Paco´s Life: Madrid

Istanbul

29 December 2006 11:24 AM | In Istanbul, Nightlife, Travel |

Istambul, nice city located in the union of the european and asian continents. I think I said many times this is a year for travelling and, as far as I can remember, I always spent New Year´s Eve in Madrid so I decided this was a good chance to break this rule. As usual, the ICEX steel partners were ready for the call and 14 of us attended the Istanbul meeting. Apart from the usual suspects: Guerri – Warsaw, Chelo – Dublin, Julia – Istanbul, Nuria – Vilnius and Manuel – Paris, we had new people showing up; a few big night punishers such as Beni – Tel Aviv, Jesús – Moscow and Javi Bucharest and some people who could not make it for the other meetings like Elena – Athens and Rubén – Teheran. Fortunately Julia had two flats available in the same building, at least in theory, so we fit. As soon as I got to the city, Beni was waiting for me with a drink already prepared. With a welcome like this you immediately feel at home, this first night out proved Moscow and Bucarest night skills and also gave us a taste of the Turkish night. The environment is kinda curious, plenty of bars everywhere and people on the street. However you have to negociate prices for the drinks so they don’t cheat you and the feeling is still a bit machist. For example, there was a moment I was dancing (yes, sometimes I do dance) close to a turkish girl without any evil intention of course and then there was this guy coming to me and saying very politely that I should not get so close, that his brother was around and that was not the way things work in that country. No hard feelings neither bad attitude from him but he makes clear YOU are foreign there and there are some things you can´t do. Anyway, it was already very late and there isn’t much to say about the night. We discovered a place closed to Julia´s home for eating Turkish food. Sort of kebabs but slightly different, we got adictive to something called urfa, like a roll with meat and more stuff inside. The place was funny, as soon as you sit down you were served a dish with the most spicy green chillies I ever tried. I don’t know if you were supposed to eat them alone or put them into the urfa. The next night, been very drunk, we challenged each other to see who could eat more, very bad for the stomach… We also met a funny local, very old and full of alcohol who took a seat with us. A pity he did not speak any English other ways I am sure he would have told us plenty of interesting stories.

Dublin, Moscow and me getting to Istanbul

Stockholm, Dublin, Tel Aviv and Moscow

Our turkish friend

All tourism pictures hereNext morning, been culture lovers people as all ICEX are, we went to visit the city that is definitely beautiful. Plenty of Turkish churches all over form Istanbul landscape, the view from a high point is awesome. It is funny also to hear all over the city the call for praying early in the morning. Funny but also dangerous if you are next to a guy like Beni – Tel Aviv that, been a little drunk, joined the chorus, showing Julia´s neighbors how faithful he is. Anyway, back to Istambul, the city is divided by the Bosforouso, a strait which marks the border between the European and the Asiatic part. On the other side you have the main Turkish churches and the Great Bazaar. We visited Santa Sofia church and the Basilica Cistern, amazing subterranean space, used in ancient times for storing the water which is filtered through the roof. Very nice… We ended the tourist itinterary at the Istanbul Great Bazaar, huge commercial area full of every kind of shops. Here the girls went shopping as it could be expected. Moscow, Bucharest and me thought it was a better idea to have some beers so we went to a bar Bucharest knew from a previous visit to the city. The waiter there happened to be a very great guy, he remembered Javi from the previous visit (which was one year ago), he was a very clever fella, he even remembered what Javi had drunk that day and who he was going with. Besides, he could speak a very correct Spanish that I am sure he had learnt only by speaking with customers and some other languages. From time to time he sit down to speak to us, without been annoying at all. The other waiter there was also very cool, every time he was serving us a beer he was having one himself so he had quite a few. Honestly, a great place, makes you feel at home. And they were not so friendly because of getting our money, the invited us to some French fries and the guy even refused the tip we tried to give him. Before leaving we took some pictures and got his email address. I would recommend the bar to anyone hanging around in the Great Bazaar.