Awesome Weekend Part 2

Any fears I had about my experience here being far too touristy were finally quelled yesterday during our adventure in the old city.  We'd been there twice before, once on the Fatih tour and once on our way to Samatya, but we hadn't yet looked at all the things you're supposed to go look at.  Our goal was to find Çemberlitaş Hamamı, a Turkish bath dating from 1584.  Well, we did, but not before visiting Ayasofya and the Blue Mosque.  At Ayasofya, we used the trick one of our teachers gave us: don't as if there is a student discount, as if he'd be so kind as to give you a student discount.  So we got in for free.  (Our pride at this was greatly diminished when we forgot to ask for one at the Hamam, but oh well.)

The Ayasofya experience is pretty well summed up by, "Woah, I'm actually here!"  

The Blue Mosque wasn't so bad, itself.  The two buildings are right across from each other, separated by a walkway that looks kinda like you're heading up to the Mormon Temple in Oakland, but without quite as many palm trees.

Stumbled upon people rehearsing for a folk music concert.

Here's the outside of the Hamam.  The rest of the building is covered by little touristy shops, which is why we missed it at first.  The massage was happily just in between "limp-wristed" and "mortally dangerous," as the lovely people at Lonely Planet described.  Oh dude, and my skin's super soft.  Seriously.  They also had a habit of dumping pails of water on you when you were least expecting it.

Dinner after this was an experience in and of itself.  The restaurant could have easily passed as any generic Middle Eastern restaurant as well as Hawaiian and Latin American.  We were served gözleme, standard cheap rolled up street food with things like spinach, cheese, and/or potatos inside, on a plate for a relatively large amount of money.  My ayran, usually served in an oversized yogurt container-looking thing, was in a strange pitcher.  The poor employees wore salvar pants, your stereotypical Turkish pant that you don't really find anywhere besides the Southeast, about as far away from Istanbul as you can get.  The worst was the band.  They played the same two songs per set and stuck a violin in your face until you put money under the fingerboard.  I know they're working musicians and all that, but seriously?

One great thing about the peninsula, besides all the historic buildings, of course, is that people are seriously impressed that we speak a little Turkish.  Reactions elsewhere tend to range from frustration to condescending smiles.  Another difference: in Sultanahmet they ask if you're from California.  Everywhere else, they ask if you're from Chicago.  Luckily I can say yes to both!

I'll leave you with a quote from my professor about a story we just read.  In the story, a psychiatrist, supposed to fix a woman's allergies, actually made it so that she died when she smelled flowers.  (Or maybe it was when someone said "Bless You." I'm still not really sure.) This way, the wife would be out of the picture, and the psychiatrist could have the husband all to himself.  When we finally understood that this was what had happened, our professor explained that they almost didn't have us read this story, because we may have thought that they have a negative view of gay people.  "It's just the opposite," she said, "We LOVE gay people!"