Paul has been swamped with work these last few days so our sightseeing has been limited, but today is a holiday (Remembrance Day) in Canada so we had some free time for a change.  We spent it shopping and eating on Istiklal Street, and in the evening we experienced our first Turkish bath at the Süleymaniye Hamam.  Getting scrubbed down and massaged with soap by a couple of male “tellaks” definitely made today a unique experience!

These past few days have been full of new experiences actually.  Eating wise, we’ve tried a lot of new things.  On Monday we ate at a place called Cennet near our hotel (actual address is Binbirdirek Mh. Divanyolu Cd. No: 31/A).  Here we tried gözleme, a hand made Turkish rolled pastry like a pancake or crepe that is filled with your choice of topping (we tried spinach and meat), and manti, a Turkish dumpling filled with minced meat (I would describe it as a wonton ravioli and I loved it).   They also gave us our first taste of chocolate baklava, which was really really good but a bit too sweet for me.

Yesterday, I made the mistake of trying a Turkish coffee without reading about it first so I drank it totally wrong.  First I didn’t realize you’re supposed to tell them when you order if you want your coffee sweetened because sugar is added while the coffee is being cooked.  I ended up dropping in a sugar cube, which doesn’t taste right at all!  Also, because Turkish coffee is made so the coffee grounds float freely in the brew (that’s why it’s so strong), you’re supposed to agitate the cup continuously as you drink to re-mix the grounds with the water.  I just sipped from the top and left the inch of “mud” at the bottom, which apparently is where all the strength is!

Today we unknowingly had a very adventurous meal – a kokoreç sandwich at Şampiyon, a restaurant Ilyas recommended.   Kokoreç is minced lamb or goat intestines which are seasoned with lemon, olive oil, oregano, salt and pepper.  The seasoning takes away the intestine taste and we didn’t realize it was intestine until we came home and looked it up!  Ilyas had actually forewarned us, but we had forgotten what kind of food was at each restaurant on the list he wrote for us.  If Paul knew it was intestines, I don’t think he would have been so willing to eat it!

Sights wise, we set foot into a mosque for the first time yesterday by going back to Sultan Ahmed Mosque when prayers weren’t happening.  It astonished me to see how big it was inside.  Outside there’s a list of rules for visitation and it says women should cover their head with a scarf so I used a cashmere Burberry scarf I had bought while outlet shopping in Italy (yes, I know, it’s a ridiculous luxury item to carry around when you’re backpacking).  Because the scarf isn’t very wide it didn’t work well for wrapping around my head, but I thought it was better than nothing which is what I saw some other female tourists do.  It seems a little disrespectful to me to just ignore the rules like that.  We also went to the Egyptian Bazaar (spice market) yesterday and it was our first time in a spice market.  Apart from spices, you can find all kinds of sweets, nuts and the most amazing smelling coffee here.  I desperately wanted to buy some coffee, but it comes already ground and therefore won’t stay fresh until we get home in a month.

On our way to the bath tonight, we almost experienced our first scam – the shoe shine brush drop.  What happens is a shoeshine guy walks by you, dropping his brush as he walks.  Not knowing any better, tourists usually pick up the brush and call out to the guy.  Thankfully, another Turkish man saw us about to do so and rushed over, pushed us out of the way, and told us to keep walking, saying something like “mafia.”  We were confused, but realized he had just saved us from some kind of scam and noticed shoeshine guy go back and pick up his own brush.  Now, after talking to a friend on Facebook,   I’ve learned that what they do is offer you a free shoe shine for helping them, but then insist you give them some money when they’re done.  Lesson learned, sometimes you have to deny your instinct to help people!

Finally, most interesting of all, there was our experience at the Turkish bath tonight.  Paul generally refuses to go for any kind of spa treatment (he doesn’t like other people touching him), but our Aussie roommates in Vienna said this was an amazing must do thing in Turkey so I made Paul go with me.  Most Turkish baths have separate sections for men and women, but Paul didn’t want to be in a room full of other almost-naked guys so we opted for Süleymaniye, the only mixed gender Hamam in Istanbul.  I thought this meant just the two of us take the bath together, but they group you with other people (women wear bikini tops and shorts while men wear towels).  Since we were the first to arrive, we were the first in our group to be called into the bathing rooms after we had sat in the warming area for a while to adjust our body temperature.  Being with a bunch of strangers of both genders, it’s nice that you go into a slightly secluded area with just your partner for the scrub/massage part (at regular baths the tellak comes to scrub you on the large marble slab you sit on with everyone else).  I felt like our bath might have been a bit rushed because we were the first and it wasn’t nearly as amazing as other people have described.  The scrub was just a few basic strokes with the Kese mitt, and I didn’t see any dead skin roll off me like other people describe.  In between each activity they dump cold water on you like they’re bathing a dog.  The soap bubbles felt amazingly soft and wonderful and the massage was ok, but again just a few quick strokes and a couple slaps. The bath part lasted 15 minutes or less and then we went back to “relax” on the marble slab with the others, but someone smelled funky so we didn’t want to stick around.  For 75 Turkish lira each ($50 CAD), I could have gotten a very good one hour massage back home so I feel a bit ripped off!