Istanbul, cloudy, high 20s.
Sitting in a coffee shop with Cathey Philbrick, my laptop, an iced mocha, and techno music playing in the background. There’s a religious couple flirting at the next table, and it’s kind of amusing. She has a headscarf on, he’s clearly wearing his best threads (light blue shirt, black pants and shoes and khaki socks – dear me, where is Jen when you need her?), and they’re sitting as far apart as possible trying to be prim and proper while flirting. Something you only see here…
The group left this morning – assuming the flight left on time, they ought to be somewhere around the British isles right now. It wasn’t the utterly depressing event that I’d feared, but it’s weird not having everyone around anymore. I keep listening for Maryann’s shrill “güzel” or Laura’s purse or trying to spot Dana and Rob because they’re the tall ones and you can usually see them over the crowd.
Last night, our farewell dinner was held at a place called Orient House – I’m not exactly sure where it was – over by the Sultanahmet area, somewhere. It’s the kind of place where you get dinner and a floor show – in this case the floor show featured an MC who resembled something of a cross between the guy who plays Fes on “That 70′s Show” and [insert name of actor who has played a henchman named Igor here]. Lots of bellydancing, folkdancing, and the highlight act [sic] was a singer in impossibly tight pants who referred to himself as the Turkish Julio Iglesias.
More interesting was the crowd. There was a very large contingent of upper middle class Iranians there, all of whom were dressed in the latest fashions (several of the men videotaped the entire evening, and the joke that the show would be #1 on the home video charts in Tehran next week came up a few times – they REALLY got in to filming the bellydancers). Several times the show broke down into what Beth referred to as “Persian Dance Party USA,” with a multiethnic crowd as unlikely as Iranians, Israelis, and Americans occupying the stage. Maybe it was the wine, but the cordial attitude of everyone in the room (except for perhaps the dour Palestinian couple who appeared bound and determined to look as miserable as possible all night) really seemed to reinforce everything we’ve seen so far. Governmental attitudes will be as they are – the attitudes of people don’t necessarily reflect that. Give us enough wine and a cheesy atmosphere (and last night was REALLY cheesy) and we’ll get along just fine. Maybe they ought to have a DJ at the UN. That would shake things up.
We got in around 1:15, and Ali scheduled our wakeup call for 6:30, and made sure that even those of us who weren’t leaving got one. I remembered to thank him for that later. The group left late for the airport, finally getting under way a little after 8:30 even though they were supposed to leave at 8:15 (fitting – we haven’t done anything on time yet, why start now??). I think they were all happy to be heading home – it has been a great trip, and it’s time to move along now. Met up with Ali later in the morning before he headed back to Ankara. We’ve been making little jokes about “Gee, Ali, how far are we from the bottom of your list of favorite groups?” for a while now, since there have been lots of questions that are sometimes a bit off color, lots of inconvenient stops for shopping, photos, and whatever else, and you can tell when your guide is stressed out. I didn’t really realize how much he’d bonded with us until we were sitting in the lobby after everyone had left, and he was telling me how difficult his job is sometimes, because he’s always leaving, and people are always coming and going. He’s quite the character, our Ali, but I think he did just fine with our little group.
Afterwards, Ann, Cathey, Dana and I went back to Topkapi a little later on this morning – Ann and Dana went off to explore the Archaeological Museum located in the First Court, while Cathey and I went to visit the Harem section of the palace that we didn’t see on our tour last week. I was glad that we went back, even if we didn’t get to see a lot of it – after paying TL 12 million to get in, and TL 10 million for the extra ticket for the Harem, they really rush you through, and if you want narration in English, you have to pay TL 5 million to rent an audio tour. So, was the Harem worth TL 27 million (about $20)? Yeah, it was. It really gave much more of an insight into the palace culture – as Cathey pointed out, the people who lived in Topkapi were completely isolated from the world outside, and lived within a highly artificial world entirely of their own creation. Is it little wonder, then, that the Ottoman Empire stagnated from its own inward stance while Europe passed it by? It was fascinating seeing the personal chambers of the Sultan, of the eunuchs and concubines, and of the Valide Sultan, the Sultan’s Mother, who was where the buck REALLY stopped, divine right be damned. I really felt much more like I got a sense of Topkapi this morning, and I was glad to have gone back. We came back to the hotel, and sat with Dana for a quick lunch before she left for the airport to fly to Madrid.
So, let me tell you about the shoe shine boy. There are a whole bunch of kids who hang around Tepebasi Square, which is more or less in front of our hotel, with shoeshine equipment. Every so often they come up to you to demand to shine your shoes – some of them speak English, some don’t. Our last night as a group in Turkey, Carole got her shoes done for a million lira (about 75 cents), so I knew what it was supposed to cost. Some of them, however, are a little underhanded in their techniques. There was the night, for example, that one of them dropped a dab of polish on Rob’s shoe so that he’d have to have them done. He didn’t buy into it, and just wiped it off later.
Well, anyway. Cathey and I wandered around after the coffee shop. We did a little shopping, hit the internet cafe, and decided to go into Tepebasi to see the view of Istanbul at sunset. On our way out, one of the shoeshine kids came up and asked the usual question. I was wearing my leather Rockports, and they were pretty scuffed up, so I said, “Oh, sure.” He sat me down and started, and then it occurred to me that because I hadn’t been paying attention it didn’t occur to me that we should have discussed the price BEFORE I sat down. Soon, there was an entire crowd of shoeshine boys around us, and some of them weren’t little. I recognized that they weren’t speaking Turkish – they weren’t, they were Kurdish, and they apparently have a little racket going on in that part of the city. At the end, I asked how much – dumb move on my part. Of course, I got the enigmatic smile and “Oh, whatever you want to pay.” Except that my initial offer (TL 1 million) was rejected outright with an insulted grunt. No, he was thinking more like 40 million, which is damn near $30. I laughed in his face – maybe not the most diplomatic response, but since he was being an ass, so could I. He then said he was “willing” to go down to 30, but that was really insulting. Cathey at this point had the idea of announcing that she’d go ask at the hotel what this should cost. The kids started to scatter a bit, but then they regrouped – and now I was on my own, and they weren’t being so cute anymore. I handed my guy a 20 million note, and walked away as quickly as possible – only to meet Cathey on the way out of the hotel with the expected news that the appropriate rate for a shoeshine in Istanbul is one million lira.
Tomorrow, Ann, Cathey, and I are off to Bursa for the day. That should fill our day up rather nicely, and then we’re off Tuesday morning. I’m glad not to have been caught up in the hysterics of trying to get everything ready to go by this morning; all the same, I’m glad that my own adventure is wrapping up soon. I’m already thinking about the things I need to do when I get back, and it’s nice that I’ll have a few extra days to take care of things around the house before I have to head up to the Metroplex on Monday. I know it sounds like I’m depressed (mom), but it’s more like a feeling that I’m ready to move forward – it’s been great, folks, but they’re starting to clean the aisles and they’re waiting for us to gather our things and leave.
