Two really big mosques

In the afternoon I was standing on a street corner waiting to cross when I was greeted by an attractive young man--dark wavy hair, stubble and soul patch, Italian shirt, fashionable jeans. He wanted to know where I was from, and when I said the US he asked where. Minnesota surprised him. "I am meeting people from California and Texas and New York," he said, "but not Minnesota." He asked for the major city, but Minneapolis was of no help. Nuri, as he introduced himself, was not simply friendly but trolling for foreigners like myself. He suggested we step down the street to the travel agency where he worked. I didn't see this as necessarily worth his time or mine, but it was easier to say yes rather than no, and so I did.

But after we had walked fifty yards I stopped and said, well, maybe not. Nuri was patient. "It's ok. You are new to this country, yes? We Turkish, we take our time, there's no rush, just come and talk." I hesitated. "It's right there," he said, pointing to a sign.

In the travel agency I sat down at a desk with Nuri and Nuri's boss, a man named Mustafa, who took charge of the conversation. He wanted to know how long I planned to be in Turkey, and I told him four weeks (so he'd have less time to work with), but when he started in about tours I told him of my walking plans. Neither man was familiar with the Lycian Way. Mustafa dismissed it: "so that's a week or so, but you will want to see other places when you are done." I laughed and said I didn't think I could walk 500 kilometers in a week. But he didn't back down. "You never know," he said. "You are strong." I told him that for the moment I was only interested in a bus ticket to Fethiye for Friday. He looked disappointed but said he could arrange that for 75 Turkish Lira (TL). I said I'd keep it in mind.

Over the course of an afternoon's walk I was approached many more times, by travel agency personnel again but mostly by rug merchants trying to get me to their shops. All ensuing offers I politely declined.

I didn't get out into the city until three. I had gotten up for the breakfast in the basement restaurant at my hotel. But back in my room afterwards I dozed til one, to the soothing accompaniment of street noise and British CNN. Then I read for a couple hours, still sleepy and still reluctant to leave the sanctuary of my room....

I'd met Nuri soon after I left the hotel. After our chat I visited the Blue Mosque then Hagia Sophia. At the entrance of the Blue Mosque shoes must be removed; you are given a plastic bag for the shoes, which you carry inside with you, I suppose to avoid theft. Women with tank tops or shorts are given pale blue wraps to cover themselves with; the same for men in shorts. The mosque is massive and domed and smells musty, maybe because of the vast wall to wall carpet. Four huge "elephant feet" pillars support the structure from the inside. The mosque was built in the 17th century by a sultan who supposedly wanted one to rival the Hagia Sophia. He fell short.

Hagia Sophia, originally Christian, was completed in 653 and for nine centuries was supposedly the greatest church in Christendom. But after "the Conquest" of 1653 it was converted to mosque. Since 1935, though, when Atatuark (the Turkish George Washington, and a secularist) made the change, it's been a "museum." So one can wear shoes and bare shoulders inside. The big big space, the dome high overhead, the echoey acoustics, the ancient mosaics (of Jesus, the Virgin Mary)--all these make it impressive but not, for me, sublime. I can't see that all the effort was worthwhile.... But then I often find myself left a little cold by antiquities--or maybe it's the efforts to keep them up (much scaffolding inside, many young headscarved women picking away at the crumbling walls). Isn't the time of the Hagia Sophia long gone? I was briefly intrigued by the roped off square on the floor where the kings of Byzantium were crowned.... But the place seemed lifeless, and the tourists all holding their digital cameras aloft were as interesting as anything else. I suppose I've come to the wrong place if I'm going to dismiss old stuff right off. I might have to give this some more thought....

I walked along full, busy streets for several hours, quickly through the Grand Bazaar and the Spice Bazaar (where the shops were closing up and where I plan to return), through narrow, hilly lanes lined with shops and littered with the day's trash, past more mosques, each flanked by tall, thin minarets ringed with loud speakers for the call to prayers. Late I ended down at the Bosphorus, standing on a foot bridge over a congested street (where at any given moment approximately 25% of drivers were using their horns), watching an auto ferry arrive and load and unload, watching the ships passing on the tossing water.

I stopped at a nearby kebap stand, Neslihan Bufe, and pointed to a picture of a burrito-like object: yavik tonuk doner. A man with a cigarette in his mouth sliced pieces from the slow cooking pillar of meat (what sort I don't know) and let them fall into the tray at the bottom. He opened the metal lid of a small oven and pulled out a warm, thick tortilla, then scooped up the meat pieces and tossed them on; using tongs, he grabbed the other ingredients from nearby trays: french fries and tomatoes and greens and I don't what else. Finally, he folded over the tortilla and wrapped a piece of white paper around three-quarters of the kebap with one end sticking out. I put it in my waistpack and set off for the nearby hotel, stopping only once more at a tiny market for a large bottle of water.

In my room I sat on the bed and ate and watched tv and wondered at the strangeness of the last two days.

I'd like to stay a week at the Erboy, huddling in my comfy room, venturing out for walks about the city, taking in not only the famous sites but bookstores where I could buy more novels (I've already almost finished One of Ours by Willa Cather; I think it's going to end badly). But it's expensive, and I do want to get south and start walking.... I'm still adjusting to being away.