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Diary - Turkey - Istanbul (8th Apr to 10th Apr)
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| Istanbul has an electric atmosphere that makes your heart pulse harder and faster. The hustle and bustle of street vendors, charismatic men trying to charm you into restaurants or more frequently rug shops and even the random guys selling tea or tissues in between traffic gives the city a charm and spirit that we have not felt before. |
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| We have happily sat about drinking Turkish Tea, or the nicer Apple tea, and simply watched how a city of 15 million plus people survive and the quirky jobs they seem to perform. This includes people try to sell bread to bus passengers, whilst at a specific stop, to the men delivering goods by trolley twice the size and probably weight of a Turkish Stallion. |
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| All of this relaxation and sight seeing was made easier by opting to leave Gweneveer at a campsite 50km outside the city and caught public transport. We then stayed a couple of nights in a Hostel, unfortunately in a dorm with somebody who snored loudly. Once we reached the outer part of the city we were thankful for this choice as the drivers are somewhat crazy, with beeping horns and a very much first come first served attitude to any form of manoeuvre. This attitude is a contradiction to how the people manners are as we have had nothing but wonderful kindness and fun with everybody we have met. |
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| We managed to see most of the major sights within the few days we were in town, some of our favourites were the Blue Mosque that dominates the skyline and the Grand Bazaar that is full of over 4000 little shops. Where we had our first haggling session for a few tea glasses, a very common Turkish item you see everywhere and which will allow us for lots of apple tea. |
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| One of our nicest evenings was taking a stroll along the edge of the Bospherus river, where we came across a hundred metre section of rocky coast covered with men fishing. With confidence growing in Katie she jumped onto the rocks and went to investigate what fish the men were catching with a very aggressive fishing style. To her delight a local, who could not speak English came and spoke/mimed to us what was happening. We managed to work out that they were catching Zargana, a small and long fish with a pointy nose and plenty of teeth, which they caught simply by forcing lots of bare hooks through the water to penetrate their bodies. |
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| Stray dogs and cats seemed to be part and parcel of the Turkish way of life, even means they chase your car away from toll booths late at night. However they tend to keep themselves to themselves and even appear to all get tagged by somebody. |
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| As rugs seem to be a major sales item in Istanbul we tried out some hospitality in an attempt to learn a little more. It also meant a nice chat over a free cup of tea, however after twenty friendly minutes and even after our opening line of we will not be buying a rug, we got invited to their showroom. This was down a dark alleyway at night and we had just had a conversation about how Turkish people take matters of revenge into their own hands. However we escaped with ease, but always interesting to see how quickly the charm is switched off when a sale is not going to happen. It was worthwhile and we did learn a little about the people, country, rugs and kilims, which are thin double sided rugs. |
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| All in all it is a wonderful city and one that is so different to anywhere that Europe has to offer. If you can stand the harassment of the shopkeepers and have a laugh with them instead then you would love the City. |
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| Since leaving Istanbul, we have simply done nothing for a few days at a quite coastal campsite, where we camp only meters from the sea. |
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