Spice up Your Life

I could bore you by telling you we woke up early this morning and made our way to the Tokpiko Palace before 10. Or by telling you about its incredible size, intricate tile design, or historical legacy of the Sultan’s reign over the 80,000 square meter grounds. Or even about the Harem, the area where the Sultan kept women, including his mother, one of the most powerful women in the empire, his wives, or wives to-be who were held in a certain section to essentially train to be the Sultan’s sex slaves. I could tell you about our incredible walk from the palace to the Bosporus, where we stopped in store windows filled with baklava and Turkish delight that would make your mouth water. Or about how we stopped under a bridge, filled with restaurants, where we had fresh fish sandwiches, literally a fish, on bread, with tomato and lettuce. I could try and explain the possibly hundreds of stairs we bumped up and down today, just to get from one side of the highway to another, in an underground walking tunnel. Or I could even attempt to explain the spice market, where there were tons of stores selling fresh tea, every spice, nut, and dried fruit imaginable. Not to mention the vendors, who were extremely interested in the fact that we were Americans. I believe one of the vendor’s comments was “Are you lost? Don’t worry … I’m right here!” Or another who said “Are you Miss USA?” and after I responded no, he said “Well, you are mine!” and offered me “Love” tea. Thanks, but no thanks. I felt like I was in some horror movie about super cheesy pick-up lines. We humored them by buying fresh “Relax” tea, and honey and pistachio sweets, but tried to stay away from “Natural Turkish Viagra” or “The Sultan’s Aphrodisiac” – which most of the time ended up just being Saffron.

Even though I could go on for days about all of the incredible things we did today, I would prefer to tell you that I saw my life flash before my eyes this afternoon. After about five hours on our feet exploring, we decided to grab a cab home. When we met someone who would give us a ride back to the hotel for 15 TL (Turkish lira, which is about 10 bucks) we called it a deal, crammed my chair in the trunk, and set off. The Turks drive like maniacs: worse then the French, the Italians, and anyone from Massachusetts. After almost getting into an accident because of our driver’s inability to use a blinker, we were inevitably pulled over. We sat awkwardly in the cab, while our driver got out and talked to the “polis”. We couldn’t decide whether we should stay and wait, or get out and find another cab. The fact that we were in the middle of a highway confirmed our decision of staying put. After about 10 minutes, the driver got back into the car, ripped up his ticket and threw it out the window, muttered something in Turkish, and lit up a cigarette. The next 7 minutes became the scariest cab ride of my life. Blinkers, stop lights, and people were minor hindrances, most of the time we plowed through all three, though somehow managed not to kill anyone. We arrived safely back at our hotel, where mom literally threw money at him, and the two of us ran inside before our interaction with this cab driver continued.

At the end of the day, if I could give you some advice about Istanbul, it would be: go to the palace, don’t take a cab, and when shopping, don’t settle for the first price someone offers you.