Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Istanbul, Turkey
we're getting a bit tired now and are near the end of our tether as we know that we are headed home soon. Off to downtown by shuttle at 10:30am, our intention to explore 'new' Istanbul in the area of Taksim Square. It is apparently the heart of 'cosmopolitan' Istanbul, the modern area that caters to night life and party central of the 'young turks' of Istanbul.
It all went off without a hitch at the start. We were dropped on the corner just outside the rug merchants that were after Jan last night as we waited for the shuttle. These guys are very smooth, polished, and familiar with tourists such as us. They are friendly, knowlegeable, and speak excellent English. And, they offer Turkish style tea to those like us standing on the street waiting for our shuttle bus pickup. Yesterday they almost had Jan in their clutches but she escaped just as the Shuttle arrived. Today they were out there to meet us as we got off the shuttle, wanting us to come in the store to see their rugs. We escaped, politely, but we escaped and were off heading toward the Cistern and the tramline running north toward Taksim Square. We shall have to run the gauntlet on our return to the pickup point, and we know that.
We bought the tram tickets though it took us a few questions and some help to buy them, then on the crowded tram, down the hill, around the corner by Sirkecki train station, by the 'new mosque' and over the bridge and up the coastline a short distance with the total trip taking only about 25 minutes. Then down another passage, underground, to find a funicular railway that will take us up to the top of a considerable hill to the start of our tour of Taksim Square. We found the funicular but it wasn't what we thought as it passed its whole distance in a tunnel headed up the mountain so no view. No matter, we arrived quickly at the top of the passage, then up a bunch of stairs and out into the sunlight at around 11:00am.
The street is like a busy 'high street' or shopping street anywhere in the world. It is pedestrian only, except for streetcars (looking like the San Francisco cable cars) and police cars and ambulances and street cleaners and madmen on scooters. And at the end of each block the cross-streets are not pedestrian-only either. So, nominally pedestrian travel but you sure have to keep your eyes open. The traffic at the local hospital's emergency wards here, and in Europe generally, must be very brisk. Might makes Right is a motto from long ago, but still seems to apply here.
The tram brought us to the top of the hill, so all streets led down from there. We consulted our street map, we definitely wanted the 'down' that led toward Istanbul and not the one headed toward, say, Damascus. That would not have been cool. We thought we had it figured out, so off we went and sampled the aromas and ambience of the stores along the main street we went down. The people were the main attraction, more than the shop's wares. Definitely not Robson Street, this, as there were a total absence of Chinese or Japanese shoppers. And very few 'white' shoppers either, most being olive skinned peoples that predominate east of, say, Budapest. A blonde or brunette head of hair was extremely rare and when spotted was certainly identified as being on the head of an obvious tourist. In the course of our walk of about an hour down this street, and the (about) three hours it took us to get to our rug-store bus pickup, we never heard a work of English spoken. Very little French or German either, but our experiences elsewhere has convinced us that almost everyone we bump into speaks at least some English and understands quite a bit more. In fact they are eager to practice it, and learn, but I guess they don't bother among themselves.
Eventually down to the bottom of the shopping street, with downtown Istanbul visible over the rooftops and through the sidestreets. We plunged into a corkscrew of a street that curled and twisted its way down the steep hill. Now the sidewalks were narrower, as was the street, and we wondered if we were lost. Consult the map - Nope, this thing will take us to the bottom. Very steep slope to this hill, trucks grinding their way up in bull-low gear, others with brakes squealing and smelling inching their way down, almost touching mirrors as they passed. Trucks?? Why so many?? Then walking further we encountered a plumbing store ... and walked by it. And then another plumbing store. And then ... more, lots more, a whole shopping mall, or shopping street at least, of plumbing stores. Wholesale, retail, cash and carry, signs in several languages - all just saying that 'we are open for business if you got the money'. Young men going in and out, hauling boxes and sinks and bathtubs and shower enclosures. Old men sitting behind the counters, glowering at everything, tough looking businessmen that I'll bet you would have to get up very early in the morning to beat in a business deal. Cigarettes dangling everywhere, from mouths and fingers and on counter tops. We just walked by, looking but not stopping. They would have been tougher to get away from than the rug merchants. After a couple of blocks of this, the lighting shops started up. A whole bunch in a row, then after a few blocks it was hardware stores. Ladders up against the side of buildings, building lumber and plywood stacked in the yard, chainsaws and skillsaws and jigsaws and tablesaws in profusion everywhere. This was projected in the next few blocks that we could see, but at the corner of the street we were on we could see the bridge over the Bosporus that would take us back to the city center of Istanbul, and we turned toward it.
Not so fast, grasshopper. We had to get on the other side of a very busy six lane wide street that apparently had no crosswalk. Oh, yeah, it has an underpass, so we darted across a side street and into the underpass. Which was dank and smelly and lined on either side by - what else - vendors. Same sort of thing here as corkscrew street, each vendor was completely specialized. One had pens, all sizes and types and colors, and hawked his wares with loud shouts of enthusiam. The one next to him had .. pots. Not pots and pans or dishes, just pots. Saucepans to dutch ovens and all in between, pots of all sizes. The first two I remember clearly, then my mind glazed over with the myriad sights and sounds and smells. Candy and knives are two more I recall, then Jan and I just put our heads down and chugged out of there looking neither left nor right in our attempt to not attract their attention any further. I mean, are we going to buy a pot? Or a knife? Or a chunk of candy sitting out there in a dish? No. Then lets not get them stirred up enough to get in our faces. Finally we burst from the underpass and up the stairs and out into the sunlight, and onto the bridge.
Another feast for the senses awaits. This is fisherman's heaven, they line the bridge on either side of the six lanes of traffic and leave very little walk-by room on the sidewalk. All men, most are old and the rest middle aged at least, and they have their bait boxes and lures and some even have their catch spread out on the pavement, boasting of their fishing prowess. The caught fish were sad little things, all under 7", white bellies and bloody heads, one or two here and there gasping out their last breath. The men are a chunky and swarthy lot, all smoking, grunting at each other by way of communication, as fishermen do. I can imagine their arrival home with their 'catch', oh!!! yeeeaah!! Grampa's home!! What's he got?? Oh, smelly fish ... Yuk!!!! Or maybe the homefolk are so hungry they will eat the fish, maybe head and all. I don't know, it's not my business. We walked along, over the bridge, into Istanbul (ITS ISTANBUL FOR CRISSAKES!!!) marvelling at the sights smells and, oh yeah, more vendors on the bridge between the fishers. I can just see a young man going up to his betrothed and saying "wife, I have found my calling. I'm going to sell used saucers on the bridge over the Bosphorus. We'll be able to have 14 kids." Don't think that will happen.
Off the bridge now, heading up a hill, and we are aware we are a bit weary and a bit hungry too. Aha! An outdoor restaurant is just in front of us, brilliant idea, lets sit and have coffee and a snack, quite civilized. In due course we are seated in a fairly busy restaurant that is at the end of the lunch hour, and most guests are just sitting over their coffee, or finishing their meal, and their ever-present cigarette. Jan and I order, chat a bit, I look around, and fall silent a bit. For what I see is the march of the ages in front of me, the pinwheel of civilization, courtship and marriage, war and destruction, and hope's spring eternal in humans. Just over there, over one row of tables and up one, sits three women. Seated by the door are a table of six men, and there are four servers, all men, bustling about nearby. The women are pretty, slim and nicely dressed in office style, they all have their legs crossed, flipping their hair, laughing a bit too loud, and doing their best to do their smoking as seductively as possible. One by one, they glance at the table of men, re-cross their legs, lift their cigarettes, flick a non-existant ash, and laugh prettily. Then glance at the four servers, just to see the effect. The men, in turn, are loud and raucus, slapping at one another and laughing, puffing themselves up, straighten up their jackets, glance at the women to see the effect. The servers bustle about, then turn and check out their image in the big window, and prance purposefully past the women's table delivering a side-long glance. Which starts the women up again. Within their table, a pecking order is very noticable. One is definitely prettier than the other two, and she holds court. Only obliquely does she glance at the men, her assistants do that, and with flashing eyes and hushed voices they lean their heads forward and report to her. Then peals of laughter, darting glances, and the men's table rises up again as the peacocks preen themselves once more and the mating dance continues. Then the certainty hits me that a hundred years ago, probably on this spot, this dance was played out. Two hundred, five hundred, a thousand and more years ago, as today, this dance was danced and the mating ritual consumated. The ottoman turks, the muslims, the syrians, all the conquerors and the conquered, through all of time. And over at that table by the shrubbery, that middle aged couple, both fat, both gray, he mostly bald, still nicely dressed. They are who the dancing girls and men will become as the ritual continues. I see him, with certainty, in a vest and pantaloons in the days of the sultans, still fat and bald, his wife still fat and grey, still nicely dressed. Later still, he fishes in the Bosphorus and he brings his catch home to a wife that nags him even as she shakes her finger at him now. We hope for different, yet we endure what we are dealt. Hope is a town 100 miles from Vancouver, but it is also a way of getting through the grinding days and nights after the blush of youth has faded. And even youth needs hope, particularly the three women at the table who are now getting up to go and making a big production of it, they hope their suitors can provide for them. And the men? - Hell, they just hope to get lucky. The dance of the ages. The only passtime for a man that is more worthy than making war, and all else pales to insignificance.
I describe my thoughts and the scenario to Jan, who looks at me for a moment and says I have too much imagination. True, but I can't help that. Besides, that's what travelling is, to me, a giant movie theater of the mind, a movie where the characters are real and say the thoughts I ascribe to them, and their actions are unseen off screen yet conform to my direction. A moment of playing god, imagining the ebb and flow of the human condition. We've eaten, had our coffee, now its time to go so we rise and pay our bill and leave. The young men and women of the movie have already left.
We walk up the hill, following the map, Istanbul is one giant hill and we are on our way to a huge market that the map will take us to. Which it does in due course, and our already overwhelmed senses are battered once again. The colors, the sounds, the hawking merchants, vendors holding up bolts of cloth, touting its quality, claiming to ship to anywhere in the world, such a bargain, and, two steps later, a spice merchant whose stall has a fragrance that is so pure, so exotic, so rich, it could be bottled and sold. Left alone, we probably would have bought some meaningless trinket or some sampler of spice, but the vendors were so strident and so insistant that we felt that we couldn't stop long enough to buy without the rest pouncing on us in our moment of weakness. We pressed on, feasting with our senses, but needing nothing that we would have to pack with us.
Out of the bazaar, pressing on up the hill, in a different district now. Here there are cloth merchants, clothing stores, rugs for the poorer people. On the road, mixed in with people, donkeys pulling carts laden with unidentified goods, up and down impossibly steep inclines. And men too, pulling loads. Long poles from the cart wheels forward, gripped in hands that must be iron-tough, powered by legs that have muscles as solid as an oak tree, bent over pulling up-hill with the upper body parallel to the roadway, pulling an impossibly large load. When he was a young man, preening for the ladies, did he see this future? And the one he wooed and won, where is she - and did she see this coming? Maybe they did, and didn't care, true love will do that to you.
Finally at the top of the hill, right next to the Iranian Embassy we stop. High fences, high gates, forbidding, forboding. I imagine Peter Lorre slipping in the side door with Sidney Greenstreet, both looking menacing, with Humphrey Bogart watching from across the street. I don't mention that to Jan, who is trying to read the map and figure a way down the hill. Uncertain, as the map is pretty vague here, we head down because down is less tiring than up. Luck is with us, we find the right street. We walk by a 300 year old Turkish Bath, I am tempted but Jan is not, and instead a sidewalk tavern beckons and we slip in. We are only about eight blocks from our hotel shuttle pickup spot, and have over half an hour, so time for a beer and a glass of wine to celebrate an excellent day.
Shortly, we thwart the rug merchants one more time and escape on the shuttle. Tomorrow we fly 'home' to London, and Leanne and Tara.
