Life's a short trip...

Well it's been quite the week here in Istanbul, due to rain and more rain, I never made to Asia (sad face), but there still were some pretty memorable experiences.

First let's start with my first encounter with a Turkish Futball (a soccer match). There are three soccer teams in Istanbul:Besiktas (black and white), Fenerbahçe (yellow and purple), Galatasaray (yellow and red). That's just Istanbul, not Turkey. So needless to say they take it seriously here. How serious? Riots are expected every game. It is like a scene out of Greene st hooligans only with Turks instead of Brits. I was quickly told that I would be a Besiktas fan. Galatasaray was the richest team, but Besiktas is the funnest. Personally I have a soft spot for Fenerbahce and their gold and purples color scheme (SMC, anyone) but they are the least popular team and hardly win the rivalry matches. That day it was a match for the ages Besiktas battling cross town rival Galatasaray.  The match would not start till seven but anywhere in Istanbul one went, one could feel the tension brewing. Jersey, scarves, hats displaying one's alliance were worn by all. Traffic was unusually bad, even for Istanbul. If I closed my eyes, I didn't feel the tension of soccer match but that of a red sox/yankee game in late September racing toward the AL East Crown.  It was awesome.

Days before the game, we realized it would just be too hard to gets tickets. Thus, we decided let's head to Taksim, the causal nightlight capitol of Istanbul. At 5 pm, five of us (Rachel, Cole, Arielle, Zach and I) headed to the bus stop. A quick note on the Istanbul transit system, there really is no schedule. One just heads to the bus stop or metro station and eventually, usually at very fast pace, your ride shows up. I have no idea how it works but its very impressive. Back to the story, by 5:15 we were on our 559C Bus and headed to Taksim. The bus ride usually takes about a half hour (45 minutes in during Istanbul rush hour). Its weird I hardly even notice the length of the bus rides here, after a couple weeks, its just normal. Not on this day. It took about an hour and forty- fives minutes to get to Taksim. The traffic was awful plus the route drove right past the stadium, where a scene of absolute mayhem was playing out.

Finally, we were there - Taksim- the place I had heard so much about. I wasn't sure what to expected I heard mixed things about the place. Great shopping, good bars, hold on tight to your bag, always go in a group blahblahblah. First impression, Taksim has incredible stores and numerous bars, definitely the young section of New Europe. A couple blocks in we went took a right and then a quick left and behold what seemed like an alleyway was as outdoor cafe and rooftop bar central. After trying to get into three bars, we finally found one that had room and was cheering for our team. It was a very surreal experience. At times, you could have heard a pin drop in the room. Then a bad call or goal and you couldn't hear yourself think. The game ended in a tie. On the bus ride back, as we drove past the stadium, you could see the damage of the game. Trash everywhere, police all over the place and little scuffles breaking out everywhere. All in all, it not only showed the sheer power sports have over humans and it was pretty fun to cheer when Besiktas scored.

The rest of week has prompted me to talk about some cultural differences. Let's start with food. Because Istanbul is large city filled with neighborhoods, you can honestly get any type of food in the world- some of it incredible, some of it not. 

Everyday food is very interesting. For snacks, there are the usually chips, peanuts, sunflower seeds. In addition they are all types of little bread treats and fresh hot sandwiches similar to hot- pockets. Sometimes you just don't know what you're going to bite into. There will always be some type of meat, some form of tomato, and peppers. In addition, there could be cucumbers, pickles, and mushrooms. Main dishes will be one of three things - kabobs (my personal favorite!!!) with rice, lettuce, and tomatoes on the side, secondly there is a meat, rice, yogurt dish (fyi the yogurt here is salty and usually comes with weird orange sauce) and lastly, there is the pasta dish with yogurt and the orange sauce sometimes a little meat. Traditional Turkish food (in my very few experiences) consist of grape leaves wrapped around rice, fried meatballs and kabobs among many other dishes. The meat here is always top quality. At restaurants there is always chicken, meatballs and lamb. It's really good and for the most part the food is very inexpensive. Each meal whether its in the caf, a cafe or restuarant comes with bread, tons of bread, and tea. If you can believe it, they drink more tea then my dad! For desert, they always serve apple tea or regular tea and chocolate. 


In the restaurants that serve other types of food or any of the restaurants in the tourist areas, American girls in groups often receive a discount either for being a student or so "you came back with more american tourists, you tell home the Turks take good care of Americans" its very funny. Along the river, many of restaurants are fish only and they pride themselves on this. In the old city, we ate at a rooftop restaurant that was Indian, it was the best lamb I ever had, so tender and wonderful. Turks take pride in their cooking and their ability to impress tourist. At another restaurant, I order the chicken wings on the advice of our tour guide. Now these chicken wings were not wings over, but they were so good, grilled to perfection. Just before that our waiter brought out Pita bread and a special humus dip from southern Turkey (on the house of course). I've never liked humus in my life, until this dish. I can't wait to try again in Bodrum.

Next up weather. It rains a lot here, but also its been 50 degrees for almost two weeks now. You can always count on a little bit of sunshine during each day. When the sun does shine, it highlights the walk to class that's amazing. The Bosphorus River, the Bridge to Asia, and even the Asian waterfront are all beautiful in the sun. In couple weeks, the rain is supposed to let up and temperature will rise and there will be no mud season for me.


Moving on brings to me classes. My schedule is still a bit up in the air, but it looks like I staying with Turkish Politics and EU, Middle Eastern Politics in the World, Turkish, Ceramics, and my research project. My research project is what I'm the most excited about. Its a field project about the EU and Turkey. There's a lot of debate within Turkey about entering the EU. Turkey's economy is thriving especially compared to ten years ago when inflation was almost 100%, will it be still thriving on the Euro? In Europe, the debate continues as well. There are human rights concerns as well as religious. So it's very interesting to study and even more awarding to be able to witness it.


One last story from the week, it was sunday nights hockey game. After experiencing the Turkish soccer match, some decided to show the Turks a hockey game. So we invited Ibrahim and Bahtiyar to Superdorm to watch it with us. Throughout the game they kept asking if it was cold in the rink or why was it a big deal that we were playing Canada, they weren't communist. The whole thing was a riot. We tried to teach them the USA USA USA chant and they taught us that in Turkish would be ADB ADB ADB. It was probably one of the funniest nights in a while. It didn't matter the Canada won, we got to share in a cultural exchange.

 mosque in my neighborhood

 Don't forget pictures are posted on flickr almost every other day. Here's the link http://www.flickr.com/photos/47744895@N05/.... more to follow in a couple days