Spring Fling 4: You Can’t Go Back to Constantinople…

… but you should go to İstanbul, at your earliest availability.

(Why yes, I do recognize the shamelessly cheesy They Might Be Giants reference.  But you know you think the same thing when you hear İstanbul. Don’t hide it!).

Blue Mosque

To end the Spring Break touring, Carolyn and I hopped an overnight bus to İstanbul. And it was amazing from the first second. I mean that quite literally: we stepped off of the bus, stiff legged and sleepy, at 5:30 a.m., to be surrounded by the call to prayer — beautiful, echoing strains of Arabic –  coming from mosques all around us.

Good morning, İstanbul!

[NOTE:  Bulgaria is not yet on the Euro. Turkey is not even in the EU. However, should you be an American, on a bus to Turkey from Bulgaria, have 15 Euro with you. Why? Because you have to buy a visa, and pay in Euro. Why? I have no clue. Yet, I assure you, it is better than nearly being stranded on the Turkish-Bulgarian border whilst your friend finagles a border guard into selling you some Euro for some Bulgaria leva. Trust me. You don't want to be stranded on the Turkish-Bulgarian border]

From the towering minarets to the men selling little round loaves of bread from tall stacks on their heads to the sparkly, turquoise Bosphorus to the huge billboards advertising fashionable versions of the traditional Muslim head scarves, İstanbul made me feel like I wished I had more eyes, as if my own two were insufficient to take in all the beauty around me.

Inside the Harem

We walked into mosques, such as the famous Blue Mosque, which were covered with the most intricate tilework, shining with deep, rich colors and swirls of Arabic lettering in gold. We stared in awe at the cavernous Hagia Sophia, where the sun streaming through the windows onto the ancient tile was enough to make you forget what year it was. We took boats across the Bosphorus, watching the blue water stream by the steep shores where sun-bleached houses seemed to sprout out of one another. We ate fresh fish, flash-grilled along the shoreline. We pondered whether it really would have been that bad to be a courtesan when we saw the harem at the Topkapı Palace. We smoked too much nargileh, or flavored tobacco in a water pipe,  for two girls who do not smoke at all.  We emptied our pockets on the wide array of glittery goodness at the Grand Bazaar, even managing a hand at bargaining while sipping apple tea, and bought our weight in Turkish Delight (that stuff they sell in most US stores and call Turkish Delight? Not even close!) at the Spice Bazaar.  We drank numerous cups of the dark, sludgy, delicious Turkish coffee.

Beyoğlu at Sunset

But I think the aspect I loved about  İstanbul most was not a view or a dish or a museum, but an attitude, how it seemed to literally teem with life. Like walking into Times Square on a warm spring evening, going to the neighborhood called Beyoğlu (a steeper-than-steeply hilly ‘hood, directly across the Bosphorus from all the “big” tourist sites) meant walking into a crowd.  Sometimes, I hate crowds — like August in Washington, when the number of belt-pack-wearing Midwestern tourists (who always refuse to stand on the right side of the Metro escalator, so those of us D.C.-ians in a rush can pass on the left!) is enough to make me want to strangle them with their recently purchased “You Don’t Know Me: FBI Witness Protection Program” (why, oh why, do those keep selling?!?) or “God Bless America” T-shirts.  But at other times, when you find a city just hitting its evening, work’s-done-fun-get-together time stride, the crowd can be electric and energizing. It pulses; it makes you want to get out and join it. It makes you want to be part of the action. İstanbul’s got that kind of vibe. The streets are so crowded around 7 p.m. that you almost feel pushed by the swell of people behind you — and yet, it seems to be exactly the kind of push you want, to start your own fun night. 

Beyoğlu from the Bosphorus

We also arrived in the city exactly one day after President Obama’s historic visit there. As any American who does not live under a rock knows, Obama had to play his campaign very far away from any suggestion he could be Muslim, thanks to a right-wing whackjob’s email campaign saying he did practice Islam — and the more depressing fact that we “land of the free”, protectors of the individual’s right to worship as one chooses Americans are still scared of anyone who is not Christian. But when he came to Turkey — a secular city with ambitions to enter the EU — that move  “Oh, you’re AMERICAN!” Turkish people kept saying. “Your president, he was here!” or “We love him!” or even “We love Americans.”

Wha-wha-what?!?!?! It is still a bit jarring, for someone who last lived abroad under the Bush era, the era of hiding one’s US passport cover, to hear one’s own country praised as such. Certainly, I am sure that as I type this, some right-y blogger or other such cynic would use these words to prove Obama’s “otherness,” his lack of “proper patriotism” for cavorting with the Turkish people. But, Fulbrighter that I am, I believe goodwill and good grace could have real consequences. No, a president making a press-fueled pit stop in a country is not the same as sound foreign policy. Yet, if said pit stop shows another country that, yes, the US recognizes their concerns and wants to work with them, and makes it so the average guy selling you your doner kebab wants to maintain happy relations, it seems to me it is only all the more likely that should the two countries find themselves in more dire straits, that goodwill will be much more appreciated.

Carolyn in Beyoğlu

Oh, and if you go ever go to Turkey, please follow this advice: bring a blonde. Preferably, a 6-foot tall one, like Carolyn. Now, I have seen the Italians react to blonde hair — a light-brown haired lass like myself even got a fair share of “bella bionda!” from passing motorinis there. But those famous lovers of the ladies the Italian Stallions have nothing on the Turkish male’s admiration of the fair-tressed among us. Everywhere we went, Carolyn was greeted with marriage proposals, queries about whether or not she was an angel, and down and out stares and double takes enough to make her poor, besotted suitors trip over their own feet.

I found this hilarious. Carolyn, perhaps not as much.

Of course, I did get my own shout or two, and even a very sweet proposal from a young student who timidly approached out table after a nice raki (Turkish anise flavored liquor) our last evening to tell me I was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Now, as card-carrying feminist and a level-headed girl who firmly believes in the Don’t Let Dudes Dictate Your Self Worth school of thought, I wish I could say I found this a shallow, useless interruption.

But I kind of liked it.

I blame the raki.