İstanbul Trip Journal Entries

The following are my transcribed journal entries from the end of October, when I took my weekend trip to İstanbul.

October 29, 2010

Bugün was the most amazing day. I flew from Ankara (where I've been staying with the Atillas) to Sabiha Gökcen Airport [named after one of Atatürk's daughters, a very famous Turkish pilot; an Amelia Airhart-type figure] on the Asian side of İstanbul to stay with Temiz and Fusün Üstun [a Rotarian and his wife, who actually was an exchange student to the U.S. in the 1960s when she was my age]. I was picked up at the Airport by their very kind driver (in a very nice BMW!). We went to the house by back roads so that we suddenly came down this shady road and the Boğaz [Bosporus River] was RIGHT THERE! NE KADAR GÜZEL [how beautiful]!! Their house is a big, beautiful, thin mansion. There is a thing spiral wooden staircase winding up the middle of the house and a little frosted glass elavator (!!!) going up the center of that! From every room it looks like you are floating on the Bosporus, it is so close to the house. The water goes right against the front marble patio. When I got to the house, I was greeted by Fusün and Temiz (and the 3-4 "help" people—a cook, butler!? Maid, et al.!!) and I sat down to five DELICIOUS cheeses and some sour cherry preserves and fresh çay [tea] and great honey and wheat bread and olives (black and yellow). We chatted for a long time and got along very well! I ate way too much cheese though and was too full at lunch! I found out that Fusün went to Robert Unversity, i.e. the currect Boğaz içi Universitesi [Bosporus University; it was originally an American school that was founded in the 1800s in İstanbul; sometime in the last 50 years is was given to the Turkish government and was renamed Boğaz içi, due to its stunning location up a steep slope over the huge river], my eventual dream school.

After we ate, we got in the car and went all over. I don't exactly know out route, but the driver took us back and forth over both bridges [there are two giant bridges over the Bosporus River, which divides the city of İstanbul and divides Europe from Asia. İstanbul is actually the only major city in the world that spans two continents!]. We got out of the car to look at a big old castle from the time of Mehmet II (The Conqueror [a very famous and successful Ottoman sultan, Mehmet II was the man who finally, sometime in the 14^th century, conquered Constantinople and fully incorporated into the Ottoman empire, changing it over from its once prominent and historic Christian roots to its present situation as a beautiful Muslim city]) and walked around a beautiful little palace on the water. Oh, first we went to a beautiful little restaurant right on the water called The Marina. They had the fish laid out in the entryway on ice and you could just pick out what you wanted and they would make it fresh. We had white wine and salads and fresh calamari and little fresh fried fish and bread [illegible?} and pickled fish on onions and I got a freshly caught Bosporus Bluefish [called Lüfer] which was DELICIOUS. The waiter deboned it for me. The whole lunch, for three people, was 310 TL [~$210] plus tip!!! Ahhh. I guess they really are wealthy. After the other things we toured Boğaz içi U. and it was like a dream. I have never seen a more perfect or beautiful university. I. Will. Go. There.

I had mentioned that I wanted some "handmade" boots, which I guess are unavailable, so they took me to a mall and ended up buying me a great pair of chunky bootie-like shoes! So hip! So definitely the ~140TL the they paid for! Fusün said it was a Cumhuriyet Bayramı [The Holiday of the Republic, kind of like 4^th of July. Because Temiz and Fusün are upper class, and, therefore, secular and very loyal to Atatürk, this holiday means more to them than the more religious ones, as Fusün said] present. Oh, and Temiz went and got me film [which surprisingly hard to find in Turkey—the stuff he got me had been imported from Russia and was all in Russian?!]! So cute and thoughtful!!

When we got home, I went straight out and walked around their neighborhood. It was so perfect. I walked up the cobble stone streets and passed by so many little eateries and nice, old places. I stopped into a cool little health food store and this great girl, Ceren [pronounced "jeh-REN", a very common female name in Turkey (a variation of it is also "Cerensu")], who owned it, make me winter tea [ kış çay, a mixture of many different whole chunks of herbs like ginger, cinnamon sticks, dried chamomile blossoms, cloves, and many other leaves and spices I don't know the names of] and I hung out with her and some cool (and adorably gay?!) guy friends of hers. They were so nice and we visited for almost an hour and they gave me bites of the soup she had made! I bought some olive oil soap [tan, pleasant smelling bars of rough soap that is very common in Turkey. Supposedly it is made out of nothing but olive oil, and, rather than greasy, it is very effective and moisturizing, I've found. I've been using mine as shampoo!] and more winter tea (which she made up on the spot for me!).

Walking home, I cam upon a cool little thrift store but didn't but anything. But there was a cute cat sleeping in the clothes bin! On the way back to the house there was a traditional little music troupe (so loud car alarms were going off!) playing and dancing in the street! Just a pipe/horn player, two dancing drummers, and two dancing castanet players. When I got home I met their very sweet family and we had dinner.

Okay, I am tired of typing and we are eating dinner soon, so I think that you will get these entries in installments.

Sorry about the profuse use of exclamation points and the profound lack of tact—I am trying to stay true to the (hand-) written word!

Goodnight, Sweet Reader,

Natalie