Hello Stranger,
I arrived in Istanbul. The city is a big déjà vu for me. It has the face and spirit of Sofia, the sticky air of Bangkok, the mystical story of Granada, the cheeky mentality of the Middle East. The slim figures of two minarets are the first thing I see from the window of the plane. Then the shadows of dozens of ships follow, melting quietly into the water of Bosporus. My eyes have barely adjusted to the amount of light. And with the landing, I feel like rolling out of a vacuum - face down onto a carpet in the center of a busy bazaar. Thousands of feet are rushing in all directions, signs for “Baggage claim” hang randomly on walls and the passport control area looks like a wild jungle – 8 lines of twisted postures move nervously, hardly awake enough to stand. People are checking watches and moaning like hungry tigers. We all need about 30 minutes to get our small share of the clerks’ attention. Mine looks at me indifferently. He’s on the phone, yet that doesn't disturb his passport stamping routine. I grab my papers and I just say to myself: ‘Welcome to Orient!’
Morning buzz, Istanbul
I’ve hardly stepped out of the exit door and a few elderly men jump at me with offers for a cab fare. I know the drill. They are not regular cab drivers, but they are good for a bargain, so I pick one that gives me a decent price and follow him to his car. It’s parked outside the parking area of the airport, at safe distance from the officials, which instead of giving him a fine will simply ask for a small bribe or might even give him a beating. The guy is nice. He tells me his name and what he does. He actually works for the Post Office, but outside his regular hours he’s transporting tourists to help pay for the university fees of his 2 children. Their pictures are exhibited prominently on the car’s deck. I look around the white Skoda. It’s almost factory-clean and the cabbie is dressed in a chic jacket and nice dark brown shoes, not the cab driver attire I would have expected. It’s a false assumption of course. In Turkey what you wear, what you drive, how big your TV is and what phone you use, are quite important social status factors. I used to hate these status indicators; they are pretty similar where I come from. But the easiness of the familiarity right now makes me feel home. I am content that I can navigate in this insecure chaos, which scares many others.
40 long minutes follow through the lunch traffic of Istanbul. We drive on the highway next to buses, which have probably been manufactured in Russia in the 50s and then also next to the latest Audi’s sports car editions. We are not exactly driving straight on the designated lanes. We cut other drivers by speeding right to that killing point and then stopping abruptly at annoying traffic lights that have suddenly sprung out of nowhere. We use the emergency section to secure a faster pass through tunnels and narrow sections. We jump through curbs and yell at surprised pedestrians daring to use the crosswalk to trespass. The hustle of the streets is a complete contradiction to the sudden appearance of the old Constantinople fortress – proud and beautiful, like a crown jewel upon the riverbed. I can see bits of the defense wall. How many battles from my history books I’ve imagined being fought here… I can see Aye Sofia, which is probably the one centuries-old witness of glory, massacre, victory and fall – a former basilica, a former mosque, a former symbol of power worshiped by kings from Bulgaria, Byzantium, the Osman Empire. I can almost hear the whispers of the Christian and Muslim preachers, who have given their lives for their faith, wander between the stones. I can feel the gentle steps of thousand cats, deviously guarding the sanctuaries, like untouchable godly protectors.
The Cool Cat & the City, Istanbul
A sea gull is gliding onto the warm air above the Golden Horn. A soft wind is flirting with the red mane of a big Turkish flag. The car is cutting through the rattling heartbeat of the city and I am falling deep into my infatuation, deep into the anticipation to get lost in the streets of Istanbul.
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| Istanbul at Sunset |
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