First Day in Istanbul

Today was a very interesting first day in Istanbul.  I slept in a little bit because I had to go see a speaker on the ship for my cross-cultural psychology class about virginity testing and honor killing in Turkey.  The speaker was a woman from a shelter in Turkey called Purple Shelter that works for increased women’s rights and helps women who may no longer be virgins.  It was an interesting presentation but the speaker used an interpreter so sometimes it was hard to follow because the interpreter would mess up the English sometimes.  After the presentation I ate lunch on the ship with Andrea before beginning our adventurous day.

We left the port and decided that we would go check out the Turkish Bath houses.  There are several, but one in particular seemed touristy and clean because it was in all the guide books, so we asked the cab driver to take us there.  He dropped us off and we are pretty sure he didn’t really know where the place was because he made a gesture indicating it was just somewhere around where he dropped us off.  We were in a pretty main touristy district and the streets were lined with shops so we were sort of walking around and looking at stuff and trying to ask people where the bath house was.  People in Istanbul were very into bothering you to come into their store if you were American because they know that you have money with you to spend.  It was hard to not be rude sometimes, but we just tried to keep walking generally.

We finally found the bath house (called Cemberlitas Hamam) and checked it out to make sure it looked nice and it did so we bought the basic package that included the 15min soap rub down.  Basically we went into the building and there were lots of old Turkish ladies telling you where to go so we went up the stairs where they gave each of us a locker and there was a place to change into your swimsuit.  Andrea and I put on our full swimsuit, but they also gave you a sarong thing in case you decided to go topless.  We went back downstairs and into the steam room that is apparently an original dome that was built in 1584.  It really was a beautiful room with stars and moons cut out from the ceiling for light.  Then an attendant lays your sarong down somewhere on the giant heated marble slab and you lay down on your stomach.  You lay there for a little bit to start sweating and the attendant prepares for your bath.  She comes over and makes you take off your top (so that was fun) and then unknowingly comes up behind you and dumps buckets of water on you.  Then she rubs you down with soapy water on both sides and then exfoliates you with a special scrubber on both sides which actually did feel good afterwards.  Then the last thing was the soap suds – they have some crazy thing that makes soapy water turn into pure suds and they squeeze them all over you and rub that around a little with a little massaging but not that much.  In between all the steps she generally dumps buckets of water on you which is kind of awkward since you never know when/where they are coming from.  Then you stand up and walk over to the water spout and she flung a bucket of water pretty much at my face and then had me sit down and she shampooed my hair (more like just threw some shampoo on it and let it run down into my eyes while dousing me with more and more buckets of water).  Then I was finally done so I was able to go to the cold water pools.  This was just another side room with swimming pools (chlorine and everything) to sit in after being in the hotter room for a while.  It felt good and I snuck my swimsuit top back on and waited there for Andrea.  When she was done she was pretty much just as freaked out as I was so we left like immediately.  Apparently you can hang out and lie on the marble and go back in the pool as much as you want, but we really just wanted to leave all the scary Turkish ladies.  So we went back upstairs and changed back into our clothes.  They also had hairdryers which was nice so we weren’t complete messes when we left.  It was definitely an interesting cultural experience and I’m glad I went otherwise I would have wondered about it, but I don’t ever have to do that again…ever.

After the bath Andrea was so freaked out that she just wanted some comfort American food so we settled for a Mexican restaurant called Torito.  It wouldn’t have been my first choice of restaurant but I wasn’t even eating so I didn’t really care.  Andrea had a variety plate of tacos and shared one with me, and then the server brought us some apple tea on the house.  The tea tasted really good, the only problem being that it was hot tea and we were eating outside where it was also very hot.  After lunch there was an ice cream stand right on the street corner that we had been watching throughout the meal.  My Cross-Cultural Psychology professor had told us about the ice cream so I knew I wanted to try it.  It is different from regular ice cream in that it is still cold but the consistency is more like a soft chewy caramel.  You have to like bite through the ice cream rather than just lick it.  I had a cone of chocolate and it was such an interesting texture but still very good.

After lunch we decided that we had had enough cultural experiences for the day and headed back to the ship.  We really just wanted to shower after our supposed bath that left our hair coated with kind of disgusting shampoo.  The taxi back took a while because there was a bridge closed and tons of traffic.  We finally made it back to the ship around 4:30pm and showered before going to dinner on board.  I spent the rest of the night working on the paper I had to write about the presentation from the morning.  I figured it would be easier to knock it out while the information was fresh in my mind.  Since we have 5 days here, none of us are feeling extremely rushed to see everything because we have plenty of time.  As of right now I have a kind of crazy whirlwind impression of Turkey, but tomorrow I am touring the palaces of Istanbul with SAS, so that should be a little more like what I am used to.