Steamed Buns and Baba Ganoush

                Hokay, so

Sirin called me up and asked me to meet her in Taksim square for some tea and meze. I had blisters from my sandals so I wore my boat shoes, sans socks due to the heat, and now hobble around the house nursing hotspots all over my feet. But it was worth it, because Taksim and the neighboring area of Tunel are the go-to spots for local youth looking for weekend shenanigans. We had tea on the upper floor of a café overlooking a side street. We sat down and the skies opened up, quitting just as we finished the plate (this meze was more or less hummus, baba ganoush and other pureed veggie dips served with bread, quite good – and I promise photos will come to this blog in short time). One of the nice things about that area is the historic tram which has been preserved and still runs:

                And what’s the one thing that you can always count on next to bars? No, not hookers – drunk food! While they serve kebabs, the favorite food, Sirin politely informs me, is wet hamburgers.  I could probably have invented a more appealing name, but it’s a hamburger that’s been sitting in a steamer for god knows how long. I will be trying it, and I will let you know. One surprising thing is the lack of meat served in its “natural form,” meaning not spiced and stuffed or stacked and roasted. I imagine that this tradition is probably hard to break, as spiced meat means to many that it has been preserved. Still, if I have to eat cold salami, why does it have to be the Oscar Meyer kind? – I want the aged, moldy Italian stuff. I’m probably just shopping in the wrong areas, but for now the search for good, affordable meat continues.

                I went to the Istanbul Modern, and while they seem to have missed the memo that all modern art museums need obstreperous structures of gargantuan scale, the collection was pretty good. Sure, most showed the tendency of Turkish painters to mimic the European masters, but there was still a certain something that was fresh. The real treat was actually a temporary fashion exhibition, and I saw a few good films that dealt with fashion in the age of terror, individuality and xenophobia, etc. All in all, very well done collection and a good café overlooking the Bosphorus.

                I’ve just checked the weather and it’s supposed to creep into the nineties this Sunday. I need September to come soon.

Where did he touch you? Show us on the obelisk.

I finally put my big girl pants on and worked my way into Sultanahmet (old city of Istanbul) yesterday in order to see what the place had to offer. I started at the Grand Bazaar, thinking quietly that I had seen central markets in London, Oaxaca, Granada and Rabat and so this would be something like an amplified version of those. Not really, not at all, not even close. Sure, the main covered bazaar is a paltry 58 streets with a mere 1200 shops, but the bazaar district is a few square miles. So I lose myself, purposefully, and this time I don’t take my wallet. I begin to walk, boring quickly of the painted plates (this is actually a big problem for me, and I’m beginning to wonder if anyone out there can be said to be a connoisseur of painted plates, as they all seem to be identical) and move outside into the cascading streets that hock fake designer bags and enough clothing to fill every Filene’s Basement in the States. Everything seems to say “suck it, Mall of America.” I walk for maybe half an hour in the same direction and have yet to find a way out of the narrow streets when I happen upon the Spice Market. I buy half a kilo of Turkish delights, a ten dollar jar of honey (shoutout to my boy peter paul eagler) and some Turkish coffee grounds.

I was getting ill from all the commerce and was tired of being called out by venders who knew straight away that I was American (dazed expression, nervously calculated walking stride, orange shirt), so I bought a bottle of water and hiked to the Blue Mosque/Hagia Sofia area.  The latter site was 20Lira to enter with a queue outside the gate, so I decided to save it for another, cooler day. I saw the obelisk, stolen from Egypt, which served as the centerpiece for a now, regrettably, eradicated hippodrome. The blue mosque is huge, domed, spired and pompous from the outside, but is noticeably understated in the prayer area. I do like this about mosques, they have a degree of humility that, say, the Sistine chapel lacks. But humility doesn’t make for good sightseeing, so I went to the Topkapi Palace (a stranger had come up to me and given me a free ticket because I’m awesome), which was for a long time a kind of playground for arrogant and spendthrift sultans. As it turns out, nothing says baller baller like a bejeweled scimitar (one of these sultans reportedly stuffed a harem of 250 women in sacks and drowned them in the Bosphorus because they bored him). There was an 86 carat diamond there, about the size of a baby’s fist, no big deal. But nothing is above religion, and the most stunning pieces were qu’ran stands and water flasks (next to the baby’s fist diamond).  Then the view: golden horn, bosphorus, spires of other not-quite-as-big-but-still-freaking-huge-mosques.

I had walked a long way (I’m going to go ahead and put it around 10 miles on the day) and was craving a kebab. Picked an English-friendly place and was sorely disappointed (when it comes to food, only surly, mustached Turks from now on). Oh, and what’s the number one street food above bagel-ish breads, ice cream and Kebabs? That’s right, boiled and grilled sweet corn, because everyone in the world secretly wishes they were at an American State Fair.

I made Turkish coffee in the apartment. It’s good. Turkish delights are good too (especially the ones dusted with pistachio). I also found a gym, about 70 dollars a month, and not that great. I am very disappointed in Turkey’s failure to live up to my stereotype of it as the land of bodybuilding sultans. It is, however, the only current building with air conditioning to which I have access.

That will do, pig. Hope you are all well, wherever you are doing whatever with whomever. Hosca kalin.

Day One in Istanbul

I believe that I'm writing this approximately 24 hours after my arrival at the apartment, although it's hard to believe clocks at this point. The harrowing cab ride was calculated at 15 minutes, a feat unsupported by distance and traffic. I woke at 5 this morning to the first daily prayer and failed to find my way back to sleep. Patiently biding the five remaining hours until the market opened, I bought a few foodstuffs and went on a quest to find a gym. The closest one didn't fit the bill, and while cheap, included some stray cats on the lifting benches and no visible employees. I did find British Side, where I'll be taking a CELTA course over the next month, and was delighted to find a security officer, air conditioning, and the English language. Having accomplished this, I sulked back down and up the absurd pitch of the valley that divides me from my school. Then I napped for 4 hours. Panicked, I prepared myself to go to Taksim Square in search of an A/C adpapter, but stopped at an electricity shop not two streets over and picked one up from them. Here's a narrative of that interaction:
"English"
"No."
"Huh."
Pointing to my chest, I reached for a random plug, made a gesture to mimic plugging a cord into a wall (or a key into a door, or a tail onto a donkey) and repeated:
"America. America. Ah-mur-ee-kah."
He got the point in stride and handed me exactly what I wanted. I've put off Taksim Square for a day, too relieved to be spurred to action (it occurred to me, had my computer died, I wouldn't have had google maps, and that my tourist book only includes a map of the city's central artery). So that's what I've done, and you're probably bored to death, perhaps a coma (mild wooziness?). Now, here are the anecdotes:


1. International flight terminal in Chicago, security check. A beautiful woman, I believe to be Arab turns to be and says,
"Nice bag, where did you get it?"
"Urban Outfitters," I say dejectedly.
"I like it, super-travel-light."
"Yeah, thanks."
She was talking of course about my white (cream) messenger bag (man-purse). Humiliation, clawing humiliation.

2. In the cab, gorgeous coastal road, tankers offshore in the bosphorus looking like ladies in waiting. Moving around cars and over lines, treating traffic laws the way a painter treats the rules of perspective. Suddenly, huge, a half-eroded stone wall, probably erected by some famous guy, emerges on either side of the six-lane highway. Tradition. Modernity. Lawrence's opening to "Odour of the Chrysanthemums" describes a train out-pacing a running colt. Same sensation,  probably a great photo there, and gone in a second as if it never was.


3. Out to dinner with Sirin (nice woman, waited to let me into the apartment) and company when a boisterous Turk bumps into our table.
"Oh, pardon"
The respond, jeering:
"Paaardon, oh please paaardon meeee. Hehehehe."
Turns out he was their friend, had heard them speaking English (so as to include me) and had responded properly. He sits, rambles, digs questions, reveals that he knows Joe, assures me:
"We are not sooo Middle-Eastern."
"I saw more women," Sirin tells me, "wearing that black sheet thingy in London than in Istanbul."
I wonder briefly what the proper name for black sheet thingy is, turns out it's called a chador (thanks wikipedia for your streamlined "islamic dress: female" category). The ebullient istanbulite leaves, and I am informed by Sirin:
"He is so awesome. For instance, he is gay, and he never attempts to hide it from anyone."
I make known my support for him, for gays, for Istanbul's European sensibilities. I feel weird about the whole exchange, and the chip on Turkey's shoulder reveals itself to be a tumor. Then, feeling tired, I kill the conversation.
"So how about that flotilla?"
Sighs, mixed emotions, embarrassment, a curiously American reaction.


4. I pay for my groceries, put my wallet in my back pocket, awkwardly work the food into my bag, turn, leave, feel back pocket. It's empty, of course it's empty. I panic, return to the cashier to find no wallet, and look baffled at the old man who is now paying for his food. A man walks by me, smiles, hands me back my wallet, and keeps walking. He's the same one who sold me a sim card the day before, and he works next door. I look at the old man, who is now laughing as if to say ah-so-you're-a-dumbshit. The money, the cards, everything is where it should be. He was fucking with me, and I feel castrated.