But is it Europe?

I haven’t written much about Turkey, mostly because it was such a confusing place. I really liked some of Istanbul, and I really hated some of it. Nonetheless I’m extremely happy I went. Oh, and if you haven’t heard it yet, my round trip flight + 3 nights at a 3 star hotel was only 200 dollars. Whenever something on the trip sucked, Jana and I would just say ‘but at least it was cheap.’ What I liked: History: Istanbul is covered in crap – old churches, mosques, forts, buildings, and megalomaniacal monuments to various conquers, shamans, and wannabes. I didn’t manage to see everything I wanted to in the course of 4 days. The city wasn’t nearly as cool as Rome, but history-obsessed Nick still enjoyed it. Europe: Istanbul is pretty European. I was there during a holiday weekend, so some of the people weren’t Istanbulis, and that was sometimes strange (see below). But in old Pera above the old town I couldn’t help but think I was in the middle of some Eurostan hotspot. Bars, cool cafes, designer clothes, teenagers making out, what is more eurotrash than that? The Bosphorous: This is the strait that leads from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean, and Istanbul is built around the thing. It’s strategically obvious: from here you control all shipping traffic to the ports of Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, Russia, and some of those Shitistans. I had the chance to take the tourist ferry up the strait, and hike up to and old Byzantine fort on the top. It was probably my favorite part of the trip. The food: The Turks kick ass on this front. I absolutely loved it. The beer: Turkey is my kind of Muslim country. I could buy beer anywhere I went. And everyone seemed to be taking advantage of this little sin. What I didn’t like: Big-City People: Too many people. And they had absolutely no problem walking up to you and trying to get you to come into their restaurant or carpet shop. I heard a couple people say nasty things as we walked away, but I guess that’s the way it is in the big city. The call to prayer: This wasn’t so bad in principle – I understand different religions have their own ways of doing things. My objection is thus: when those guys get on the loudspeaker and sing their prayers, they do it on an eastern musical scale. This means they won’t resolve the chord like we do, and instead hit some note a half step below the triad. It made my teeth hurt. That and they do the damn thing at 5:30 in the morning over loudspeakers that pointed directly into my hotel room. The hotel: 3-star my ass. The place was a piece of crap. But at least it had a toilet The toilets: Turkish toilets scared the hell out of me. They’re mostly just a hole in the ground. Not a big hole, so I wasn’t afraid of falling in. But there wasn’t any toilet paper, and they had a bucket of water next to the thing, and I had no idea what to do with the bucket of water. There didn’t seem to be any device for soaking up the water once used. Luckily I managed to avoid the Sultan’s Revenge, and I was always aware of the location of the nearest McDonalds. The flight: We were delayed 4 hours on the way over. We flew a Turkish airline called ‘Freebird’ that literally had the worst food I could possibly imagine. Inedible cheese pasta – I could vomit up something tastier than that. On the way back our flight was delayed again for another 4 hours, and we flew an airline called ‘Travel Service’, which was owned by the ‘Unicom Group’. A ‘Place Airline Name Here’ company, owned by a vaguely menacing low-level mob money-laundering operation it may have been, but the flight was surprisingly pleasant. Religious people: There were several people around who I wouldn’t be willing to get on an airplane with. My friend Michal, who lived in Izmir for 9 months, told me that the conservative people from the boonies come into town during holiday weekends, and that you rarely see people in religious garb in most Turkish cities. We were there for the end of Eid, which would explain that. The weather: for some reason Istanbul was colder than Prague. The sun came out for a total of 30 minutes the whole trip. Hazy, wet and cold – Not exactly most peoples idea of a Turkish holiday. The verdict: I enjoyed it. I’d like to go back next year, but I’ll probably check out something other than Istanbul. Check out the Istanbul slideshow here.