spain and turkey
i don't where to begin in my travel stories... where does anything begin, really? on the plane ride over, the day in december when i decided i should just go ahead and do it, or when i first stepped out of the metro into the middle of madrid?
in spain, i spent the bulk of my first day in El Retiro, the large park where everyone goes on Sundays, entire extended family in tow. there was a symphony concert and dozens of impromtu musicians all around, an african drumming circle, couples rowing little boats on the pond, children playing, and old men playing bocci. i roamed around the streets for a bit and then took a nap before meeting up with my friend mari satur, whom i had met the last time i was in spain. we went out for tapas (like appetizers, extended to ridiculous proportions) and wine with a friend of hers.
i started each day with a small pastry and some cafe con leche at the little panaderia down the street from my hostel, and then i pretty much flipped a coin to decide which direction to go to explore next. for the next few days i roamed the streets trying to just soak in the culture and rhythm of the city, getting used to the accent and cadence of the language (so very different from the spanish i speak here in new mexico), and generally finding myself smiling.
mari satur's boyfriend, martin, came to visit from london. i had met him at the same program where i met mari satur two years prior, and where they had met each other. so the three of us went gallavanting through the city to the royal palace and various famous and not-so-famous monuments and gardens, to tiny hidden bars with hundreds of bottles of wine in endless racks. we feasted on more tapas - jamon serrano ( a cured ham that hangs from the wall by its hoof ), olives and peppers, bread with an odd blue cheese and date mixture, a melted cheese with onion marmalade and honey, stewed rabbit, mushrooms in a wine sauce, potatoes fried with eggs, patatas bravas (as will described in his article), grilled vegatables, and of course, the ubiquitous pan (bread).
one night i went to a little bar in the neighborhood around my hostel and met some hilarious friends - a young woman from madrid, her boyfriend from sweden, and their friend from hungary. we laughed and drank for most of the night. they couldn't believe that i was 33, so they decided instead to celebrate my "fake birthday" and went around telling all the waiters that it was my 23rd birthday so they'd give us free drinks. it was quite insane, but so much fun.
my last full day in spain was spent in toledo, a smaller town near madrid where they used to make swords and armor during the middle ages. i saw a church that still had the shackles on the tall wall high above the cobblestone streets below - remnants of the inquisition, where those being accused used to hang until they confessed. at which point, their lives took a clear turn for the worse, if you can imagine... but not that day. that day it was sunny and beautiful, and full of pilgrams and tourists. on that day, there was a huge celebration of Corpus Cristi, which is held at or near Pentecost. there was a processional through the entire town of the crucifix and an intricate but enormous gold shrine of sorts weilding an image of a communion wafer - representing the body of Christ - being carried through town by the priests and bishops, with all of the boys and girls taking their first communion. all of the streets through town were decorated with offerings hanging out of the windows - scarves, flowers, canopies strewn over the streets, people waving and paradingand tossing down petals to those below... later i took a bus back to Madrid, made some dinner at the hostel and slept soundly until morning, when i had to catch to my plane to istanbul.
at dawn in istanbul, the most incredibly beautiful and haunting voice resonated through city streets and in through the open windows of my room. the sunrise call to prayer. it only lasted for a minute or two, but it was a suspended moment, one of incredible power and intensity.
at breakfast, i sat on the rooftop terrace looking out at the harbor, watching the boats come and go, my eyes traversing the scene of rooftops of various shapes and sizes that i never see in albuquerque. across the bay, domed rooftops and spires create a sillouette that mirrors the hills and trees of the natural landscape behind it. a brown dove sat on the wrought iron rail of the building next door. preening herself casually admidst the sun and mist, ancient architecture and 20th century signs, the cries of seagulls and laughter of children.
the standard hostel breakfast included zeytin (olives), domates (tomatoes), ekmek (bread), peynir (cheese), some strangely delicious chocolate / hazelnut spread that i cannot name, and khave (coffee). this is pretty typical of a turkish breakfast.
on my second day in istanbul, i was all stressed and unhappy. they were working on my room at the hostel, so i couldn't sleep in; the spice bazaar was closed when i went; i ate some really yukky (possibly rotten) chicken dish; i got followed by about 4 or 5 annoying men asking me to marry them; and i had strange credit card issues, where my card got rejected twice, so i worried that i would have to live in Istanbul for the remaining 3 days with just a few Lyra in my pocket - not really how you want to spend your time in a country you spent over a thousand dollars to visit...
but then my sister and brother-in-law helped me out by conferencing me with my credit card company on skype and it all got fixed....so i got some Lyra, and then i went out for dinner at an awesome restaurant and had meze (like tapas, or extensive amounts of appetizers, eaten as a meal) and cay (tea, but not with milk). incredible. and then i had a beer and played chess with a couple of french guys from my hostel. they mentioned going to the islands the next morning.
so on my third day, i visited Topkapi Palace, which is quite possibly one of the most beautiful places I've ever been. every possible surface was covered in gorgeous hand-painted tiles. the harem was quite intriguing as well - opulent luxury, in captivity. the best possible living conditions for that gender in that day and age, but at the price of freedom and respect and dignity. these hundreds of pampered concubines were slaves. can you imagine such a life? the thought of living in decadence but without freedom seems like an impossibly difficult and unfair exchange. but then, i have never had to trade in such currency.
later in the day, I met up with my french friends from the hostel, and we took a ferry (for 2,60 TYL, or about $2.50) to the Prince Islands. we went to the second largest island in search of a nice beach. ha! ...we rented bicycles for about $6 (U.S.) each, and, since i can't really ride a bike well, we shared one of those tandem (double) bikes. the island was very hilly, and we took the road that circumscribes the whole island. at almost every turn, there were incredibly beautiful views overlooking cliffs above the sea, with other islands in the distance, and little houses of various shapes and sizes, fishermen bringing in the catch, old women cleaning laundry at their piers in the sea water and ringing out sheets and hanging them up to dry like prayer flags blowing in the wind. we finally found a couple small beaches, which were rather dirty and gross. once was clean, but had some hairlike algae of a frighteningly flourescent green color. we opted not to swim. instead, we kept riding around on the outer island road, passing horse-drawn carraiges and small children playing. at one point we came to a small clearing in the trees and looked out at the sun setting behind one of the other islands, casting an orange glow to the sea and painting everything around a brilliant gold. one of those ephemeral experiences that will hopefully be imprinted on my memory for the rest of my life. when we got back to the little town near the port, we stopped for some desserts (Turkish delight is quite an understatement, I must say...) and hopped back on the ferry to the mainland.
tuesday morning i woke up, had the tastey standard turkish breakfast on the roof, and walked off to the spice bazaar, where i bought some more turkish delight and Iranian saffron and spoke in my broken Turkish with a man named Abrahi'im. he told me to go over to Uskudar, on the Asian side of the city. so i did.
i took a ferry (1,30 TYL) to Uskudar and roamed around the steep hilly streets. my friend from the spice bazaar sent me to a restaurant in a small neighborhood i never would have found otherwise. no one there spoke any English. perfect. soooo perfect. the food was incredible - i ordered several things not knowing exactly what they were, but feeling rather adventurous. one was a pastry of sorts, filled with cheese and lamb sausage. delicious. the other was a kettle of chicken, mushrooms, peppers, tomatoes, and seriously amazing spices and herbs. then i walked along the bosphorous strait, hung out in a park and watched some people swimming and others playing backgammon. people were fishing and would immediately grill their catch over an open flame in the park and eat with their families, spread out on blankets by the sea. i walked further on to Kizkulesmi, a small island lighthouse. i took a little boat out to the island, and then climbed up to the top of the tower and had coffee overlooking the city and the water. sweet.
i returned to the hostel and went up to the roof bar for a beer and met several new friends, as is the way in hostels. we all went out as a group for meze (like tapas, or appetizers, that you share) to a place in Taksim that Onu (one of the bartenders) had recommended. It was so much fun getting lost trying to find it, we were laughing and starving by the time we finally got there.
wednesday morning, i went with a hostel friend to Yedikule (7 towers), the old city wall towers at the stronghold by the Marmara Sea. we climbed in all the towers and walked around the perimeter of the wall, looking out at the ships in the sea, community gardens below, the city streching to our north, and the fall of the Byzantine Empire in our imaginations. we practiced a little yoga on the roof of the main entry gate and generally found ourselves smiling. then we headed to a large mosque on near Eminonu and the Golden Horn. we watched men come in to pray. bowing, standing, kneeling, praying, standing, bowing, kneeling. it was amazing. there are no chairs or pews in these mosques. they are open and magnificent, but with no paintings or images, save the thousands upon thousand of hand painted tiles decorating the walls and the beautiful old windows letting in light from the sun at particular prayer times. it was amazing to spend that moment with someone who was equally willing to just be quiet and respectful and watch with me, someone who was also fascinated and moved by cultural differences in subtleties.
then we walked up to Beyoglu and had some lunch of kavun (melon), hayarti (yogurt with dill), and an eggplant dish whose name i can't remember, and of course ekmek (bread) and bira (beer).
then we went up in Galata Tower and looked out at the views of the city north of the Golden Horn, and we could see all the way across the strait to the Asian side as well. when we finally made it back to the hostel, it was time to shower and head out for dinner.
we summoned the group of friends, including a new arrival from Boston who had been in Italy for 4 months. we headed out for more meze, this time in a pretty nice restaurant, where we sat "sultan-style" on pillows with a low table. we had the most incredibly delicious food including gozleme (like crepes with filled feta or spinach or honey), dolmas (grape leaves stuff with rice), various bean and eggplant dishes, calamari, shrimp, cacik (a yogurt mint sauce), and ekmek (bread). i bought a bottle of Cappadoccian wine to share in honor of my last night. it was so incredibly fun and decadent, and i can't think of any better people in the world to share it with. funny how travellers develop such an incredible bond.
after some more turkish delight, i retired to the roof to take in the view for as long as i could. i stayed up all night, as i didn't want to waste my last hours in istanbul sleeping. i almost cried when i got on the tram to the airport. i seriously wasn't ready to leave.
i'm already planning my next trip. several of them. i love my life here in albuquerque, i genuinely do. and i have the best friends here that i could ever imagine. my desire to leave and explore is not in any way a need to escape. but i did learn so much on this trip that i couldn't have imagined learning. so much to experience. so ... incredibly rich. i am a bit tired still, but entirely filled with bliss.