Hi Guys welcome to istanbul! After spending an amazing 4 days with Muge visiting all of the local hangouts in Istanbul and visiting the university of Istanbul and the Bosporus I was finally about ready to actual return to my humble tourist routes and visit the main sites of Istanbul. The Blue Mosque, The Iya Sophia (Please excuse my spelling) and the Top-okapi Palace (Main Turkish Museum).
Upon arriving at the main gardens outside the Blue Mosque, two canadian girl friends of mine (Kelly and Sharron) where set upon by a Turkish reporter with wild fuzzy hair. That Hair i'd remember anywhere. Nassinin is but one turkish citizen in a city of approximately 14 million and i could pick her out of a crowd any where any time. Casually strolling up behind her i asked her if perhaps she could use my help. After looking at me for 2 seconds she recognized me and came screaming and running into my arms shouting oh my god! oh my god! oh my god!.
Now guys, it was nothing like that! We are just friends! Her poor old camera man was convinced that she had finally gone completely insane running into the arms of a strange western man in the middle of the blue mosk gardens. Anyway, after much talk about how impossibly remote the chances of running into each other was (I was planning on calling her that afternoon anyway) we finally got down to talking to Sharron and Kelly about exactly what we wanted them to do.
The Stage is set!
Every night on turkish television Show TV, a section is done on just how bad are turkish men at hassling foreigners. Anyway needless to say they are pretty pushy and have a very low opinion on how western women should be treated in general. The solution. 2 good looking western girls, 1 hidden camera, 1 hidden microphone and the stage is set for very good television and a few very embarrassed turkish gentlemen.
After succeeding in her goal to obtain her 5 minutes for tonight. Nassinin promptly trussed me up like a chicken and forced me into her Show TV van. 20 minutes later i was ushered through security assigned an official guest tag and i was walking through one of Istanbul's premier television and magazine studios. Greetings the news cast, the script writers, the pre and post production teams and finally meeting my old friends Korhan and Yasim i had the privilege to be given a crash course in how to create a news article from the 2 hours of tape by editing it down to 5 minutes. Basically it was my role to watch what they did and help translate the english that was the Canadians dialogue.
One hour later 8 phone calls, i was informed that i was going out for dinner! No problems here! After stopping off at a local Nargile bar (Turkish Water Pipe) we proceeded to head to Taxim where it turns out there were 10 people waiting to meet me only half of which i had previously met!
Lots of Raki, great food and the best company made for a fantastic day 2 to istanbul... but yes as for the sights... still haven't seen any yet! Oh well, i'm in no rush and there is always tomorrow, i'm having far more fun on my own!
As Always
Carpe Diem!
Ralph Bragg
Private Notes
Muge coming in a climbing into a hostel dorm room to greet me at 6:30 in the morning!
The next three days! The night in Taxim!