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Merhaba | Software Memories

Merhaba

I’m in Istanbul, in the second part of a two-week vacation with Linda. Last week we stayed almost completely in the old city, with our hotel being just 3 blocks from the Gülhane tram stop. This week we’re in the new part, on a hillside between Taksim Square and Kabataş. For a variety of reasons, I haven’t been as diligent about email and so on as I usually am while on vacation, and I’ve been completely unavailable for any except the most utterly urgent phone calls, of which there thankfully have not been any. But this evening, while Linda watches Muhteşem Yüzyıl in the other room, I’m in the mood to write a bit of travelogue, and post it in what among other things has become the most personal of my blogs.

Linda lived in Turkey for a while with her first husband, and speaks excellent Turkish. (In general, the Barlow women have an amazing talent for languages.)

If you’ve never been to Istanbul, it must be seen to be believed. From a hills and water standpoint, imagine 10 San Franciscos, but with many of the buildings being 500+ years old. The whole thing is wrapped around the Bosphorus, in which at any moment you can see 2-3 tankers, a whole lot of commuter ferries, and generally more ship traffic than I imagine can be found in any other similar expanse of water in the world (the Panama Canal area perhaps excepted). And there are plenty of places from which to get awesome views, most notably on the water itself. If you’re ever in Istanbul, seize every pretext you can find to be out on the water.

When it comes to great religious buildings, Istanbul may be my favorite city in the world, ahead of Rome, Paris, and even Kyoto. Reasons include:

There are a lot of them here, since in the Ottoman Empire there weren’t many ways for the rich and powerful to use their wealth except by endowing buildings, most notably mosques (in particular, they could pass little wealth on to their heirs). The Ottomans built feverishly for about 400 years.

Since Islam frowns on figurative art, the whole thing is very geometric, which I like.

Mimar Sinan, the Ottoman analogue to Michelangelo or Leonardo da Vinci, got along fabulously with his patrons. (Suleiman the Magnificent called Sinan the only person who had “never disappointed” him.) Those patrons had much of the wealth of the Ottoman Empire to play with. Consequently, he had huge budgets and staff, and built many beautiful things.

When the Turks conquered Constantinople, they found Hagia Sophia there, and developed much of their own style in mosques based on it. I think that style works beautifully on the outside of buildings just as on the inside, more than is the case for – for example – most Western cathedrals.

Many of Istanbul’s great buildings can still be seen from the outside, at a distance, more than is the case in any other city I can think of. (The hills are a big help with that.)

The standard list of “must-see” sights in Istanbul would probably start with:

Hagia Sophia.

The Blue Mosque.

Topkapi Palace.

They’re all great, but I’d put ahead of them:

The Süleymaniye Mosque (by Sinan). To see why, just do a Google image search on its name.

The Rüstem Pasha Mosque (also by Sinan). The big reason is the tiles, which – unlike in bigger mosques – are right in your face. Tiles are the greatest decoration in mosques, just as stained glass windows are in churches. I don’t find Rüstem Pasha quite as beautiful as Sainte-Chapelle in Paris – but the analogy isn’t far-fetched.

There also are several very nice tiled pavilions in Topkapi, but I’d put the Rüstem Pasha Mosque well ahead of any one of them.

Also on my mustn’t-miss list are:

The final room in the Turkish and Islamic Arts Museum, aka the Ibrahim Pasa Palace. It’s a crafts museum, of course, since they didn’t have much figurative art in the Ottoman Empire. The final room has what must be the greatest collection of rugs in the world, many of them around 30 feet long. Don’t miss it, even if you only have 20 minutes to spend. It’s extremely close to the Blue Mosque, and hence to Hagia Sophia as well.

The aforementioned boat ride(s).

Topkapi Palace and the Blue Mosque.

via Merhaba | Software Memories.

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September 20, 2012
A Cultural Revival in Istanbul

Travel Guide

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City of the Senses

A Cultural Revival in Istanbul

East has always met West in this gorgeous, gritty city on the Bosphorus. But never as boisterously and creatively as now. Suzy Hansen watches the sparks fly

Drinks on the terrace of Mikla, a restaurant in Tepebaşi—one of Beyoğlu’s happening neighborhoods—come with an eyeful of Sultanahmet and what used to be ancient Constantinople, across the Golden Horn.

By Suzy Hansen Julien Capmeil

October 2012 Issue

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One evening last May, around the time when evenings heat up and Turks spend all night outdoors, I went to an art opening at the new Egeran Galeri in Istanbul. Across the water from the gallery, Hagia Sophia, lit up like an aging movie star, gazed warily at this louche, noisy party in Karaköy, the brash ingenue of Istanbul’s neighborhoods. A hundred foreigners and Turks drinking wine in tall glasses had flooded around two DJs in the middle of the street. American conceptual artist Mel Bochner, whose work was on exhibit, sat on a couch bestowing kisses. Inside, his paintings—consisting of clusters of words, such as Blah Blah Blah—hung on white walls that led through huge glass doors and back outside.

These days, Istanbul is no longer just the spot where Europe meets Asia; it is a creative mishmash of civilizations, eras, classes, and ways of life—as if someone had dribbled bits of Berlin and New York and Barcelona onto a seaside Islamic wonderland. Karaköy is one of a handful of neighborhoods that typify the new feeling. En route to the opening, walking through an architectural jumble that included a sixteenth-century mosque as well as Armenian and Greek churches hiding behind paint-patchy walls, I passed narghile hangouts where young people who smoke but don’t drink lounged on beanbag seating; bars where blond socialites, sprung from their Bosphorus mansions, sip cocktails next to tables of hipsters; heavily designed Austrian coffee shops that attract graphic artists on break; and the traditional drab concrete teahouses for male workers. When I later consulted the architectural critic Gökhan Karakuş about this dizzying, inclusive mix of design and society, he deadpanned, “Turks are good at aggregating.”

I moved to Istanbul in 2007, and for the first three years, I went to Karaköy for only two reasons: to stuff my tourist friends with sweets from the baklava emporium Güllüoğlu and to cross the Bosphorus via the ferry at the Karaköy docks. Truth is, I was afraid of Karaköy’s weird little streets. Abandoned buildings sagged against one another for lack of love. Fishermen swung their hooks like lassos. Moody men smoked and stared or sold electrical supplies off horse carts. When news broke that a murderous Fascist gang with a female ringleader had been operating out of a Turkish Orthodox church—an unofficial religion with roots in nationalist ideology—I guessed that the church was in Karaköy. Karaköy was the rotting underbelly of a faded Constantinople, home to everything creepy and half-dead.

I had an excuse for my ridiculousness: Turkish friends from the States—those who’d left Turkey decades ago—were appalled that I had even accepted the offer of a free place to stay in Beyoğlu, the district where Karaköy is located. In their childhood memories, Beyoğlu was a broken-down place where thieves, prostitutes, and drug dealers thrived, and where they never dared to go at night.

But now artists and curators are flocking to Istanbul, drawn not necessarily by the quality and quantity of the work but by the city itself. These days, everyone wants to be here. They want to breathe in its special atmosphere—foreign and familiar, old-world and modern-world, Islamic and Mediterranean—as well as feel the thrum of creative ferment, the excitement of an ancient place that seems somehow fresh and new. But whenever I ask Turkish friends, “Hey, is there some sort of new Turkish style emerging?” they throw up their hands and scoff, “Oh, what do you mean by Turkish?” It is strange that in a country where Turkishness has always been so important, so many Turks are arguing about what Turkish even means.

Istanbul is in the midst of a native culinary revival (lucky you!): Boats docked on the Golden Horn sell mouthwatering fish sandwiches for three dollars.

Istanbul is huge, “bigger than the nation,” a friend once said. For decades, the most popular area for visitors was Sultanahmet, the neighborhood that is home to Hagia Sophia, Topkapı Palace, and Sultanahmet (a.k.a. the Blue Mosque). As Byzantium and then Constantinople, Sultanahmet was the center of Roman, Greek, and Ottoman life, where the sultan lived with his harem and governed his empire. Directly to the north of Sultanahmet, across a sliver of water called the Golden Horn, is what the Greeks named Pera, today known as Beyoğlu. First a colony of the Genoese—you can still climb up to the top of their fourteenth-century Galata Tower—and then of the Venetians, Pera evolved into the sophisticated European quarter of Constantinople. By the nineteenth century, this was where the Armenians, Greeks, Jews, and Italians lived; where you could walk into a café and hear seven different languages. Then came World War I, the defeat of the Ottoman Empire, the rise of the Turkish Republic, and the expulsion of anyone who wasn’t a Turk.

In the 1920s and ’30s, Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the country, told his poor and traumatized people that the way forward was to be Western, modern, and secular. Subsequent leaders combined Atatürk’s nationalistic ideology with a statist economy, which had the effect of cutting Turkey off from the world. Everything was for Turkey, the state, and everyone had to be “Turkish” even if Kurdish or Bosnian. The elite shunned all things Islamic and turned their backs on their history (the Ottoman era) and culture (calligraphy, ornate architecture, the fez). The observant were left to practice Sunni Islam quietly in the countryside, far from the coastal cities where Western-oriented so-called White Turks aspired to high-rise apartments, American kitchens, and two-car garages.

Then, over the last three decades, millions of rural Turks came to Istanbul from the east, looking for work and to escape the Turkish military’s war against the Kurds. They brought not only their loose scarves and tightly fitted coats, their mustaches, kilims, and clay cooking pots, but also the politician Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, an Islamic conservative. The election of this charismatic prime minister in 2002 made this strictly secular country more visibly religious as well as more democratic. He encouraged his pious constituents to be proud of their roots. “In this country, there is a segregation of Black Turks and White Turks,” Erdoğan once said. “Your brother Tayyip belongs to the Black Turks.”

Above all, the pro-capitalist policies of the Erdoğan era made Turkey rich, and the country began to feel freer. Wealth was a more liberating force than religion was a repressive one. The devout crowds parading down Main Street made many secular Turks fear for their personal freedoms, but economic success entitled Erdoğan’s followers to feel like viziers. Newly rich covered women started covering themselves in Burberry. Girls in sleekly fitted head scarves rode bikes on the Princes’ Islands and held hands with boyfriends by the Bosphorus.

At the same time, upper-class and educated Turks, instead of staying in New York or Boston, returned home. As the rest of the world cowered in a financial crisis, Turks reveled in their booming, globalizing economy. And all these Istanbulites, from the bankers to the bartenders, worked hard, more like New Yorkers than Europeans. They wanted better restaurants, more sophisticated bars, artistic and social freedom. Westerners followed. Istanbul “is incomplete,” one American architect now living here told me, “an open book.” Even the secularist kids, Turkish patriots to the core, embraced the swagger Erdoğan brought to the world stage and the pride he took in being Muslim, Ottoman, Anatolian. It was no longer a given that Istanbul creatives would look west for inspiration.

There is no better place to revive cosmopolitanism than Beyoğlu, which, it should be said, houses less than two percent of the city’s fifteen million inhabitants. But this tiny area has transformed at lightning speed. If I go away for a week, I return to discover that my deli has become a secondhand-glasses shop, that the old-school one-oven bakery is now a high-end burger joint. I know that when I step inside one of the many beautiful Art Nouveau buildings, it will be newly renovated, with high-quality painted tile beneath my feet and recently uncovered hundred-year-old paintings on the wall.

Many of these new places have a recognizable style. House Cafés, a popular restaurant chain; the pricey Witt Istanbul Hotel, in Cihangir; even the Turkish Airlines VIP lounge, all share the same look: large mirrors and heavy leather furniture, gorgeous light-wood tables and shiny-white wall tiles, huge windows and high ceilings which let in that resplendent Aegean sun. Gray-and-cream-patterned floor tiles are so common that I began to wonder if contractors were in thrall to some Gray-Patterned Floor Tile Mafia.

September 19, 2012
Postcard from Laura: Does anyone know what time it is?

Istanbul and the Dardanelles, Turkey, Sept. 14: Depending upon where I am in the world, I have the worst time knowing what time it really is. Often I am reminded of the song about time sung by the music group Chicago. I try and whistle this tune, especially when riding on a train run by the Chicago Transit Authority, which is a very fitting concept since this hometown music group was originally known as CTA.

Laura C. Johnson contemplates the concept of time in front of a case of 5th century BC glass beads and artifacts near the ancient site of Troy in Turkey.

The two old public clocks made famous by the much-loved American artist Norman Rockwell on one of his Saturday Evening Post covers are still kept running as icons in Chicago on the historic Marshall Field’s building, now Macy’s, off of State Street.

Other than those two, there are few older street clocks on Jewelers’ Row, or in the suburbs of Chicago, such as Oak Park, which are still kept running. This sad fact struck me as being very curious until one day I forgot to put on my wristwatch and, while on the elevator of a 54-story high-rise in the Loop, I asked a few people, “Does anybody really know what time it is?” Not one person had on a wristwatch. Not because, like me, they had carelessly forgot to put it on, but because almost no one wears one any more. Several people in the elevator instead fumbled around for their iphones. I concluded that, no one cares — publicly — to know what time it was.

Their time predictions were reconfirmed when we got outside, trusting the old, tried-and-true Field’s clocks instead of the electronic gadgets of today’s hip crowds, to which I do not belong.

I wear a wristwatch, usually everyday, because it is like a piece of art on my arm, but, moreover, I love timepieces because time-keeping devices remind me of a very happy period in my early working career at The Time Museum, formerly in Rockford’s Clock Tower Resort.

For several years, on Mondays, when the museum was closed to the general public, we used the day to check the accuracy of the various long-case clocks and to clean and reset the dozens of other working pieces. John Shallcross, the horologist, or timekeeper, who fittingly was from England and had worked at the Greenwich Observatory, wore a white lab coat like a doctor whose specialty was keeping the clocks healthy. He walked around with a clipboard and sharp pencil in hand, and would carefully record the clocks’ statistics. We all loved our jobs, except for the fact that it was impossible to be late and get away with it.

via Postcard from Laura: Does anyone know what time it is? – Rockford, IL – Rockford Register Star.

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September 17, 2012
An Introduction to Istanbul — Old and New

An Introduction to Istanbul — Old and New

Posted by: Amy Lohmann Updated: September 16, 2012 – 1:32 PM

Merhaba! Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Amy Lohmann and I’m a junior at St. Olaf College, which is located in the quaint Southeastern Minnesota town of Northfield. For the next few months I will be traveling as a part of the St. Olaf College program “Term in the Middle East,” where 16 of us will journey to Turkey, Morocco, Egypt and Israel.

Turkish flags strung alongside the houses on the Bosphorus Strait.

Now, if this was a regular semester, I’m sure that at this moment I would be writing from the reference room of the Rolvaag library, clutching a gargantuan caffeinated beverage. As it so happens, I’m lounging in a Café on the streets of Istanbul (where I’ve been staying for the past three weeks), nibbling on chocolate and sipping a tiny Turkish coffee (or Turk Kahvesi). While certain elements of this scene are commonplace, the presence of caffeine for instance, the overall scene makes it clear that this is no ordinary school day.

This dichotomy of the familiar tangling with the new seems like an apt metaphor for an American visiting Istanbul. At almost every turn you can see where the recognizable life of the West melds with the East, or where the traditional meets the modern. My memory floods with examples of these two worlds intermingling.

Some examples are humorous; finding a Starbucks on every corner was a funny surprise, especially when the Seattle born brand is located next to historic mosques and other auspicious sites. Others seem more symbolic. Two women arm in arm on the beach of the Black Sea, one sporting a skimpy bikini, the other shrouded from headscarf to toe. A man clearing the dust from the entrance of a cell phone emporium with a broom made out of twigs.

While I could write about a multitude of topics in an attempt to introduce Istanbul – among them the crazy transportation, the droves of stray cats and dogs, and the delicious çay

served practically everywhere – this meeting of the old and the new, the familiar and the strange, has been impressed upon me with every passing day.

Soon it will be out of the city and into the unknown as our group heads out on an excursion to explore cities and sites deep within Turkey. Look forward to pictures of Troy and a group yacht trip!

via An Introduction to Istanbul — Old and New | StarTribune.com.

September 17, 2012
Istanbul – It’s Definitely Something Different

By Art Petrosemolo

Tourists come to Turkey to visit the historic ruins, to cruise the Aegean Sea, to enjoy the beaches, or to see the remnants of the Ottoman Empire. Istanbul is usually part of the trip but may not be the focal point.

For this traveler, it was Istanbul and Istanbul only. The historical sites along with the hustle and bustle of the bazaars and markets in this modern city where East meets West was always high on my bucket list.

That itch got scratched this summer with six days in Istanbul primarily in the Old City. It was all that I expected, and more.

My wife and I stayed in a small, boutique hotel (Levni) within easy walking distance (albeit uphill) of the Blue Mosque, Hagia Sophia, and the Grand Bazaar. Restaurants and shops were a stone’s throw from the hotel’s unique front and rear lobbies.

We were six days on the ground in this Western-type city with a strong Muslim influence. Like any traveler these days, we spent weeks researching websites for tips, as well as Turkish tourist information sites, to be sure we knew what to see and what to expect on our visit.

Turkey’s summer weather wasn’t a shock but that doesn’t mean 90-degree plus temperatures and high humidity are easy to endure. We did our touring and shopping in the morning and spent the hottest part of the day relaxing by the hotel’s indoor pool or taking a midday nap in the air conditioning.

There was always a breeze on our July visit. It was noticeably cooler and bearable in the shade outdoors at lunch. By 6 p.m., the temperature drops just enough so the breeze makes dining al fresco a pleasure and most of the Istanbul restaurants we saw had accommodations for outdoor diners.

Highlights and Tips:

Getting There – Istanbul isn’t close. Your options for direct flights are best with Turkish Air, which recently started direct service from Dulles. Turkish Air – and Delta – also fly Istanbul nonstop from JFK. We flew British Air via London, which made the trip about 12 hours portal to portal.

Hotel and Transportation – Choose your hotel carefully so you are central to what you wish to do. There are plenty of taxis in Istanbul but the traffic is maddening and it can take you, at times, much longer to get there by taxi than by walking or taking the efficient tram system.

If you taxi – and we did – be sure the driver resets the meter before you begin. Remind him. The starting meter should be 2.75 Turkish lira.

We chose, with the help of a travel agent, the Levni, a small hotel on the edge of the old city. It provided a wonderful buffet breakfast daily and the restaurant is good if you decide to eat in. Hotel staff were warm and helpful. The room was small but clean, with a modern bathroom and air conditioning that worked well.

Money – The American dollar was worth almost $1.80 Turkish lira on our visit, which was great. We changed our money ahead of the trip at a U.S. bank. You can exchange money at U.S. airports before departure.

It did not seem as easy or at least it was not as obvious where to change currency in-country. Merchants took lira, credit cards, or U.S. currency. Travelers’ checks, once the staple of keeping your money safe, are rarely accepted. It appears the wave of the future will be debit cards in the currency of the country you visit, but in Turkey during the summer of 2012, debit cards were available only for pounds sterling.

The dome of the Hagia Sophia – church, mosque and now museum.

The Important Sights – The key ones are the Blue Mosque, Hagia Sophia, and the Ottomon palaces. You can do them all on your own but entrance lines can be daunting. We took a city tour on our arrival and a Bosphorus boat tour the last day. The tour expedites entry to sites and gives you lay of the land if you plan to return later on your vacation.

Food and Water – Bottled water is the norm and everyone has it. Sometimes hotels transfer from large containers to smaller ones but in the restaurants you purchase water by the liter or half-liter and open the bottle yourself.

The food is great with lots of fresh fish, vegetables, and fruit. Meat kabobs of beef, lamb, vegetables and rice are popular everywhere. Many restaurants post photos of what you are ordering. In small street cafes, you can even walk right up to the grill where the chef is cooking, point, and ask.

Hamdi is a restaurant on the Sea of Marmara not to miss for its famous kabobs. Eating on the roof terrace with a view of the sea is a must, and we had to wait a day to reserve a table.

Communication – Everyone speaks a little English and everyone wants to be helpful. Usually the hotels have people designated as “guest relations” and they are key in sorting through reservations and tours.

What to Purchase – Everyone talks about buying Turkish carpet – handmade, double knots, natural dye, wool, and silk. But you know the saying, “there is no free lunch.” If you want good carpet – an investment – you need to do your research, know what you want to spend, and go for it. Many people sell carpet in Istanbul and you just aren’t sure if what you are looking at is machine-made in Pakistan with synthetic dye being passed off as authentic.

Art Petrosemolo negotiating with one of the hundreds of T-shirt vendors in the Grand Bazaar.

We wanted to purchase two, 5-by-7 carpets. We researched the dealers and spent a quiet afternoon as planned at a fourth-generation shop called Antique Carpet & Kilim in a very old building near the Grand Bazaar. Don’t look for its website; they don’t have one, but they do have 9,000 carpets on several floors.

It takes time to purchase a carpet. They need to give you the spiel and it’s polite to listen. You need to drink tea, Coke, or water, which is tradition. Then they start literally throwing the carpets. In two hours, we saw nearly 100 carpets before we settled on a classic blue design and an exciting, modern Scheherazade design of reds and blues. Antique and Kalim offered to ship the carpets to our home as part of the price but we chose to have them fold and wrap them so they fit nicely in our suitcases.

The cost? It isn’t Costco so prepare to spend, as we did, more than $1,000 for each piece. We believe we got a fair deal.

Something Different – Turkish baths (Hamami) have been part of Turkey for centuries. Men and women are in different parts of the facility, although one site now does co-ed Turkish baths.

This wasn’t for my wife but I took the plunge, literally, for a 60-minute scrubbing and massage that was invigorating. They used soap and rough washcloths and rinsed in hot, warm, and cool water. The dead skin literally floated away. I’ll only ever have one Turkish bath but it is one I will never forget. The cost was under $100 U.S., including tips.

Bargaining – If you aren’t prepared to bargain, you won’t be comfortable shopping at the bazaars and even at the high-end carpet dealers. Know what you want to spend and tell them. At the bazaars, I never started higher than 50 percent of the asking price. If we couldn’t meet at an agreed upon price, we walked away and didn’t look back when they chased us. Many times, the next shop will meet your price on the same goods.

For me, one way I judge a trip is whether I’d go back again. Years ago, I loved Hong Kong so much that I went three years in succession and one of those trips was a long weekend.

Istanbul may not be for everyone. It is as busy as London and Paris, and with traffic maybe worse (there are no stop signs in Istanbul). But if you enjoy nonstop activity in a truly unique city, where the U.S. dollar is worth more than the local currency and Westerners are welcome, it could be just your vacation.

Yes, I’d go back and soon.

September 15, 2012
istanbul: hosgeldiniz!

by Renee
September 14, 2012

Is a Vibrant Nation Blog Circle User 200 posts

If you want to experience a place where numerous great civilizations have left their mark for thousands of years, go to Istanbul.

If you want to see the only city in the world that straddles both Europe and Asia, go to Istanbul.

If you want to experience the energy and the chaos of a city of almost 20 million people, combined with the intimacy created by its residents, go to Istanbul.

If you want to feel like you have never left home, go someplace else.

Istanbul will seduce you, in the best sense of the word. It is a seduction that starts with the people who live in a culture that rewards generosity and hospitality.

Istanbul will seduce your wallet with the thought of scoring that priceless rug for a pittance. Most of the time, you will lose that game, even as you are seduced by the words of the carpet monger and the Turkish tea that is served.

Istanbul will seduce your taste buds with an array of food that is as good on the street as it is in the restaurants. Throw your diet out the window. This is real food, fresh and healthy and prepared to perfection.

Follow the advice of the guide book and see the Ayasofya, the Blue Mosque, Topkapi Palace, the Yerebatan Cistern, the Hippodrome, Dolmabahce Palace, any of the great museums of the city and any of the countless other don’t-miss attractions. Then walk. Through Sultanamet, through Taksim, through Beyoglu, through Ortakoy, though Galata. If you are extremely lucky, you will climb Galata Tower and reach the top at the moment the call to prayer sounds. You will never forget that moment.

Go to The Grand Bazaar, the vast, chaotic, historic market that contains thousands of shops that run the gamut from luxury to laughable that will happily take away both your breath and your money. The Spice Market, at one end of the sprawling complex is a feast for the eyes and nose.

Go to the Hamam, the Turkish bath.

Take a boat ride on the Bospherus, or simply take a ferry to the Asian side of the city. Not only will you be able to absorb the sights along the way, you will be surrounded by tourists who have come from all over the world and from all over Turkey, with their ethnic dress and their cameras and iPhones. They will be as wide-eyed as you.

And, if you can, come to Istanbul with a baby or a toddler. It is then that you will see the nature of the people of Istanbul: their unabashed love of children, their genuine delight in being helpful. Male waiters will take the baby from you and rock him. People on the ferry will grab their cameras and take pictures. If the baby or toddler is fussy, people will not complain. They will ask if they can help. No one will be annoyed. Ever.

Istanbul, like any vast city, has its confusion, its “iffy” neighborhoods, its people who will happily take advantage of you. Vendors will follow you down the street, continuing their attempt to sell you whatever your eye lingered on for a moment too long. They will know you are an American and they will ask “Where are you from? I have been to Chicago.” Or New York. Or Kansas. Or Seattle. And the funny thing is, they probably have.

For over 600 years, from about 1300 to the end of World War I, the Ottomans ruled Turkey. For several hundred years, especially during the 16th and 17th centuries, their empire ruled a vast area of the world. The jewel in their crown was Constantinople, now called Istanbul. Before them were Greeks, Romans, and countless others. Muslims, Jews, Christians have all left their indelible mark on the city. Soak it all in, this living history of a great city. Or just stand on a street corner and inhale a kebab, as you watch people walk by. For that also, I can tell you exactly where to go.

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September 15, 2012