Selling jamboree

The Grand Bazaar is a covered warren of narrow lanes housing over four thousand shops. And that doesn't include the thousands more in the twisty streets of the surrounding district, or those in the large Spice Bazaar a short distancedownhill towards the Golden Horn. Men stand before the stalls waiting for customers, sometimes guessing your language in a bid to draw you in ("Gud doy, mite"). The most persistent walk alongside passing foreigners for a stretch explaining why they should stop and look more closely at the merchandise ("Jeans for you, very nice, only twenty lira" (about $13)).

Types of shops tend to congregate, so fifty or so jewelry shops occupy one section of the Grand Bazaar, a similar number of leather jackets stalls another, women's hats yet another. Not that those sorts aren't also found scattered throughout, especially the tiny jewelry shops, in among stalls devoted to all genres of clothing, shoes (Converse individually wrapped in clear plastic), souvenirs, tea, candy, linens, hookahs, backgammon sets, juice and tea and food stands.... Outside the bazaars the same things can be found but mixed in with more prosaic items, such as plumbing supplies and guns.

It's unclear to me how anyone makes a living with these shops, they are so numerous and so apparently uniform.

The stalls are a large portion of the city's commercial life, but no niche for selling is neglected. On the streets young men stand beside boxes full of bottled water or, as I saw repeatedly yesterday, offer small spirograph and colored pencil sets; older men sell the sesame-seeded bread rings (called simit) or cigarettes; I've seen a number of elderly, broken down men standing beside worn out bathroom scales--in order to have something to offer for a coin.

I walked the bazaars and streets mostly for the sights, but I did have an eye out for a watch; however, all were too large (apparently the fashion here) and too expensive. I was hoping for a cheap kid's watch, just something so I can keep track. This would seem an easy item to find, but no. It didn't help that when I saw a watch display I would keep moving, trying to examine the options on the fly and while avoiding eye contact or any other indication of interest.

Late in the afternoon the Spice Bazaar let me out down at the water, and I passed through a tunnel under the busy fringing roadway. Here were more stalls, and finally I found the children's watches section: almost every stall had a number on offer. I bought a small black and white watch with a soccer ball on the face and several more slightly raised balls on the plastic band. I asked something inane about battery life, but the small man just reached for a small plastic bag and said "no problem!" I paid him five lira.

With my shopping finally completed, I walked across the Galata Bridge, across the Golden Horn to the Beyoglu neighborhood. Underneath the bridge, close to the water, restaurants ran the length of the bridge on both sides. On the deck above, anglers spread across the bridge, their lines dangling down past the diners. I walked both above and below but never saw anyone hook a fish, nor saw evidence that any fish had been caught.

Ferries and tour boats ran up and down the waterway, and the rising city hills on both sides were dotted with mosques and minarets. The mosques are so close together that the amplified calls to prayers overlap.

On the far side, walking along the waterfront, I discovered the Historical Seas Tall Ships Regatta. Eight large sailing ships had come in earlier in the afternoon for the four day event, including ships from Germany, Indonesia, the UK, Russia, and Poland, and visitors were allowed to walk around on deck. The Polish ship, the Dar Mlodziezy, was my favorite: quite shipshape.

Back on the other side of the river I bought a fried fish sandwich from a boat. The frying and quick sandwich making (slap the filet on a opened french roll, toss on some raw onion and lettuce) was undertaken by young men on the heaving, ornate boat, who then handed the sandwich ashore to another man who took my four lira and handed it to me.

In two days I've seen little of Istanbul, really, yet I'm ready to move on. Partly I know I'll be back here at the end of the trip, but also I'm a little overwhelmed by the crowds and congestion.

Earlier in the day I'd booked, online, a hostel in Fethiye. Then I asked the front desk clerk at my hotel how I could reserve a bus seat. He tried to book for me online (the bus websites are in Turkish), but my credit card didn't work, so he tried over the phone; my card failed again. Later I found out that my credit card company had put a hold on my card, suspicious of the hotel booking I'd just made. I was at a loss, but then the desk clerk, a large, phlegmatic man named Sirnan, asked if I had the cash. "You pay me," he said, and then he got back on the phone and booked the ticket with his own credit card. I got the last seat on tomorrow night's nine o'clock bus.

So far I'm finding the Turkish a disconcerting mix of hard sell and helpful.