area. We learned from him a bit about Turkish schools and rent prices, and asked him what we should do the following day. Using the backgammon chips, he made a map of the area and showed us where to find shops and cafes across the bosphorous to the north.

The next morning we had a hostel breakfast resembling a Greek platter: sliced tomato and cucumber, soft, creamy feta, a half dozen well-cured black olives, hunks of baguette and a hardboiled egg. Coffee came from a Nescafe can, and tea came in a normal black tea bag. I doubt I've ever eaten olives before noon, but it was a nice start to the day and less heavy than most American breakfasts. Our first stop was the Blue Mosque, and we pulled off our shoes like the rest and carried them through the holy building in a plastic bag. The building was impressive inside, but its grandeur was diluted by the hanging chandeliers that descended like advent wreaths of bare bulbs and hung 10-12 feet from the floor. It must've been a prayertime necessity, or something traditional, but it made the architecture hard to appreciate.

We continued on to the Cagalogli Hamami, the oldest Turkish baths in the area. I'd found them online in a few traveler's reviews, and they are one of NY Times' Top 1000 things to do before you die, so it seemed the best bet for a bath experience. We paid our Lira and split ways, me to the women's side. I was shown to a small room with a bed (for massage? after-bathing nap? I never really knew) where I undressed and wrapped myself in a blue-and-white towel. I was expecting a long soak in a tub, maybe multiple tubs of different temperatures like in Spain, but instead my masseuse led me by the hand into the steam room. She brought me in front of a faucet that ran like a fountain into a stone bowl and took my towel from me. I now stood naked in front of her and she said, sit. You sit here. She took a metal bowl and showed me how to take bowls of water from the wall and pour it over myself to get clean. She told me, you wash. Wash, wash, wash. I come back. And with that, she left me alone in the steam room. I looked around for the first time, from the star-shaped holes letting in shafts of light from the ceiling to the raised center platform accented by a single potted palm. I was in a James Bond movie, or maybe transported through time to a harem. I was the only one in the bath, and I did what I was told, pouring water over me and humming a little to hear the 5-second echo of the octagonal stone room.

Another girl entered after a while, and we didn't make eye contact, just continued washing. After another 10 minutes (this felt like a lot of washing) my masseuse came back and took me by the hand to the center platform, where she told me to lie down. I kneeled and she motioned for me to roll over on my back. hmmm, frontal massage. This was a new one. I lay, and she squirted oil on my stomach and began to massage in circular motions. It felt more like a doctor's visit than anything, and I closed my eyes and tried to get over the wierdness and enjoy the oil massage. This is the way the Turkish have been doing it for thousands of years, so I took it all in. I wondered briefly about Jordan and decided that no matter what he was wearing, he was probably uncomfortable.

She flipped me over and gave me a good back and neck massage, and then did my feet. She had me sit up facing her and did my shoulders, which felt very mothering and safe. Finally, she led me to the faucet and did a shampoo and face massage, covering my nose and mouth as she poured water over my head--just like in the bathtub 20 years ago. She asked me how I liked it and I told her it was very nice, very good. She smiled and handed me my towel, then took off her bathing suit and wrapping in a towel--she only wore the suit for my comfort, apparently. Better for there to be only one nudist in the room at a time, and that would be me. Jordan had a similar experience, but faced the same confusion as I about where to go and what to do, and his masseuse was hard on the chest hair. We agreed that we didn't have to do the baths twice, but were glad to have done it.

We began to walk back along the tram tracks, weaving in and out of alleys and avoiding the gaze of shopkeepers, who would prey upon a passersby that so much as looked through the window. I began to notice routines that are unfamiliar to us; throughout the day, shopkeepers and diners and almost everyone takes small glasses of turkish tea, set on a white platter with a small silver spoon to mix in a cube of sugar. It's a tiny vase of liquid compared to anything starbucks churns out, but it's apparently a staple in the diet. Jordan noticed that the stereotypes about doner kebab have an utter basing in real-life Turkish diet; you can't walk 20 feet without hitting another doner stand. Conical stacks of meat hung everywhere we turned, rotating against a heatlamp and dripping reguarly into a frying pan underneath. We stopped at lunchtime to try a doner, ducking randomly into one of the shops and ordering the burrito-style wrap. It came covered in newsprint and held a delicious mix of grilled chicken, lettuce and shredded carrot, and the occasional french fry. Our bill came to something like 2.25 in dollars.

More to come...