From Cairo to Istanbul

I write to you from an Internet Cafe. I am surrounded by pre-tween turkish boys playing first-person shooter video games.
We landed in Istanbul on Saturday the 26th, and were immediately conscious of just how clean the air is here. The blue sky above the city, punctured by a plethora of minarets, starkly contrasts the heavy blanket of smog that traps Cairo and gives the city an undeniably claustrophobic feel. The breeze is refreshingly salty along the Bosphorous, a river which, when compared to the Nile, seems almost pristine. The people are well dressed, and the Lira exchanges with the US Dollar at a rate alarmingly close to 1. The street vendors prepare sanitary food. From the balcony of our hotel room we can see the dome of the Hagia Sophia which, for nearly 1000 years, was the largest church in the world. The waiters at a nearby bar know us by name and coerce us into dancing a Turkish folk dance every time we stop by.


What more could you ask for?

To be honest, I am homesick for the tea and coffee shops of Cairo. It is easier to find a cup of Starbucks here than it is to find the sludgy Turkish Coffee they served on every corner in Egypt. And I admit I was a bit concerned for the cultural integrity of Istanbul when I asked a man whether he spoke any Arabic and he sternly reprimanded me. I was afraid the Turks had sold out their Muslim brothers in the struggle for Westernizatıon. What I have since come to realize is that Turks exist within a cultural context that is neither Middle Eastern nor European. The transliteration of their language, 90 years ago, was not an instance of selling out, but of progress, and of acknowledging their place within a Western dominated Global economy. Turkey´s cultural integrity is still fully intact.

How do I know? Because I have been to a Turkish Bath, a 'Hammam'. In the midst of a Pamukian snow storm, Adam, the Dans, Erik and I ventured into a damp basement by the Sultan Ahmet Train station. I had, quite honestly, thought that Dan was kidding when he described a Bath as 'a fat Turkish man having his way with you'. I thought wrong. Scantily clad in towels and sandals, we were directed to the Hammam's innermost sanctum: a small, dome-ceilinged room that smelled distinctly of chlorine. We were told to wash, and just as we were beginning to wonder what exactly we were meant to do next, in sauntered three paunchy Turkish men, clad in matching towels, mustaches and chest hair. We were told to lie on a slab of marble in the middle of the room. One of the men grabbed Adam by the neck, quite forcefully spun him around, and proceeded to slap him across the back. In succession, we were all treated quite similarly. What followed was a half-hour of what could be loosely defined as a cross between a deep tissue massage, a soap bath, and a Greco-Roman wrestling match.

I can only imagine how bizarre this account sounds, out of context. But you must understand the degree to which what we have defined as 'man-love' permeates this society. This was by far the most extreme degree of 'man-love' that we've encountered thus far, but it is not at all uncommon to see men holding arms as they walk, or kissing cheeks upon meeting, things that would seem outrageous within the context of a largely homophobic American society.

Naturally, we left the Hammam feeling relaxed and revitalized.

Over this past weekend we rode down to Troy and Ephesus. Needless to say, the ruins were unbelievable. But the sense of wonder one feels, walking along a road that was built 3000 years ago, is indescribable. So instead of relating a brief history of Ancient Civilization, I thought I would finish this entry with a story about Rummikub.

In the interest of providing us with a little more free time on our trip to Ephesus we were allowed the option of skipping a previously mandatory Museum trip... We found ourselves in a Coffee shop, surrounded by Turkish men playing Rummikub, a game similar to Gin-Rummy that is a family-favorite in the Kring household. To be honest I have never seen the game played anywhere other than in the Kring household, and until coming across this Coffee Shop I wasn't entirely convinced that it even existed in the real world. So we sat down, and I began to teach my classmates. Being Carleton students, almost all of them immediately comprehended the rules and strategic nuances of the game. Adam didn't. He struggled. This is a picture of Adam:

We played for about 45 minutes and Adam got thirsty. Apparently, it was a thirst that tea could not quench, so he wandered out of the shop in search of a Pepsi, leaving his game pieces for all the world to see. Almost immediately a man, seeing the open seat, asked in the universal language of hand gestures whether he could join our game. He won, for Adam, in one turn.

This is a picture of the world's greatest Rummikub player: