Istanbul
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Istanbul, The Blue Mosque and Fountain
Fountain of Ahmet III, Istanbul
Suleymaniye Mosque with Photographer
Istanbul - Nargile (Water Pipes)
There are a lot of cultures that take preventative steps toward warding off the "evil eye" and a bunch of them are in this neck of the woods. The belief is that nefarious types can get control over the unsuspecting by glancing at them in a certain pernicious way. The unsuspecting, apparently, are those who don't sport these shiny blue eye-like glass talismans. That's all you need to avoid a world of hurt. They are absolutely everywhere. Travel here for a few days and you will be sure to pick up this prophylaxis..or else!
Maybe I've just been on the Paleo Diet for too long and I'm hyper aware of them but the carbs seem to be everywhere and in great abundance. It wouldn't be so bad but man, they are delicious. I'm craving and the bakers are feeding my habit. Come on over this way my simit-selling friend.
Turkey is unique in the world of Islam in that there is a separation of mosque and state. Women, I'm told, are free to embrace western style or follow more traditional fashions. At the mosque however, the separation is well defined. The country is 95+% Moslem.
Coffee. In the good old coffee-addicted USA it is served up early in the morning and in such abundance that cafe waitstaff pour it lavishly and without regard to precise measure. Different here. The word for breakfast actually means "before coffee." Coffee after breakfast? It is an upside down world. Coffees are not brewed but reconstituted from powder and served in tiny cups by the the micro-milliliter or nano-centicube or some unit so damn small that no single serving will clear your head or give you a decent buzz.
Tea. Whereas coffee is selectively available, tea wantonly throws itself at you from every street corner. All social interactions are lubricated with tea. The curvey little tea glass is so common that it is used as a standard of measure in Turkish recipes. I wish I liked tea.
Travelers often ask about the plumbing. It does vary highly from country to country and we in the USA experience little of the variation which flowers so prolifically overseas. The standard Turkish facility is a combination of the good old stand-by and the French bidet. The pragmatic Turks have just added nozzle and a valve, no need for a space-consuming separate bidet stool. The terminus of one's alimentary canal is serviced via a squirt from the nozzle. Paper is used for drying.