My Istanbul, a strange love story

I once saw the tip of Africa far away behind the mist, from Gibraltar. The only other time I’ve ever been between two continents, staring from one into the other, was one summer in the Port of Istanbul.

A city of contrasts and a meeting point for Asian and European cultures, Istanbul has a quality that doesn’t betray it’s particular geography. As soon as you enter the blue-green Bosphorus, the domes of its grand mosques dominate the scene, endowing it with an almost fairy-tale-like quality; this is a land of princesses and rich palaces, of sultans and their well-guarded harems, of magic carpets and a thousand fascinating tales. When the night falls, the sound of prayer rises and fills the air with its dreamy tones. It is sheer beauty to watch the sunset, while listening to the beautiful music of the Mosque.

When the song is over, you can walk into one of Istanbul’s most traditional spots: the Nargile alley. This is where Turkish men come to watch soccer matches, sitting comfortably on the lush colourful pillows of gold and red and green, around the low wooden tables, smoking Nargile and playing backgammon in their traditional hats, with their long beards and their westernized clothes.

After a taste of Nargile, you can either head to Galata Tower for a bellydancing show with the most entrancing view of Istanbul by night, or check out the hip pub area of TAKSIM Square.

One night, I just wandered past the Nargile alley and the Mosque into empty nondescript streets. Among the ugly buildings and soiled sidewalks, I started hearing the persistent bass drum of traditional Turkish music. I started looking around dark frightening alleys, searching for the source of my pleasure. Alone in a strange place, the last thing you wanna do is glide into a dark alley, but, so I did, lured in by the entrancing music.

My friend Nancy, who always made friends with old men in square hats named Ahmed, who, of course, told her stories, had told me about the Turkish circumsition ritual. Turkish boys were circumsized at the beginning of puberty, when it was not exactly a painless affair. One look at the alley crowd, the boys in tall hats and blue-golden costumes, the women´s jingly scarves, the musicians, the garlands and the coloured light bulbs and I knew I was at a circumsition feast.


In the middle of a big circle of neighbours, relatives and onlookers, women and children were dancing. The music, the joy and spontaneity of the people were such a gift to me; the women were not skinny and blonde like the belly-dancers at Galata, but they were unquestionably more beautiful, and there wasn’t a tourist in sight.

This was the last I saw of that magnificent city before sailing away; the dark-haired women in vaporous white skirts and lavender jingly scarves, surrounded by their children in red and blue and gold, gracefully dancing into the depths of the cool Istanbul night.