The Virgin, Nameless Orgies, and Melon Balls: The Day of Rest

Sunday will go down in history as the best “academic” Sunday of my life. Michelle seconds that motion. Dane, Brad, Michelle, and I met in the lobby of Süperdorm at 8:40 and headed to the Pastane for some breakfast, and then caught a cab down the hill to Arnavutköy, which is where the ARIT (my scholarship people) office is located, in order to meet up with our group for the boat trip to the Princes’ Islands. We hopped out of the cab a bit early, because someone in the group who took the other cab (we met others from ARIT at breakfast) said they saw Greenwood, the fellow in charge of the program.

Turns out we were right across the street from our boat. We boarded, and after a fashion we were underway. The upper level had a huge tarp over it so we were in the shade, and there was free water, beer, juice, wine, snacks, tea, and coffee. It was shaping up to be a solid day. As we moved south along the Bosphorus, Professor Freely, an ancient man who knows everything there is to know about Istanbul, got on a microphone and started giving us a really interesting breakdown of what we were passing. The guy was rattling off dates and names like it was his job. Which makes sense. The kids from ARIT, meaning me, Dane, Michelle, and maybe a couple others were easily the youngest there (not counting the infant and the 7 year old), so Freely would preface some of the history with “some of you may remember World War II,” or something funny like that. At one point, he was looking straight toward the shore and said flatly, without changing his tone or rhythm as he gave his commentary, “None of you are listening to a thing I’m saying anyway, but I’ll keep talking…” I cracked up and let him know we were. The view from the boat was amazing, as usual. After we started heading into open water, and Prof. Freely started talking about more general history, Michelle, Dane, and I headed downstairs to the stern (ass of the boat) and sat in some of the chairs outside, watching the city shrink behind us. It happened so gradually we hardly noticed it, until at one point Dane said “Oh, I guess we have made some progress.” We were just chillaxing in the shade, getting our chat and joke on, telling funny stories, and so on. We passed a lot of smaller boats, bigger boats, sailboats, and seagulls, and it never got boring. A few times, one of us, mostly yours truly, would accidentally say “fuck” quite loudly just as the little kid wandered back toward us to get to the head (toilet, sailor. Shutup, pervert.). That almost made us laugh even more than a joke about Roma (you know, gypsies!) or Kurds. Almost.

Our first island stop was the tiny, almost barren island of Sivriada, where a bunch of tiny boats were anchored and people were swimming and listening to music, having a great time. I saw some bikinis, but there was more back hair than breast action going on there. It took us about an hour to get there. We got off and had a half an hour to explore, which we managed to do successfully. There were thorn bushes and cool views and rock faces exposed by mining. Not much in the way of wildlife, aside from small plants and a, uh…little…kratzilly…like a beetle. The sky was awesome, though. We were far enough away from the city that the smog wasn’t as obvious. It was weird on the ride there, you could see the kind of umbrella of grayish-brown hanging over the city like some kind of glass dome.

We hopped back on the boat and headed to Yassiada, which was larger, and was also more interesting for a few reasons: it was where Atatürk sent all the stray dogs of Istanbul to die, way back in the day. The island doesn’t have any natural water sources. It was also the site of the trial of former PM Adnan Menderes, who after the 1960 coup was tried and hanged in a gymnasium on the island, which we were able to go into. It was creepy. Also, there was a castle facade built on the Yassiada by some crazy Brit named Sir Henry Bulwar. Apparently, this castle was the site of many “nameless orgies,” as Prof. Freely informed us. The older folks continued making orgy jokes all day after that. It was awesome. We docked at a little wharf on a side of the island that was sheer and rocky. The stairs were narrow, and the drop on the side was steep and into the sea. It was a bit creepy and thorny, but we all made it alright. We headed past some old abandoned shitter, down a path to the hangman’s gym, which had a lot of pigeon feathers, graffiti, and ropes. Then we hit up the castle facade, and heard/saw a bunch of boats docked on the other side of the island rocking out to Russian techno. It sounded fun, but we didn’t have time to get over there to party. We had to be back to the ship in 45 minutes, so we headed back, and saw our ship out on the water, pulling away.

We panicked for a minute, but then I realized that they were just going in circles because the sea was too rough to anchor by the rocks. We climbed carefully down the steps to the dock, and waited for the boat to come back, which it did. Dane saw some reptiles, but we didn’t. That must mean he’s insane. We all got on the boat and waited for the others, who came sooner or later. I told the folks who had stayed onboard, Prof. Freely included, that I thought they were trying to shanghai us and pull around to the castle to “have some fun.” I get a kick out of dirty older people who laugh at sex jokes. Salty. We steamed (or dieseled, whatever) off to the next island, Burgazada, about 20 minutes away. It was bigger still, and one side of the steep hill had been recently ravaged by fire in 2003. It had some really fucking nice houses right on the waterfront, and I imagine it was one of the inhabitants of said houses that flicked a cigarette out of their elevator on the way to their boat that started the blaze. We anchored offshore and had lunch, which was tasty. It wasn’t fancy like the last boat trip. Mixed lunchmeat sandwiches, fruit, drinks, and delicious cookies and Doritos. The Doritos proved to be the most important part of the meal, as each bag had 2 free temporary tattoos in it. So Michelle suggested that I apply a fake Chinese character to the top of my chest, between my neck and the Phoenix. It looked (looks) sweet, and means nothing. Unless you ask me, in which case I will make something up. I told one of the older folks on the boat that it meant “good deeds are the only path to nirvana,” and someone else that it meant “free with purchase of large soft drink.” I slapped another on my left arm, and then four of us shared one featuring four hearts with angel wings. We’re kind of a violent gang now, and our first task was to set out looking for recruits.

The obvious choice was Professor Freely, and after nominating Priya to approach him, we went upstairs and waited until he wasn’t talking with someone. Michelle and Priya asked him if he’d care to join our tattoo gang, and he said “I’ve always wanted a tattoo! I almost got one done back when I was in the Navy during the war, but the fellow in front of me was having a rather large one done on his chest, and I ran out of time.” So I snapped some photos of Priya applying it to his 80 year old arm, and then got a picture of Michelle, him, and Priya showing them off for the camera. It’s probably one of the funniest things I’ve ever witnessed. Our tats turned out to be pretty popular among the old folks, who apparently had tried applying some to their own bodies with limited success (one woman had part of one on her shoulder, and another part on her leg.). I was paraded around by a friendly older chap and answered questions about how to best apply them for anyone who asked. I also met a woman named Melinda, who was married to a Turk and lived in Istanbul, but was originally from Oklahoma. She asked me if I was the one with the “Sioux” heritage on the boat today. What? Apparently there was a redhead somewhere with some Native American blood in him. I informed her that I was a modest mix of Scotch and Brandy, and we chatted about Genghis Khan and Chinese sailors and things for a while. She suggested getting a paid internship with a German company based in Istanbul someday, because her son went to the German high school in Istanbul and was doing that. He speaks German all day at work, and Turkish at night. Sounds awesome. Then, apparently, I spoke with a guy named Chase who is a PhD student at Georgetown. I swear to God, I don’t remember talking to him, but Michelle and Dane insist that I did for about 20 minutes. I think they were huffing or something, and were completely out of it. Had to have been.

We ended up at the largest island we were going to visit, Heybeliada, around 3:00. This island is home to lots of people, and has some hotels and a part of the natural bay was used as a swimming area with sweet inflatable slides and stuff. It was busy busy. We got off the boat on one side of the island, and were to walk across the island and meet the boat at the other side (by the swimming area). The first thing I noticed upon getting off the boat was the smell. Horse shit. Horse shit-stink so heavy it slows you down while you walk.

It’s because cars are not allowed on the island, and the only means of transport aside from boats or the occasional municipal vehicle (garbage trucks and fire engines) are horse-drawn carriages, called faytolar. They are pulled by a team of two horses and seat about 4-6 people. They fucking fly, too. One woman in our group almost got run over by one. Did I mention that they, like the taxis, don’t stop for pedestrians? We walked along the main road a bit, and I saw a sweet golden bust of Atatürk in front of a white building, and immediately pulled out my camera to snap a photo. As soon as I pointed it, two military men dressed in whites shouted “No!” at me, and everyone in the group looked at me, horrified. Turns out right behind the bust was a sign that said “Absolutely No Photographs!” in English, German, Turkish, and Greek. So sue me. I was just really excited, I explained to Melinda, because it was a huge bust, and it was made of gold, which makes it even more impressive. Whatever, it’s their loss. I was going to show that bust to everyone and give Turkish nationalism all kinds of free advertising.

We headed past some really old wooden houses and ended up in the Greek church of Saint Nicholas, which was really, really gaudy and ornate but interesting. When we set off on the boat trip earlier that morning, I had told all the ARIT kids that I would pay one American Dollar to whomever saw an image of the Virgin Mary in the sweat patterns on the back of my t-shirt first. On the boat, someone saw Klimt’s “The Kiss,” but no Virgin. So I figured I would have someone check again in the church, because that would make sense, right? I mean, it would be completely logical to expect the image of the Virgin Mary to appear on my back in the church, of all places. So as someone was checking, one of the funny older guys came up to me and said “you’re not the only one who’s hot, you know. Quit your bitching,” and then slapped the back of my head with his hat. We all started laughing, and then we realized that Mary was a no show. Damn it. Michelle and I ended up talking shop with the guy for a bit, Catholicism, falan, yani. The church had paintings of the dragonslaying saints in it, which was cool, and its high altar was hidden behind a fancy wall and curtain, which was much more exclusive than any Catholic church I’ve been in. I guess the Roman Catholics like to show off the magic. In the lobby, Sylvia Hanim (yeah, she was with us!) told me and Michelle that the little figurings slipped into the frames of the paintings were offetory prayers, either for someone who died or was sick, or for a house that burned down, and so on. Pretty cool.

We walked up a road a bit and came to the summer house of a certain Ismet Inönü, one of the dinosaurs of Turkish Republican history, and one of the longest serving prime ministers probably anywhere in the world. The house was really nice inside, and well kept by the staff there. The room for his grandkids still had the old furniture in it, complete with the stickers or plasters that the kids had put on them, including some really old Snow White stickers. It was cool. There was a garden out back, and there was a canary in a cage. I asked the woman who tended the house what its name was, but it was pretty long and I forget it. Something -çik. She told us it could talk, but really she meant it could repeat melodies if you whistled enough at it. It was bright yellow and looked really cool hanging in the cage from the vines and tree branches that covered much of the backyard. The kitchen of the house still has the original refrigerator, which was a Frigidaire, which made my heart sing and reminded me of Pat’s camp. I’ll be there soon enough.

We walked a bit further and ended our tour at the Halki Hotel with free cookies and tea. Delicious, even though some of the cookies were actually salty. Interesting. The view was really nice, of course. We said our goodbyes to the island and walked down to the pier. The ride back was equally hilarious, even though the only thing left to drink onboard for a while was white wine. As we got to the Bosphorus, we hugged the Asian side and Professor Freely gave us his take on the architecture and everything. The oldest mosque on the Asian side was very tiny, and apparently there’s a legend that the sea birds don’t land on it. I watched it the whole time as we passed, and sure enough, no birds landed on it. Maybe because the roof is electrified or something. But there wasn’t any bird shit on it at all. Pretty neat. Allah-hu akbar!

Some of our party jumped ship in Asia at a hotel right on the water, including Sylvia Hanim. We continued to Bebek pier, but before we docked, I ran downstairs to take a pee in the bathroom, so I could say I “yap’d in the Bogaz.” It was quite satisfying. We caught cabs back up to the top of the hill and met up again for dinner. The destination was some manti restaurant. Manti is like the Turkish version of ravioli, but its texture is closer to gnocchi. Delicious. Just when the night couldn’t get any better, we went to Venus, the pastane across the street, and got a couple toplar (balls) of dondurma. Turns out what I thought was peach was, in fact, cantalope melon flavored ice cream. I about shit my pants when I tasted it with my strawberry ice cream. Amazing. Absolutely amazing. The night wound down to a close gradually, and Michelle showed me a ton of really cool Star Wars tattoos on the internet. Some of them are small enough that I could totally see myself getting one on the ass someday. Wouldn’t that be about the hottest thing imaginable? Sunday ended. Holy shit. I managed to escape relatively unburnt, but I have a fierce tan line where my watch sits on my wrist. I love it. Peace out. I am about to go to Taksim with Michelle to meet her friend and get some dessert, inşallah. I got my hair cut again today for 6 YTL, or $4. Take that, $17 in Georgetown! It’s sex. Take care.