On Boats...

Being back from Istanbul, I am longing for boats. Journeys by water. One funny anecdote. As we were ferrying up the Bosphorus to the Black Sea, I heard a man next to me say in Italian. "Istanbul reminds me of Brooklyn." I couldn't resist. "Brooklyn?" I asked him, laughing. Here I was in the most exotic place I could imagine and the guy next to me says it looks like Brooklyn. But then we chatted and in fact it does with its bridges and waterways and ferry boats. Istanbul did remind me of home. And if I could, I would only travel by boat. There is a wonderful passage by Henry Miller in the Colossus of Maroussi when he flies to Crete and has deep regret. He wishes his journey had been longer. He wishes he'd traveled by boat. Below I'm sharing several images of boats. I especially like the last one, not as a photographic image, but for its content. Two horses are being transported on a small Turkish ferry. You can see modern-day Istanbul, looming in the background.

Boats

A Free Day

Yesterday was a free day. I don't only mean that I was free, but the whole day was, it seemed. The weather was beautiful, and, the truth is, I've got a serious case of spring fever. I haven't gotten a lick of work done in the past week and I'd been spending most of my time, wandering the city, sniffing the daffodils, planting windowboxes of my own. Dreamy, restful, but not very productive stuff.

So when my beloved, and outstanding, travel agent (who definitely belongs in this blog because she had literally gotten us around the world), Susan Levine informed me on Wednesday that she had free tickets to see the Magic Flute the following night and she couldn't use them, I said sure, I'd take them. Actually it turned out there were four tickets and I spent what little free time I had on Wednesday, calling friends and trying to give them away. With no takers.

Then my dear friend, Nancy, emailed to say that a former friend of hers, a film make named Mark Wexler, was screening his new film at the Director's Guide which was not so far from Lincoln Center in Thursday from 6-8, and it too was free, and, if I was free, which I was, I could see Nancy to boot, so why not make an evening of it? Then Nancy told me that Mark Wexler is the son of the great cinematographer, Haskell Wexler, who coincidentally is the best childhood friend of my cousin, Barney Rosset, and who also stole Barney's high school girlfriend away and married her so, given all of this, I felt I had to go.

That morning, knowing I wasn't going to get much done, I met another friend, Susan, for a morning walk along the Battery, that turned into lunch and the early afternoon so I rushed home, showered, changed, headed out, went to pick up the free tickets to the opera, then met Nancy at the Parker Meridian Bar which is decorated with silk curtains and lounge chairs that reminded me of the Topkapi harem I'd visited just weeks before (more on the harem soon).

Nancy and I found a nice table for ourselves, but as the waitress came to take our order, Nancy had a lot of trouble deciding between the smoked salmon sandwich and the vegie sandwich and the waitress didn't really know what they had so she said she'd check. Meanwhile she brought us our water and me my glass of wine.

Just then a handsome man with a shock of gray hair, dressed all in black, asked if we were going to see the film and if we were with meetup.com which we knew nothing about, but it turns out that it was a kind of single's way for meeting people, but we infact were not part of the meetup.com group. Still the handsome man wanted to join us, but we had to rebuff him as Nancy and I had stories to share. We began tossing around tales from our love life, our health issues, our money and the lack of it. our friends, everyone we knew in common, her brother, my daughter...

Maybe I'm free associating here. But next thing we knew our waitress returned with not one, but both sandwiches saying that since we hadn't really been able to decided she brought us both and one was on her. Meanwhile I'd given Nancy a free copy of a friend's book because I'd gotten two in the mail and told Nancy that it was all a part of my free day.

The movie which I loved is called How to Live Forever. You have to see it and laugh, but I had to leave early because I had these tickets to the Met and I also had two that I couldn't give away to friends, though I'd tried. Karma seemed to be working so I decided to get the extra tickets to someone who wanted them, but I got to the Met at 7:55 and held up my tickets, and an elderly woman with a West Indian accent approached and asked how much and I told her they were free because they'd been free to me. "A gift," I told her as she looked at the tickets. "Orchestra," she cried, tears in her eyes.

I sat next to her (since I'd given her those seats) with Larry beside me and we loved the Opera, though I had to a lot of money for two glasses of rose champagne, but who cares because nothing else had cost anything.

As the curtain came down, Larry and I headed to the subway, the spell of the Met still in our minds, the wonder of dancing bears and flying food and a mythic bird with three spirit children on its back, a birds who come to life, and find love and a magic flute. A Chinese man ahead of us stroked his metrocard, then he stepped back from the turnstyle. He spoke very little English, but enough to say, "Go."

Go? He made a grand gesture with his hand.

For whatever reason this man decided not to take the train. So we even got a free ride home!

Harem

My Turkish Bath

I was told I couldn't leave Turkey without having a Turkish bath. I was resistant. I had more things I wanted to do and see. I wanted to walk through Topkapi once more. Besides I wasn't even sure I wanted a Turkish bath. It would mean a scrub and a soaping and I am more a massage oil kind of girl, but who could resist a 700 year old hamam (ie Turkish bath), built by the architect Hayreddin in 1475 that had been in continual use every since. It seemed like one of those things you had to do. And it was right near the Grand Bazaar where I'd had yet to venture.

So on my last day, at the last hour, really, I decided to go. A driver picked me up at five o'clock at my hotel. He was young and unshaven and he tossed his cigarette away as I got into the car. I was starting to have more doubts even as he explained that he was late because traffic was so bad and he'd take the back roads. As he wound his way through the narrow streets of Istanbul, I plied him with questions until he told me that his family had owned the hamam for generations and that now it was his father's and soon it would be his. But he seemed disaffected. His car smelled of smoke and something else and he was hesitant to talk to me. I suspected the worst, but Fatih at my hotel had told me that the Gedikpasa Bath was one of the best.

As we drove we negotiated a price. I didn't really want the scrub/soap thing. I mean I bathe daily so what was the point? What I wanted was a nice oily rub, the kind I was used to. Besides I had fallen flat on my face in Istanbul just days before so I just wanted someone to make me feel good for the flight home. Oil massage alone, 30 Turkish lira, plus use of the bath, so many lira, but with soap and scrub...etc. Well, when in Rome, I told him I'd go for the soap and scrub, and then maybe we could end with an oil massage. Agreed, he said as we pulled into a narrow street. Then he pointed to a flight of stairs that disappeared into a darkened building. You go down here, he told me. And he was gone.

I made my way down the dingy staircase, not sure of what lay at the bottom, but, opening the door, I walked into a large, warm, steamy room where I prepaid for my services and then was taken to a door. This was perhaps the lady and the tiger moment, but the door opened and a woman wearing a long gray sweater (and it was very hot now) took me by the hand as if I was her long lost daughter. She led me into a large room where two enormous women were sipping chai. No one looked up at me. The woman, whose name was Fatia (perhaps female for conqueror???) gave me a plaid Turkish bath wrap and showed me to my dressing room where I took off everything, wrapped the plaid thing around me, and as I emerged was led once again by Fatia into a very very warm, steamy room.

In the middle of the room was a large marble slab where an opulent woman was being slathered in soap and rubbed down. She lay completely naked and exposed, and her masseuse wore only a thong and very skimpy bra. The room itself was a very tall, dingy domed structure with lots of sinks around the periphery. Before I could turn around and leave, Fatia took me to the sauna, told me to relax for ten minutes, and left me.

Ten minutes can be a long time if you don't know what's coming next and I certainly didn't expect what I saw. But after what seemed like an interminable wait a very large almost naked woman, dressed only in a thong that disappeared beneath her rolls of fat, came to get me. She was braless and her enormous flowing breasts hung from her mother earth body as she took me by the hand.

"Come," she said.

I followed her to the marble slab where several women were now being scrubbed and soaped. "My name is Nazia," said my guide. And with that she removed my bath towel which she placed on the marble slab and motioned for me to lie down. What choice did I have? A goddess was commanding me and I obeyed.

I lay face down as Nazia, who had now put on some kind of a bra, proceeded to scrub every inch of me with a rough glove. From and back, face, feet, underarms, you name it. Nazia turned and twisted me and when she was done, put me back on my face and proceeded to wash. With what seemed to me some kind of oily soap that somehow comes out of what appears to be a pillow case, Nazia slathered me and washed every inch of me. She didn't miss a crack or cranny. She gathered me in her arms and, with my face sunk into her ample breasts, she washed my back, my thighs and the rest of me. Whenever she wanted me to turn, she made a high-pitched kissing sound (all the masseuses did) that I later learned is how a Turkish mother kisses her baby).

I relaxed in her arms. We had no language between us, but I honestly don't think I've ever been this close to a woman before. Not physically at any rate. But it was more than that. I melted in the heat in her arms. I was completely comfortable with my face pressed against her breasts. Then she made that strange smacking sound and once more took me by the hand and led me to a sink by the side of the hamam. "Douce," she told me.

I wasn't exactly sure what was expected, but Nazia sat at a nearby sink where she took a small plastic container and poured water over her breasts and down the front of her thong. She had been sniffling during our treatment and I watched as she blew her nose into her hand, then rinsed that off as well. Normally this would repulse me, but I loved her. What more can I say? I really loved her.

When we were done, she took me once again by the hand back to the marble slab and told me once again to lie down. And then she disappeared. I had no idea where she had gone, but I was cold and wet and lay for what seemed like a long time to me on that marble slab. Other masseurs were working on other women (I should add that this was the woman only part of the bath), but no one paid me any heed.

Then the door opened and Fatia appeared, out of her long gray sweater, transformed into a leopard-skin bikini with Nazia no where in sight. I had no idea really what was happening, but suddenly Fatia was pouring hot oil all over my body and rubbing me and Nazia returned and for an all too brief moment the two women worked on my back. For hands swirling over my muscles. This must be heaven, I thought, until Nazia withdrew. She blew a kiss to me on her hand. "Bye bye," she said.

"Where are you going?" I asked her for I had become unnaturally attached. She was now my mother.

She made the international gesture of going home to sleep and once more blew me a kiss as Fatia continued to massage and oil me and then when she was done, much to my chagrin, she did another one of those soapings again until I was cleaner than I'd ever been since I was perhaps two years old. Then Fatia took me to the sink where she washed and scrubbed my scalp and poured water over me until I thought I would just lie down on the floor of the Turkish bath and rest.

But that was not to be. When she was done, she dunked me in a cold bath and left me there. Then stuff me into the sauna one more time for good measure until like a roast in the oven I was done.

When I left the bath, it was late. Dark out already and the Grand Bazaar was closed. I wasn't hungry so I took the tram back to my room where I watched Harry Potter in Turkish and, somehow understood every word, until I drifted off to sleep.

Tea Sugar A Dream

I seem to be learning Turkish. I've learned that bay is man and bayan is woman and Fatih, which you see everywhere, is Conqueror. But after ten days or so I can't manage to say please or thank you. Hello or good-bye. The basic pleasantries are lost on me. But thank you, which it seems to me is the most important of all, next to please and perhaps excuse me, seems beyond my reach. I've tried and tried, but I cannot say it.

I have always been good in language. In high school where I did not particularly excell we were administered a language aptitude test in Kurdish (coincidentally). We were given an hour to study grammar and vocabulary and then tested on our retention. I was off the charts. Not so with English or math, but in languages I always scored very high. But now in Turkey I was challenged.

For years I had traveled to places where I spoke the language quite well. Latin America, France, Italy. When I went from Beijing to Berlin by rail, I took some time to learn the basics of Chinese, Russian, and German, and I still can remember what I learned. But now I was in Asia Minor and at the mercy of a language that had no antecedents for me. I was grateful that Ataturk changed the Turkish alphabet from Arabic to Roman, but beyond that I was clueless.

On the other hand there were obstacles presented by the Turks. For example I did not order the "lethal" soup on the menu. And I was befuddled by the wine list in which the English side of the menu was identical to the Turkish. And an interesting moment occured as I tried to explain to our charming desk clerk (named Fatih) what "cold turkey" meant.

Perhaps the low moment came as the man in the phone store tried to explain to me in very very slow Turkish how to activate my new phone. Or in the cab as the driver sped away from Istanbul, listening as I panicked in the backseat, even as he was taking me to the destination I had asked for.

Finally someone helped me out. To say thank you, he explained, just say tea sugar a dream. Tea sugar a dream. I said it over and over. And somehow this phrase seems to encapsulate everything we lived in those two short weeks. Something about it rang true. Now I need to learn you are welcome.

Arabian Nights

Larry had to get back to New York, but I stayed on for five days. It was rather lonely, especially at night. But I found myself entranced by the darkness and the light. All the monuments beautifully lit. I know it's a cliche, but the gulls soaring all around. The strange music playing. Gypsies on the streets begging. And the call to prayer at midnight. At dawn.