Turkey

One week ago I was sitting on a rooftop terrace in Istanbul overlooking the Marmara Sea. I brought my computer and did some journaling one morning from the roof. Here are some clips (but...I warn...it's LONG!):

There are huge tanker boats coming in and resting just out in the haze that’s making the water line disappear before seeing a big hill rise up behind it, only the silhouette of which is visible besides the 8 or so spears sticking up for the prayer calls. The sun is beating down and making the water glitter to the right, next to a landscape that is clearly industrial with a visibly large red Turkish flag flying amidst the tall cranes and boat lifts. The buildings around me are scattered levels of high and low, balconies and outside circular stairways, plants and umbrellas and sheets hanging under extended rooftops. Behind me to the right I can see the rounded dome of the Blue Mosque; the main dome, the smaller domes and its four prayer tower spears are all adorned with golden tips with the Turkish crescent moon at the very top. Behind me to the left are the four spears and dome of Ayasofya, one of the oldest mosques in the world (which used to be the oldest Christian church until it was taken over by the Muslims). It was originally constructed in 315 AD, was burned 100 years later and rebuilt again in just 6 years time. I know it had something to do with Justintine and Constantine and the Ottomans and Byzantines and all the amazing rich ancient history that I never paid attention to or cared much about until arriving here, surrounded by a cultural tradition that has preserved its age and juxtaposed it with modern technology and modern commerce. Yet the streets are narrow and cobblestone and winding up and down the hills, between cracking buildings and renovated facades, around corners where, in a car, you’re bound to come to a screeching halt for a man pushing a huge flat wooden cart filled with lettuce or cucumbers or roasted corn on the cob up the hill.

When we first went to the Blue Mosque (Sultanahmet Camii), the afternoon prayer service was in session, and we sat in a courtyard and listened to the prayers being projected from a big speaker into the courtyard where mainly women waited for their husbands to finish and emerge. When we could, we entered from a side, wooden porch where we stepped onto mats and rugs, removed our shoes, and being a woman, I covered my head with my scarf. We entered into this expansive mosque with intricately decorated columns and ceilings and domes…the entire floor was covered in a repeating pattern of rugs, and as we walked around in just our socks, I felt warm and content and at peace. The Arabic calligraphy was prominently displayed on large wooden panels as well as painted above every door and worked into some of the ceramic tile work throughout the entire mosque. Looking up, you can rarely find an uninterrupted view of the ceiling, as there is a maze of heavy-duty metal ropes descending from every part of the ceiling to hold up the low-hanging lights that illuminate the whole mosque. At first I thought it was a shame that the lights were so low and the wires were everywhere, until I realized that it gave the effect of a cozy living room, with the wooden floors covered in rugs muting the sounds that, in most churches (as my only other frame of reference) echo against stone floors and bounce off of cold walls.

We finally found the spice market, a jam-packed, hold-your-bag-tight-against-your-body sort of place. A woman at one point was screaming and trying to run down towards the exit of the market. A man was yanking on her arm, starting to pull her denim shirt off, but she was dragging him, and whatever she was yelling was attracting the attention of everybody else—customers and vendors alike—who were watching her, some of whom started running in pursuit. The cheese men went back to slicing off samples, the men behind huge baskets of nuts started yelling out prices and plunging their plastic scoops back into the multi-colored menageries of pistachios, almonds, walnuts, orange cracker-coated nuts, and spicy cocktail mixes. The butchers stood behind cases displaying white hooves and bleached and salted pig skins, a few flies and bees buzzing around raw carcasses of chicken and lamb out on a wooden table off to the side. I stopped to buy some dried apricots, and when I walked beyond the baskets of fruits to pay for them I discovered an entire back section with rows of clear plastic cases containing every variety of Turkish delight, candied fruit, and sweetened nuts. Since we were looking for rose-hip jam, we then stopped at a spice stand that had rows of jars in the back. A short Turkish man came up to us speaking English, telling us to look around and that he’d help us in a minute. Thankful to step out of the crowd and not be harassed, we were happy to stand behind the low-hanging strings of dried peppers, garlic, and myriad other roots and vegetables that I didn’t know. We gazed over full baskets of spices: a whole row of whole peppers—mixed, black, white, red, berry—chunky red pimentos and brittle dried mint twigs, orange and red fine strands of saffron, smooth yellow cumins and curries, and in the front a row of wet red pepper paste. The back shelves were packed with rose, pomegranate, and fig jellies, honeys and jars of pure pollen, boxes of Turkish delight and apple tea and mixed sets of spices. Our Turkish spice seller sat us down in the back and ordered us apple tea from an old intercom on the wall. We sat on rug-covered stools and put our bags down. Our tea arrived, and while we sipped, he kept coming back to have us smell sticks of fresh vanilla and taste lemon salt crystals. We finally walked out with vacuum-sealed jars of exotic jams and spices and boxes of tea. We wove our way up narrow passage ways splitting in every direction, past reams of fabric and scarves and kitchen pots and coffee percolators. We didn’t know where the Grand Bazaar was, but we kept following the general direction leading upwards, and we arrived seemingly magically at the arched entrance to Kapali çarsi. The Grand Bazaar is an expansive covered market area with everything from rugs and embroideries, ceramics and Turkish lamps, leather, jewelry and jeans and tee-shirts, knock-off Fendis and Guccis. Whatever you’re looking for, you can find it there. The problem was that our feet were completely screaming by the time we arrived, and after both of us needing to use the bathroom facilities and finding absolutely filthy (stand-over-a-hole for the men) toilettes, we weren’t in much of a mood for being harassed: “Lady, come look at my shop” and “Hello? Hello? I’m talking to you. Please come have a look”. But then I found a ceramic oil lamp I really like, which caused me to follow the man, not surprisingly, to “his other shop” to look at more varieties. But it led me past an embroidery shop that was exactly the type of thing I’d been wanting to find. I sat on a rug-covered floor, sipped more apple tea, and looked at nearly one hundred embroideries, old stuff, all-silk, all hand-made, and the man was showing us photos in a magazine of rugs from different style influences and time periods.

Saturday night we went to a hamam, a Turkish Bath. I entered and laid on the enormous hot rock in the center. After a short while, a large Turkish woman came over to give me my soap bath. She'd smack my hip when she wanted me to flip over, sit up, or follow her to a side sink where she shampooed my hair while I sat on a thin Turkish towel between the woman’s bare legs as she sat on the edge of the sink and dumped water over my head, worked in the shampoo, and douced me again with buckets of warm water. She then sent me back to the rock, and as I laid on the hot rock, my body sweating yet energized from the serious exfoliating rough rub-down I’d received, I gazed up at the bottom side of a rounded stone dome punched with round holes and along the bottom, stars. Water ran from the 15 or so marble sinks placed symmetrically around the room, each one kept company by a silver bowl for dipping into the water and pouring it over your body if you got too hot. Due to a minor confusion about where I was supposed to go for my massage, I ended up being the very last person in women's hamam besides the Turkish women who worked there and who, at that time, were still wrapped in towels and sitting on the other two massage tables, some sipping cups of tea, all talking in low voices. It was after midnight, and a little girl was there going back and forth with silver bowls filled with water, and I just thought about how different her childhood memories will be of spending nights naked and wet and wrapped in towels at the hamam while her mom worked. Surrounded by women, in a community of support that will teach her essential lessons about her society and her religion and her body.

On Sunday after a rooftop terrace breakfast in the sun, Henderson and I took off for Topkapi Palace. We marveled at the strong eastern influence, the way the patterns on the kaftas and in the architecture and on the tapestries was so clearly eastern—when it could have gone either way with Turkey being situated and influenced from both the east and the west. The sultans would receive people on big cushiony couches and a huge wide bed. There was one picture on the wall depicting one of these meetings between the Turkish men and the Europeans (not sure from which country, but my guess is England or France). The European men are in their pointed shoes, their tights, their short pleated skirts, tight jackets, wigs, and pointed 3-corner hats. They are all standing together looking towards the Turkish men in their long robes, no shoes, some holding pipes, sitting on the floor, some on benches, their arms falling casually onto their robed laps. Henderson and I just laughed at the contrast, the French men all uptight and serious, not even able to sit on the floor and get comfortable with their short skirts! We joked about President Bush inviting foreign dignitaries onto a big bed to come sit with him and discuss international policies. We walked around all the grounds, looking through rooms of huge and extravagant jewels (more jewels than I’ve ever seen in my life!), looking at golden writing boxes, learning about how the sultans had 2 people with them at all times—one was their foot attendant, one carried the writing box and a flask of water at all times. We walked out on terraces that overlooked the Sea, went in circumsicion rooms, receiving rooms, deliberation rooms, kitchen rooms, dressing rooms, and places I didn’t even know the function of. The Harem was in the complex as well, but they charged an additional 10 lyra fee to see it, and by that time we’d been there for almost 3 hours. One of the most celebrated rooms at the palace contains artifacts from the Prophet Muhammad. There were signs outside the door asking people to remain quiet and respect the dignity of Muhammad. In that room alone, a man sang verses from the Koran into a microphone, sitting in a small booth. Rows of people moved around the cases containing the artifacts—a sword, one of his teeth, parts of his beard, a footprint, and a letter he wrote to the people telling them briefly what it meant to be Muslim. I could hardly see the items or read the translations, but it was pretty amazing to see the preservation of such things as old and significant as they are.

After leaving the palace, we sat outside and had a cold beer, we walked to a stand and bought chicken dolmer wraps which we took across the street to a park. We then found a little Turkish sweet shop where, little did we know, you order your pastries and eat them in the rather large back coffee-shop section. We ordered Turkish coffee also since we hadn’t drank it yet. It’s the size of an espresso but with so many grounds that it’s actually thick and sludge-like. But there’s a trick to drinking it. First you have to let it sit so the majority of the gounds settle to the bottom, but then once you start drinking, you have to finish relatively quickly otherwise the grounds on the bottom will soak up the water. The tradition is to then flip over the cup into the saucer, let the water drip onto the saucer, and after 2 minutes or so, flip over the cup and read your fortune in the grounds. We didn’t find anybody who could read ours. But our present was looking pretty fantastic.