TRAVEL TALES
City of the Seven Hills
Travel Notes: Istanbul, Turkey
Bayrampasa was the biggest and most complicated bus station I saw during my 15 months of traveling. I got off the bus completely disoriented. Istanbul made me nervous, even before I stepped foot in Turkey. A city almost as big as Mexico City, with more than 20 million inhabitants, but with a different culture and language that would devour me completely.
At that moment, I thought I had had enough and wanted to go home. Maybe it was the darkness of the night, or because I was morose and sick with a cold. I didn’t have the spirit nor the motivation to continue. I slept all the way from Sofia, Bulgaria, and only woke up when the bus stopped at the border.
“What do you want in Turkey?” asked the annoyed migration officer.
“I’m a tourist,” I replied.
“What is your profession?” he inquired.
“Student” I lied.
With that officer’s attitude, I knew that “backpacker” would be, without a doubt, a “Go back the way you came from.”
I showed him the International Student ID that I got from a travel shop when my university credential was about to expire.
“It’s not enough,” said the damned officer. “Show me another document to back it up.”
“I only have that one,” I replied, not letting myself be intimidated.
Of all the people waiting at the immigration office, I was the only one whose luggage was searched. The annoying officer even took the liberty to personally go through every detail of my stuff. “What is this?” he asked with a smart smile as if I had hidden a kilo of cocaine inside my Kindle. I taught the officer that in the 21st century paper is no longer essential to read a book.
I got off at Dolmabahce Avenue after several hours of the eternal local ride from Bayrampasa. Alper was waiting for me in Besiktas, a popular neighborhood full of cafes and small restaurants on the European side far away from tourists’ sights. I met Alper through Daniel, a Mexican friend living in Ingolstadt, Germany, who had traveled through Turkey years before me. Alper offered me a place to stay in his apartment when he thought that by “A Mexican friend is visiting your country,” Daniel meant a hot and lonely Mexican female friend was visiting his country. Surprise, surprise.
Alper had the appearance of a Turkish pimp: completely bald since the age of nineteen, with a thick, circular beard, and both ears pierced with golden rings. He claimed to be a pretty busy lawyer. Every day he left to work early in the morning and returned late at night accompanied by Rita and Irina, a couple of exotic Russians with questionable appearances, but with a cool and sneaky sense of humor… Sorry, my imagination got carried away with the Russians. In reality, Alper was a hard-working lawyer, but above all, he was a pretty decent person. Of all the people I met while traveling, Alper was one of the most pleasant and generous, and, of course, he wasn’t a pimp.
The night of my arrival we had Dürüm for dinner. After that, I fell fast asleep in his brother’s bed. He was out of town those days, visiting their parents at their hometown in the south. The next morning when I woke up, Alper was already gone. I went out to explore the labyrinth of Besiktas, losing myself among its winding streets and dead ends. Passing through stone and brick slopes, I came across the busy Karaköy Avenue and, eventually, the Galata Bridge full of fishermen sitting calmly under the sun. I crossed the Bosphorus Strait and had Balik Ekmek for lunch, a grilled fish sandwich with salad and a touch of lime and salt, in the Eminönü neighborhood, the ancient heart of Constantinople, where its biggest temples and palaces were built.
Hagia Sophia, the highest symbol of Istanbul, rested accompanied by the Blue Mosque on top of the First Hill (Istanbul is known as the City of the Seven Hills). A protest outside the old mosque caught my attention. Members of a religious sect were facing the police. I thought they could be protesting against the ban on preaching inside the building. Since 1935, Hagia Sophia stopped being a mosque and became a museum open to the public. At least until last year (2020) when Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish President/Dictator with clear aspirations to become an Ottoman Sultan, restored Sophia’s status as a mosque.
The protest turned violent. Some were pepper-sprayed while others ran with blood on their faces. More than protesters, they looked like frustrated hooligans ravaging after their team had lost a football match.
Even with all the violence and the noise, the First Hill was a marvelous place with beautiful gardens and fountains separating the two grand structures. I must say; however, that it is one thing to see Hagia Sophia from the outside and a totally different one to be inside its walls.
One of the vault’s corners was being restored; nevertheless, its majesty remained absolute. Four feathered Seraphim protected the golden dome with their six-winged bodies, all faceless but one. Huge green wooden medallions hung off the walls with the names of Allah, Muhammed, two of his grandsons, and the four Caliphs inscribed in golden calligraphy. Stone arches and grey walls held the dome.
Hagia Sophia’s golden ceilings were adorned by mosaics and Orthodox frescoes of Jesus, Joseph, and Mary; accompanied by Angels and Byzantine Emperors. Climbing the stairs to the second floor, right next to the Deësis mosaic -the one with a Jesus with more realistic features than the rest-, sunlight pierced directly through a small squared window, breaking away from the cloudy sky above the four minarets and the cerulean dome of the Blue Mosque: a picture worthy of a Renaissance painting.
There is no doubt that the beauty of Hagia Sophia is the ultimate symbol of syncretism between Christianity and Islam, a structure that found its own style, its own reconciliation within its walls.
Back in Eminönü, I entered the Toptaki Palace, where Mohammed’s swords were kept along with some of the mythical hairs of his beard. A few blocks away from Toptaki was the Archaeological Museum with beautiful ancient mosaics of Mesopotamian lions and Greek sarcophagi, whose inscriptions and carvings narrated legends of Gods and their lovers.
I met Alper and his friends in a bar at Besiktas that afternoon. They drank Tuborg; it was neither the best beer nor the cheapest by Turkey’s standards. A jug cost eighteen Turkish lire, the equivalent to three euros back then.
They insisted that I tried Midye Dolmasi and Kokorec outside the bar. Both street dishes are usually eaten at night. Midye Dolmasi are mussels stuffed with rice with spices and a flavor similar to that of Spanish Paella with a touch of lime. The Kokorec, on the other hand, is a roasted lamb belly cake (also known as buche in Mexico). Alper and his friends suggested pairing the Kokorec with Salgam, a fermented black carrot drink, whose flavor was equal to the liquid that remains at the bottom of a potato crisps bowl when you add a lot of spicy dressings.
Alper prepared Menemen for Sunday’s breakfast, a dish that in Mexico we know as Huevos a la Mexicana (Google it if you haven’t seen them). At noon we went for a walk in the neighborhood of Ortaköy, in the north of Besiktas, near a bridge that crossed the Bosphorus to the Asian side of Üsküdar. The Ortaköy Mosque seemed to have been carved from a giant piece of ivory with beautiful Baroque engraves.
People around relished the view and the sun, eating the Turkish equivalent to stuffed baked potatoes. Yachts and small boats were docked in front of a long wooden pier. “Here is where Madonna comes to party!” said Alper with excitement, pointing to an area of restaurants and bars with luxurious facades across the street.
It was a sunny day with fresh air. I had no more plans now that I had arrived in Istanbul. The only thing I knew was that I wanted to get to Nepal at some point, but nothing more. Alper told me that I could stay as long as I wanted in his house. I took him at his word and extended my stay for one more week to enjoy the sun and the delicious food.
I took the ferry to the island of Büyükuda, the largest of the Prince Islands in the Sea of Marmara, where Trotsky lived after being exiled by Stalin. Although I did not find his house, I did see many old Ottoman-style mansions and buildings on my way to the top of the island, haunted by the constant barking of a pack of dogs that seemed to pursue me, hidden through the shrubbery. I picked up a stone from the ground that, beyond guaranteeing my safety, gave me a false sense of protection.
Senlik, a lawyer friend of Alper who had an exaggerated kinship to Javier Duarte (the corrupt ex-governor of Veracruz), arrived on Tuesday. He stayed for a couple of days, sorting out a client’s business in town. He was a nice guy, but the kind of person I wouldn’t want to start an argument with.
The next morning, I started sleeping in the living room; Erkin, Alper’s younger brother, returned from Denizli, where his family ran an olive oil business. Erkin was a sweet guy, with a rougher English than Alper or Duarte. Taller than Alper, he somehow reminded me of Kenai from Brother Bear, in his bear form. Erkin taught me a lot about the gastronomy of Istanbul, guiding me through the hidden lunch and breakfast corners of Besiktas.
Turkish breakfasts are famous for their variety and abundance. Apart from the red tomatoes, the green and black olives, and the black tea and cucumber; we tried the Kuymak, a dish made of melted cheese and cornmeal, literally a fondue with an oily consistency eaten with pieces of bread. The Kaymak, similar in name but different in flavor, a combination of cream cheese and jocoque, is spread on bread together with honey. As strange as it might sound at the beginning, its strong, bitter, and sweet flavor heavenly blend together.
When we were in a hurry, we would go to the bakery across the street for Simit, a circular crusty bread covered in sesame or sunflower seeds that goes well with cream cheese, chocolate, or butter. In every corner of Istanbul, one can find a small Simit stall, which is always delivered to you in red plastic bags.
The weather in Istanbul was warm, at least fifteen degrees warmer than the other Eastern European countries where I was coming from. It took just a couple of days of sunshine for me to recover from the flu and the pseudo-depression that had dragged me down for almost three weeks.
The days I spent sitting in front of the Gülhane Park fountains were eternal; walking in the narrow alleys of the Grand Bazaar, absorbing the aroma of its spices; or watching the boats cross from one continent to the other through the Golden Horn from one of its bridges. Together with Alper and Erkin, Besiktas became a second home to me, a different world from the crowded streets of Eminönü and Taksim. Its blocks were seesaws of shops, markets, bakeries, restaurants and cafes; the place of the students, of the artists: the cultural heart of Istanbul.
Written on February 10th, 2019.
Continue with: Gaziantep’s Pistachios and the Turkish Family that Adopted Me for a few Days
Article based on Memorias del Este.
I am leaving for a camping trip in Sweden, so I will continue to publish more articles in a few weeks.
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