Driving along by the water, we get
glimpses of the city and, at one point, I am sure I spy her in the distance.
The water is grey, she barely blushes and then she is gone again. Trust
a Belgian, who just survived a horrendous Canadian winter, to land in a grey
Istanbul. But I don’t mind. Instead, I sit back and get lost in massive
fragments of the old Byzantine wall that still surrounds a good part of the
city.
“There she is again,” I whisper.
“No,” says my attentive husband. He may not have seen all
items offered on the movie menu of his monitor while on the plane but he knows
this city.
The plane. I had to look away during landing because I
got dizzy imagining its giant wings
shaving off the delicate roofs of the buildings that cover the land below like
a giant blanket. The memory of it almost makes me dizzy again so I look out and
marvel at the many mosques aspiring to greatness, imitating the Hagia Sophia
like younger sisters that leaner and prettier never quite manage to rival the
beauty of their majestic, yet still playful older sister. All the way to my new
home, I fancy she plays hide and go seek with me and, once there, I am no
longer sure it was her I spotted that first time.
What I do know, though, is that from now on, as I sit and
write these first words in my travelogue, I will never again mistake her. All I
need is to look up and I see her through my window. Across the Golden Horn she
rises from the trees, on one side the Sultan’s Palace and on the other her
younger sister, the sleek Blue Mosque. Between us lies the silver ribbon of
water where busy fishers cluster together in tiny boats, imitating the schools
of fish they set out to capture, so that they will not be ignored by their
bigger mates. Some of the many ships come from the Sea of Marmara that beckons
ahead, or go there; others shuttle people back and forth in a never-ending
dance that connects the European side of the city, where I will spend the
coming months, and the Asia Minor side where the rest of Istanbul disappears
into a world as unknown to me as the transparent fog that rises in the
distance.
#
In the afternoon we go for a
bit of shopping at the nearby supermarket. Such markets are called that not
because of their size, for it is modest, but because of the fact that they
offer everything a household needs to put food on the table, and keep the
house, the clothes, and the person clean. We stop at a snack bar for a
wonderfully light donair, followed by a tiny glass of sweetened tea flavoured
with a hint of Bergamot. It occurs to me that there are only men in the street,
men behind the counters; men around the tables. When I ask my wise husband
where the women are, he says, "In the kitchen."
After we take the groceries home he proposes we go for a
coffee, and a cigar for him. It will help, he assures me, with the much-needed
siesta. We end up only a street away from the grocery store but the scene is
very different here. It is trendy, with modest bistros and coffee houses, and
women. A woman waits on us, women laugh as they sit together or with men around
the many tables, women walk by in city clothes. Four women stroll by in jeans and
leather jackets, looking like biker chicks. Gorgeous women with long dark hair.
And good looking men. Even the older ones--there are no older women--whose
greying hair, or balding pate, only accentuates their strong features. I fancy one
of them to be Orhan Pamuk. After all, we are now practically neighbours. He
only lives ten minutes away.
On the way back, a clear voice breaks out in song, its
melody snaking its way through the narrow streets of Karakoÿ-Tophane. My skin
tightens and my heart soars until I realize I am too tired to keep aloft.
With one last longing look at the Hagia Sophia, I lay
myself down and wait for sleep to come in the middle of the day. Maybe I too
should have had a cigar because next to me my husband lies, oblivious to the
world.
As daylight wanes on my first day here, I am still
sitting by my window. Every time I look up the Bosphorus is busy: busy with
traffic, busy with moving water, busy with moving people and goods, busy with
birds, busy with changing hues of grey.
When the lights come on all colour drains away.
Then dark settles and the important buildings that
surround us light up. Across, on the Asia Minor side, fireworks go off. Behind
us a voice calls the faithful to evening prayer.
I think I have just been welcomed officially.
