In favour of Turkey (on Republic Day, no less)

Last weekend was really nice... I went to an island in the Marmara Sea and had a ride in a horse-drawn carriage. Certain colleagues dismissed this as bourgeois... but then, as I like to remind certain people, we are working for a school built by an Eastern-European centred construction corporation.

Going through the usual oscillation of loving İstanbul and all there is to do and see here, and feeling vaguely appalled at the possibility of staying here for another two years, minimum... Some things I do like about this country though
- people think its cute when you try to speak Turkish. (I think). This is great, because cute and mildy entertaining is really all my Turkish can offer right now. In order to practice I find myself saying lots of basically untrue things (tomorrow İ will go to the palace, I like bread, I am tired). These are 'white lies', or something, because I usually am tired-ish, and bread is ok, and I suppose there was some possibility of me visiting the palace. But mostly I said them because I was so proud of the sentence I have learnt.
- I have a very supportive and generous hairdresser. Getting my hair straightened regularly makes me quite happy.
- Kebaps. Cheap, not appalling unhealthy, and everywhere.
- every now and then I come across something that is really very Agatha Christie/Ottomon Empire/Orient Express-ish, and it is so cool to engage with a culture that I never really thought I would. Of course, finding a real-life example of anything that has been romanticised in popular culture, especially the popular culture of your childhood, is a pleasureable experience. But while I was pretty seriously committed to seeing Catherine Gaskin's Ireland, I never really thought about Turkey as a kid. And thus, the 'remembering' of the scene in front of me is kind of sweeter, and less open to disappointment, perhaps!
Ok enough for today.

Expatriates Unite.

Was chatting with a similarly-minded friend (an American one! An endless wonder to me) about the challenges of being an expat as one of our generation. I guess I can begin to capture it by noting that even a sentence like that one makes me want to puke-- the 'challenges' of being an expat? Like, what are THOSE exactly? And of course it's true that we lead comparitively luxurious lives-- even within expatriate communities I know that my own life is so secluded, so insulated from the challenges that many expats face that to speak of difficulties within it might seem indulgent. But that is the very problem-- that for a certain element of the current population it has become very difficult to speak or act AT ALL because we are so painfully self-reflexive about everything we do, and so critical of everything those around us do simultaneously. The things I say and do, let alone write, seem to me to be so riddled with cliche or pretentiousness that it is difficult to make any sort of definitive statements of belief or like or interest. We are so quick and so expert at identifying the 'backpacker' mentality that places the burden of authenticity upon the developing nation's people, or the peace corps ideology that is so self-serving or short-sighted in its realisation that we can hardly appreciate nor contribute to another culture. And don't get me started on the impossibility of critising, or even expressing dislike, for aspects of a foreign culture.

A great deal of this is born out of very sound ideas of not wanting to patronise or simplify complex cultures and peoples. Those are valid and, dare I say it, proper goals. But when they can also lead to the very things that they are supposed to avoid (how patronising is it, for example, to be so fearful of simplifying a culture that you never really engage with it? Isn't criticism of a people in some way related to respect for them?) there needs to be some compromise between the ideals that we know to be sound and the results that we know to be desireable.

So does that mean I should get on board with the 'save the stray cats' movement? Should I admit that köfte totally grosses me out (and to whom?)? Do I refuse to stay in mainstream tourist resorts again because they aren't the real Turkey? Or do I just commit to taking half my phrases out of inverted commas, and declare that some things do not have contested meaning... even some controversial ones. Or maybe, even if they do, I don't care.

And then I go back to the pathetic sense of radicalism that I have just associated with the removal of punctuation... and it starts all over again.

turkish baths, round II

It is the Bayram weekend here in İstanbul, and this means that everyone has a day off and most people are out of the city. What a great time, I thought, to explore the city and see the many sights that I have neglected to do thus far. Things kicked off well with a party at a friends house where I met an ethnic Iranian Jewish Turk (tick!) and a Canadian juggler who made the entire party hold hands to channel some juggling-conducive energy. All good and in the name of fun, until I decided to drink a full glass of water straight from the tap, and so day one of the 'holiday' was spent lolling around on the couch and bathroom floor as my body attempted to rid itself of whatever is kept in the water pipes around here. Not quite the weekend I had envisaged. Just to keep things interesting though, there does seem to be a persistent shot-gun sound that occurs every couple of hours in my compound. No idea what this is, and respond in responsible-adult fashion i.e turn up the repeats of '24' on the telly.

Anyway, the bath. So a colleague and I pick a bath out of this coffee-table-style guide to the 'historic baths and culture of İstanbul', jump on a dolmuş to Sarıyer and hope for the best. As usual, my Turkish is completely inadequate and attempts to ask if we are in Sarıyer is are responded to with 'straight ahead'... so I guess we are going the right way. It is a little frustrating to spend three hours a week in language lesson and realise that the only thing people understand of me is the name of the place we are headed for... which was written on the bus anyway. However, I take heart from a story I heard recently when a man who has lived here for seven years went to an office and starting chattering away in Turkish... only to have the woman behind the desk explain that she didn't speak English. Te he he.

So the fun continues when we get off the bus and ask which way the bath is. Of course the answers that are given do not contain the words I know for straight ahead, left, or right. And so we just keep walking in the direction pointed until we hit another crossroad and ask someone else... with the same result. (Note to you all-- when someone asks for directions in faltering English, use SIMPLE words in your answer!)

Finally we 'arrive' at what looks like a tea house and is surrounded by old men, but is apparently the bath.... we walk up tentatively and step inside. No one around.... we walk back and ask the tea men.... yes it is open. Repeat times two. Finally a man ushers us through a curtain (at which point I realise I must have been walking around the mens area of the bath earlier-- but press on, since I saw nothing) and into a little room with change rooms inside. Due to the fact that the men are not supposed to be anywhere near the women's side, he wants to speak to us in Turkish through a curtain. Do you speak English? I say in perfect Turkish. No I don't speak English, he says in perfect English. Thus ends the usefulness of those phrases.

After a little pointless nattering back and forth and quite a bit of exasperated giggling, he finally gives in and comes through the curtain, knocks on the door to the bath interior and shouts. The door swings open and there, barking instructions in the friendly but brusque Turkish that so many women seem to adopt as the manner of choice, stands a woman about my mother's age, naked except for a saggy skin coloured pair of what looks like thermal undies. Rolled up at the sides, mind you, so the effect is somewhat like that of a saggy boobed baby. We have arrived.

The man steps away and we are shown that the deal is to wear only underwear-- no bras though. Western friend and I are suitably horrified but I decide to obey and come into the bath wearing only the warm plastic flip flops provided, my bathers bottoms and a stiff towel. Next instruction-- towels off!

I make a shamefaced run back to the change rooms where I re-dress into my bathers top.

Charissa and I sit down to be scrubbed, washed and massaged. Or as Charissa later puts it, violated. First we have the pleasure of watching a more-experienced bath go-er strip down and give (all of) her body a thorough once-over. This is confronting enough without considering that we are expected to do the same in a few minutes. And the bathers top doesn't last either. You try maintaining your modesty while a mostly-naked Turkish grandmother yelps at you to take it off. But actually, once we got over the horror of seeing each others boobs get a scrub with a large exfoliating mitt, it was pretty fun. Our bath attendant is unconcerned with our concepts of social niceties, but actually rather jolly in her own way. Learning that I am a teacher and from Reşitpaşa inspires the first slap on my nearly naked butt. And Charissa's nervous giggles inspire her to throw large containers of warm water at her when she's not ready. You kind of can't help but lose your inhibitions after that. She grunts and sighs deeply as she massages us but is undeterred by the digusting sludge that is scrubbed of our bodies in the first wash. And successfully asking her whether she was tired made me so happy that I didn't even flinch when she grabbed my foot and held it between her tummy and naked breasts to finish soaping my leg. Each sections' finish is declaring with a loud and triumphant 'TAMAM!' (ok) and by the end of it all we are both kind of freaked out but definately keen to go again. All in all, it was a great morning.

Touring the Asian side, Japanese Restaurants, etc.

This weekend the americans and I went to visit the Asian side. A much lauded activity by those in the know, and only about 25 steps away from the hip-ness of visiting something on the Eastern side or making a day trip to Syria.

Actually, it was kind of everything people said it would be (more 'asian'/'real') I suppose. It certainly had an atmosphere that the European side doesn't have, and was more like the Asian cities that I went to. I also felt cooler, which is a big plus. Everything was incredibly busy and a lot of things smelt like fish, which is nice in its own way, and there were shops selling loofahs and cinnamon sticks and semi-dried tomatoes (tick!) and loads and loads of people. One of the things that has struck me again and again (perhaps suggesting that I am a little simple) is how MANY PEOPLE THERE ARE. Just like, in the world. Because as you may know, most of them don't live in Australia. I think my comprehensive school had about as many people as my home town, so wade through the masses of people speaking another language is always quite fun. The downside to visiting this last hurrah of authenticity is that the masses of people also take many many buses to get there, and so it took about 80 minutes to do so. I had nostalgic flashbacks of the glory days of Dad running late and doing 120 on Firman's Lane in Hazelwood North and covering what must have been about 25kms in 15m.

Anyway, after recovering from the somewhat traumatic experience of trying to get home from the suburbs, a few of us went out for Japanese food in town. We are led to our table: 'Could we sit outside?' I ask? 'No', my otherwise impeccably well-mannered waiter tells me. This is a little unnerving... I'm not sure if I should ask again but decide to just behave and sit inside. Under the floodlights in one probably one of the most expensive restaurants I've ever been to. Mood lighting is, in my experience, one of the later acquistions of 'developing' countries.

So the sesame seeds were stale, the gyoza basically just chicken mince and it all costs about a month's wages... but it was sushi, my beloved, and so I was happy. Another weekend in Turkey.

Meyhanes and going public

The new blog, to document my experiences of living here in İstanbul, or Reşitpaşa, İ suppose. I went out in Taxim for the first time on the weekend. Taxim is sort of the Swanston Street, or maybe Soho or Leicester Square, of İstanbul. İt was very busy and pretty lively, although like most places with anything resembling a nightlife around the world, more packed with foreigners than one might like to imagine.

We went to a Meyhane-- a sort of Sizzler for Turks, with live music thrown in. İt was a very atmospheric kind of place-- the roof opened up to expose the apartments above and there were plenty of modern Turkish girls behaving pretty much the same way packs of women around the world behave when they go somewhere with music and food... although they were much better dancers! Actually, the differences did seem to run a little deeper than that. Although İ never spoke with any of the women, and of course am in no real position to judge... being 'alone' in a foreign country at a loud bar does rather lend itself to quiet reflection, and so. İt was the Turkish women that intrigued me: there was, to my eyes, a greater sense of cameraderie between the Turkish women and a warmer sort of 'performance' than seems to accompany the 'Western' equivalent. İf one were to speculate, one might imagine that this is borne out of the sharper divisions between male and female life. Perhaps when women are so forcibly 'locked out' of certain aspects of everyday life there can be a less competitive existence within the lives that they can lead.

Although this sense of the shared experience (the 'community' is the rather reductive and bland definition that is commonly given, I suppose) can be observed amongst my students as well. They look after each other-- translating in hidden whispers and taking turns to make notes in a way that does not seem to negate competition entirely, but seems to delineate the competitive world as one that does not relate to their peers. That is, they know they are competing with each other, and take great satisfaction in getting the 'best' result on a test (for example), but this seems to bear no relationship to the custom of helping each other within the classroom.

But İ have lost track!

Back to the women: (aren't they, after all, the object of fascination for nearly all Western visitors, in one way or another?) İ don't want to imply that here at the Meyhane were a collectivity of naive and 'traditional' Turkish women who were simply accompanying the menfolk on their boozy night out. No doubt these women exist but these were undeniably the modern and sophisticated İstanbul girls-- dressed far more fashionably than İ was and clearly leading far more glamorous lives... you get the point. But İ suppose that is the point (another one)-- that what İ think İ observed was a subtle and complex cultural 'phenomenon' that wasn't entailed or contained by the wearing of the burqa, or whatever other cliche plenty of people seem to require to believe that they are seeing 'real' Turkish people.

Anyway, tomorrow İ must deal with the rather more concrete business of proper nouns and the like. More later, then.