Salvador made my day, Turkey didn't.

Hello Joofers,

Disclaimer: My apologies to all Turks that I know and love but I was quite frustrated today. Of course these observations do not extend to all Turks.

As a little background info, my favorite artist for years has been Salvador Dali. It is in fact why I originally became interested in Spain.

Today Rana and I got up early and headed to the Salvador Dali Exhibit that has been on display in Istanbul for about a month now. Time and again we tried to go but something had impeded our trip each time. Today only heavy rain tried relentlessly to persuade us to turn back. We persevered and walked into the Museum at around 11 am.

We were searched thoroughly until the beepy machine didn't go beepy anymore. Apparently museum security is quite tight. As tight as Dali's mustache. We walked into the first room and saw about a hundred people crowding around little snipits of info pasted on the wall about Salvador. At the end of the very crowded area was a lovely photograph of him. Seen here. What a dashing fellow humm? As I took this photograph a woman bumped into to me. Why? because she was attempting to video tape the entirety of the gallery, every photo, every word. My "tacky" meter went off, and it just went downhill from there.

As Rana and I walked to the first room of paintings we became acutely aware that we were less important than all of the other people there. As we were admiring a lovely piece entitled, "Two Pieces of Bread Expressing the Sentiment of Love," shown here, we were shoved aside by a woman using one those obnoxious little cell phone talky wands that tell you information completely unrelated to the painting when you punch in the numbers. We gave her the evil eye but she seemed in no way perturbed that she had walked right in front of us. Apparently the talky wand had told her that museum etiquette was passe.

Ok Ok we thought, calm yourselves, it's just one lady I'm sure the other people here has some respect for art. Wrong again. We walked to another painting, one of my personal favorites (well now it is), The Grape Pickers: Bacchus's Chariot.As we were admiring it a man stepped in front of us and took a FLASH photograph of the painting. Now look I understand that the people don't feel the need to follow all of the rules. I've seen how they drive but for gods sake this is a rule I can't believe anyone who cares about art would break. (Therein lies the rub as they say) Flash photography causes great damage to paintings. It only takes a few times. ERRRR.

We then made our way into a small hallway that had a video playing at the far end. It was a previously unfinished animated short by Salvador Dali and Walt Disney, Cool! It was called Destino. It was by far the coolest thing I had ever seen by Disney. As we watched it, a Turkish woman videotaped the whole thing on her camera. Tacky alert at dangerous levels! If you want check Destino out here. (Yes I do realize the irony of posting a camcorder version of the video but go with it)

We then went to the sketch area which really turned out to be our favorite because it contained most of the work we had not seen before. Rana and I exchanged pained glances as a girl barged her way in front of us and proceeded to take a picture of each and every one but never stopped long enough to look at one. I guess she was saving them for later. Here are a few of our favorites, taken without flash.



I particularly like the dresses! So swoopy and angular respectively. We also looked at a bunch of pieces he did for New York magazines and Newspapers during is 8 years in the US. My favorite was this high society piece for The American Weekly. Dead and drunk aristocrats enjoy a field of burning giraffes. How cool would it have been to see Dali's work in your local newspaper? Right after I took this a woman who had decided to take a video of all of the newspaper clippings backed right into Rana. I gave her an "Excuse me!" in Turkish but just as the others, she did not acknowledge that she had done anything wrong.

As we approached the water color section a elementary school class entered the exhibit with their teachers. They quickly raised the volume level about ten times and proceeded to smash kick and push eachout around each painting only to take a quick picture with they cell phones (yes they had them) and push and fight to get to the next painting.

All the while the "guards" stood by.

I found this amazing booty playfully painted by a master over 50 years prior. I loved it in the rising din. We envisioned her luxurious posterior as a kind of port in the storm of uncouth museum goers. We stayed a little while longer but we'd kind of had it at this point.

On our way out we got in line to get our coats from the check. A line as clear as day mind you. This woman walked in front of all of us and gave the valet her ticket. She and her two umbrellas were apparently more important than the 12 people in line.

THIS shit happens all the time and I'm tired of it.

We finally made it out feeling relieved to exit an exhibit of my favorite artist. There's something wrong with that. Rana remarked later how she wasn't sure if we were in a museum or at a football match.

Look I'm the last person to be culturally insensitive but WTF Turks? I thought museum culture was UNIVERSAL. I felt as if no one in there had ever before been to a museum. Art isn't an amusement park or local celebrity, it is beauty. It seemed that someone had put all this time and resource into bring a famous exhibition to Istanbul but the patrons did not have the cultural awareness, sensitivity or courtesy to appreciate it.

...

Out side men who peacefully fished in the Bosporus were probably oblivious to the very existence of Salvador Dali. Indeed a great portion of the people in the museum seemed to suffer from the same oblivity.

Dad arrives in the City of Old Cool stuff

Ok so it's not a title that will win me a Pulitzer but it's true. Mom and I had been waiting for my father to arrive for a few days so we had been tactfully avoiding going to the "must see" sites in the city. Once he arrived it was on like Donkey Kong.


Like many tourists we took advantage of the proximity of most of these major attractions. The blue mosque, the Hagia Sofia and Topkapi Palace are all within reasonable walking distance of each other. It really was kind of the ancient Sultans to construct their building in such a way that they now serve my convenience.

Inside Topkapi palace I discovered (discovered meaning I followed the arrows and signs) the biggest most ornate robe I ever seen. I'm too young to have seen Libirachi in concert. Anyway I found out that it belonged to the last "warrior sultan" named Murad the 4th." Check out the wiki on bad boy Murad_IV. He was a giant man who carried a 130 pound hammer that he swung like a baby rattle using only one hand. Kinda has the princess Amadala look to the head dress.

We then we checked out the Blue Mosque which is not called that in Turkish. It's called SultanAhmet named for the sultan (Ahmet I) who built it. Go figure? I always wonder how they know to call him Ahmet the 1st. I mean do they know there are going to more? There's a lot of pressure for Ahmet to have sons then, right? I'm sure he figured it out with a Harem of 30 women. Here's mom outside the Harem (translated conveniently into English for us)

I stayed outside because I'd seen it before but mom and dad traipsed right on through. (It took me a really long time to spell traipsed.) I wish the french would stop giving English words, it is far too confusing.

By the time we'd seen these wonders we were tired and a bit hungry. We walked up to a local simit seller and bought a doughy sesame covered ring of loveliness. Here he is walking away after we patronized his cart. Ok, well that's all for today. Görüşürüz (see you later) as the Turkish say...I know what you are thinking and yes, it is a hard language.

Tourists and Tulips oh my!

So there we were surrounded by buildings that were older than our country by a good clip. What else to do but explore them? We walked up Istiklal (mentioned earlier) until we came to Taksim square.

Taksim is probably the most important location for an Istanbul Turks.

They've all been here for years (some were even born here) and are less interested in things like the Blue Mosque or the Hagia Sofia but Taksim baby, that's where it's at!

The square bussels with open air cafes, movie festivals and the aforementioned smell of commerce. Everyone meets here, works here and passes through this area once a day. It's like that damn bottleneck on I-5 in the middle of Seattle but much more pleasant as there are snacks.

In the picture above you can see that the square has been filled with Tulip sculptures. (Love the disco ball motif) The tulip has long been argued to have originated from Turkey but Dutch enthusiasts say that it was imported by the Ottoman Sultans from Holland. I don't really know, but Istanbul is doing bang up job of pushing the product. Local businesses commissioned local artists in a kind of culture meets advertising mash-up. This be the result:
This tulip is embroidered with crochet! It's a Halloween tulip with spiderweb stitching hanging off of it. Well maybe not. This one took my notice because it was entitled "Remembering my Grandmother." Sweet.











This one has a post world war look mixed with that stunning barber pole aesthetic.


















Pretty pretty princess Aviary?


and my personal favorite: Suddenly horticulture looks like a lot more fun!

So we meandered around checking out the shopping districts. As a side note, "Meander" I found out, is the name of a twisty river here in Turkey. That's where the word originates, or so the Turks say. I've discovered that Turks are more nationalistic that anywhere else I have ever been. One of my guides told me that everyone in the world is descended from Turks because of the Trojan war. I told him that Uber-Nationalism was Turkey's Achilles heel. Needless to say he did not pick up on the joke.

Being sated artistically by the tulips we headed out to look at some ancient architecture.

The Hagia Sofia is one of largest structures of antiquity. It was built as a church then was converted to a mosque and now is a national park, talk about a case of identity crisis. Note the gigantic Sulatn medalions hanging from the supporting pillars. These are early Bling, Bling!

What you won't find in the Wikipedia article is that the street merchants which surround it know how to say "cute things" in about 10 different languages. "Please sir let me help you spend your money. How bout some on your Honey?" Who knows how to say "Cotton Candy" in yiddish, this guy...
So we ended the day with a cotton candy. How can you not? And he walked off into the sunset dispensing pink happiness to all... See you next time.

Didn't your mother tell you not to climb on rocks

Hello all,
Two weeks now and not a pip. You must be salivating for the next leg of my journey, laid out in exquisite prose for your reading enjoyment. (Can a journey have more than two legs? I mean if there is a journey animal, then it can, right? maybe four? I know. The journey animal has 10 legs as there were 5 members of the original touring lineup. Don't stop believin') In reality you most likely deleted the link and I am typing a pointless diatribe to my self. C'est la vie.

The trip over left the slightest bit to be desired. The champagne was served in flight slightly above the preferred temperature (48°F). The airline stewards did not greet me with the traditional "Good morning monsieur Carroll" to which I am accustomed. Furthermore the pepper-flaked pate infused Brie was a touch on the runny side.

Oh yeah, in "real life" I sat sandwiched between a snoring Englishman and one of 14 women all wearing the same shirt going to Istanbul for some sort of female version of a bachelor party. Lovely.

After listening for hours to them make noises not unlike a flock of hens discovering an open bag of chickenfeed we arrived in Istanbul. There I was picked up by my gracious and wonderful partner, the beautiful, the intelligent the resourceful, Rana.


The first few days have been filled to the brim with a murky liquid called jetlag. Whoever tells you it doesn't exist is selling something. A heavy malaise hovers expectantly over even the most minute action. For example, every time I sat down I felt like I'd been doing ab exercises with the men from that "300" film. Out like the lights at an all-girls boarding school was I.

Now that the jetlag has run it's course like the cruel drug it be, we decided to go hiking today . I can't tell you how beautiful it was. It was beautiful (ok so I can). At least that is until I fell off of a rock wall looking while looking at the black sea. I'm fine, I'm fine. No need for the letters and flowers I'm sure you were going to send, but I was doing one of those "things." You know those things that your mother told you not to do.

I was "horsing around" on the rocks and I paid the piper with a leg like a used bowling pin. Wee. The walk back to the ferry that had brought us there was fine, didn't feel a thing. Once I sat for a while though my shin ballooned, a marshmallow in the microwave-like heat of Istanbul.

With some trouble I disembarked and made it to the Dolmuş (a little yellow mini-bus) which would take me to safety. Here I lie. Beer in one hand, leg (the third leg of my journey?) elevated, and shin covered in a makeshift ice pack (frozen onion rings). Oh how the semi-mighty have fallen. More soon. Love to you all.