New Years

We were invited to go visit one of the downtown areas in Istanbul for the festivous occasion. I was excited to hear about it and very excited about the idea, but as soon as I mentioned it to some of my co-workers the bombs began dropping. DANGER DANGER DANGER!!!! Apparently Taksim, the area we were gonna visit, gets extremely crowded and chances of SOMETIHNG happening are extremely high. I've heard that from a few of my non Turkish co-workers and so naturally not being convinced by the gossips of others I went on the internet to do my own research, which resulted in nothing more but guided advices on how to best spend your new years in Istanbul, or the places to go and visit when in the area of Taksim. So once again I was back on the market asking around about what is up for the holidays and same story, but this time coming from the Turkish part of the population, which in the end was convincing enough to dissuade me from the trip across the continents. The most convincing part was the possibility of my wife being groped in a public and extremely crowded area. I can take care of myself and can handle my own problems but my wife being groped about wasn't just appealing enough for me. I guess the situation would be if she actually enjoyed being groped by strangers. Not the case however. So a house party with co-workers it is.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you have any questions regarding living in Istanbul or the city in general, just leave it in the comment section. I will try and do my best to answer your question.

Traveling

No stay in any place would be a good one without checking out more than that one city. During the first week of December, Turkey celebrates the holiday of Bayram, an Islamic holiday which carries an importance similar to that of Christmas in the Christian world.

During Bayram animals such as sheep and cows are sacrificed and the meat is shared with the poor people of the country. The origins of the tradition are written down in the Koran, and came from a man, whose name I don’t know, was asked to sacrifice his son in the name of God and when an angel showed up, or in the Koran may have been some other being, and told the man that sacrificing his own son was not necessary and that an animal would suffice, the man happily obliged.

For those asking themselves, “What the?” yes this story is the exact same story as that of a man written about in the Holy Bible.

So since the opportunity came knocking and a 9 day long holiday was just what the man prescribed, we decided to pack our bags and head out.

Bayram Travel

Be forewarned, when traveling by bus during Bayram. On any given day it is possible to just waltz into the Istanbul Otogar, main bus station, and choose to buy your tickets from one of the 164 odd vendors, without having to worry that you may not find anything. During Bayram the story is a bit more complicated.

Since it is a big national holiday and since Istanbul is Turkey’s biggest city, people tend to book their tickets months ahead of time. By the time we walked into the immense space of the bus station, which was around 6pm on a Saturday, the place was crowded with people sitting on their bags, eating food, loitering in front of the numerous ticket offices giving ,me an overall feeling that I may indeed have come too late to purchase tickets. We started off in a near frenzy nearly running from office to office trying to get a couple of tickets heading for the Southern coast of Turkey. The plan was to take the bus down to Antalia and go from there. It took us a half hour or so before we were approached by a man who said he knew where to find tickets. He made a phone call and made us run after him to a nearby office, which as it turned out, did indeed have tickets for sale.

Commissions and Scams

In a rush we stepped into the travel office and were sponsored by our rescuer who told us that his fee would be 10 YTL (Turkish Lira), which is approximately 5 Euro. I thought that in the moment of need and that without him we would have spent a really long time searching or possibly would have given up all together ten lira was a fair price for this little service.

The set of events that follow were a bit confusing to me at the moment of their occurance and I would like to convey them here with a similar sense of confusion.

The travel agent charged me 150 YTL for two one way tickets to Antalia.

Our temporary search agent took us inside the room and showed us the way upstairs, to a separate waiting room. We had 4 hours to wait before the departure and spending those 4 hours inside a possibly very smoky room was a rather unappealing concept, that and we were hungry as hell. So I declined, to which he responded with an interesting gesture of hand which reminded me of a really long beard. That meant it was time to pay up.

At that moment I stopped and stared, because I was pretty sure that the travel agent had already included our man’s 10 YTL finders price in our 150 YTL ticket price. It took me a couple of seconds before the veil of stupification subsided. After my vision returned to focus I saw the same man standing in front of me with an expectant look on his face. I dag out the 10 YTL and handed it over to him. Today I really believe he had thrown some spell over me.

He hurried out of the office and back into the dimly illuminated bus station. We decided to follow and get some food in one of the restaurants. But something was eating at the back of my mind, a feeling that we had been swindled. I was fairly certain that the travel agent had said the price for the tickets was 70 YTL/ person, which was 10 YTL more than what I had paid. So one of them dudes had managed to pull a scam on our unexperienced asses. I checked the tickets, which clearly had a price of 70YTL printed on them, which meant that I just had paid 20YTL above the agreed price.

First we went to eat, no use in worrying about things on an empty stomach. Next we headed down to the travel agent. He said that the tickets were indeed 70YTL and that the additional 10 YTL were for the Temporary Agent, whom I had given another 10 YTL due to my being as gullible as the next best tourist.

I respect a man making a 10YTL profit of other peoples time in need, but 20 YTL for a 3 minute walk and a 5 minute talk was simply too much.

My wife kept telling me to let it go and not make any troubles, but the idea of being a sucker once again was eating away in me and there was no way I was going to let it go.

We marched right back to the place where the man found us. Walking up the busy sidewalk, people sitting, standing, smoking, talking, drinking Turkish tea, carrying luggage, laughing, watching, advertising, bargaining and just being submerged in the overall chaos of the moment I saw the man walking towards me carrying a suitcase and another older man following close on his heels. I saw his face and I could tell that he saw mine because his expression instantaneously took on that look of someone who had not expected to get caught and now suddenly was facing the pursuers.

I stopped him mid stride, and simply told him to give me back my 10YTL, to which he responded in a raised and excited voice asking “What money!” I guess it would have been more difficult for me to prove his guilt had he remained calm. The man whose suitcase our scam artists was carrying happened to speak pretty good English and translated the whole episode to him.

I guess the 10YTL wasn’t worth all the money he could make in as well as his reputation as a businessman, which is why he finally after a rather heated 10minute discussion asked me what it is that I wanted. I told him I wanted my 10lira back, to which he pulled out his bundle of cash and handed over the note. I thanked both him and the man who translated and span around on my heal, away from them. I AINT NO SUCCA!!!! 1 for Jacek, dozens more to come for the Turkish business men....

If you have any questions regarding living in Istanbul or the city in general, just leave it in the comment section. I will try and do my best to answer your question.