February 2012
46 posts
“If one had but a single glance to give the world, one should gaze on Istanbul.”
– Alphonse de Lamartine
Try this on for size.
Tuesday Night
It’s Tuesday and I’m borderline drunk. Yes, this is me studying abroad.
Let me just go ahead and say that La Liberta has proven to be one of the best bars in the entire world. YES I SAID THE ENTIRE WORLD.
First, it’s less than a ten minute walk from my bed. Second, the staff generally recognizes me and gives a warm welcome. Third, the bartender ALWAYS recognizes me. Fourth,...
Probably my new favorite song. Of the moment....
For getting back into the swing of school.
Kapadokya
For those of you who didn’t catch the bug I brought with us to Cappadocia, I lift my glass in a salute to your immune system. For those who did, I apologize indefinitely. Bringing this tenacious cough on a poorly ventilated bus was probably a jerk move, but after seeing all that we saw, can you blame me for putting my (and your) health second? That said, this cough has proven to be a worthy...
Dig it.
Skandal
I get a kick out of the club scene. I think it’s ridiculous and sweaty and captivating. I think it’s a mad mess and everyone’s a little crazy. Overpriced drinks. Endless thumping house music. People letting loose in the flashing lights.
Once we found Skandal and shoved our way through the entrance, I didn’t hesitate to lead our group to the front of the dance floor. I wanted to be immersed in the...
Damn this song is funky. Couldn’t help but...
First Day of Class
Tonight, at La Liberta, Galen and I were sipping our beers when an employee came up to us to give us a Turkish lesson on the names of body parts. I don’t know why. But now I know how to say the following:
Eye = göz
Hair = saç
Hand = el
Ear = kulak
Nose = burun
Arm = kol
Besides my Turkish For Foreigners class this morning, I had no plans. My FLED 512 class is postponed until next...
“Merhaba.
Ben adım Chris.
Memnun oldum.”
– Turkish for Foreigners.
Music to get pumped up for tomorrow’s party.
Luck
Kelsey and I found the ESN Club Office on the bottom floor of the Men’s Dormitory and walked in to find a rather flustered looking ESN Officer sitting in front of stacks of money from people who’d already come to get tickets for the Cappadocia trip, and she looks at us and says, “I hope you only want two.”
At first I thought maybe we weren’t allowed to buy tickets...
Beşiktaş vs Gençlerbirliği
Realization: the bus ride from Beşiktaş to Boğaziçi University feels like traveling the entire length of the city of Sacramento. This is madness.
Tonight from the bus I stared out the window at every passing storefront, awestruck by every light and face and billboard and coffee-shop and taxi cab and every little cog in this giant Istanbul machine, this captivating city, amazed by every...
Listen
Bursa
Somewhere between Bursa and Istanbul, on a bus that knows no class other than business class, which is to say we each get our own touchscreen TV and a free snack and beverage (and only for 20 TL), I recline my chair and look out the window at the darkening hills and lights of occasional civilization, the trees and hills heavy with gray snow, and I feel a sudden soothing as I finally...
The First Two Weeks
In the first two weeks I’ve walked a million miles.
I’ve touched the Bosphorus Strait and passed beneath towering bridges that connect Europe and Asia (though I’ve still yet to touch foot on the Anatolian side). I’ve stood on cement docks near patient fishermen and watched cargo ships rumble by, leaving the tug boats and ferries to bob in their wake. In some areas, I’ve seen herds of jellyfish...
Quarter-Life
For my birthday I wasn’t drunk-drunk, but I certainly reached that precipice and, after looking down into the abyss, I decided to steer back toward sobriety and that last beer in Taksim was abandoned after only a few sips before Stine, Emre and I took a taxi back to the Simpledorm.
It’s morning now. I’m 25 and there’s no going back.
Today is Stine’s birthday and Valentine’s Day and yesterday’s...
I didn’t get to see them play in Belgium,...
Saturday in Sultanahmet
You wake up and the internet doesn’t work, again, so you give it the old college try and still there’s nothing but a dead signal, so you shrug and move on with your day. On purpose you don’t finish reading your book because if you do then you have nothing left to read, so those last three pages remain a mystery. Not one to stay cooped up all morning in your room, you head out...
Flight Facilities - “Crave You”...
Dancing to a Turkish cover band
I won’t even bother trying to blindly repair my wireless connection anymore. It seems to disappear overnight, sucked back into the ether, everywhere and nowhere at once. Either my laptop is being racist against the local router or the router doesn’t want to mix blood with the foreigner. Either way, it’s a mystery and the instructions are in Turkish (sometimes, by freak chance, in temporary...
Çay Day
I already forgot his name, but when I came home tonight I saw that one of my roommates was moving in. I’m no longer alone. If it wasn’t midnight, maybe I would’ve stayed up to chat with him and maybe I’d remember his name, but we’ve got plenty of time for that.
I’m becoming concerned that the strange sprain-like sensation in my right foot is getting worse, with...
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.
A week ago I landed in Istanbul during a rare snowstorm and I saw employees on the tarmac having snowball fights among the luggage carts. The snow melted and washed away and some of us wished we’d taken more photographs of the city in the snow, hearing from the locals that such weather in Istanbul is rather strange. Snow, yes, but not like this. Well… our wishes were granted and for Week #2 we’ve...
Lost in Levent
Before I get into my misadventure in Levent, I should say a few things about the Superdorm…
I suspect that “Super” is the result of a bad translation. Whereas I am grateful for the roof over my head and the close proximity to school, there is little else that qualifies the use of an adjective that evokes much higher expectations. Ultimately it feels like “Super” was tacked on as a sort of...
Beşiktaş vs. Fenerbahçe
By no exaggeration, tonight I had the best chicken Caesar salad of my entire life. Grilled chicken, fresh lettuce, corn, warm melt-in-your-mouth croutons and a subtle, yet flavorful dressing that was so good I wanted to lick the plate clean. This cost me 13 TL, about 7 or 8 bucks, and with the beer and the cover charge, I spent 35 TL on our exchange-group fieldtrip to watch the soccer...
The Old Town District
I needed two more copies of my passport so I figured a quick trip to the library to use the photocopier and the Wi-Fi would be about as much as I did today, the day after my long trek along the Bosphorus. For some reason the library was empty and one of the doors, locked, while the other let me take a few curious steps into the building before a Turkish gentlemen came and said something I didn’t...
Where Your Feet Can Take You
It’s nearly impossible to describe how beautiful Istanbul is.
Imagine the compact liveliness of San Francisco. Now add a few centuries of history, apply a thick layer of snowfall, erase the idea of a grid system, subtract all the native English speakers, add the Bosphorus Strait and sprinkle it with a hundred boats and cargo ships, insert dozens of stray animals, make sure most of the men are...
Here’s an amazing version of Cat...
Istanbul
We open on the Green Park Hotel where it’s early and snowing and we slowly pan forward, passing through the automatic-revolving door and past the lobby and we nod to the employees at the front desk behind the bowl of tiny complimentary candies on our way to the elevators across from the staircase. We could take the stairs but we’re feeling lazy and the classical music makes us feel royal during...
