Eternal Trip – The Never-ending Journey (Istanbul & Everything After #68)

I am sitting here fifteen and a half years after my 2008 trip to Turkey. Now I am wondering when, or if, that trip ever really ended. And if it has not ended, will it ever? A trip is more than the physical act of travel. It is also a mental journey that begins well in advance of the actual trip and can last long after the return. An argument can be made that the mental part of a trip is more satisfying than the physical one. A gift that can keep on giving. 

Lost in time – Basilica Cistern in Istanbul (Credit: Hiro-o)

Security Blanket – The Rough Guide
The end of any overseas trip can be a strange thing. Usually, a trip ends for me when one of the following happens: 1) I arrive home; 2) I arrive back in the United States; 3) I unpack my luggage, wash all the clothes, and put the items I purchased away. All of these happened after my return from Turkey, but I am still puzzled as to when the trip ended or if it ever really did. The more I have traveled since then, the more I have realized that trips do not end when I expect them to. They take on a life of their own, returning to astonish and haunt me years later. These trips get pushed to the back of my mind, but not out of my mind. The effects of a trip linger, even when my interest in the places I visited wanes. After returning, my interest in Turkey lessened, but it never became an afterthought. The trip was too unique to be discarded.

While I have never looked up the exact start and end dates of my trip to Turkey, they are not that relevant. This is because I have trouble pinpointing when the trip ended. I also have trouble pinpointing when it started. The journey did not start when I left home or landed in Istanbul. As far as I can remember, the trip started in a Borders bookstore almost a decade before I set foot in Turkey. That was when I purchased the Rough Guide To Turkey. My journey began as soon as I opened the guidebook and started reading. The Rough Guide would accompany me throughout the trip, The same guidebook is still within reach as I write this. The Rough Guide was just as much my travel companion on this trip as my best friend Steve who accompanied me. The Rough Guide was a security blanket that I kept clutching. Now when I see that book with its frayed edges and blue spine, I immediately think of my time in Turkey. The Rough Guide helps me recover memories anytime I want to revisit the trip.

Once and future generations – At Gallipoli

Hangover Helper – Many Happy Returns
I was surprised by the vividness of my memories while reliving the trip to Turkey over the past couple of months, The trip was just two weeks of my life, but very rarely have I lived life with so much curiosity and intensity. I felt awe, anger, fear, hope, joy, love, melancholy, and sadness during the trip. Sometimes I felt every one of these emotions on the same day. My feelings about the trip were bipolar. I wanted to go back home, and I wanted to stay forever. The journey was exciting and exhausting. When I got home, there was no place I would have rather been than back in Turkey. I would later contact the same company that had led my tour to inquire about a trip to eastern Turkey. I did not hear back from them.

I would have loved to travel across eastern Turkey, but an underlying need was filled when I made the inquiry. I did not want my initial trip to ever end so I conjured up a potential return. Another trip would have been an extension of the first one. I was not that disappointed when it failed to materialize. The important thing was that I tried to make a return trip happen. This helped compensate for the withdrawal I felt upon my return home. Turkey left me with a bad hangover, one that lasted for months. In a sense, I still have that hangover. My trip never really ended for the simple reason that I did not want it to. This became apparent to me upon my return home. I kept the trip’s memory alive, even as I took trips to many other foreign countries.

I could not let the trip to Turkey go. The entire journey was unlike anything I had ever done before. That created a lasting impression and an even longer afterlife for the trip. One that I am still enjoying to this very day. The experiences I had defined many of my foreign trips that followed. The trip to Turkey became a standard I sought to uphold. While I have never traveled on a group tour since then, my independent travel has been done in the same spirit of discovery that informed the trip. As much as I came to loathe the group tour, I came to love Turkey even more. This led to a perpetual case of separation anxiety. The only way to quell that anxiety was to tell myself there would be another trip in the near future. That future came and went without any resolution. The idea of it gave me something to which I could aspire. If I did the trip once, I could do it again. I would travel to Istanbul five years later. That trip would also be memorable, but never quite like the first one. 

Never-ending journey – View of Istanbul with the Golden Horn (Credit: Juraj Patekar)

First Love – Deep Down Inside
My trip to Turkey only came to an end in a superficial sense. Deep down inside I knew that it was not over. I later realized it never would be. At times, the trip went into hibernation only to reemerge. I kept coming back to it as a reference point. All my subsequent trips to Eastern Europe were based upon the confidence I received by first visiting Turkey. That trip spurred me on to further adventures. The trip to Turkey was like a first love. The relationship may have ended, but the love never did. I now realize that the trip will always be with me, and a part of me.

Taking A Travel Valium – Welcome To Frankfurt (Istanbul & Everything After #63)

Flying into Frankfurt felt vaguely familiar. Part of this was the fact that my friend Steve and I had transited through the airport two weeks earlier on our way to Istanbul. Frankfurt is hard to avoid if you are flying into Central Europe. The airport is Europe’s second largest behind London Heathrow. Business travelers, bankers, and finance gurus are among the top clientele. Besides Brussels, there is no other city more important to the European Union than Frankfurt. The city is Europe’s financial nerve center. As home of the European Central Bank, Frankfurt is to finance, what Brussels is to bureaucracy.

Despite French protestations to the contrary, Germany is the closest thing the European Union had to a superpower. As the EU’s largest economy, Germany holds the power of the purse over Europe and Frankfurt is the epicenter of that power. When economic issues are at the forefront of the EU, Frankfurt trumps Brussels. German fiscal policy has ripple effects felt across the rest of Europe. Money is power, and Frankfurt has plenty of it. 

Inside out – At Frankfurt Airport (Credit: David Wong)

Disconcerting Silence – A Quiet Place
Arriving in Frankfurt was like landing on another planet. Two weeks in Turkey was filled with sensory overload. Frankfurt was a return to the buttoned up, business culture of the western world. When stepping off the plane and into the airport, the first thing I noticed was that it felt like all the energy had been sucked out of the place. If Istanbul was the equivalent of crystal meth, Frankfurt was an overdose of valium. The airport was clean, clinical, and disconcertingly quiet. Sure, there was noise, but after Istanbul I did not really hear it. The theme song of Frankfurt Airport could have been “Enjoy the Silence” but that would have been much too loud for this low-fi environment. While there was activity in the airport, none of it was frenetic. The Germans had organized the emotion out of everything. The idea of spontaneity did not seem to exist.

I was nursing a hangover from the adrenaline rush of Turkey. Germany came as a complete shock to my system. It only took a few minutes for me to feel disappointed. In my imagination, Germany promised so much more. Its most notable modern historical figures for better, worse, and awful were famous enough to be known by a single name. Bismarck, the Kaiser, and Hitler. These men were respectively conniving, vile, and evil. They were also fascinating. The sedative administered by the aesthetics of Frankfurt Airport was an antidote to all that was interesting in Germany. I found it hard to believe all the history that happened in Germany had anything to do with what I felt at this airport. I could have used a good dose of antidepressants to get through my initial shock. I had entered a highly organized environment that reflected an entire nation.

Enjoy the silence – Frankfurt Airport (Credit: Robot8A)

Culture Shock – A Turkish Tale
Like all airports in major cities, Frankfurt’s was well outside the city center. None of the taxi drivers were complaining. They could make a good living by whisking business types to and from the city center. Steve and I had a choice. We could take a taxi or ride the rail line to our hotel in central Frankfurt. The taxi was five times more expensive, but our time in Frankfurt was limited. We wanted to make the most of it. A taxi would take us right to the door of our hotel in the shortest amount of time. We could have saved some Euros by booking a night at one of the hotels close to Frankfurt Airport, but we had enough time on our hands that spending one night in the city made sense. After experiencing the antiseptic nature of the airport, I was glad to avoid a night spent in any of the nearby hotels which I imagine would have been just as soulless.

The culture shock continued when Steve and I went to hail a taxi. The anything goes, everything is open to negotiation aspect of Turkish taxis was missing. At Frankfurt Airport, the taxi drivers were ready and waiting in an orderly succession of vehicles. The taxis looked like they had just come off the showroom floor of an auto dealership. The only thing these taxis had in common with the ones we had taken in Turkey was that the drivers were Turkish. This was not much of a surprise considering the history of Germany over the last fifty years, Upper estimates of the number of ethnic Turks living in Germany hover around seven million. This is a direct result of two historical events, a major economic boom in postwar West Germany and the Berlin Wall being built. What could be more redolent of modern Germany than those two things?

The Berlin Wall was constructed by the East German government in 1961 to stem the flow of its citizens westward in search of better economic prospects. West Germany was in the throes of an economic boom. To keep their economy churning along after the wall went up, the West German government made a deal with Turkey to bring in guest workers. In a twelve-year period beginning in 1961, 650,000 Turkish guest workers arrived in West Germany to provide a much-needed labor supply. Most of these economic migrants ended up staying, despite efforts by the German government to have them move back to Turkey. Many of the guest workers later had family members join them as well. Germany’s ethnically Turkish population is predominantly found in west-central and southwestern Germany. Relations between Turks and ethnic Germans have been marked by friction. Ethnic Turks are not well integrated into German society. Nonetheless, few cared then or now to return to their roots in rural parts of Turkey.

City break – Frankfurt at night (Credit: Andreas Trojak)

Foreign Affairs – A Strange Land
Our taxi ride to the hotel only took twenty minutes. The exorbitant cost turned out to be worth it because we now had time for an evening walk around the city center. It was Saturday night, and the restaurants were packed. Pedestrians strolled about, quietly conversing among themselves. Dissolute youth rode skateboards and drank beer from large bottles. This was nothing like Turkey. We were once again strangers in a strange land.

Click here for: Going Both Ways – A Hypocrite In Frankfurt (Istanbul & Every After #64)

Our Worst Nightmare – Flight to Frankfurt (Istanbul & Everything After #62)

We made it past the sub-machine guns and metal detectors, past the paranoia of passport control and penetrating stares of security officers, past three checkpoints and through the throngs of departing passengers. My friend Steve and I had taken the first step on our long journey home. We had two days of travel ahead of us. We would fly first from Istanbul to Frankfurt for an overnight interlude. Then it would be on to Denver, followed by a five-hour drive home. The thought of this was exhausting. Fortunately, our focus was on Frankfurt. Everything else could wait.

Hazy landing – Lufthansa flight at Frankfurt Airport (Credit: Emran Kassim)

Star of the Show – An Unwanted Guest
My Turkish dream was fading. I had long since grown weary of the frenetic activity and noise of Turkey. The western world with its greater personal space and solitude was a mere three-hour flight to Frankfurt. Compared to the forthcoming trans-Atlantic flight, this one should have been a lark. A time for relaxation and reflection while settling in for an uneventful journey back home. That was the ideal. Steve and I had been anticipating this flight as an opportunity to ease back into the western world. A stress-free sojourn. Compared to what we had endured on the endless bus rides in Turkey, a Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt would be blissful. Especially now that there was no tour group by our side. The shadow that stalked us for nearly two weeks had vanished. Well, not quite.

While at the gate waiting to board our plane, we were suddenly reacquainted with a nightmare. The one member of our tour we had loathed more than any other was taking the same flight to Frankfurt. It was Andrew, the Australian who had joined our Turkish tour a couple of days after it started. We rued his appearance from the first moment we met him. To recap, Andrew was a self-anointed, secondary leader of our group. His narcissism was only equaled by his arrogance. Andrew came across as a been there-done that-know it all. He sought attention from the younger women in the group by trying to impress them with tales of his travels across Europe and the near East. Andrew was full of himself. His lack of self-awareness was startling. Andrew needed to be the star of the show. He was vain, condescending, and deeply insecure. The first time I talked with Andrew I wanted to punch him. That urge kept coming back to me anytime I heard his voice or caught a glance of him.

Ready for departure – Planes at the International Terminal of Ataturk Airport
(Credit: Mertborak)

Small Talk – A Turn For The Worse
A week into our tour of Turkey, Steve began to speak openly about his distaste for Andrew within earshot of others. In all the years I had known him, Steve had never done anything like this. I did not know whether to be worried or impressed. His attitude took a turn for the worse when Steve discovered that Andrew had abandoned his wife and kids back in Australia to “go find himself.” That Andrew would admit such a thing demonstrated his lack of self-awareness. Steve and I were disgusted, as were several other members of the group. From that point onward, Steve would seethe any time he caught sight of Andrew. One of our South African friends expressed his contempt for Andrew.  Norm, an Australian who was one of the most likable and affable people I have ever met, confessed that he had no respect for Andrew.

To be fair, none of us knew the backstory on Andrew’s family life, but judging by his self-centered, me-first attitude he was most likely the problem. Andrew did not help his cause by talking down to everyone to boost his ego. I will have to give him credit for one thing. Andrew had the remarkable quality of managing to unite people against him. I was surprised that someone did not tell Andrew to stop talking about himself. Then again, why bother. He was already too far gone for constructive criticism. When the tour ended, Steve and I were elated to finally rid ourselves of Andrew. Now here we were at the boarding gate with Andrew.

Andrew came up and tried to make a bit of small talk. Since I loathe public displays of rudeness, I did my best to stick with the basics of the flight to Frankfurt. Steve ignored Andrew. While boarding the plane, I was suddenly struck by the fear that Andrew would be seated with us. He was not. I did make a mental note of Andrew’s location. The flight was uneventful though the presence Andrew hung like a dark cloud over the journey. I began to wonder if we would ever get away from him. Upon our arrival in Frankfurt, we were less worried about getting through passport control, to a taxi, and onward to our hotel, then avoiding Andrew.

Arrivals & Departure – Frankfurt Airport (Credit: Robot8A)

Tempting Fate – An Obligatory Act of Insincerity
After the arrival process, I thought we were finally free of Andrew. Once again, I was wrong. Coming out of the bathroom we ran into Andrew. By this point, I would not have been surprised if Andrew wanted to go have a beer together. Instead, he offered a farewell handshake. I felt like breaking his hand, but I managed to maintain self-control. Andrew then turned to Steve. For a moment my heart stopped. If the obligatory act of insincerity was completed with an open hand rather than a clenched fist, we could escape from what had turned into our worst nightmare. We were on the verge of being done with Andrew, but he kept tempting fate.

I have never seen Steve give a more half-hearted handshake in his life. He barely acknowledged Andrew. For a moment, I thought he was going to take a swing at him. The most amazing part was that Andrew scarcely noticed this. He was too wrapped up in himself. We immediately headed for the airport exit, relieved that the Andrew ordeal was over. I could not help but wonder if he might pop up behind us and want to share a taxi ride into Frankfurt. Thankfully, this did not happen. We had arrived in Frankfurt and so had Andrew. We would never see him again.

Click here for: Taking A Travel Valium – Welcome To Frankfurt (Istanbul & Everything After #63)

A Matter of Safety – Keeping The Peace In Turkey (Istanbul & Everything After #61)

Sub-machine guns, security checkpoint at the entrance, another checkpoint for personal belonging, and a third checkpoint at the gate. This was what greeted Steve and I during our final hours in Turkey at Ataturk Airport. The Turks take no chances anywhere there are mass gatherings of people. The security protocols were thorough, the soldiers manning them extremely serious. This made us feel safer, rather than less secure. We were satisfied with the many safety precautions taken in the country for the safety of tourists. At no time had either of us felt threatened or feared for our safety. Turkish hospitality went a long way in alleviating concerns. The only rudeness we noticed was nothing out of the normal. Our only worries about safety were reserved for petty crime, mainly pickpockets. Those who I had told about our trip before departing voiced other concerns.

Going in the right direction – Ataturk Airport (Credit: Matt@PAK)

“Is It Safe” – The Usual Precautions
When I first told family and friends that I was traveling to Turkey, there would be a pause on the other end of the phone line. Their next words were predictable, “Is it safe?” This was followed by, “Are you sure?” My friends and family knew very little about Turkey other than that it was in the Middle East. In 2008, we were not that far removed from the September 11^th terrorist attacks which had their origins in the Middle East. That Turkey had nothing to do with the attacks and took a hard line against terrorism hardly mattered. In America, the Middle East only makes the news when there are wars. America’s war on terror, especially the war in Iraq had once again made the Middle East a flashpoint for Americans.

 I was not really worried about these issues affecting American tourists in Turkey. There is a big difference between the Middle East and the Near East. Those terms are imprecise. The two regions overlap. Turkey is part of both, but more Near Eastern, then Middle Eastern. Whereas in the Middle East, the major geopolitical issue centers around Arabs and Jews. The biggest issue for the Turks is relations with the Kurdish minority which lives in the eastern part of the country. American involvement in Turkish-Kurdish relations has been on the fringes and never central to the issue. The war in Iraq and American support for the Kurds in northern Iraq did cause problems, but Turkey continued to be an American ally.

There was plenty of armed security at all the heavily trafficked historic sites we visited in Turkey. For instance, the security presence at Topkapi Palace was noticeable. Soldiers with a look of stoic sternness stood on guard at the entrance. Only a fool would tempt fate with these men. The look on their faces said, “shoot first, ask questions later.”  They made American soldiers and police look easy going. I found the seriousness of Turkish soldiers a confidence booster. No wonder, they had been at the forefront of NATO operations for half a century. 

Ready & waiting – Turkish soldier guarding a historic site in Istanbul

Rubbing Shoulders – Beyond Crowd Control
Tourism is also an economic imperative for the Turkish government. The country’s service economy is heavily reliant on the tourism industry. The government has a compelling interest in keeping Turkey in the top 10 most visited countries in the world. That Turkey has built up such a robust tourism industry is partly due to its track record of keeping tourists safe. This is quite remarkable considering it borders Iran, Syria, and Lebanon, which have all seen their fair share of civil and geopolitical strife from the late 20th century up through the present. Keeping the peace in the Near East has never been easy. That task would only become more difficult in the years after our visit. Eight years after our visit, a terrorist attack by Islamic State killed 45 people and injured 240 at the international terminal in Ataturk Airport. Even in a country as security conscious as Turkey, terrorist attacks still happen.

My main safety concern in Turkey involved the threat of petty theft, but I was never aware of any issues. Of course, I had interior pockets and a money belt. Despite this, there were certain heavily touristed areas of Istanbul where the crush of people was so great that I could not have stopped a would-be thief. Underpasses, the Grand Bazaar and Spice Market were extremely crowded. Literally rubbing shoulders with hundreds of strangers in a single day was disconcerting. For the most part, I found the lack of personal space more irritating than threatening. This was not the fault of Istanbul’s inhabitants. They were in the same predicament as tourists. There was simply not enough space in the historic parts of the city to accommodate 14 million inhabitants, plus thousands of tourists on a daily basis.

Istanbul (Constantinople) historically has been one of the world’s most populated cities for 1,500 years, but it was never anywhere close to as populated as it has become in the 21st century. For me, the most worrisome aspect of this overcrowding was the possibility of a stampede caused by any sort of panic. Like most fears these proved to be unfounded. Only two perceptible threats to personal safety arose during the trip. These involved angry locals who lost their temper in public. The first one was somewhat warranted since a vendor in the Grand Bazaar believed another man had tried to steal from him. I doubt the alleged thief will ever try it again with this same man. This was one of the few times in my life I had seen someone so angry that I believed they might commit a lethal act of violence. 

Open for business – At the Spice Bazaar in Istanbul (Credit: Ray Swi-hymn)

War & Peace – Taking It Personally
The other instance was as bizarre as it was intense. A woman at a tram stop exploded at a member of the opposite sex. Her anger was so fierce that people standing along the street stared in amazement. I assumed that she had suffered some deeply personal affront, perhaps of the romantic variety. Her ferocity lasted for nearly ten minutes. None of the onlookers knew whether to be fearful or impressed. Fortunately, there was no assault, only words. I assumed that such things happen in a city where millions of people are crowded together. Considering the amount of people in the city, Istanbul was amazingly safe. Things never got out of control, If they had, there were plenty of Turkish soldiers, policemen, and security personnel who knew how to keep the peace.

Click here for: Our Worst Nightmare – Flight to Frankfurt (Istanbul & Everything After #62)

Endgame – Invisible Fears In Istanbul (Istanbul & Everything After #60)

To paraphrase T.S. Eliot, “This is the way the trip to Turkey ends.” With not a bang but a whimper. Steve and I were not Eliot’s Hollow Men, but if we had stayed much longer in Turkey, we just might have been. Weariness had taken hold of us long before we returned to Istanbul. Even as we were leaving, the weariness would not go away. We had to make one final push to the airport. The idea of this should have delighted us. Judging by the glazed look in our eyes, the airport transfer was another tiresome task that we would have to endure. The idea of expending energy was something that neither of us relished.

Leaving Turkey was harder than getting there. That statement shows just how far our energy levels had fallen. Traveling to Turkey had required a five-hour drive from South Dakota to Denver, a ten-hour flight from Denver to Frankfurt, and a three-hour flight to Istanbul. The difference between that initial journey and the forthcoming return trip was vast. We were now exhausted, rather than excited. The effort it took to pack our bags and then wait for the transfer to Ataturk Airport was wearying. This was just the first of three legs across two days to get back home.

Spiraling upward – Istanbul (Credit: Sinoplu Diyojen)

The Journey Within – A Stinging Success
I began to silently worry that something was about to go terribly wrong while we sat in the hotel lobby waiting for our driver to arrive, I did not say a word to Steve about it, but I found myself getting stressed by invisible fears that materialized only in my mind. What if we did not get back home? What if we did not even make it to the airport? Suddenly, I was imagining that our driver would not arrive. We would miss our plane and then what? We might be stuck in Istanbul for several more days. At the start of this trip, that thought would have delighted me, now it terrified me. Why was I imagining the worst? Deep down I knew the answer. Success is what I fear the most. This old problem reared its ugly head once again. I did not trust that this trip had come off without any real problems. Something had to go wrong. These fears were utterly ridiculous and so real that I could sense them swirling inside me.

The truth was that an old problem had come back to haunt me. My worries were the result of a problem that had plagued me ever since I broke my neck twenty-one years earlier. No matter how good things are going, that can all suddenly change in a matter of seconds. One moment everything is fine, the next I am facing catastrophe. I could go all the way to Turkey for some of the most unforgettable experiences of my life and still be stalked by traumatic thoughts. No matter how far I traveled from the initial trauma, I still carried it with me in the form of psychological scar tissue. The irony of this is not lost on me. For someone with a limitless passion for history, the one part of the past I never want to study is my own.

Stuck in transit – Ferry on the Bosphorus in Istanbul (Credit: Elif Ayse)

Guilt Stricken – A Miraculous Discovery
History is an escapist fantasy, an endless source of fascination for me if it is not my own. Give me the Greeks and Persians, the Romans and Byzantines, the Selcuk and Ottoman Turks, and I am in heaven. But when I am forced to face my own history, I succumb to fears that run so deep that I cannot bring myself to speak of them. The self-imposed silence is devastating. Even worse, I cannot stop thinking about them. A simple airport transfer to Ataturk Airport sparked the deepest misgivings within me. A fear so palpable that I can still feel it sixteen years later. The intense absurdity of that moment is still with me. There I am with my best friend beside me on a sun-drenched afternoon in Istanbul. I am sitting in the hotel lobby waiting for one final ride, and the first thing to arrive was the invisible fear which forever haunts me. The source of my fear is the guilt I feel for having survived a broken neck and still being able to live a normal life. I get to live life in a way that others who suffered the same fate never will.

Every step I take is a miracle, but I do not know how to honor the miracle that has been my life. I am stricken with guilt for getting what I feel like I don’t deserve. This guilt is self-inflicted. A punishment for lacking gratitude about the life I have been able to lead. That life has led me to a hotel lobby in Istanbul where I am not really waiting for an airport transfer. I am waiting for fate to intervene and take me on a terrible journey where I am forced to confront my deepest fears. I used to feel like there was someone or something always out to get me. It turned out that I was right. I am the one out to get me. My own worst enemy materializes at times like these. No matter how far I travel, I can never escape myself.

Lost in a haze – The Bosphorus Strait in Istanbul (Credit: Mirela Saenz)

Going Home – Stuck In Transit
Thomas Wolfe said, “you can never go home again.” I beg to differ. You can go home again by returning to the place you never left. I left home many years before I traveled to Istanbul, but home never left me. I took it with me to Turkey. Home is the one piece of baggage, that wherever I go, it is always with me. I opened it that final day in the hotel lobby. What I found packed inside was the part of my past that I fear the most. I could not bear to face it, and I had no way of escaping it. I was stuck in transit. I probably always will be. I keep waiting for something to happen and it never does. Life goes on, so I might as well go with it.

Click here for: A Matter of Safety – Keeping The Peace In Turkey (Istanbul & Everything After #61)

Separation Anxiety – Dearly Departing From Turkey (Istanbul & Everything After #59)

I have always felt great sadness at the moment of final departure. It was no different in Istanbul, then it has always been for me. There would be many more trips, including a return to Istanbul five years later, but there would never be a trip like this one again. Leaving this Turkish trip behind felt like a whirlwind love affair that abruptly ends. It was like one of those dreams from which you awaken and wonder if it really happened? In this case, it did.

Distant memories – The Golden Horn in Istanbul looking towards Galata

Maximizing Moments – Time Ticks Away
When Steve and I said goodbye to our South African friends, I knew that there was a good chance we would never see them again. Of course, there were reciprocal invites for us to come visit each other’s respective countries. Phrases like, “I just might do that” or “I will look into it” were spoken with sincerity, but these promises highlighted the underlying anxiety that we might never meet again. Rather than fixate on the unforeseeable future, I tried to think how lucky I was to have spent time with such lovely people. Still, I was left wanting more. Perhaps we felt a special kinship with each other because our time together was limited. A finite amount of time can be advantageous to the intensity of certain relationships. We could not take the time spent together for granted with the end so near.

As much as I had wanted to escape from the tour group, the South Africans were the kind of company I enjoyed. They must have felt the same because we both made efforts over the final twenty-four hours to spend more time together.  We sought to maximize these moments despite the effects of travel fatigue. The final evening, we were beyond the point of exhaustion. The daylong journey from Cappadocia through Ankara and onward to Istanbul had felt more like nine days than nine hours. After arriving at the hotel, instead of falling into bed, we made plans to visit a nearby bar and continue our conversations. At this point, I could barely stand up, let alone stay awake. Still, there was no way I would miss this opportunity. I have no idea what we discussed, but it kept me awake a little while longer. Considering everyone’s mental and physical fatigue this was quite an effort. One that I would gladly do again if given the opportunity.

Bridging the divide – Connecting Europe and Asia on the Bosphorus

Saying Goodbye – Beyond The Hotel Lobby
Our final morning in Turkey offered one more chance to enjoy each other’s company. All of us were flying out in the late afternoon or early evening. My friend Steve and I were heading for a one-night stopover in Frankfurt. The South Africans next destination was Dubai. I had no interest in Dubai, but I would have bought a ticket to join them if my career had not been calling me back home. We managed to make the best of our increasingly limited time by doing a bit of shopping and then finding a watering hole for more conversation. This last rendezvous was lacking in quality through no fault of our own. The Turkish penchant for ear splitting music resulted in everyone wondering why in a place created for cocktails and quiet conversation, someone thought it necessary for us not to hear one another. The experience was distasteful and oddly memorable. A cacophonous coda to an otherwise glorious trip. This did nothing to detract from our friendship. The act of getting together one last time mattered more than anything else.

After that we headed back to the accommodation. Somewhere beyond the hotel lobby the life we had left behind awaited each one of us. In a week, I would be standing in a field beside a nuclear missile silo talking to strangers about the Cold War. Stave would be in the high desert of eastern Oregon at a hospital lab. The South Africans back in Bloemfontein, as attorneys and private security. Our lives back home were waiting for us. The finality of this was so real that I felt every step of the way on that last day.  The moment soon arrived to say goodbye. There was no melodrama or tears, just handshakes and hugs. Wishes of good luck and see you soon rounded out the pleasantries. Then the awkward moment came when we went our separate ways. Walking away is easier if you never look back. I always look back.

It is cliché to say that all good things come to an end. The harsher truth is that all things, whether good or bad, come to an end. Departures are as much a part of life as arrivals. And yet they are fundamentally different, Arrivals are filled with excitement, departures are melancholic. What has always bothered me most about saying goodbye is the thought that I will never see someone again. The feeling that another relationship – like all relationships – is mortal. Eventually we will have to say goodbye to everything and everyone in this world. We do it hundreds, if not thousands of times, in our life. Eventually, we will lose everything we have gained. Life is filled with losses and so was this trip to Turkey. 

Inspired choice – Istanbul at sunset

Miraculous Discoveries – Suspension of Fate
It is one thing to feel abandoned, it is quite another to abandon others. This vicious cycle always leads to the same place, a parting of the ways. Saying goodbye to the South Africans brought me back to reality. There had been moments when I thought the magic would last forever. I should have known better. Fate can be momentarily suspended, but not denied. Miracles by their very nature are not meant to last. The miracle of our meeting was never more apparent than in the aftermath of our time together. What were the odds that we would have ever met? They had been impossibly long. For all of us to come together at a certain moment in time and specific place, depended on circumstances beyond our control. This was all part of a greater plan that remains mysterious to me. I have always been a believer that if something extraordinary occurs in life, that it was meant to be. Whether it ever happens again does not matter as much as the fact that it did.

Click here for: Endgame – Invisible Fears In Istanbul (Istanbul & Everything After #60)

Fighting To The Finish – Turkish Warriors (Istanbul & Everything After #58)

I saw many impressive sights in Turkey, but without memorabilia and photos I would have trouble recalling several of the places we visited. That was probably because our tour covered so many different places that it blurred my memory. How many ancient amphitheaters can a person see before they all meld into one? Distinguishing one place from the other twenty is difficult at the time, and only gets more so as the years pass. My most vivid memories are not of specific places, but of certain incidents. They involved incidents and behaviors that I experienced or witnessed. Each of these had a single standout moment. The young men thanking Allah after surviving a car crash in Fethiye, our bus driver’s gentle smile and final departure after twelve days of transporting us safely around the countryside, a compulsory stop on the highway for a military checkpoint.

Those are some of the memories that have remained with me for the past fifteen years.  All of these are trumped by one moment that comes to mind when I think of that trip. A moment that was not advertised in any tourist brochures. A moment that I didn’t see coming until it was ten meters from me at the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul. This was where I witnessed an incident so intense that I am sure it will stay with me forever. An unforgettable incident involving two men, one act of theft, and a reaction so angry that if not for the reactions of some salesmen, there might have been a murder. 

Serious intentions – At the Grand Bazaar in the 1890’s (Credit: Jean Pascal Sebah)

On The March – A Matter of Pride
Turkey would not exist in the form it does today if not for the Turkish people’s toughness. During the two weeks I spent in the country never once did I see anyone who looked like a wimp. Turks are serious people, and as such they must be respected. If they do not get it, woe to the person who wounds their pride or fails to respect their traditions. An unspoken code of honor rules relations. Adhere to it or reap the whirlwind. That not only goes for foreigners, but also its Turkish inhabitants. Before my visit, I read that Turks were slow to engage in a fight, but once they do so it will be a fight to the finish. There is no off switch for their ferocity. Anyone who picks a fight with a Turk, or offends them in a significant manner, will be lucky to survive the experience unscathed.

Anyone who might doubt the toughness of Turks, need only pick up a history book. The Turks who inhabit the country today are the direct ancestors and heirs of the Ottoman Turks. The Ottoman Empire encompassed most of the Middle East, North Africa, and the Balkans. On two occasions, 154 years apart, the Ottomans knocked on the gates of Vienna and nearly broke through. It is a long way from Istanbul to Vienna, it was even longer in previous centuries. Distance did not inhibit their lust for conquest. The Ottoman Turks’ war machine was formidable enough to make it all the way to Central Europe. They did not get there by pussyfooting around the Balkans or Hungary, they got there through violence, valor, and military technology. 

On the march – Turkish soldiers in the early 20th century

Fighting Back – From Collapse To Creation
For centuries, Europeans were set back on their heels by the Ottoman Turks’ expansion into southeastern Europe. When people nowadays talk about the legacy of European colonialism, they tend to forget that the inhabitants of Eastern Europe and the Balkans suffered the same kind of depredations and occupations from the Ottomans Turks that Europeans inflicted upon other people in other parts of the world. The Ottoman Turks were formidable and ferocious. Even when the empire was collapsing, the Turks displayed a fighting spirit that thwarted the efforts of European powers trying to carve up remnants of the Ottoman Empire.

In the years following World War I, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk tapped into the ferocity of his fellow Turks to turn the military tide in their favor, expel the occupying forces, and create Modern Turkey. No other people on the losing side of World War I were able to successfully defeat the victorious powers on the battlefield after the war other than the Turks. That is because the Turks have a warrior mentality which makes them excellent soldiers. It also makes them the kind of people who will not tolerate being wronged, either by foreigners or their brethren. What does all this have to do with the incident I witnessed in the Grand Bazaar? In my opinion, everything.

Warriors in wait – In the Grand Bazaar (Credit: LBM1948)

At All Costs – No Holding Back
While my friend Steve and I were shopping in the Grand Bazaar on our final day in Istanbul we suddenly heard a commotion. Cries of anguish rang out. Across from the shop in which we were browsing, one man was doing his best to attack another man with his bare hands. The man being attacked was held down by a couple of men, not only to apprehend him, but also for his personal safety. The attacker was trying to get his hands on him, but several other men were doing their best to hold him back. Such was the ferocity of his anger that they could barely keep him contained. This was war on an intensely personal level. We soon learned what had stirred this commotion.

The man being attacked had reputedly tried to steal from the other man’s shop. It was not until the police arrived that the threat of violence subsided. After order was restored, I wondered if the attacker might make one more mad dash to administer justice. The anger he had displayed made a deep impression on me. He had been ready for a fight to the death. I have seen a few fights in my day, but none of them ever made me think a murder might take place. This one certainly did. I have never forgotten the moment and I doubt I ever will. Turks are an honorable people who are ready to defend their honor at all costs. I would not want to face them in a war or in a fight at the Grand Bazaar.

Click here for: Going Our Separate Ways – Dearly Departing From Turkey (Istanbul & Everything After #59)

Paradise Bought ­- A Bazaar World (Istanbul & Everything After #57)

A trip to Turkey would not be complete without a trip to the Grand Bazaar (Kapali Carsi) in Istanbul. In my case it would be multiple trips. While I do not like to shop and never will, the Grand Bazaar was a site to behold. A frenzy of materialism that was overwhelming in the extreme. Every one of the sixty-six streets was jam packed with merchandise. America is supposedly the home of consumer culture, but the Grand Bazaar easily had it beat. The Bazaar was a wonderful place to window shop for a few hours or the rest of your life. The range of merchandise offered was astonishing. Carpets, ceramics, and copper; sandals, shoes, and slippers. These were just a few of the bazillion items to be found in the Bazaar’s 4,400 shops, 2,195 workshops, and 497 stalls. High end and low end, originals and knock offs, it was all there. All you had to do was name your price. Paradise could be bought. The Grand Bazaar is a dazzling icon. There is nothing like it in the western world. Much of the east is envious as well. Dubai may have a ski slope inside a shopping mall, but Istanbul has the Grand Bazaar. That is all that needs to be said.

A rich pageant – In the Grand Bazaar (Credit: Laima Gutmane)

Growing Pains- Bazaar Circumstances
Americans claim to have invented the shopping mall; the Ottoman Turks would beg to differ. Two years after the conquest of Constantinople (Istanbul), Sultan Mehmed II (Mehmed the Conqueor) ordered a structure built not far from his palace that would stimulate economic development. The Bazaar initially focused on the trade in textiles and jewelry. Through the centuries it continued to grow at the heart of an expanding empire. There were troubles along the way. The Bazaar could not escape growing pains which came in the form of periodic cataclysms. Between 1515 and 1701, twelve different fires decimated the complex. While later fires were less frequent, they could be just as devastating. The last fire occurred in 1954 and led to yet another round of repair and rehab. The Bazaar was also badly damaged by earthquakes on several occasions.

Natural and human caused calamities could be overcome, economic woes had more lasting effects. This was especially the case as the Ottoman Empire went into decline.  One of the greatest threats to the Bazaar’s existence was economics. The Bazaar’s lifeblood is commerce. This took a major hit with the rise of European manufacturing in the 19^th century. Handcrafted products could hardly compete with mass production techniques that were all the rage throughout the industrialized world. More recent travails have involved the infusion of lower quality products from China. Despite these challenges, the Bazaar has continued to thrive.

One remarkable statistic reflects this success better than any others. The most recent calculations show that the Bazaar had 91 million visitors in a single year. That means it has more visitors per year than Turkey has people (85 million). The Bazaar’s yearly visitation is greater than the populations of all but seventeen countries. It is a city unto itself, dedicated to commerce in every iteration imaginable. Need a restaurant, a coffee shop, a bank, a police force, the Grand Bazaar has you covered.  

Lighting the way – Lamp store in the Grand Bazaar (Credit: Rob Stoeltje)

Dazed & Disoriented – Taking Inventory
During my first visit to the Bazaar, I found its size and complexity to be confounding. Newcomers can easily get lost in what amounts to a maze that puts the Minotaur’s lair to shame. My friend Steve and I bracketed our trip by visiting the bazaar on our first and last days in Turkey. Most of our time was wandering in a daze. Despite spending several hours walking around the Bazaar, neither of us was ever able to properly orient ourselves. There was so much to see, and we would never have enough time. We unwittingly picked weekend days to visit. The crowds were close to unbearable. Both locals and tourists descended on the Bazaar with dollars, euros, and liras in their hands. The masses of people made finding a way forward difficult. There was no use trying to follow a pre-planned route. Getting lost was part of the experience.

Everything looked the same, but somehow different in the Bazaar. We could not distinguish one area from the other except for the merchandise being sold. That still did not help us find our way since some of the areas were so large that we got lost within them. Matching the maze-like streets, shops, and stalls for disorientation were the mesmerizing effects of the merchandise. The complex blend of products and colors caused sensory overload. A bewildering array of variations could be found for most products. For instance, a shop selling glass lamps had hundreds of them with so many different designs that it had a kaleidoscopic effect. Too much was never enough. I could not help but wonder how anyone could take an inventory of the lamps. Distinguishing one from the other five hundred would be close to impossible.

Looking for the way out – Entrance to the Grand Bazaar (Credit: Osvaldo Gago)

Finish Line – The Way Out
It did not take long for fatigue to set in. Everything in the Bazaar that had first seemed enchanting, now felt exhausting. From time to time, I would glance at Steve. He had a blank, glassy eyed stare. I felt like I was staring back at myself. We would look at random products, even though we were looking at nothing in particular. The esoteric is never essential. After a few hours at the Bazaar, you look at everything and see nothing. The combination of frenetic human activity and endless choices had been too tiring. The Bazaar was like running a marathon without a finish line. Once inside its walls, there was neither a beginning nor an ending. There was an endlessness impossible to fully comprehend. The Bazaar proved to me that infinity exists. The human mind can only take so much. And if the mind is weary, then the body soon follows. It was time to leave it all behind. The Grand Bazaar had offered us everything we ever wanted and nothing we really needed. It was a place where we could spend all our money and never buy our way out.

Click here for: Fighting To The Finish – Turkish Warriors (Istanbul & Everything After #58)

The Hard Sell – Hospitality & Salesmanship in Turkey (Istanbul & Everything #56)

In the west we have customer service, in the east they have hospitality. The concepts should not be confused. In practice, customer service is a way of appearing nice to someone in order to extract money from them. The ends justify the means. Whereas hospitality is a matter of honor, respect, and sometimes money. If that means the host must open their heart and their home, then so be it. If the guest opens their wallet, then all the better. The person providing hospitality may or may not expect anything in return. Their hospitality is a given. For a tourist, being treated as the guest of honor is intoxicating. It can also be annoying and revealing.

           On sale – Grand Bazaar in Istanbul

Selling Out – The Unspoken Rules
There is a tradition of treating guests with extreme courtesy in Turkey. I believe that most of the Turks I met would have been this way no matter if money was at stake or not. I got the feeling that Turkish hospitality ran much deeper than dollars. Nonetheless, I had never experienced anything like their salesmanship. And to be clear, it was mostly men who did the selling. After a couple of days in Istanbul, I concluded that Turkey must be the most capitalistic place on earth. Despite Turkey bordering Bulgaria and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, communism never had a chance here. The Turks were born salespeople and their greatest city, a capital of commercialism. Istanbul was the world’s largest showroom floor, with millions of sales items on display. In the shops, streets, and bazaars, sales items were prominently displayed. Every color of the spectrum was covered, making the items more eye-catching than anything I had ever come across. The merchandising was mesmerizing with vanity and beauty interwoven to boost the appeal. Image was everything as style trumped substance.

Shopping in Turkey was more often fantasy than reality. Knock offs of name brands abounded at cut rate prices. Superficiality had its downside. Seeing was not quite believing. We had been warned ahead of time that many of the carpets were made in China. The ones that were authentically Turkish came with a significant markup. There was also the matter of prices. Whether it was for carpets or trinkets, the prices were just a starting point to open negotiations. The wise customer would show interest, but not enthusiasm. Acting aloof and indifferent was a way to counter the hard sell of the uber-hospitable Turk. It was a game where buyer and seller size each other up. The game was less about winning and more about coming to a compromise. The rules were unspoken, but easy to follow. The buyer should never let the seller know their level of interest. The buyer should never let the seller know their level of interest. Sowing doubt in the seller’s mind was imperative. At a certain point, the buyer should convince the seller they are going to walk away. That is when negotiations really begin.

        Corridors of capitalism – Grand Bazaar in Istanbul

Serious Business – A Form of Art
The art of negotiation in Turkey was a bit baffling to me at first. My initial meetings with Turkish salesmen occurred in bazaars. Before long, I was wondering if every one of them had patterned their behavior on Let’s Make a Deal. The cut and thrust of shopping at the bazaar started off unsettling then became vaguely maddening, Being the object of affection never felt right to me. There would be a moment of unreality where I would think this cannot be happening. It felt like one of those reality television shows that is the opposite of reality. How could anyone take the level of salesmanship seriously? I told myself it was all just a game, or was it?  For the Turks, salesmanship was serious business that many of them took to an art form. A negotiating novice like me was just learning to draw, while the salesmen were painting Picassos.

Of course, there were still the scam artists, double talkers, and carpet salesmen who could never be trusted. Those salesmen who are predators and view tourists as their prey. Fortunately, most salesmen I encountered at the bazaar were not that aggressive, but Turkish hospitality was less sincere when money was at stake. The potential for monetary rewards tended to increase the offerings of it. The effusiveness of these acts could reach ridiculous proportions. A comfortable seat would be offered by my new best friend, the kind that in less than an hour, I would never see again. Coffee, tea, and sweets would soon appear. I had never been the guest of honor at anything until I set foot in a Turkish bazaar. By the time I was through being feted, I wondered whether I would receive an honorary degree. The Turks have an ability to baffle and charm. A magic act that miraculously transfers money to the seller’s pockets while the customer is made to feel special. In America, we like to say the customer is always right. In Turkey, the customer is always pampered. Never has a fleecing felt so good. 

      Selling out – Grand Bazaar in Istanbul (Credit: Dmgultekin)

Dirty Money – Pay For Play
The oddest aspect of shopping in Turkey would occur when a purchase was finally consummated. On this trip, my pockets were filled with Turkish Lira. After a price had been agreed upon, I would lay money in front of the salesman. Exchanging money hand to hand was not done. I expected the salesman to rapaciously scoop up the cash and begin counting it. Instead, the seller would often ignore the money at first. Several of them could hardly bring their eyes to look upon it. They would suddenly become indifferent to what they had spent so much time and energy on. The money did not seem to matter as much or at all. I found this strangely startling. The salesmen were always aware that money had been offered to them and they affected an attitude of disdain towards it as though they could have cared less. This behavior was so odd that it brought the term “dirty money” to mind. The money was treated with a combination of indifference and offensiveness. It would lay between us awkwardly, a profound distance between the salesman and his true object of affection.

Click here for: Paradise Bought ­- A Bazaar World (Istanbul & Everything After #57)

Hot & Bothered – First & Last Sweats In Turkey (Istanbul & Everything After #55)

In America we have a saying, “if you can’t take the heat, then get out of the kitchen.” That is good advice for those who do not like to sweat, but what if you can’t stand the heat and there is no kitchen? I endured such a situation on my last evening in Turkey. I did not need a kitchen to feel the heat. Our hotel room substituted for a Turkish bath. Discontent, discomfort, and night sweats without a fever ensued. My friend Steve and I had come all the way back to Istanbul where we started the trip. Much to our regret, we discovered that one thing had not changed over the past twelve days. At our hotel, the heat was still on.

Fever dream – Istanbul at night (Credit: Karsten Wentink)

Night Sweats – Soaked To The Skin
What started out with sweat, exhaustion, and irritation would end in the same manner. Our first and last evenings in Turkey were marked by being hot and bothered (no sexual pun intended). In a sense, our trip around Turkey had come full circle. On the evening of our arrival. I remember pouring sweat in Ataturk Airport while we waited for a transfer to our hotel in the center of Istanbul. Perspiration covered my forehead. Beads of sweat seeped into my clothing. That was because the airport’s air conditioning was non-existent by western standards. Being sleep deprived, exhausted from two long flights, and stuck inside a terminal turned sauna was not the kind of introduction to Turkey I had imagined. Despite being soaked to the skin, I made it through the experience, but only after producing a bucket of sweat. In the process, I learned that air conditioning in Turkish hotels was very different from what we were used to back home. The room was suffocating.

Steve opened a window to air the place out. That made it a bit more tolerable, especially for Steve who proceeded to join in with the locals who called out to random passers-by on the street. His efforts both worried and inspired me. That was our introduction to Turkey. I did not fancy another evening like that. The heat had not been a problem during the time we spent in western and central Turkey. Thankfully, we were traveling in September when it was warm, but not intolerable. I did not want to imagine what Anatolia was like in the summer. Whether I imagined it or not, reality would intrude on the final evening of our trip. After sitting on the bus for most of the day and suffering through rush hour traffic on a Friday evening in Istanbul, we were finally dropped off at our hotel. This was not the same one we had stayed in when we first arrived. Instead, this hotel was more generic. Imagine a Turkish Days Inn in an area of the city bursting with activity. This hardly mattered to me. All I wanted was a cool room for the night. It would not be forthcoming. 

Night lights – Aerial view of Istanbul in the evening (Credit: Alet123)

Hot Mess – Sweating Myself To Sleep
Our room was spacious enough, but it lacked good ventilation. Getting a window open was nearly impossible. That was not all bad. The noise level outside the hotel could wake the dead, I do not like noise, especially while trying to sleep. I like heat even less. Air conditioning may have existed in the hotel, but this evening it did not. I cannot think of anything much worse than being in a confined space with no air flow. The slightest bit of humidity becomes intolerable. Warm turns to hot and hot feels like a swamp. In my experience, the worst place for this is a hotel room lacking good ventilation. The air has a texture as the heat becomes inescapable. This was what we endured after a few minutes in the hotel room. I knew it was going to be a long hot night.

A comfortable bed and soft pillow can do little to mitigate the effects of a slow burn sauna. Bed sheets are transformed into wet blankets. Pillows become sopping wet props. Turkey is not the first place I have endured these conditions. The United States has its fair share of hotels without good air conditioning. What made the ones in Istanbul unbearable was that they came at the start and end of this trip. The hotels left me with indelible memories of sweating the night out in Istanbul. It took me over an hour to fall into a fitful sleep. I periodically reawakened in a hot, sticky mess. Rather than tossing and turning, I slid and slithered around the bed. This fever dream lasted through the night.

Burning out – Istanbul at sunset

Dazed & Abused – The Making of an Old Man
I woke up the next morning with what felt like a massive hangover. The night had been long and hot. I was battered physically and psychologically. I could not wait to leave this hot box of a hotel room behind. Even in the morning, the air was still stagnant. The bed sheets were soddened from my sleeplessness. Sometime in the early hours of the morning my fever dream broke. I could not wait to leave. Istanbul and Turkey were magnificent places to visit, but this trip had drained me. I noticed Stave was stumbling around in a daze as well. The heat, the noise, the activity, the lack of sleep, the strange smells, the unintelligible language, the unfamiliar food that had become all too familiar, the checking in, the checking out, the musty clothing, the sultry conditions, everything and everyone bothered me.

Mercifully, there would not be another night of barely breathable air and cloistered nightmares. Istanbul had made an old man out of me. I was a shell of my former self, the one who could not get enough of the city. For me, Istanbul had gone from magnificence to malignance. I wanted to get away from it all. How could anyone live like this? The energy and emotion it took was impossible to fathom. How many more restless nights would it take to bend this city to my will? I did not want to know. All I wanted was a quiet, cool place to rest my weary bones. And that was what I would get.

Click here for: The Hard Sell – Hospitality & Salesmanship in Turkey (Istanbul & Everything #56)