TurkishTraveler too

From Barbara: For Larry, Turkey was a chance to explore his roots, to find after 30 years the moment I had known in a small Swedish cemetery where generations of my ancestors slept before me, their grave markers a friendly pat away. For him he does not need a cemetery; meeting cousins, sitting in a Sephardi synagogue making connection with his ancestors although they may never have attended it, climbing the hills, feeling the breezes off the Bosporus are more than enough to feel he has found an ancestral home.
For me Turkey was initially a place to get away.the name did not matter, as long as it was away and part of a new adventure with Larry. Wherever we went, I would be looking for the future in the past, recapturing the early days when we stayed in shabby hotels, ate apples for meals, and never cared because where we were together mattered more than insignificant luxuries. And while Turkey was not my first choice (I wanted Europe, the familiarity of museums and theatres), why not turkey? Midnight Express surely was a period piece, describing a country and conditions that only had existed in a more drug pervaded world. And it seemed that everyone had been to Turkey and expressed a bored ho hum to what seemed so exotic to us (however, that was such a wrong reading; turkey is not on the most visited list of most people I know). So off to turkey on the magic carpet of imagination, multiple books in hand, ready to be young again and live and travel with a freedom of spirit we have not known in years.
I joined Larry after 2 weeks in which he settled in, met his Turkish cousins, and fell in love with this new stop on his world travels. Arriving late at night, I had first impressions of endless rows of high rise apartment buildings, a long wide bridge, hills, and lights enclosing all the minarets...When we arrived at the university, we passed through a high gate, rushed down a steep hill, turned into a nother narrow street,and stopped by a tall building, our dorm. the guest hotel for us would be the boys' dorm, convenient for Larry as his building is only 5 minutes walk away. the next day we would check out the guest hotel, which was similar to our spartan digs with the exception of a television and pictures on the wall. the boys dorm would continue to be our home, and there was a cozy comfort in the bare walls. Outside we could the voices of children playing in the neighborhood beyond the walls of the university (we are cloistered here, set aside from the crowded neighborhood) and sometimes early in the morning if we leave the windows open and invite in the bugs, we can hear the calls to prayer from the nearest mosque, a reminder that we are in a very different world from the ones we have known before.
My first few days here were ones of getting acclimated, figuring out where Larry's office was (the first day a challenge), discovering the food options. Larry had said I would not like the turkish breakfast, which he loves; he knows me well. I eat the toast, sometimes a few olives and drink my tea and think about eating omelets and pancakes made by Anni. There is nothing wrong with the Turkish breakfast; it's just my northern European soul wants something else! every morning it is the same. We walk into the student cafeteria and see dozens of identical plates,all with the same contents, all covered with plastic wrap, the ubiquitous 2 hunks of white cheese, slice of cold meat (looks like bologna), half a tomato, a wedge of cucumber, and 6 olives...In a basket on an adjacent wall are pieces of bread to put through the toaster, a conveyor belt of sorts, which warms and almost toasts one side of the bread... Larry eats half a dozen slices each morning as well as everything else on his plate; I discreetly cover my 2 slices with cherry jam and remember that for years as a child, my breakfast was quite similar. Bea would hand me my plate of toast as I sat by the warm register on the floor (like the family pet dog), and when no one was looking I would hide the crust in the register. such a strange child I was...
Finally, on Friday, Larry's birthday, we decided to explore the face of Istanbul tourists see. Larry knew how to get to Taksim, a central bus location in Pera, the section of Istanbul across from the Old City. He suggested we get on a double decker bus so I could see the sights...But the sights were an endless parade of concrete high rise apartments interspersed with vacant lots filled with litter. Small shops selling an assortments of items, always clustered together (the shoe stores in clusters, the green grocers, the hardware stores, etc). And the trip seemed endless. Where was the beautiful city I had read about, where was the exotic, the special? From my vantage point I could have been in any mediterranean city or middle eastern one with more poverty than grandeur. And Taksim itself was confusing. For the first time in my many travels with Larry, he could not figure out how to find a bus to the Old City or even which street to head down so that we could possibly walk across the Galata bridge and find things on our own. No one seemed to speak English. He tried in vain to purchase an akbil(the pass which makes public transportation easier to use)...But it was his birthday, not a day to complain...
We ate a doner, chicken wrapped in a pita, wandered aimlessly around the streets adjacent to Taksim with its large statue of Ataturk, who else (his face is omnipresent; I'm almost surprised his portrait is not hanging above our bed...), discovering a small China town, steep streets lined with shops, but where was the long great shopping street I had read about, where were the mosques and museums?
Realizing we needed a better map, we decided to find the tourist office, which was supposed to be at the Hilton Hotel...We headed off in another direction where the name hotels could be spotted...ending up on a wooden walkway looking out on a park...and somewhere in the distance, across an inaccessible busy road was the Hilton..We proceeded down the path ( at least the views were lovely and I was warming up to the day's adventure) walking down into a park that lined 2 sides of a busy highway. Paths led down to a large stadium and beyond that to the waterfront. We were making progress! Along the way we stopped to explore the interior of the Ritz Carlton (oh, so posh, so worlds removed from our abode!). Actually, it was the intrepid Larry who wandered in ; I sat on a bench looking at beds of flowers and waited until he reappeared insisting I also see the lobby and the art gallery featuring kilim carpets that seemed in flight...spectacular views of the Bosporus and the Asian side in the lobby and the delight of freshly squeezed pomegranate juice offered to all the guests..
The adventure was becoming a pleasure, not a drudgery , as we continued walking to the Bosporus, passing the Dolmabahce Palace, where the sultans lived in the last decades of the Ottoman Empire, seemingly endlesss rows of mosques and fish restaurants, seaside parks filled with odd sculpture, the Istanbul Modern Art Museum ( in what appeared to be a converted warehouse), large cruise ships looming over the shoreline...We walked for seemingly miles, but we both were delighting in thd discoveries...Even the endless stray dogs (absolutely everywhere in Istanbul, and I've discovered in my reading a centuries old phenomenon western visitors have always commented on) were not a problem...We finally reached Kabatas where we could get a ferry to the Asian side and Larry could finally purchase the long sought akbil...We knew we had to get back to Yeditepe since larry's Russian friend, Renad, was meeting us for dinner, a birthday dinner. And as we passed the Old Town, the dome of Hagia Sophia looming over the scene in a misty postcard kind of view, I spoke wistfully of hoping that wasn't the closest we would ever get to the istanbul of countless travel books...But we seemed to know now that Taksim was not the way to reach the Old Town, that ferries, the source of travel across the Bosporus for centuries, would also be our means to reach the places we wanted to see.
Of course, the day continued with its frustrations. We could not find the bus we wanted, the #19, which has become our"friend" on our travels, and ended up on the #14ks. Never, never, take the #14ks to Yeditepe...An hour and 10 minutes of rush hour traffic..we never seemed to move, we were so crowded that we wondered if we would be able to get to the door if we ever reached the familiar looming gate to the University...And we were already late to meet Renad..and his family. A subsequent trip on the same ill-fated bus was also as long, as crowded, as frustrating...we've learned our lesson..Even if #19 is crowded at Kadikoy, our bus terminus, it is better to stand for a half hour than sit for over an hour...
But it was Larry's birthday; everything had to work out happily. Renad was also late. Larry could order his favorite meal of spaghetti bolonez and revel in the day's adventure. And now we knew how to get where we wanted to go!
Oh, the petulance...Now I have come to enjoy the long bus rides to Kadikoy, marking the familiar landmarks,the vacant lot where sheep are sometimes tied, the lighting fixture store, the endless string of barber shops(we amused ourselves one night counting the ones still open at 11pm), the cemetery behind the hospital, the walk along the highway we took the morning we were looking for the Metrobus stop, the women with heads covered with colorful scarves (still maybe 25% of the women we see)...And the concrete buildings no longer seem so anonymous;different colors mark them, different windows. the bus trips have become the adventure Larry promised that first day. and the rush of buses at Kadikoy, the stalls selling fish and chestnuts and semits (the sesame covered bagel-like pastries) seem part of a fascinating bazaar...the city is capturing my heart, too, and it's the city tourists do not see...The ferry crossings always enchant, especially if timed to coincide with sunset..Seeing the mosques and minarets of Fatih (the Old town) in a reddish purple haze will be a favorite lasting memory...and the approaching facade of the train station on the Asian side (so much more impressive than the terminus of the Orient Express on the European side)... and the odd sculpture near the ferry terminal in Kadikoy, and the islands off in the distance...and the waiters carrying trays of tea on the ferry...Oh, what a lovely way to get around! First impressions, as Jane Austen so aptly described in the same named novel which became Pride and Prejudice, are so often incomplete...