Turkey: culture, chaos, and really good bread

We’re back! And by that I mean, back online… not back in the U.S. We’re still traveling! We’ve been a month in Nepal, most of it rural, without reliable internet. Prior to that we were in Turkey, and we have no excuses for not posting about that sooner except that we just didn’t. We are currently working to catch up on blog posts, and will have more out shortly. For now, enjoy our much belated post on Turkey!

Actually, even calling this a blog post on Turkey is a bit misleading. We had fully intended on seeing more of Turkey. However, the very beginning of our post-Istanbul travels around Turkey found me (Meghan) with some serious back pain. Thus, we made it to the middle of Turkey, Cappadoccia, an incredibly beautiful, interesting area, only to be largely bed ridden in a hostel the rest of our time (a very lovely hostel, I might add). So, Turkey goes onto a future travel list, and we’ll focus on the beautiful chaos of Istanbul for now.

And beautiful chaos is quite appropriate, as one t-shirt I saw in shop a window summed it up pretty perfectly – “Istanbul: you call it chaos. We call it home.” Experiencing this chaos wasn’t originally a bucket list item for us until we found ourselves, mouths hanging and eyes wide, wandering down Istiklal Street toward our hostel in an absolute sea of people… Times Square on New Year’s sea of people.

Pause. I jumped to Turkey skipping over the most amazing experience we never expected. I need to back up half a day to our experience actually flying in to Istanbul. Are you ready for this? No, probably not. Neither were we. Turkish Airlines, the carrier we flew to Istanbul simply because it was the cheapest option, included a full hot meal complete with beverage (alcohol or non!) on the flight! A two hour flight! I think we paid as much for the tickets as some airlines charge for their “meals.” AND, this was after they handed out a scrumptious hazelnut chocolate candy to everyone (and two to Brian… it pays to ask!). All this despite stepping onto a plane that may have been partially resuscitated from a Southwest graveyard.

The setup made the experience even better. First we smelled the food. Interesting, some people must have paid for a meal. Then we noticed the attendant was asking everyone if they wanted food. We steeled ourselves; we’re not paying extra for airplane food (budget travel and all). She turned to us, “chicken or vegetable?” Brian was quick with the question, “is this included?” And then we got a look – not a full facial expression, mind you – a slight twitch and a well composed gaze from behind the eyes that suggested we were being very childish and wasting time. All she said, though, was “Yeees,” drawn out slowly to reflect her annoyance. She smiled slightly at our shocked expressions as we were barely able to whisper, “one of each, please.” This is winning the budget travelers’ lottery, friends. You could not have served me a Michelin star meal that day that tasted better than my included nuked rice and veg and chocolate banana mousse. Spirits were high as we landed in Turkey.

Okay. Back on Istiklal Street in Istanbul, where you could make a very challenging “Where’s Westlander” trying to find our heads among the throngs despite my blond hair, we slowly wove our way toward the Galata bridge to find our hostel on the other side. The chaos itself was just as fascinating as the walk. The wide street, lined with shops mostly for tourists on both sides was completely filled with people walking (no motor traffic at the time), most of middle eastern descent and many in more traditional Muslim clothing. While their ethnicity and clothing was not unexpected, it presents the visual image of how truly in the minority we were. The joyous shock of free airplane food was completely replaced by the sheer culture shock of the moment, but we were happy to embrace it all. It turns out we landed in Istanbul on the first or second day of the Muslim, Eid holiday, a time when thousands of other tourists flock to Istanbul for vacation.

We slowly swam through the sea of people, taking it all in, and emerged at the bridge as the lights of the mosques were just coming on across the waters. It was our first expansive view, and it was entrancing. Mosques created for sultans dotted the hills, enormous and lit up in the evening light that reflected off the waters. It was a peaceful contrast to the throngs we’d been in. We followed the bridge and found our way to our hostel, settling in and climbing to our rooftop for a look just as the final evening call to prayer began sounding.

Ah, the call to prayer
I’m going to be quite frank here. The first time I heard the call the prayer, it was haunting, and I felt like I was in a movie in some foreign, mystical land. Each time it sounds it serves as a reminder to reflect, and we appreciated that, Brian especially. In fact, 5 times a day is not really overdoing it with the reminders in such a fast paced society (though the 4am call had us grappling for earplugs and wishing we could reflect further on the insides of our eyelids). But, by the third or fourth day, I wanted to gift Istanbul several sets of Bose speakers, and I found myself covering my ears to avoid the scratchy wailing resounding all around us. We hold a lot of reverence for this particular practice, but it could go for an upgraded sound system.

Exploring Istanbul
Istanbul is full of amazing historical sites, and if you’re tight on time, you can see a lot of them in about four days. We were grateful to be able to take a bit more time in Istanbul, spread out the sites, and enjoy our experiences in between as well. I don’t think we’d been quite so atune to slowing down in other countries we visited. Here, we were grateful to plan that time to allow us to experience different aspects of Turkish culture. And since Turkey presented our most foreign experience yet, we found the extra time very valuable here.

Culture
When you spend time around the tourist sites, you are faced with one facet of Turkish culture: the how-can-I-separate-you-from-your-money facet. While this facet exists around tourists sites all over the world, it was presented in a very specific way and much more in-your-face in Istanbul than anywhere else we’d been previously (hence my decision to even call it a facet of culture). “Yes please.” “Yes please.” “Yes please,” each hustler calls out from every restaurant and shop you pass attempting to get your patronage by practically pulling out a chair and sitting you in it. So tiresome is this frequent beckoning (does this work on anybody?!) that when Brian responded with, “Yes, please,” after being offered a sugar for his coffee one morning, I practically turned him to stone with my glare before realizing he was only being polite.

But Turkish culture and hospitality took on a completely different vibe in between the tourists hubs and surrounding areas. The strongest element of this we noticed was in how helpful everyone was. Turks will help you. Nope, don’t wave them away as you look at your map slightly confused. You don’t get a choice in the matter. They will help you. And if they can’t help you in your native tongue, they’ll help you in their’s. And if you still look confused as they rattle off instructions in Turkish, as most assuredly you will, someone around who speaks English will translate for you. And, if the small team of Turks who’ve assembled to try to help you can’t translate enough to be useful, someone will be chosen to escort you all the way to wherever it is you wanted to go… or hunt down another person to join the team to continue helping you. And you will be entirely endeared by their sincerity and friendliness, so overwhelming it is to have that kind of hospitality bestowed upon you. It was this helpfulness we met with, or at least observed, time and again throughout our stay in Turkey: Ali, our first hostel host spent a couple hours with travelers each day helping them plan their travels around Turkey; an older gentlemen paid our first bus fair before we were able to get a transport card and refused to accept payment back, while another made absolute certain we knew where to get off before departing himself; and a mall security officer walked us half a mile to a photo shop (nowhere near the mall) so we could get passport photos taken. We were truly touched by this good natured, hospitable spirit.

We also had one of our best new cultural travel experiences by spending a few days staying with a couchsurfer. Couchsurfing is a community of people who meet up with and host travelers from all over the world. We’d had a couple great couchsurfing experiences meeting up with people but had not stayed with anyone until Istanbul. Couchsurfing gave us an opportunity to spend more time with a local, have some great conversations, and learn more about neighborhoods and transportation than we would have otherwise. And we got along great with Suleyman, our host. He took us out a couple of nights for wonderful food and great conversation. He’s quite the gentle intellectual and taught us more about Turkish history than I ever paid attention to in school (and it was fascinating), as well as providing us a nice place to stay. We are truly grateful for these experiences and the wonderful people we meet and befriend.

Food!
And finally, I can’t end this post without sharing a couple of our experiences with Turkish food. Okay, this could probably be a separate blog post in itself, but I really will try to be quick about it. Turkish food. Yum!

Turkish breakfast is simply wonderful, full of energy providing balanced foods topped off with a giant basket of white bread and four different spreads… reminding me that Turkey is the place to go for delicious white bread. We didn’t expect it and were quite surprised by it… but, if you’re content eating your weight in amazing, fluffy, white bread, Turkey welcomes you.

Iskender kebab. This might be the single most delicious food we ate in Turkey. It’s simply kebab meat over some fabulous white flat bread, covered in a tomato sauce, and topped with the “duh! why wouldn’t you top all meats with this?” sauce – browned butter. Served next to yogurt and with a side of defibrillator, it’s simply amazing. If you feel like taking on a bit of homework and a heavy meal, try to find a Turkish restaurant serving this incredible feast. We recommend a diet of mostly salads on both sides of this meal.

And perhaps one of our favorite tourist experiences so far: our cooking class with Ouz (pronounced “ohs”). Ouz is awesome, and if you search Trip Advisor, you’ll find many many people who love him and his cooking class. The class begins with a trip through several older traditional market shops located just off our favorite touristy street, Istiklal. Ouz talks about Turkish food culture as we get handed samples of various fish, pickles, and turkish delight. Along the way, we pick up ingredients for the day (and snacks and gifts at non (or at least less) touristy prices). Then we walk to an apartment with a beautiful kitchen and large table set up for the class. Ouz talks through food culture, and we help chop and mix ingredients for five Turkish dishes. The class is not so intense of a cooking class, but a wonderful social experience in which we come away with a spectacular Turkish meal, lessons in cooking culture, and recipes to repeat these dishes at home (completely doable). A wonderful time with a great group of people, and we are excited to take on these recipes back in the states!

Who’s up for a Turkish feast?