An Explanation about this Site -- PLEASE READ

I am adding this explanation because of some questions (perhaps accusations! ha!) I've gotten over how this site came into being. As you peruse, it appears that I have been diligently updating this blog since my arrival in Turkey; the earliest posts are from the first day or so of my time here. My one friend said, perhaps a little hurt, "It took you so long to send this to me." As I send this link out widely this week, I want everyone to know that I haven't been "blogging" away and keeping it hidden from all I know for two months.

I first put up the site the first week of November, when I put up a few posts; I then abandoned it for a few weeks and focused on other things, all the while obsessing about it and not emailing people who I wanted to send the link to until the site was up to date. (Yes, very silly!)

Most of the text that you see on the site was not written for One Eye Closed. Most is comprised of emails to my mom and some family members which I bcc'd to myself, or journal entries, or other rambles. The appearance of a several months old site is a grand ruse.

So, even though it looks like I've been secretly blogging for eight weeks, I haven't. I finally put most stuff up there on Saturday and Sunday of this past weekend, and am now widely circulating. I'll continue to post in real time so to speak from now on. And I'll do a better job of keeping in touch with those near and dear.

Promise.

$4 US worth of produce from the Hal in Ulus.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Saturday Markets

It ended up being a really great day. I’ve been sort of bummed that I wasn’t well enough to travel this weekend and keep up my tradition of every-other-weekend sojourns out of Ankara, and it was a rough week overall so my spirits have been pretty low. Between the fire this week, burning my hand, repeated bad interactions trying to speak Turkish (it seems impossible to me that people would not understand my attempt to say the word “yok.” One syllable, not complicated – means there isn’t/aren’t any. The man said, “The taksis are there.” I said, “Yok.” It just seems that sometimes people here can be extremely unforgiving when it comes to pronunciation. I find it especially frustrating since I feel like I spend much of my time bending over backwards trying to decipher people’s English). And, I’ve been feeling a bit lonely and unconnected, but not willing to hang out with people I don’t really enjoy instead of being alone. I’m just not meeting that many people I really like! Or rather, I am having lots of superficial interactions and not really that enthusiastic about following up on them.

Anyway, I did some stuff at the flat this morning, working on the website, and then by the time I got around to heading to get on the dolmus it was getting pretty late, almost 1. I debated going to the market at the German Embassy – it supposedly ended at 2:00. The other one, across town in a neighborhood where I always get profoundly lost, overwhelmed and even frightened, went til three. But I had a sneaking suspicion that there might be food at the German one, so I tried anyway.

Without incident, I got to the German Embassy, and tried to enter as a car received a full search with under-cab mirrors and the works. The guard told me that the market was across the street at the school, so risking life and limb (literally!) I ran across the street and tried to get in to the gates, which were locked. Two Turkish women approached me and asked, first in Turkish, then English, whether there was a bazaar there. I said, yes, and we debated how to get in. Then I saw the guard across the street trying to get our attention, flagging us around to the back of that building. So we headed down there, along the way encountering a British woman also trying to get in.

The place, once we found it, was packed! Tons of people from all over the world streaming in and out. I paid my 2 million fee and went in, not sure where to go. Of course, my pork homing signal let me to the cafeteria where they were serving up plates of grilled brats with sauerkraut and potato salad and brown mustard, and, well, my heart lifted. So of course I bought a platter and woofed it down and a bratwurst never ever tasted so good. Then to finish it off they had hot mulled wine with fruit floating in it, which I also love. The scene was fascinating. The event was at the German School in Ankara, and the place was crawling with people from everywhere; lots of Turks and Germans, but a fair share of other ex pats as well. Everyone seemed so jovial.

I headed upstairs and they had a bazaar up there – mostly homemade craft goods – looked a lot like the bazaar at the Methodist Church. Not much jumped out at me (though some of the greenery wreaths were pretty) but I did buy a gingerbread cookie (she gave me a second one for free) and, at the school’s booth, a little clay candle holder and a clay turtle some child had made. It is adorable and it was about $4 so I thought I could swing it! He is really cute. Unfortunately I broke off his leg on the dolmus home, but it will glue easily.

Anyway, I was tempted by some serious baked goods – chocolate cakes and all sorts of things, plus real coffee – but so was everyone else and the lines were huge. So I bailed, and headed by bus up to Ulus to try to go to the other bazaar. The German fest put me in good spirits and I am now really psyched for the Germany trip. I didn’t think I would miss the Christmas holiday hullabaloo, but seeing it, I got nostalgic so it will be fun. Plus I can eat pork in Germany, in great quantities.

Anyway, the bus ride was fine (this is a feat because anytime I’ve tried to go to Ulus, which is the old city, there has always been some kind of problem). The old man next to me saw me looking at a English language map and said, “Hello. Good Day. Nice to meet you.” It was very cute. I got off right where I needed to and went to the other bazaar, which is in the state guest house and was in the gorgeous lobby. It was really closing down – only about 25 minutes or so to go, but the concept was interesting. Lots of international booths (manned by Turks or people from the Embassies) and unfortunately a lot had already closed down. But I did get a large satchel of Bangladeshi and Algerian food for about 5 million – with extra stuff thrown in because it was the end of the day. There were a couple of cool things, but I hadn’t taken much money and I spent a lot of it at the German market. So, after wandering a bit I headed out and decided to brave Ulus for a while.

I’d heard about the Hal, a fruit, vegetable, fish market, but never had been able to find it or any of the Ulus market streets. Two other times I ended up in a really ramshackle neighborhood with few women and men who stared at me and made me really uncomfortable. But this time I had looked more carefully at the map and I went right there. The market is really cool! Very colorful and the prices were terrific. Despite my recent frustrations over being understood in Turkish, I saw some “hormonefree” tomatoes (?!?!?) and I asked for half a kilo (no idea of course how many that would be.) I told the guy, apologetically, that I don’t know Turkish but I wanted half a kilo. He was super friendly and talked to me, and raved very kindly (and untruthfully!) about how excellently I speak Turkish. It made me feel really good. And so that gave me the courage to try to buy some other produce. Well, about half an hour and 8 grocery bags later I had spent all the money I had left (except for enough to get home) buying all sorts of beautiful veggies and fruits, but that was only about $4.50 US: a kilo of strawberries (they fill both my colanders!) for 1 million (so about 70 cents); 5 cucumbers, five cabuk (kind of like a light green zucchini), 10 clementines, 3 kiwi fruit, 6 big carrots, a huge head of really nice lettuce, two onions, a cauliflower, three tomatoes, two lemons, five apples, and about 15 tiny green peppers! All the vendors were extremely nice and friendly and it was a hugely positive experience. I’ll have to go back with my camera – the fish vendors were amazingly colorful shouting and rivaling each other.

The trip home was also uneventful, and I think I should go produce shopping in Ulus more often! I have the rest of my life to shop in grocery stores. Now I know where all the other stores are too, so I’ll have to go back and look around some more.

Anyway, now I am back at home, getting really excited to eat the first round of my Bangladeshi fritters! I can’t believe how much I miss foods other than Turkish food. Don’t get me wrong – it is incredibly good. But I am used to eating a really varied diet ethnically etc and sometimes I just want something not Turkish. But if I say that to people, I get comments in return about how America isn’t known for its cuisine. This is true – “burgers and freedom fries” isn’t what I’m missing. The advantage – a huge one – of the US is the diversity of cultures and regions. There is such a different kind of variety. And that I miss.

In the evening I went to an amazing classical music concert at Bilkent, featuring a pianist playing Tchaikovsky. That campus seems really moneyed, and the concert hall is quite grand, postmodern, and lush. I had a seat about 10 rows from the conductor and it was exhilarating. There were multiple encores, both for the pianist and the symphony, and I thoroughly enjoyed watching how much the musicians seemed to be enjoying themselves. It's the kind of stage where there are audience members sitting behind and above the back of the symphony, facing the conductor, and there were several children sitting in the front row up there, mimicing the gestures of the conductor grandly throughout the latter part of the concert. The ticket itself was only about $5, and I was able, despite having to cab it there, to ride a free service bus back to the main gate here and then get a dolmus into my place. I definitely want to go back there for more concerts. This week we have the Ankara Jazz Festival on campus, and I went to a show last night that was great. So hopefully I'll get to see more.

After the Fire

I had a lot of conversations about the fire the next day, and pretty soon was able to laugh about it. A little.

A few interesting notes: one, most of the people from here I spoke with said that, culturally, if there are no flames than it isn't considered "dangerous." The concept of toxic fumes (which had my lungs burning and caused severe coughing for a few days) is not a common one. Also some basics of fire safety in the US are not practiced here, apparently, or at least in my setting. No smoke alarms; our fire exits in the building are kept locked (you can fumble with a key to get it open, but then you would be trapped in the stairwell, so I'm not sure that's a good thing either) and are used as storage areas for boxes and furniture; and there are no emergency numbers posted or much general awareness about what to do in case of emergency. So, my goal for the next few weeks is to try to get some communication going about this, which won't be easy, but I'd rather feel a little safer in my building than I do now.

Everybody laughed a lot about the "shoes off" incident with the electrician who came to help.

The most amusing thing to come of the incident, for me, was something that happened when I told my classmates about it. Everyone was pulling out all the stops with all the elementary Turkish exclamations they could think of ("Allah allah!" etc), but Yelena, the woman from Kazakstan who is pretty darn fluent in Turkish, started lecturing me, at length, about how these problems wouldn't be happening to me if I went to church and started praying to Christ. She is Eastern Orthodox and very passionate about her religion. She carries a small trifold icon of the Virgin, Christ, and a certain saint (can't remember which) and she pulled it out of her bag and suggested I get one and carry it everywhere.

Frankly, I was stunned. My mindset has already shifted so much to a Muslim majority culture that I was incredibly surprised when she suggested Christianity. I didn't know what to say. At our break time she talked to me some more about it, which Ashraf found really amusing for some reason.

Fire! Or How Cultural Differences Could Get You Killed

Note: I wrote this to my family the night it happened, and my frustration and tension are rather evident. I was going to edit it significantly (especially the end) before I posted it, but upon rereading it, I thought it best to capture my feelings at the time rather than practicing revisionism. So there.

Rough night.

I’ve been fighting a really bad cold and had a very tough client for two straight sessions at the writing center so I was looking forward to a pleasant, quiet evening at home, with a nice dinner and some relaxing. It was took cold and I felt too tired to go to my yoga class so I did a great session of yoga at home, and felt very chilled out and quite content.

I started cooking my dinner, a chicken patty, here called chicken schnitzel, some pasta and some vegetables. Nothing much; I put the food on to cook and went back to the computer to look up something on a yoga website.

As I surfed, suddenly the power snapped off loudly. I thought, gosh, this is one of those power outages that everyone always says is so common here. Must be the two straight days of snow. Glad I bought a flashlight this weekend. With the computer lit, I didn’t really react, just kept surfing. The food would shut off with no electricity, so…..no big deal.

A few minutes later, I glanced outside and noticed that the other wing of the building had lights. Hmm. But I still didn’t react.

Well, my nose is stuffy so I didn’t really smell anything. It wasn’t until I began to feel like I couldn’t breathe and started wheezing that I noticed in the dim light of the computer screen that there might be a haze of smoke. I jumped up for the flashlight and realized that actually the whole apartment was filled with smoke. I ran over to the stove area and didn’t seem anything on fire, just the pots simmering on the shut off burners.

What the hell do I do?? I thought, any understanding of Turkish evaporating. I panicked completely, and could hardly even open the door for the smoke and not being able to breathe and now feeling a bit dizzy from breathing the stuff.

The hall was empty and dark…I flicked on the hall light and, though relieved that the building didn’t seem to be on fire in the hall, I still didn’t know what to do. I ran to Louis’s door, and knocked. He sounded startled and asked who it was. Do you have power? It is Kris. What? He asked, yeah, I’ve got power.

I have a problem, I said. Please can you help. By this point because my door was open the smell and haze were in the hallway now. There’s some kind of fire and my power went out.

Louis hurried to my door and put his tie to cover his mouth; we both went in as there were no real flames, but the fumes were pretty bad. He told me to grab my most valuable things (laptop camera passport coat shoes and Turkish notebooks, for some reason) and we fled to his apartment. Neither of us knew what to do! He ran to get a woman from downstairs. I called Shahika. She seemed pretty unimpressed by the situation, and I was in a panic, so it wasn’t a good interaction. A minute or so later, Louis came back upstairs with a woman from downstairs who looked at the apartment and said she’d call someone. We couldn’t quite ascertain who, but whoever it was would come in ten minutes she said. She went back downstairs to continue tutoring students. So Louis and I waited. And waited. And waited. Both of us were sort of unbelieving, that there was a fire in an apartment building, possibly, most likely electrical in nature, and nobody seemed at all concerned. But we didn’t know what else to do. Eventually he went back down and she called again. Louis said he was going downstairs to wait and flag the “whoever” in, whether it be trucks, workers…who knew?? I sat up in Louis’s apartment really wheezy and dizzy and, frankly, feeling rather despondent.

After a while I heard the sound of a radio walkie talkie echoing in the hall, and I went out there to see who it might be. I expected firemen from the sound of the radio. Well, all I saw was a guy about my age, carrying a black plastic store satchel. We exchanged hellos – I assumed he was a neighbor from down the hall. But he stopped at my door. Turns out he was the one they sent. The bag was tools. I opened the door for him, saying, “problem var.” “He responded, “evet (yes)” as he got a wiff of the smell. He wanted something….I wasn’t sure what. So I gave him the flashlight, and ran for my dictionary.

Louis came over, and all of us were standing there, me in my haze filled apartment with a clear problem going on or just subsided; Louis just watching; and the emergency responder wrestling with trying to get his shoes off as is the Turkish custom before going into a home. I kept waving to him, getting more and more frustrated, trying to tell him, I don’t give a rat’s tail whether or not you are wearing your shoes in my apartment that is undergoing some kind of electrical fire. Louis started waving too. The guy looked totally confused. And finally, at the same moment, Louis and I managed to remember a probably appropriate word: “Buyurun.” We both shouted it and the guy shrugged and came in with his shoes on.

He poked around, looked at the circuit box, which Louis and I had shut off. And then he waved us out of the apartment, and started trying to get into the metal box in the hallway labeled “Fire” in Turkish. Ostensibly, it was the fire equipment, something potentially useful. Well, it was locked. So he pried it open, with a screwdriver from his little black plastic bag. Apparently it wasn’t what he needed, so he did some other things with the circuit breaker and it was getting really frustrating. We couldn’t communicate at all and there was a bit of tension. Thankfully though Shahika came upstairs and managed to translate. He rooted behind the stove area and shone the flashlight on the power extension cord thing, a three hole strip that you plug things into, as there is really only one outlet in the kitchen. It was a browned, melted, charred mess. All the vinyl on the cord had melted and the plastic was singed. I felt a mix of relief and total embarrassment at the same time.

Apparently buying a power strip like that at a flea market is not an OK thing to do in Turkey. Apparently anything like should only be purchased if it has a sticker that it has been inspected by a certain quality control organization. And apparently, even with a multicord power strip, you are still not supposed to operate two things at the same time. Apparently I made three mistakes that led to an electrical fire.

My circuit breakers shut off in the apartment, but also in the basement main circuit as well, so he had to go downstairs to be able to turn on the power. I got lectured about where to purchase power cords, how many appliances to operate (they kept saying that I’d been using three at once, but it was only two.) And by the end I felt really embarrassed and dependent and, well, stupid.

Louis (he’s the University of Florida professor who is my neighbor) said that regardless of my “mistakes” a properly working circuit breaker should shut things off before it gets that bad. And he just kept saying, thank goodness it wasn’t worse. Shahika headed back downstairs and said I could come down for tea if I wanted, but I really wanted to a) rant to Louis from an “American” perspective about the situation and b) be alone. Louis gave me a beer and said I shouldn’t go into my place until the smoke and fumes cleared, so we opened all the windows and sat in his place for an hour or so. My two biggest cultural rants were this: 1) If there is smoke and clearly some kind of electrical fire, why did it take so long for anyone to respond? Why did no one seem concerned? Sure, it was ultimately fine, but I’m not sure there would be much difference in response if there were a more dire crisis. Partly I felt like people weren’t taking us seriously. Partly I was frustrated that I couldn’t express myself or understand. But perhaps the most frustrating thing about it was the whole thing with the guy and his shoes!!!! Dude, my apartment might be on fire (at this point the problem could have been still burning!) And you are worried about not walking in my apartment in your shoes? That’s a cultural thing – I understand that. But somehow I didn’t realize that it was a cultural practice that would hold even in an emergency. I am trying really really really really hard not to be judgmental about it, but at this point, sick, tired, embarrassed, frustrated, and still coming down from the panic and fear and helplessness, I’m failing on the judgmental count. If that makes me an ugly American than so be it. I acknowledge my ugly judgmental Americanness. And hope it goes away soon.

Now I have a new appreciation for the concept of Emergency 911.

And the darndest thing of it is after all that, my fridge could burst into flames and I still would have no idea who to call.

The first snowfall from my window, the morning after.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Thanksgiving in Ankara, and the First Snow

It was a dreary weekend, and the weather turned from fall to winter all at once. Suddenly, with the change of seasons, I began to feel that I’d been here a long time. Now, I’ve sweated in summer heat and frozen in winter cold. I’ve struggled to find a winter coat, but finally found one this snowy weekend, one that I like and it was really cheap, only about $18 for down, brown, and well-fitting. And I’ve knitted myself some accessories as yarn is cheap here, and it gives me something to do on cold nights.

Saturday night was Thanksgiving for me. There was an Embassy gathering for Fulbrighters and friends to celebrate the holiday, at the home of the Counselor for Public Affairs and his partner. It was a heck of a house – it felt really weird to be in a single family home not a flat, and it was grand and tastefully decorated to boot, filled with interesting things from their many postings on various continents. On our way there, Louis my neighbor and I encountered terrible cold rain and were nearly in a cab accident. We got out of the cab blocks too early from sheer ignorance and wandered in the freezing rain until we found the place, stopping several times for directions.

Luckily there was a fire burning in the livingroom and lots of people so the place was warm. It was a fine night – Thanksgiving isn’t my favorite holiday, but I enjoyed some of my conversations, especially those with Secil and Ersen from Fulbright, and really liked the food. A lot, especially since many things on the menu are unavailable in Turkey. The hors d’oevres included stuffed mushrooms, cheetos and dip (!), and celery with cream cheese. Celery isn’t really very available here. The turkey and gravy were excellent, as was the stuffing; but the real thrill was a huge ham, with mustard. I went nuts! This whole lack of pork is really affecting me. I tried to be a vegetarian, but gave it up almost entirely because I missed pork, so that shouldn’t be a surprise. They also had pumpkin bread and some really good veggies. Then, for dessert, they had excellent pumpkin pie with whipped cream and brownies with vanilla ice cream. Yum. After a cup of coffee and some more conversation, everyone realized it was snowing really hard and there was a mass exodus.

The snow was beautiful – but the roads slick. We shared a cab with two students and I was happy to get home. The view from my window now was a winter scene; some trees, still laden with leaves, drooped and creaked all night from the weight of the fluffy, moist snow. At one point I got up in the night and moved valuables like my laptop away from the window lest a falling branch come in.

The snow and the food made it really feel like the “Holidays” – my American vision of them – were upon us, even here in Turkey.

The domes at Aya Sofia.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Aya Sofia apse

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Last Morning in Istanbul/Coming Home

My bus was leaving for Ankara at 2:00, so I figured I had a little time to wander around the neighborhood before I headed on the tram to catch the bus. I was in a decidedly restless mood. Strangely, six days in Istanbul had taken a toll on my mood. For the first time since my arrival in Turkey I felt truly lonely, cast adrift. I felt disconnected and drained. At loose ends, I decided to go to the Aya Sofia – even though it is pretty expensive (15 million, about $10). I’ve seen it before, and didn’t have much time, so I wasn’t sure if it was worth it. But, I didn’t know what else to do.

As I waited in a short line at the entrance, I noticed on the sign that they offer a reduced fee for Turkish people – only 3 million. That is great, I thought. But then I wondered if the fact that I’m living here would allow me that too. Without much planning and pre-speech anxiety, I headed up to the window and explained in simple but confident Turkish that I work in Ankara. He asked for my residence permit; I showed it to him. He charged me 3 million. I felt gleeful as I stepped away from the window – the reduced fee wasn’t so much the thrill; it was the fact that I’d negotiated it in Turkish, without apology.

Even though I felt kind of overcast in spirits, the Aya Sofia was still glorious. The sense of space in there leaves me feeling awestruck, even though this visit there was a lot of construction and fencing in the center meaning that we could only see the dome from the perimeter. It looks like they are redoing the paint job and I’m not sure how I felt about it. It looks a little new.

I spent about an hour there wandering around and just gaping at the building. Still it makes such a huge impression on me. Afterwards, I bought some postcards and wandered around, visiting a bookstore with a lot of English language coffee table books and actually bought one about Sufism written by Talat Halman, who spoke at our Fulbright orientation. Then I got some su boregi for lunch and bought a sandwich to go – a roll with white cheese, pepper and tomato on it. Then it was time to hurry back to the hotel to pick up my things and grab the bus. But I did grab another salep along the way.

The tram was packed with people, and as we chugged up hill through Istanbul neighborhoods, it began to rain. By the time I got off, it was steady; I walked over to the depot and checked in with plenty of time to spare. This bus ride I was on the lower level of a double decker bus. It felt a bit claustrophobic down there, but my frequent bus motion sickness problem seems to stem from the slight back and forth sway that occurs especially on the back of these tall buses. Down so low, there was no sway at all. But the bus ride itself was a grueling. Traffic leaving Istanbul at the end of the holiday weekend was horrific. It took nearly two hours for us to get out of the city, and we spent a lot of time just sitting. I stared idly out through the raindrops at commuter buses packed with tired-looking people. I felt even more lonely. Istanbul is intense.

By the time we got back to Ankara it was 9:30 pm, and there was a cold rain coming down. I’d expected to be back about 7 pm. And then I spent a very long time waiting for a dolmus to take me back home. A couple came but they were so packed with people that we weren’t able to board. I felt like crying.

So, the end of the trip was not so good. Istanbul wore on me….although I do like it. Ultimately though I am happy now to be in Ankara. It is just a lot more manageable and for me feels more like home.

Istanbul, the Last Full Day

Pushcarts near the Rustem Pasa Mosque.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Rainy Day in Istanbul

Today was kind of an interesting day here, or not really. I guess it started out slow, then went better, then took a turn for the worse, then picked up considerably. One of those days! I was really too tired to get up this morning and my stomach was kind of upset so I decided to skip Edirne for this trip. Also the weather was really gloomy, and it seemed to be silly to go 2.5 hours by bus each way, not counting the long haul out to the bus station and back, when I wasn't sure what things would be open.

Anyway, I slept in in the nice new room and really chilled out. I didn't get out of bed til 10:30 and then went out for breakfast. I was reading in the guidebook, trying to figure out what to do and not really in a wandering mood but everything site wise seemed to be closed on Mondays, let alone the holiday. The breakfast woman didn't come and didn't come, so I ate some oranges and was just sitting there in the lounge when the hotel desk guy maybe owner (but seems awfully young) came upstairs and was troubled that I might have been waiting a long time. He brought out the breakfast (which here is very simple, just some bread, jam, tea, olives, and usually an egg.) Apparently there were no hard boiled eggs, so he made me an omlet just with egg, no cheese or anything, but it was a nice gesture and a pleasant surprise to have a warm breakfast on such a chilly bleak morning.

After that I went back to the room and read for a lot longer -- my stomach was shaky and it started to rain, and frankly, I just felt like chilling out. So there I sat, puttering away at things for a few hours. Around 2:00 I finally left the house. I walked through Sultanahmet and was amazed that despite everything being closed the streets were packed with Turks who had the day off, among the usual tourist set. I walked down to the harbor and went over to the spice market but it was also closed. Then I discovered a little flea market open on the side and I wandered around there a while. Anyway, I puttered around there then went into the Rustem Pasha mosque which has the most beautiful tilework of any of the mosques. Then I bought a kilo of clemintines for only 750000 lira (like 50 cents!) and ate a bunch of them while I walked. I sat and sat and sat in front of the Yeni Camii (mosque) and I people watched, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Lots of families on holiday eating street food and sitting in the plaza letting the kids run around. One little toddler girl, maybe about 18 months, was gnawing on an apple, but she dropped it. Her mom left it there and tried to get the kid to go elsewhere. They walked on and sat on a wall nearby. A few minutes later, the little girl started toddling around innocently enough, but within a few seconds had worked her way over to the discarded apple and was going after it to start eating it again. Her mom had to run over and intervene. Another little kid got into similar issues with someone else’s discarded soda can. His mom sprinted over to stop him. She was wearing heels that seemed to be ill-fitting, and there were squares of tissue stuffed in her ankles to stop abrasion. She clucked and scolded, but within a few minutes he was going for the can again.

It started to drizzle so I decided to go get some dinner. I picked a place out in the guidebook that is a health food restaurant so I thought that might offer some things that Ankara does not. Well, I headed under the underpass going under the main street, and while I was down there it started to pour rain and everyone from the harbor started running in soaking wet so I had to stay down there for a while until it cleared out. There are lots of stores and vendors in the underpasses here so it wasn't so boring. When I left there it was pretty interesting to see how quickly the street vendors managed to set their wares back up after the rain subsided.
As I walked across the Galata Bridge though, it started again, and I had to walk a few blocks getting wet before I got to the underground tram to take me up the hill. When I got off the tram, it was raining terribly hard, and thunder and lightening too. Rain seems weird. I think it has rained only once, very briefly at night, in Ankara since I've been there. Seems like a novelty! Anyway, I tried to walk up Istikkal Caddesi which is the pedestrian street that reminds me of a postapocoylptic Disney main street. There were so many people and with the rain and the water running down the cobblestones it was really not that pleasant. I walked all the way up the street struggling against the throngs of people -- basically the whole street looked like a sporting event or big concert just let out -- wall to wall people. I looked down the side streets for the restaurant in question, but just couldn’t find it. I find that area of the city strangely frightening. It seems perfectly safe but I just feel a bit out of sorts there, especially on the side streets, which seem like a movie set of sorts. Or old New Orleans. Or Old London where Jack the Ripper haunted. I don't know. It is oddly spooky for a hip, social area. Anyway, I couldn’t find the restaurant so I decided to abort the mission and go instead to a Chinese restaurant, supposedly the oldest in Turkey, from the 1950s. Well, I ended up on the wrong street and I searched and searched and the problem here is no one really knows street names or how to read a map. If you show someone a map, they generally look at it like a foreign object, flail with it for a few minutes, and then start repeatedly asking you "where you want go?" I asked a dolmus driver -- a bus driver for heaven's sake - where a very main road in Istanbul and he didn't know what the road was. It is odd. Same is true in Ankara as well.

Anyway, I went into a Mcdonalds to get out of the rain and look at the guidebook, and they actually had a map posted on the wall. I looked at the map and couldn't figure out at all where we were in that McDonalds. A teenager came up to help me and he couldn't deal with the map either, so...but he said that he thought I was close to where I wanted to go. So I did manage finally to find the street...with several chinese restaurants....but all of them closed. Closed up tight. I guess they have begun to celebrate the Bayram as well.

So, rather frustrated, wet, and, at this point cold and hungry, having only had that egg and some bread and a kilo of oranges all day and it was about 7:00 at this point, I headed by bus back to Sultanahmet. The bus took an unusual route and, though I had decided to get Indian food again at a rather pricy place, I saw a newish looking Chinese restaurant very close to where I am staying. I got off the bus and headed back there and it was fascinating and really quite good. Chinese and Korean actually -- they brought three plates of free Korean appetizers to the table. I had a beer and ...drumroll....pork with mushrooms and bamboo shoots! Pork! Here! I was so excited. It tasted great. I also had a side of something that was supposed to be mixed veggies, but it in actuality was several kinds of beansprouts sauteed in a good sauce. Never had something like that before. But it was good. The pork made me very happy though. I forgot to ask for rice, so I asked the Korean and Turkish waitstaff, as a group, for rice, in English, because they seemed to speak English. Well, a few minutes later they came to the table with a big bucket -- filled to the brim with ice. No, I said, I wanted RICE. The waiters all started laughing as did I and even the other people at the tables, who mostly seemed to be Chinese tourists. So, the annoying evening was saved, finally!

Tiles at the Rustem Pasa Camii; this mosque's interior is sheathed entirely in these kinds of tiles.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Pigeons at the Yeni Camii, a large mosque near the Eminonu ferry terminal.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Whirling dervishes at the Galata Sema Hall.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Whirling Dervishes in Istanbul

Interesting day today -- slept in rather late for a host of reasons -- one, the Dunkin Donuts coffee late in the evening kept me awake; 2. some odd neighbors moved in next to me. They were completely quiet until 2 am then left...noisily....then they came back around the call to prayer at 6 am! Then they packed up their luggage (roller luggage) and left. It was then that I got most of my sleep. After breakfast I switched rooms to a better room upstairs -- it is a lot lighter and nicer and has a much better bathroom, not as musty/mildewy smelling as the other one. After the switch I walked over to the waterfront through a nice park (bought a delicious simit and ate it), then walked by the water for a while, walked over the bridge then took this funny little turn of the century underground tram up a steep hill to the "swanky" main pedestrian street. It is supposedly swanky but it is a bit divy I think, maybe in early stages of gentrifying, I don't know. It almost has a Disneyesque feel but like Disney after the apocolypse. Maybe it is also the Bayram issue because a lot on the street is closed. Anyway, I had seen advertised that the sufi whirling dervishes from a local Istanbul order do a public showing of their ceremony on the 2nd/4th Sundays of each month, so I went in to see about a ticket. It was a whopping 25 million (maybe 17 dollars or so) which is a lot for a Turkish concert. But I decided to go for it.

These guys (and women) are a particular Muslim sect, recently popularized by celebs such as Madonna. The founder, Rumi or Mevlana, came to Konya in the 1200s and was a mystic and devotional poet. He taught that earthly existence separates the soul from God, and the soul yearns to reunite either within earthly life through worship or after earthly death. Mevlana’s chief tenet was “love” and the search for truth and beauty; all beings are a manifestation of love, divine love, and unity. Their worship ceremony, the sema, involves whirling, spinning to reunite the soul with God.

I didn't know what to expect from this event, but all the guidebooks said that, although Mevlana the founder was from Konya, most of the dervish things there are performances with pro dancers rather than practitioners. The shows there are more staged rather than ceremonies. This one, though, is an actual ceremony. The people who perform the ceremony are actual practitioners and novitiates of Sufism who live by the teachings of Mevlana on a daily basis.

I got a good seat in the front row in the building where the sema occurs, a 17th century Mevlana sema house (so a place where this kind of thing has been happening for a long time -- there has been a sema monastery there since the 1400s) basically a large octagonal room with two stories but the center is open to the roof. There is a small fence around the center and then the people who are watching sit around the outside of the fence. The brochure for the ceremony – filled with info and photos and lofty platitudes about Mevlana – provided reading material for me while other guests filed in. I learned that there is an imaginary line that splits the octagon in half, called the equatorial line. This line represents the shortest path to unity with God and only the sheikh, the master who represents Mevlana, can tread on it. The band sits on one side, on the second floor in a gallery, and the sheikh on the other. I prepared for the event to begin.The first half was actually a concert of Sufi music, but with a bit of a twist -- this particular concert was in honor of Ataturk because of the anniversary of his death and they had rewritten some of these Sufi religious songs to include Ataturk in the lyrics! This struck me as unusual considering that Ataturk wasn't that excited about religion or the Sufis (he banned their orders in 1925 because their considerable power represented a potential threat to his secular reforms). As I told some people in Ankara about this later, some said that it wasn’t strange because Ataturk’s views on religion were more similar to the Sufis than to the fundamentalists. He agreed with the relative equality of women that Mevlana argued for. However, Ataturk did ban the orders; that’s a fact. So I was surprised to pick out the name Ataturk mingling with Mevlana in the lyrics, and picking out the phrase, “blue eyes” (for which Ataturk was famous)as a repeated refrain in one song. The music is pretty interesting – very upbeat and rather repetitive and meditative. I don’t know the names of the instruments in English, but they include little wood flutes, sazes, violas, drummers, chanters and a choir. They stood on the floor of the Sema, and performed.

Then there was a break; after about ten to fifteen minutes a lone man dressed in a long black robe and a tall cylindrical camel colored hat. He paused at the equatorial line, bowed his head, and then stepped over it. He carried a red blood colored swath of sheepskin – the post of the sheihk, which represents the highest spiritual level, and its color birth and existence. He laid it down gently on the equatorial line on my side of the octagon and then quietly walked out, pausing and bowing again as he crossed the imaginary line.

The brochure said that the semazen or whirling dervish attire signifies the “death of the ego” – the cap is called a sikke, earth colored, and represents the tombstone of the ego; the hirka is a long black cloak that represents the tomb; the tenure is a long gown with an incredibly full skirt with a slightly weighted hem that symbolizes the shroud. One by one the band began to file back in, this time to the upstairs gallery, and now dressed in the semazen (whirling dervish) costume.

Then the semazens themselves entered, one at a time behind the man who had brought in the sheepskin. Each paused at the equatorial line and stepped over it, and then lined up in place on another row of white sheepskin across on the other side of the octagon from where I sat. Then, with some grandeur, Hasan Dede, the sheikh, entered and took his place at the sheepskin. A chanter began to sing a thin but rich a cappella melody that praises the prophet Mohammed. Afterwards, the line of semazens suddenly threw their upperbodies to the wood floor, prostrated in prayer. It made a loud noise and startled me – it seemed so foreign and intense. A drum played, representing the divine command, “Be,” followed by a flute playing, representing, said the brochure, the soul being given to the universe. Then the full band began to play.

Next came the Cycle of the Veled. They all stood in line and approached the sheikh. He faced the man who seemed to be second in command, they bowed heads to each other, and the Sheikh turned on his heel and began to slowly circle the Sema hall. Next, the second man turned to the third, and repeated the same action, bowing to acknowledge the center of Divine Truth within each person, and turning on his heel afterwards and following the sheikh. All the women and men semazens performed this action, flowing into a circle when the last woman exchanged the action with the Sheikh. They did this three times. According to the brochure, which I voraciously read while trying to take in all the sensory detail, each rotation has a different meaning. The first describes God’s creation of the sun, moon, stars and inanimate creation; the second the vegetable world; and the third the animal world.

The sheikh returned to his place on the post and the semazens gathered on their sheepskins as well. With an understated flourish, they dropped their black cloaks in unison (except for the priest and the second in command) and I felt a whoosh of air current as the cloaks settled onto the floor. The men wore bright white gowns and the women were draped in incredibly bright colors of red, green, gold, purple, orange – it was stunning. The second in command, a man in his thirties I guessed, led the semazens forward and they, one by one, bowed again to the sheikh, crossed their arms across their chest (resembling a “one” which signifies the unity of God) and began to turn. This happened one by one in a delicate rhythm. Each semazen had a different trajectory as they shot off from the sheikh – some arched to the right, and others headed straight out on one side or the other of the equatorial line. Initially, for about six or seven turns, they would lower their arms from their crossed position high on their chest until their fingertips reached their waists; then, they’d slowly raise their arms back across their chest without pausing, and up, up, up, gracefully reaching above their heads and settling around head to shoulder height, slightly bent. The right hands opened upward and the left downturned; thus they receive from God and give to man but keep nothing for themselves. They rotate like the planets around their own axis and around the sun, circling the hall until they took positions, simultaneously also rotating as individuals.

As the dervishes began to spin more and more quickly, the gentle lapping waves sound of the fabric of their gowns intermingled with the music, and I could feel the breeze from the rippling fabric. Perhaps there were twelve of them: mostly younger people, all moving in their own pace, but quickly, turning and turning, heads all cocked slightly to one side, eyes closed. As the spinning raised their skirts higher and wider, I could see their feet underneath as they revolved. It looked like one leg remained flat on the ground as they turned, while they lifted the other and pushed off it rhythmically. It is hard to describe, primarily because it wasn’t clear to me how it was possible to spin so much and so quickly, yet so smoothly, for such a long stretch of time.

And a long stretch of time it was. There are four cycles of spinning in the Sema; each cycle is called a selam. The first one is about 8:00 minutes long and in it the semazens, says the brochure, “are viewing all the worlds. In this way they reach the grandeur and majesty of God. The lovers are freed from doubt and testify their faith in the Unity of God.” At the end of this selam, the music slowed and the dervishes ground to a halt. They rotated around, crossing the equatorial line, and reformed another line, standing again near their sheepskin with their arms crossed on their chests. They seemed no worse for wear from the Sema, a little more intense and focused perhaps, and some were flushed in the cheeks (a rapturous flush rather than an overexerted one.) Then they began the whole thing again. The second cycle was a bit shorter, and symbolized their existence “dissolving in the divine unity.” The third cycle was another marathon, nearly ten minutes: by the end, small beads of sweat were gathering on some of their foreheads, and now all were flushed. This cycle was about cleansing and reaching maturity. The fourth and final cycle was only two or three minutes long, and the brochure described it as the arrival “at the junction of non-existence within Divine Existence.” During this selam, the sheikh marched one step, then a pause, then another step, turning and progressing along the equatorial line, among the spinning dervishes. He opened one edge of his cloak, symbolizing that he had opened his heart to all people. As they slowed to a stop this final time, they slowly walked back into place one by one, in line and each pausing at the equatorial line. They lined back up and put their cloaks on. The sheikh did a recitation from the Koran, and they slowly filed out, stopping again at the equatorial line as they left.

Watching the ceremony was stunningly intense. I didn’t expect to react on an emotional level to it, but I did. It seemed inappropriate to take pictures – I only took two, even though everyone else was snapping away. And after taking those I felt a bit awkward. It seemed so much like a religious ceremony, and that’s because it was. Devotion was palpable in the room. A young girl was sitting next to me, and she was responding with intensity as well; during the Koranic prayers she followed along with the hand gestures, like one that mimics bathing the face in light.

As we filed out of the building, I felt myself full of questions about the group. I saw an American (I think) older woman who seemed to be a coordinator of sorts for the group; I’d spoken with her earlier because she was saving the seat next to mine for a guest of hers who never came. She said goodbye and thanked me for coming, and I asked how often they do a ceremony like this. “Not for us, not for tourists,” I tried to explain, somehow unable to phrase my question even though I was talking with another native speaker. “What you just saw isn’t for you. It’s not for other people. It is for us. To do it here in this place, we have to rent the facility from the Turkish Ministry, and your donation goes towards that fee so that we can worship here.” She was extremely intense about it. She explained that there’s another facility that they own where they have lectures and other devotional options. I bought a CD and some post-cards with nice photography (shockingly overpriced, but hey), and headed out onto the street.

The bustle of Istiklal Caddesi and Tunel on a Sunday afternoon was a shock to me after the intense meditative atmosphere in the Sema hall. I felt off kilter and a bit overwhelmed. I hurried to the tram and hopped on it; it was dusk, and when I got off and started to walk towards the bridge, I remembered that my plan had been to go see the Galata Tower up close, so I got back on the tram and headed back up the hill, retracing my steps.

I walked the several blocks down the hill to the tower and paid the outrageous admission fee to go to the top. The building is about 1500 years old and has nice views of the Bosphorus and the city lights from the walkway around its perimeter, so I guess it was worth it. Probably not something I’ll do again. I have been amazed by how dark the city seems over the last two days. I think it is because of the bayram and everything is closed up. I don't think it is usually so dark! Last night I thought there was a power outage there were so many dark blocks. After taking in my fill of the Galata Tower, I walked back down the hill to the bridge. This wasn’t a wise idea. For a few blocks it was more than a little scary -- lots of men around, dark small streets and no women at all. At the bottom of the road, I was strolling along not realizing that I was in the middle of a street because it was so dark and I was nearly hit by a car. Anyway, I walked back over the bridge and watched the vendors a while at the port -- there they sell fresh fish sandwiches off of boats mounted with grills. I wasn’t in the mood for fish, so I headed back to Sultanahmet and got some grilled kofte meatballs and pilaf, which tasted great.

From the Galata Bridge.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

From Galata Tower.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Simit bread rings for sale, near Topkapi Palace.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Grand Bazaar, Istanbul.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Fresco, Chora Church.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Mosaics, Chora Church.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

More Sightseeing in Istanbul

November 13, 2004

Long but fine day today. Yesterday was great -- took a bus to another neighborhood and went to the Chora Church -- incredible mosaics, some of the nicest I’ve seen outside of Ravenna. It is a really small building relatively, and the ceilings are fairly low so I felt like I could really see the mosaics in a way that is more difficult in larger buildings. The bus ride there was pretty interesting too; I went through Fatih, which is supposedly a more conservative neighborhood with a huge mosque (and a really extensive market one day a week, worth checking out). But from the bus windows, it seemed as if almost every store on the main street through that neighborhood sold wedding dresses, from bare somewhat revealing ones to long sleeved ones with matching headdresses to cover the hair.

Then in the afternoon went to an Islamic arts museum, ate dinner at the fair (a couple of funny moments there -- including approaching a guy at a hot grilled sausage sandwich stand and telling him "I don't want a sandwich." instead of I do want a sandwich -- really there is only one letter difference in the turkish (istiyorum v. istimiyorum!) It is hard. Then went to that symphony anyway, even though I was running so late -- ended up catching nearly 3/4 of it, so I don't know how that happened. Took a taxi, then on the way back caught the bus and then went to the fair again and had more salep. It is too good not to drink it as much as possible. The other thing that needs to be done as much as possible when here is to stand between the blue mosque and the aya sophia in the park next to the fountain, at night, and just enjoy being surrounded by beauty. I think it is perhaps the most beautiful place I have been as far as the built environment is concerned. Forget Paris -- imagine those kinds of grandly lit views but with minarets and 1500 year old buildings!

Today I slept pretty late -- I have been sleeping really well and deeply at this hotel and I am really still tired so don't know if I am getting sick or if istanbul is just more exhausting than Ankara! Then walked to the covered market -- which is exhausting in and of itself! I had some agendas of needs to purchase and then was getting back in mind various souvenirs on offer. Don't want to buy anything yet, want to research prices on that kind of stuff, but eventually there will be a buying spree. I am thinking of saving all my tutoring money for that kind of stuff. It actually wasn't bad at all today -- not very crowded and the guys weren't hassling me much to buy. Now, not only do I have a pretend husband (no one asks actually if I have the ring on so that is good) but I don't speak English. I'm actually starting to believe I don't speak English, which is really weird. Apparently I look more french or german than american, because I'm getting, "Bonjour, parlez vous francais" rather than anything else. Did buy a scarf (and later today hat and gloves) because it is supposed to snow on Wed in Ankara! WAAAA.

After that I was totally exhausted. That place is so huge and overwhelming, but cool too, and it wiped me out. Anyway, after that I had Indian food for dinner! It was good but really really expensive (well, I paid about 20 million so about $14.) I think that is the thing about the US that I am most appreciating being here...though Turkish food is delicious, am accustomed to such a wide variety of flavors that it is hard to get used to the uniformity (though there is a variety in Turkish cooking, don 't get me wrong). But there is no Ethiopian one night, Charcoal Pit the next, tofu stir fry a third! Anyway, I came back to the room and took a much needed shower -- there hadn't been hot water in the mornings and I thought I was just oversleeping the hour - 24 hour hot water is not necessarily common here. However, when I asked today about what times the hot water is offered, they were apologetic and told me that they forgot to turn on my room! So I have it all the time now.

After that I headed out for another walk and then ended up in a kind of trendyish area on the other side of the bridge, Tunel, called Istiklal Caddesi. Bought some books in a book store with English language materials and also enjoyed looking around. I replaced my lost copy of World Food Turkey, and read about salep. The drink I’ve been obsessing about apparently has the reputation of an aphrodisiac. I took a tram up the hill to the main square and then got off and walked back because I saw a Dunkin Donuts. Had to get coffee, even though I feel guilty about it! I told the guy in Dunkin Donuts that I didn't speak English without even thinking about it, which was strange. Then I shopped for a hat and gloves and, unfortunately, missed the last bus (absurdly early at 9:30) back to the neighborhood where I’m staying. I was really annoyed because I missed it by about one minute, tried to chase it and then gave up. I had to cab it back unless I wanted to take the metro, which isn't direct and involves multiple transfers.

I was annoyed but then it cost only 6 million (so about 4.50) not bad! Then I got salep again at the fair -- and listened to some folk music while I drank it. Istanbul is pretty overwhelming, and I haven't even strayed at all from the main Tourist circuit.

A kumpir store at the Hippodrome festival. Kumpir are giant baked potatoes mixed with all sorts of fillings, from corn and cheese to potato salad and hot dogs. This stand decorated one mound of filling as Hala, the devil.


© Kris Nesbitt 2004

The Blue Mosque illuminated.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Salep salesman, Hippodrome.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Boza salesman at the festival.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Making swirled lollipops at the street festival.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Greetings from Istanbul

Well, I made it here to Istanbul -- got here about 3 in the afternoon after a very pleasant bus ride. I opted to pay a little more and go on one of the high-end companies that doesn't leave out of the big terminal. This one I could hop on my free service bus right in front of my place and get dropped off right in front with time to spare for a little breakfast. Better than paying a cab fare or sprinting around looking for a dolmus to the big terminal!

Anyway you get what you pay for. This bus was something else! Huge first class style seats and only three people per row instead of four -- it was a "royal class" bus with something they call "American VIP seats" with only one single one instead of a pair on the one side. Lots of beverage service and the rest stop was the best rest stop I've seen in any place, anywhere. The world over. It only serves customers for this bus company and it was incredibly clean with lovely views and nice food options.

I did have one bad incident on the bus though -- as we approached Istanbul, about a half an hour out, I realized I'd put my jacket in the overhead bin (just like on a plane). I was worried I'd forget it and so I stood up on the moving bus to take it out. Well, I forgot that the bin was also filled with plastic-wrapped blankets which began to fall out when I opened the bin. I grabbed my jacket and tried to slam the bin shut but when I did, the next bin over (also filled with blankets) popped open. I tried to catch it and shut it, but then when I did the original bin flew open again. I started saying "help" and the guy sitting behind me jumped up and tried to help, but another one of the bins opened! The two of us were standing there desperately trying to keep the bins closed and neither of us knew what to do. Finally the steward came running up and he knew better how to shut them. He told us to sit down and in a few seconds the crisis was averted.

The only thing I can say about Istanbul is it still takes my breath away -- from the standpoints of beauty, size, and amazing things to watch. However, that being said, I am already thinking that I am happy to be in Ankara rather than trying to live here -- it is just such an enormous city (15 million people!)-- I think I would have been completely overwhelmed if I'd dropped here out of the blue. And things are much more expensive.

That being said, I am paying about 17 dollars per night for my hotel room, and it is about a 6 minute walk from the Aya Sofia and the Sultanahmet Mosque and the heart of Sultanahmet. There have been nicer rooms, but it is perfectly fine (if televisionless) and for that price (with free breakfast, a pleasant host, and a very nice cybercafe with american alphabet keyboards right across the street!) I can't complain. I'm actually in a room that sleeps four, but apparently in two days I will be moved to a double across the hall. It is a really nice old building on a pretty little street.

One thing that is really annoying about Istanbul is the hawkers in the souvenir stores. I just ignore them, but it is pretty oppressive. Just have to keep walking because once they have you in their lair, forget about it! There are so many interesting things to buy though! I figure I am saving about 70 dollars over what I was going to pay for the other hotel down the street (a splurge at $30/night) so maybe I'll live on the edge and buy something nice for myself to take home.

Tonight ended up being really great, somewhat unexpectedly. When I got off the bus I searched for another hotel that would have only been $10 per night, but when I saw it I felt that I wouldn't feel comfortable wandering back there after dark. So I bagged it. But I did, on my way there, walk through the Hippodrome, the park that stands on the grounds of the old stadium where they did chariot races or something back in the old Byzantine days a thousand years ago, and they were setting up and just opening quite a large street festival in honor of the final few days of Ramazan. Lots of food and rides and even a mechanical bull so I made a mental note to come through after I settled into a hotel. After getting the lodging straightened out, I grabbed Iftar at a restaurant the guy at the pension recommended. It is always interesting to watch people at Iftar meals. They are clearly hungry and eat really fast, without talking much. Then, after they've finished and are smoking, drinking their tea, and visiting, they seem really satisfied and relaxed.

At any rate, after my iftar I began a search for a particular newspaper. On my way to the pension initially, I saw a paper in a trash can that had a post-election map of the US in which they had colored in the "blue states" the same color as Canada, and the headline was something about re-drawing the US borders, putting Kerry states in the bounds of our northern neighbor. I was desperate to try to translate the article, but unfortunately the paper was wrapped around a mostly eaten ear of corn and was too gross to snag from the garbage. So, I searched around trying to find the paper, but, sadly, after looking at a bunch at one newsstand (no small task because you had to ask for the papers from inside the kiosk individually), I couldn't find it. Sigh. But I did manage to purchase a paper that I think is a conservative Islamist paper with its take on the US elections.

Then I walked around a bit more window shopping on the main tourist street in Sultanahmet (which is the oldest and most historic area of the city). The carpet touts are annoying, calling out hello and saying things; however I basically pretend not to speak English and if I have to speak with someone, I answer in Turkish to their English, which seems to keep things pretty chilled out and gives me an air of mystery I think. Maybe I'll start saying I'm Portuguese, because they won't speak it here. Or Albanian. I do have to admit though that I have a ring that I have been wearing on some of my travels. Occasionally it makes things easier to have a pretend husband waiting for me back in Ankara, or coming the next day. However, I am already bored by him, since he never does anything interesting. That is really a shame, isn't it? I can't even manage to commit to a pretend husband!

I headed back to the festival to watch the mechanical bull. The festival ended up being a real highlight of my time in Turkey and I was there wandering around, people watching and eating junk food for several hours. I just kept making the circle around the Hippodrome like some zoned out, popcorn eating, picture taking chariot! There were so many people there and all kinds of great street foods and an utterly festive atmosphere. I find it so interesting to watch people interact here at that kind of thing. There were so many conservative women (by that I mean women in headscarves or in full black, everything but the nose and eyes covered) but I was as likely to see one of them clinging to a woman not in a headscarf as to another one dressed like that. It seems like women who wear scarves and women who don't do not segregate from one another, or at least that is the visual that I have been noticing. But there was something to see every few feet at each booth. For instance, I saw a conservative woman getting her back massaged by a man demo-ing a hand held massager. There were fortune-telling rabbits, live musicians, African shops, and Islamic book stalls (with one book I was trying to translate from Russian which appeared to say, as best as I could remember my Russian, Islam Proclamation Terror but then when I saw it in English it actually said Islam Denounces Terror. So that was good.)

And the food! Wow -- there was so much there, from chestnuts and popcorn popped fresh in round metal boxes over bowls of open flame, to kebabs and grilled meats and sausages, to sweets of all kinds: baklava, candy apples, gullac (a particular ramazan dessert), interesting homemade lollipops swirled fresh and artfully onto a stick while you watched. I bought an ear of corn, popcorn, a kind of apricot fruit leather shaped like doner or hero meat, shaved off a 2 foot tall cone, and boza a kind of cold fermented winter drink.

But my world changed when I tried something new called salep, a hot winter drink I've seen for sale on the street in Ankara but never tried. Whoa! The best way I can describe it is imagine the flavor of piping hot, fresh custard; and then imagine drinking that, covered with cinnamon, out of a cup. The first taste of it stopped me in my tracks, and instead of walking with the crowd I moved off to the side to savor every sip. Delicious.

Everyone seemed to be having such a good time -- lots of laughter and smiles and not that many tourists, especially the early part of the evening. It was nice to be in Sultanhamet surrounded by Turks rather than the tourist crew! And the sounds: lots of the vendors trying to out "Buyurun" each other and clapping and calling out the name of their food or the price "Bir Milyon Bir milion bir milyon!" I caught one father/son moment at a popcorn stand. The boy vendor started yelling Bir Milyon as loud as he could: the father looked over at him with an expression part amused and part proud. The boy grinned back at him.

Well, I am going to head back to the room. I bought an English language newspaper and found a newsstand that actually has English language magazines. Probably way to expensive to buy but I might treat myself to one, as they are really difficult to find in Ankara. I am really interested in seeing how people here react to Arafat's death.

Aya Sofia, one of my favorite buildings in the world, taken from one of my favorite spots in the world, the park between Aya Sofia and the Blue Mosque.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Ataturk Day decorations on the Armada Mall.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Ataturk's Death, 9:05 a.m.

Every year, on November 10th at 9:05 in the morning, Ataturk’s death is marked here in Turkey. This year, I got to see the tradition as I made my way to class. I knew it was going to happen – I’d read about it in my Turkey books. But I was amazed to actually see it myself.

The service bus takes us past the Ataturk Mausoleum every morning, and this morning traffic was terrible. There were literally hundreds of buses – military, school, and otherwise – lined up and double parked and spewing their passengers onto the sidewalk. A solid mass of people walked en masse along the walkways going up towards the mausoleum. When we passed the driveway leading there, my eyes bugged out as I saw row after row after row of people – probably 15 -20 across – thick as far as the eye could see up the hill towards the mausoleum.

When I got off the bus at Sihhiye I started my morning walk towards class. Along the way I paused to watch school children gathering around an Ataturk statue on the median in the middle of Ataturk Boulevard. Wreathes and flowers stood at attention next to the statue.

I debating waiting there for the time to come, but then I didn’t want to be very late to class. So I walked further southward towards Kizilay. I was about a block from the school when all of a sudded sirens started going off and everyone began to beep their horns. All the traffic stopped in the middle of the road, and all pedestrians froze in their places and looked downward with their hands to their sides. People froze on steps, getting onto buses, getting out of cabs. Everything was still, but the air was crackling with the sound of the multiple sirens. Some of my classmates said they’d even seen people crying.

After a minute or so, maybe two, the sirens dropped off to a single one, which faded to a thin, weak cry and then stopped. There was a second of total quiet, but then, as if I had “unpaused” a tape, everyone began moving again as if nothing had happened. Cabs screeched off, buses pulled away from the curbs, and life returned to normal.

The crowd streams out.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

At the futbol match.

© Kris Nesbitt 2004

A Cultural Weekend in Ankara

November 7, 2004

Culture Weekend in Ankara

I stayed in town this weekend, and experienced an interesting mix of cultural events. Friday night, I went to a Japanese Folk Dance concert in honor of the 80th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Japan and Turkey. It was packed with people – Turks, Japanese, and all other expats – and the show itself was pretty incredible. The costumes and sets were beautiful. I got terribly lost trying to get there, but after five or six fits and starts and lots of wandering around and asking for directions, I finally got there, just as the lights in the lobby were flickering to signal the start.

Saturday I hung out at home most of the day, and then met an American exchange student and an Italian woman from my class to go to a theater production. It was a French theater of the absurd play by Alfred Jarry, performed, in Turkish, by a combination of live performers and Karagoz shadow puppets. The theater was a very hip, artsy place, felt more like Chicago than Ankara!

Sunday, I went to a futbol match between Ankaragucu and TrabzonSpor at May 19th Stadium here. I walked there, had a little trouble finding it, and then discovered when I got there, just as the game was starting, that getting into a futbol match, even with a ticket, can be a little complicated here. When I’d purchased the ticket, I had to identify my rooting interest. I said TrabzonSpor, who knows why. Well, because violence at games is such a threat/problem here, the fans from the two teams are completely segregated. You can’t just go into any entrance like you do here. You have to enter a certain gate, after waiting in a long line, and move through a guarded caged corridor. There are metal detectors, full body searches, and confiscation of potentially dangerous objects. In my case, my pen was confiscated and tossed into a huge box filled to the brim with other banned pens. Meanwhile, the game was progressing, and I could hear the cheers and rhythmic chants of the fans. I had trouble figuring out where to sit, and finally found an English speaking guard to told me to sit anywhere in my Trabzon section. He kept asking who I was rooting for, and I just kept shrugging. There is apparently no room for neutrality.

Between each section there are 12-15 foot tall chain link fences with barbed wire on top. The fans were going crazy – Trabzon was winning (I’d missed the first score waiting in line) and I got to see them score again and watch the fans break into exuberant cheers and chants.

At the end of the match, it seemed to be taking a really long time to get out. However, the Ankaragucu fans were leaving quickly – just flowing out like water. I realized that they let all the fans from one squad out of the arena while keeping the others locked in. They give the first fans plenty of time to disperse, and then let the others start to leave, thereby keeping them separate even outside.

After the game, or shall I say after the wait to get out of the arena, I decided to walk from there to a dinner for Fulbrighters I was supposed to attend. I knew exactly where the dinner was because it was the very area I’d been lost in on Friday night. A woman who is a professor at one of the universities here was on a Fulbright exchange in the US last year, and felt she was treated so warmly by people there that she vowed to treat the Fulbrighters in Turkey this year. On the way there I got followed a little bit by somebody, which was kind of nerve wracking but I handled it OK and he left me alone without incident. He’d offered to give me directions at a point of decision blocks earlier, and then he went the other way. But without my realizing it he must have doubled back and about 6 blocks later he was right there next to me. I definitely need to work on my awareness and I was pretty angry at myself that I’d not realized it sooner.

But when I got to the place, it turned into a really nice night. We were welcomed to an incredible dinner of home cooked Turkish food. It was a stunning array of food – all kinds of dolmas, chicken, bean dishes, lots of cold appetizers. Astounding. And there was an entire tray of desserts, including the best Gullac I’ve had (it is a Ramazan dessert; I asked for some at the bakery the other day, not knowing at all what it looked like. I was standing there next to the clerk, who was standing next to a 5 foot counter filled with trays of gullac that I didn’t recognize. I asked, “Gullac var mi?” He looked at me like I was crazy, gesturing towards the 5 feet of gullac beside him: “Var.” I felt pretty dumb.) Anyway, this gullac had pomegranate seeds on it which really added a lot. It was a really lovely evening and I appreciated her hospitality and the good conversation and company.

Why "One Eye Closed"?? Please read.

Gittigin yerde herkes körse, sende bir gözünü yum.
If you go to a place where everyone is blind, close one eye.

I decided to call this site One Eye Closed because of this Turkish proverb I've come across a few times since my arrival. I realize that there could be some misinterpretations, so here is my clarification. I'm obviously not suggesting that people in Turkey are unseeing; instead, I intend to comment on my experience coming to a new place. While I'm here, I want to learn by trying to see the world from a different perspective, but I want to retain (and experiment with) the perspective I've developed through my previous experiences. The proverb encapsulates my approach. So there.

Ankara Election Watch 2004

The CNN room, front lobby of TAA, election night.
© Kris Nesbitt 2004

Election Watch

I decided to watch the US election returns from the Turkish American Association. They, along with the Embassy, organized a public all-night event. The evening began with a cocktail reception and viewing of a Chicago photo exhibit, which of course started triggering all my latent nostalgia for the Chicago years. I met some interesting people -- one the president of an American school who considers himself extremely conservative but is against Bush and can't imagine more than three people voting for him, and another a woman who works for the Turkish foreign ministry and who lived in Chicago from 2001 until two months ago and worked at the consulate on Michigan Avenue. The principal said that his school had a mock debate and election; a Korean girl played Bush and an American guy played Kerry. Kerry won in a landslide.

The staff had decorated the TAA with red, white and blue decorations and campaign signs. That I so enjoyed seeing the campaign surprised me. I got so sick of seeing their omnipresence in PA over the summer, but here, after no first-hand glimpses for a month and a half, they were a strangely comforting sign of home. Multiple TV feeds in different rooms offered CNN-International, CNN-Turk, and the Pentagon Network (which frightened me a bit at first, but proved itself later by offering Oprah and the NBC coverage with Russert and Brokaw, for me a throwback to the 2000 election.) Seeing Oprah was a thrill, even for only a few minutes. Earlier in the evening the Bush-disliking school principal said he thought Oprah should run for president, which I've been saying for years.

At 9:00, a panel discussion began, featuring one Turkish professor (who had been making the circuit of TV talk shows all day), and two American professors from Bilkent. One introduced the concept of the Electoral College (difficult for anyone to understand, let alone a predominantly foreign audience), and the other offerred his thoughts on the Bush and Kerry strategies. He gave a pretty blunt critique of the Kerry strategy, saying that by hanging his hat on his Vietnam service and "reporting for duty" he played into the Bush team's game; he tried to out-war and out-macho a war president. He also noted that Kerry all but ignored his 20 year Senate record, one that included lots of impressive work. Bush on the other hand, he suggested, offered the exact same simple message for 18 months. Lots of good questions at the end from the audience, too, so I felt pretty stimulated by the end of it. I've been generally avoiding things American in the last few weeks (still recovering from my guilt over two moments of weakness in which I bought Starbucks coffees and McDonald's french fries.) But being able to talk with a large group of people about something that was of great interest to me was oddly comforting, or something. I don't know how exactly to describe the feeling.

At any rate, I floated around a while, eating free food from the Hilton, and then headed back to the cheap hotel room I'd gotten a few blocks away to catch a few hours of shut-eye before the returns started coming in. I slept for about 4 hours, then got up and caught a taxi back to the TAA at 4 a.m. Already it didn't look good. After being nervous and sick-feeling over the election for a few weeks, I now felt strangely, momentarily calm as resolution approached. But as soon as I started watching, I got anxious again. About 20 people or so were also there, a mix of Turks and Americans, including some folks from the Embassy. Some men were dressed in red, white and blue patriotic ties with their suits. Despite the decorations and apparently festive atmosphere, now the tone had become rather tense as Bush's electoral vote count ticked ever upwards. When California and Washington were called for Kerry, a cheer went up in the room, prompting one guy to ask another behind me, "Where are all the Republicans?" The other's response: "They're over at the Embassy."

I sat there knitting a scarf, which got some attention from the Turkish tv cameras that were there. At one point, I got tired of watching Brokaw and company (how many times can you watch Russert scribble the same thing on his little wipe board without a) getting exasperated and b) succumbing to 2000 flashbacks.) I went downstairs to get me some Wolf Blitzer action on the CNN feed. At that point, about 5:30 or so, the room was almost completely empty. A bunch of Turkish polis loitered outside (there was a huge security presence) and a woman from the Embassy who had organized the event nervously moved tables and did idle set up tasks (earlier I'd overheard her saying that she was too nervous to watch the returns.) I sat down in front of the TV and was soon joined by one of the polis men, a young guy who approached me looking as if I was an animal in the zoo! He stared at me (friendly about it, but his reaction was amusing to me nonetheless) for a while and then asked me who I was supporting. I told him Kerry, and he laughed and said, gesturing toward the TV, "But Bush is winning!" He then sat down and proceeded to read the ticker aloud: "Mississippi. Bush 62%. Where is Mississippi?" Then I'd show him on the map. "Vermont. Kerry. Where is Vermont?" Later he said he thought everything from Texas to North Dakota would go to Bush. Good call, officer. We were soon joined by five or six other polis, who provided running commentary in Turkish, the only portion of which I could really understand was the name of states and their accompanying percentages for the appropriate candidate. At one point the call to prayer began, and that was a surreal moment for me -- hearing something like that that's so atypical in the US intermingled with Judy Woodruff and Wolf's running commentary.

I headed back upstairs to get some tea and settled in for the duration up there. People began to trickle out to go home and get ready for work. When Brokaw called Ohio for Bush, I felt deflated. All I could think was that in a few hours, I had to go into my class and face Ashraf from Iraq and tell him that Kerry didn't win. I tried really hard not to cry, but I did tear a bit. Then the provisional ballots offered some hope, but it never seemed real or possible to me. I was just trying to accustom to the fact of four more years.

At 7:00 they offered a breakfast buffet (cheese, olives, tomatoes, cucumber, yogurt, simit, nescafe, tea.) It began to get more crowded, and the party-like atmosphere resumed. People smoked and drank tea as they stood around TV sets, and the Embassy set showed up (some for the first time betraying partisanship in hushed conversations on the margins). Another panel discussion happened at 9:00; this time three different speakers offered their views on how the election would affect Turkish American relations. The general consensus: not much. For all my talk about the world affects and the foreign policy implications, now that it was a done deal, I couldn't help but be concerned most about the domestic aspects of the Bush win more than anything else, which surprised me a great deal. That's the thing about this experience -- the Turkey one -- is that I am constantly having reactions that are not the ones I would expect.

At 10:00, the Ambassador showed up with his security staff and offered a press conference. At that point, there wasn't anything much to report, other than a probable and popular Bush win (it was about 3 am EST). But he shuffled papers and read some exit poll info off of CNN. It was from him, actually, that I first heard of the evangelical outpouring for Bush. He cited church attendance as a factor -- and then said, "By church I mean church, synagogue, and mosque." Really? That's what I just can't get: with all the issues facing the country and the world domestically and internationally, that this election hinged on gay marriage and whether stem cells are "life" or not is really, frankly, disappointing to me. I could accept a Bush win if it was primarly based on the war on terror or even people's thoughts/decisions that he should finish what he started in the Iraq war. But for him to win, on some level, because people don't want Linda and Jen in Columbus, Ohio to tie the knot? Doesn't make any sense to me. Sitting over here, it seems, frankly, so irrelevant to the future of the world. Let's keep our eye on the ball, people. But it is too late. They've spoken.

Well, enough of that rant. After watching CNN in the lobby a little longer, I decided I should head over to the hotel to check out and then to class, about two hours late. I felt really tense about seeing Ashraf. I've built our interactions up in my head so much that this moment seemed really crucial. Turned out it wasn't up to my own internal hype. I walked in late; Cigdem asked how I was. I explained about the election, and expressed my dismay. Ashraf made eye contact with me and mouthed "Kerry?" I shrugged and shook my head no. He rolled his eyes and shook his head. And that was it. The next class we were back to our normal interactions.

Over here, it is very easy for me to be in denial. There's been inital press coverage, but otherwise, I can insulate myself from the reality pretty well. And I'm channeling myself into my guy Barack Obama, and looking forward to the inevitable 2nd term scandal that could, if we follow Reagan and Clinton's precedence, could come. I was really glad though that I watched at the TAA. AS a woman from the embassy told me (the one who was so nervous), "I'm glad you came. This was a historic election, and it is memorable to come together to witness history." It will be memorable. I think in 2012 when Obama wins, I'll think back to watching him win his senate seat, from my seat in faraway Ankara.

After the Ambassador's press conference.
© Kris Nesbitt 2004

A panel discussion on the election.
© Kris Nesbitt 2004

One candle

One Candle

On Election Eve, I hosted an AFSC candlelight vigil here in Ankara. Unfortunately, due to my lack of advance planning and lack of extensive network in Ankara, it was a vigil of One.

I sat in Guvenpark on a bench with my solitary lit candle. Unexpectedly, I found myself drinking hot tea. A young vendor with a large carafe of tea came along asking “Do you want tea?” in Turkish, so for about 30 cents I had myself a steaming plastic cup full. I sat and thought, watched the people coming and going, and wrote in my journal. Overall, it was a reflective, if solitary, evening. At one point some young people, just out of their evening university exam preparatory lessons, gathered on the other end of the bench. One of them approached wordlessly and lit his cigarette with my candle.

My journal writing was somewhat intense, thinking a lot about where I was four years ago (geographically, emotionally, and physically) and where I am now. Even though I was alone, it was a pleasant, thoughtful evening, and I was glad I bothered.

The new look flat

After shopping for various textile items in Tokat and in the big Migros mall here, I managed to do a Trading Spaces on the sterile dorm-room feel of my flat. Now it's a bit more my style. Having actual lamps intstead of overhead lights helps. Tremendously. Now, if I had Digiturk I'd never need to leave the house.

The livingroom.

The livingroom.
© Kris Nesbitt 2004

The bedroom, with my bizarre found object bedside focal point.
© Kris Nesbitt 2004

For reference, a "before" shot.
© Kris Nesbitt 2004