First it got kind of rainy... then it got really really windy... and then came the snow... for my final two days in Istanbul. A far cry from my arrival, when it was 55 deg and beautiful. I really got to see a range of weather while here.

The inclimate weather brought the need for some indoors tourism. And luckily, Istanbul has plenty to offer. On Wednesday, as usual, I wandered around the design shops of lower Galata before heading to the Istanbul Modern Museum, a great museum highlighting modern Turkish art. While I really enjoy museums, I just don’t find art all that interesting, unless it engages the landscape or is spacial in some way, like the work of Judd, Turrell, Heizer and Eliasson. But I do enjoy visiting museums to see how they function and to do a little people watching. I came to the conclusion while walking around that my two favorite rooms in a museum, more appropriately, a modern museum, are the cafe and the gift shop... In the cafe you can see people winding down, not pretending anymore, myself included... and you can get a drink and be surrounded, typically, by smart and attractive people, usually in a well designed space. And I like the gift shops because it is like the museum condensed to its greatest hits. And it is all mini... you can get cheap, miniature versions of all the cool things you might see while walking around the museum itself. After the museum I met a new friend, Yalda, for drinks in the Bestkitas neighborhood. That is when the cold wind started picking up. It was a frigid walk home that night...

There is a great gallery scene in Istanbul right now. In some amazing and quirky set of circumstances, it’s become fashionable in Istanbul for wealthy financial institutions and family business dynasties to endow private art galleries. So in addition to the excess of historical riches, the city now boasts top notch, privately funded art galleries, none more engaging and cutting edge (and free) as the SALT gallery. SALT focuses on the arts, architecture, urbanism and social and economic history. A two part gallery come library located in Pera off the main drag, Istaklai, and then down in Galata under the tower. A really fantastic institution! I spent a lot of time in the Pera gallery, and on my final day I finally found the Galata location, and I am really glad I did. The founders did everything right here... the buildings are well designed and appropriate and absolutely contextual. The Pera location hosts more of the exhibits while the Galata location hosts research, and a private arts library available to anyone... for free!

In the morning I woke up to a wet driving snow. It was just ugly out. I did an abbreviated survey of the shops in the neighborhood, but high tailed it over to the Sultahnmet side and visited a hamam, or Turkish Bath, at the ancient Cemberlitas site. The hamam was built in 1584, designed by the architect Sinan, who was responsible for many of the famous mosques in Istanbul. There is nothing like getting scrubbed down on a steaming hot slab of marble by a burly turkish guy in a loin cloth. I really appreciate the tradition of the hamam, if not the tourist price tag on it. It is the same concept as the Japanese onsens, neighborhood wash houses to cleanse, because most houses didn’t have modern conveniences. So you go in there once or twice a week to clean... but it is much more than that. It is a community event as well, with old timers catching up and young gents from the neighborhood coming in to relax. Thursday was the perfect day for the hamam with the weather the way it was.


I am going to take a minute here to tell a story, that does not belong to me, but my friend Nels. I think of this story anytime I go to a turkish bath. I am going on memory, so some of the details may be incorrect, but the general idea should be there. Nels went to a Turkish bath once, perhaps in Istanbul, but maybe in Budapest or somewhere else. He checked in, never having visited one of these establish,ents before, and was accidentally given two loin cloths. Not really knowing protocol, Nels took the two loin cloths and figured he was given them both on purpose. So he put the first one on covering his frontside, then the second one on covering his backside. When he presented himself in the bath, the locals all had a pretty good laugh!

I stayed in the hamam for an hour or two then headed back over to the Galata side of the bridge, feeling spic and span, really relaxed, and maybe just a little worked over. Sidenote: I just watched the movie Taken 2 on my three legged flight from Capetown to Jo’berg to Addis Ababa to Kilimanjaro, and in the movie, which takes place in Istanbul, the final scene is in the Cemberlitas Hammam. I sweated it out and got my Turkish massage on the same marble block where the fight scene takes place.

In the evening I went and met my friend Jason, and his girlfriend Merve, for dinner. Jason is an old friend from SF who found out I was going to be in Istanbul, and coincidentally, was going to be there as well. It was great to see a familiar face and catch up. Jay left SF probably 5 years ago or so, heading to grad school in Vancouver before moving over to Holland. I had only seen him a handful of times since his departure, so the reunion was well overdue. Things didn’t get too crazy, as Merve wasn’t feeling great, the weather sucked (depending on your perspective I guess... there is something nice about being in a vibrant city with a great nightlife while the snow is falling), and I was heading out on a street food tour at 8:00am on my last day in Istanbul. I was on a midnight flight the following night, pointed south, heading to Capetown for Christmas and New Years.

I
 was up early the next morning, my last in Istanbul, to do a street food tour throughout Pera and Kadikoy, on the Asian side of the Bosporus. The tour was hosted by a company called istanbuleats.com. It was great! We went around tasting street foods and getting a bit more of an insiders view of the city. There is so much I could say about it, but honestly I am running out of time and haven’t gotten a post up in a while, so I will let the photos tell the story. What I will say is that I met a great couple from New York on the tour (unfortunately I can’t remember their names, perhaps if they are reading this they can comment and let everyone, at least the two people who read this, mom and dad, know who they are). We did breakfast and some tea near the Galata Bridge, then caught a ferry over to Asia where we gorged ourselves some more: turkish pizzas, turkish burritos, cakes, baklava, meatballs and so much more... I walked with my new friends through Galata before checking out of Tolga’s place, meeting Jason and Merve for a drink and some food and then heading to the airport to begin my African adventure, and to hit 3 continents in a 24 hour span!