Turkey - Istanbul - Lots of work and some food

It wasn’t easy getting up, but I managed and did my morning workout. I was proud of myself for having done that and after a shower had a nice breakfast. I wanted to do a video of breakfast, but there were many people around, so I just decided not to. Most of them seemed the business type. On my way back to the room, I did pick up a fig to eat.

Afterwards I got ready for work. That took up most of the day. However, one of the partners took us to lunch at this very nice restaurant. I visited it last June as well. It looks very unassuming, you wouldn’t think it’s anything special. However, the food is delicious. It’s called Madalyalı Koru Tesisleri and I wrote a review.

Review:

Oasis in the area

Madalyalı is a more traditional Turkish restaurant. It’s located in an area that is a mixture of industrial and residential. Definitely not the place where you see many tourists roaming around.

I’ve eaten twice in this restaurant, both times invited by partners who work near there. We ate in the shady more open area. There is small inner garden in there, with a pond that has frogs and turtles, though I would suggest adding fish. There is a cute waterfall. However, the waterfall does have a lot of limescale, which could use a clean-up. There did seem to be something going on with the little garden, so I hope that it’s what I suggested.

Both times I had a Turkish salad, which was very nice. I asked for a version without walnuts, as I’m allergic. If you have the same problem, then note that by default it does have walnuts. We also got some mushrooms with cheese, which looked very nice, though again, I can’t eat mushrooms. For main, I had a nice piece of meat with rice and lentils. They also brought some thin Turkish bread, which was nice. I do love the rice and lentils combo, and that’s something I’ll want to do at home.

I do recommend this restaurant. The flavours are good and simple. The atmosphere is comfortable, and even on a hot day very cool. It’s an oasis in a busy environment. For more on Istanbul, please visit my channel on YouTube, Izzy’s Travel Diaries.

After some more work, we headed back to the hotel, pretty tired. I had some free time, and the sun was shinning onto the balcony. I picked up that rolling desk-chair, a put it out onto the balcony. I had no bikini, so I rolled up my skirt and put on a workout bra. I first tried to work on my laptop, but the light was so strong. I opted for my Kindle instead. I stayed outside in spite of the loud street until I could get some sun.

I wasn’t very hungry, so we just had a light dinner at Mado. I had a lentil soup. I really love the traditional lentil soup in Turkey. I try to eat it more than once. They spiced it up a bit by adding some small mozzarella balls and crotons. The Mado near the hotel was very nice. They even shot down the fan when I asked. The air was moving fine on its own anyway. The waiter was a really attentive and fast-moving guy. I liked him a lot.

After dinner, I decided not to hit the sack yet and went down to do some video and buy a few things at the shop. My mum has a major sweet tooth, so I always try to take her some local chocolate. It was nice walking around at night. There were a lot of people about, also a couple of dogs. They seemed a lot livelier than during the day, when they mostly just lie about.

Turkey - Istanbul - Viaport Shopping Day

I set the alarm next to my bed to 6.30am. Pretty early, but I wanted to work out in the morning, and I also had to set time aside for snoozes and me talking myself into working out. Though thing to do. The alarm turned out to be quite annoying, an insistent beeping, which only relented for about 8 minutes with the snooze button. After two snoozes, I dragged myself out, got ready, put on the headphones, selected a Spotify playlist, and took the elevator down to -3.

It was quite abandoned so early in the morning. I checked, and there was an alarm I could pull in case of an emergency. I started with the treadmill, did some things with handweights that I’m used to doing with my trainer, changed playlists as the first one was crap. Then as a rest I took a selfie for Instagram. Got it on the 10th try. Don’t know why my phone keeps blurring the selfies. Must be a feature, but it’s annoying. It wasn’t always like that.

After my selfie break I used the bicycle, which isn’t like the usual ones. It’s a recumbent exercise bike – yes, I looked it up. It’s actually very good for my very bad knees, as they don’t have to bend over the 90° angle, which is what bothers them the most about biking. So, I did a good 10 minutes on that at a good speed. Then did some floor exercises and was done. Walked it off for a few minutes.

I took a shower, got my contacts in, hair, make-up, pretty girl, outfit trying, outfit discarded, and settled on my jeans. I went down to breakfast, and there was practically no one there. I wanted to have soup, but there wasn’t any! I’ve never seen a Turkish breakfast spread without soup. I opted to have a protein feast and some vegetables. Got tomato sauce on my top and tried to take it out with some water. Then another disaster, obviously one of those mornings, I overfilled the coffee cup and it spilled everywhere. No whitener at breakfast of course, and no soy milk. Or any milk that has no lactose and I can drink. Got a nice seat, then had to go back for juice. Breakfast went on Instagram, and I ate while listening to Matt Dillahunty dissecting a debate he had done recently. Yes, I’m an atheist and I really like listening to debates and thoughts on debates. I ate the food, but it could have been warmer. I tried the coffee, but it was awful without milk. I abandoned it and got some tea instead. Turkish tea is so strong, it’s a pretty good substitute for coffee anyway. I’ll probably do that from now on.

After breakfast I went up, tried to take out the spots on my top again with soap. I put the desk chair out onto the balcony to put the top on it to dry. We were going to check out another hotel with my boss, but I had plenty of time, so I worked on my blog, my Instagram, did the tags. Of course, my boss overslept, and we opted to skip the hotel viewing, and just go straight to shopping at Viaport. 

I had a list of things that I wanted to get. It was difficult when I needed help in shops, because no one speaks English. Shop assistants kept talking to me, and I had to break it to them that I don’t speak Turkish. I did find some shoes that I wanted, which made me very happy. Shoe shopping is hard. After some shopping, I had a stop at Starbucks. Starbucks is actually cheaper in Turkey than in Hungary, which is crazy. I got a cold coffee, an apple juice, and sat down on a sunny spot to rest. Maybe get a little tan.

Then I had lunch with my boss, who was doing his own shopping. We ate at Mado, which is mostly a pastry shop, but they have some basic savoury dishes as well. I had a lemonade, which was nicer than the one before, and a köfte spaghetti. It was an interesting mix between Italian and Turkish flavours. I enjoyed it, though I probably had more carbs than I should.

After that I shopped a lot at the Koton outlet. It was great, as I finally found two skirts. I wanted to buy more, but you can barely find any skirts in Viaport. As I looked around, even though it was a warm day, I barely saw anyone in skirts. Most women wore long jeans. Not even shorts. Another thing I had a problem finding was a bikini. I tried on a few, but the fit was awful. I need to find a new one for Malaysia. I did gain a lot of weight since last year, but nothing I do gets the weight off.

I did find a new bijou shop though, with some really great stuff. It's called Deniz Kabuğu.

There were so many kids everywhere! It was hard to not fall over in one, or get a pram pushed onto my foot. Even when I was trying on shoes, I had to pay attention to not have a kid fall over my stuff. 

We went to buy something for dinner and went back to the hotel. I changed and went down to the gym for another session. Used the bike again for over half an hour, so I hope I made a dent in my weightloss program. Back in my room I only had some soup and two dates for dinner. I was pretty exhausted and soon went to bed.

Turkey - Flying to Istanbul again

There weren’t really much in the way of surprises that day. The flight had the comfortable 1.50pm take-off time, so I could sleep until my normal time, have breakfast, gather anything I may have forgot about the night before, and still be ready for my ride to the airport. The weather was the only strange thing, as the days before it had been hot in my hometown, but of course on that morning there was a thunderstorm. Luckily, as we left the city limits, that soon passed as well.

Surprisingly, in Budapest it didn’t rain while I dragged my luggage from the parking to the terminal. Check-in, getting coffee went off without any problems. An annoying thing at the airport was that the wifi was nowhere to be found. Quite strange, as I usually post a picture on my Instagram before take-off. I even got a really nice picture, which I would have loved to post.

The only other anomaly was that we got on the bus, went to the plane, and the bus doors didn’t open. We just waited and waited for many minutes. It turned out that we had to wait for a person in a wheelchair to get on the plane, though not sure why the two weren’t doable at the same time. 

I got a seat next to the window. I have a Turkish Airlines loyalty card. One benefit is that I’ve set among my preferences that I like to sit next to the window, so now I always get window seat. So, my fellow travellers, that’s something I recommend. Get loyalty cards, accounts for everything, as they usually have benefits even if you only use them a few times. As someone who has worked as a receptionist, I always upgraded loyalty members if we oversold on the cheaper rooms. Believe me, overselling on the basic rooms is quite common.

As the plane was getting ready for take-off, it started to rain quite heavily. So, there was rain while I was in Budapest! Luckily, I didn’t get wet this time. It really didn’t bother the plane either. Within seconds of being in the air, the rain was gone, and the sun was shining again.

The flight itself was uneventful. There were few clouds, so we got little turbulence. One new thing was the food. At every Turkish Airline flight we got a sandwich, a mousse, and drink. On that flight we also got a nice chicken salad. It did have milk, but I took my pill and was fine. They didn’t give it the usual way either, but on a handy paper tray. I hope they recycle though.

Once the plane landed we headed out and managed to go into departures instead of arrivals. Good fun. Backtracked and finally got to the passport control. The thing about passport control in Istanbul is that they make you walk up and down blocked off corridors instead of just opening the crossways. So, everyone is pretty tired by the time they actually get to the stamping person. I call it the start of Turkish training camp. I actually saw some Hungarian wrestlers get off the plane. They had wide shoulders and smashed in noses. Hope that they get plastic surgery once they retire. Though noses are notoriously difficult.

We got the luggage okay and visited the ladies’ afterwards. When I got back my boss was sitting next to a guy and they both had their arms crossed over their chests. I found it so funny, I just started laughing. Then we got the paperwork done for the rental car. My boss has an Avis card, and that usually gets us an upgrade on the car. We got a nice Ford this time. We also asked how much the tunnel is to the Asian side and found out that only 20Ł. Well worth all the time we can save, so we settled on using that from now on. A minibus took us to the rental parking. We had to wait for it and there was a family of all women next to us. The little girl started screaming at the top of her lungs. Poor thing, was probably very tired. This is to my friend Tony: Screaming kid! He’ll get it. The minibus was so full, there weren’t enough seats, so I got to ride with the driver. As I’m learning to drive now and struggling with all the pedals, I kept an eye on his feet as to how he does it. Quite neatly.

We got the car and were off to the Asian side. Traffic was heavy, but we kept a good pace. The tunnel worked out well, just as we expected. On the way to the hotel, we passed the airport on the Asian side. Before that there was some sort of surface mining going on with the dust going everywhere. After that we saw two parallel running concrete tubes that were being constructed. They were massive, but there was no apparent reason for them. Also, some basis for high electricity wiring were coming towards them from the other side of the hills. I have no idea what any of this is for, so I just described them. Maybe I’ll find out some day.

We got to the hotel, Hampton by Hilton Istanbul Kurtkoy, and check-in was as painful as it usually is, with my boss repeating the same thing over and over again, a really long list of requirements that seem to always confuse the receptionists. Especially as most of them speak very minimal English. I may put some English teaching videos onto that YouTube channel of mine that I would design for these people. I worked as a receptionist myself, so that would be a good basis for them. I’m adding another project! Somebody stop me!

Of course, the first rooms weren’t right, as they faced the very busy road. We went back, and I clarified to the receptionist that the rooms being quiet and non-smoking were top priority, all the other things were down the list.

Second rooms were good, and I got a really nice view of the square next to the hotel. The room also had a nice couch, perfect for sitting on and writing this blog. It did have a balcony, but strangely no furniture on it.

I settled into the room a bit, and we were off to find something for dinner. Before that though my boss needed to get his phones out of the car, so I waited in the lobby and had a look around. I found a typo again! What is it with Hilton hotels in Turkey and not being able to spell in English. Instead of “quiet” they wrote “quite”. Of course, as an English teacher I had to point it out, and the two staff members didn’t understand what I was talking about! I left it, as we were off to eat. I was very hungry. There are plenty of places to eat around the hotel. Even our favourite chain restaurant, Tavuk Dünyası, which is where we went. The night was quite cold, but in the restaurant it was nice. Very full, as usually for Ramadan dinner Turkish people go out to eat. I got a nice lemonade, though maybe a bit sweeter than I’d make it. My boss got all his food and had almost eaten it too by the time I got my chicken, pasta, salad combo. It was a bit much, but I ate it all.

After that I popped back into the hotel for a cardigan that I brought, and we went to the Carefour near the hotel to get some juice. We also had a look around for dinner options while we’re there.

I got in pretty late, washed my hair in the big shower. I like the shampoo and conditioner they provide. They also have a very nice hairdryer. The bed was very comfortable, but I had trouble falling asleep all the same.

Turkey - From Konya back to Istanbul

This was my last morning in Konya. I was a bit sad that I didn’t go walking the night before, but I was too exhausted. I started packing, and got down to breakfast a bit late. I didn’t really feel like eating soup, which I had chosen the morning before. Very nice, but I just wanted some pancakes, which I got. I again took my coffee up to my room, to drink once it cooled. I packed, but was still a bit tired. Frankly, I never slept well. I kept waking up, tossing and turning. Couldn’t decide why, but something kept me uncomfortable. I hoped for a nice sleep in the new hotel that night.

We returned to the airport. It was hard to find the place to enter from the rented cars park. None of the doors opened from the ground floor. Then we discovered we had to take the outside elevator upstairs. It smelled strongly of cigarettes. Upstairs, we could enter, and had to go through the first line of checks. This made me a bit worried, as my boss had a toolbox that he put into my bag, because he was afraid of being over the weight limit. We brought it as a sample. So when they put our luggages through the X-ray, of course they made us open my suitcase. I had my boss take care of that, as at the time they were making me start my laptop. It’s a new thing they do. You have to unpack the major electronic devices and start them. After me there was a woman, who had a big photography case. She had to open that too. When she opened it up, it was full of equipment. I was a bit envious of her. I told her she had quite the set-up. She replied that photography is a serious hobby for her. I told her I loved it too, but I didn’t have the strength to carry such things around. That’s actually because I have a waist problem and sometimes it gets painful even with my tiny camera. So she motioned towards my boss and asked why I didn’t have him carry it. I had to inform her that that’s my boss, and I’m more likely to carry his stuff. I do sometimes, actually.

Meanwhile, he was having his own little adventure with the officer who was checking my suitcase. He examined the toolbox, but kept rummaging around. Then the officer asked if it was my boss’ luggage. He replied that no, and gestured towards me that it was mine. The officer quickly abandoned his search. I guess it’s a good thing I always pack my underwear in a separate bag.

We had to wait a bit to check in. There weren’t a lot of people around. An interesting couple of people were dressed like they were from Nepal. They even had warm hats on. It was quite warm, so I didn’t get why.

We checked in, and passed through security. There was no line, as there was barely anyone around. So I put my backpack through, took out my laptop, but not the other stuff. Seriously, if I took out all my electronics, it would take a year. When my bag went through, the officer stopped me. He started talking about something metal being in my bag. I had lots of metal in my bag, so I wasn’t sure what he was talking about. A female officer joined us. So the guy kept pointing to a part of my bag. I pulled out my massage gloves. They are plastic, with metal balls to use for a stronger massage. He stared at it, and asked what it was. The woman knew it right away. He said something about not keeping it in my carry-on. Actually, I’ve been travelling with it there since I got it in Aveiro the year before. I keep it there in case I need my circulation helped along on the plane.

So we sat down, then got some food at the only little bufe in the domestic departures. I also used the cleanest toilet I have ever seen in an airport. As I was eating, I could hear fighter jets. Then they appeared in front of the tall windows that overlooked the runway. It was the Turkish air force practicing. Konya has a massive airbase. It was the coolest thing ever! There was an airshow right in front of me. They did loops and turns, formations and solos. They were still doing it as we went outside to board the plane. When some would pass overhead, everyone stopped and just watched them.

The plane set off towards the take-off part of the runway. And kept going. And going. It was taxiing so much, I wondered if we were going to go to Istanbul on the ground. When it reached the furthest strip from the airport, it finally took off. It felt like forever. The flight itself was fine, quite uneventful. Got the usual sandwich. We arrived to Istanbul, and flew right passed it. Then I understood that we were going to take the landing passage that came from the sea. The year before we stayed at a hotel right under that landing passage. Wonderful hotel, unbelievably noisy. At night you could see a daisy-chain of plane lights that were in line to land on Atatürk Airport. When we finally landed, there was a lot of taxiing again to finally park. I swear I spent more time on the ground in that plane, than in the air.

It was quite strange to land in Istanbul and not have to go through all the security checks. As we were waiting for the luggages, many women came in full niqab, only their eyes visible. Their men were dressed like any other guy, jeans, red trainers. It looked like such a contrast. I felt a bit weird standing next to them in Western clothing. Frankly, I also felt a bit sorry for them that they felt that’s what they had to do in their lives, and all the limitations they had. But it’s not my place to judge, only to observe.

After we picked up our bags, we searched for the Miles & Smiles stand which is the Turkish Airlines benefit program. We’ve been having a problem with signing up, but it turned out that we both had functioning accounts. He didn’t know about it, I couldn’t sign into mine. Somehow getting a card printed fixed both which I found out once I got to the internet.

We picked up our car and headed to the hotel. We stayed at the Hampton by Hilton Zeytinburnu. When we got to the hotel and told them about the requests we wrote down in advance, they seemed a bit frazzled. Obviously, they don’t do room allocations in advance. So I ended up with a room on the ground floor, furthest from reception. At least I got a workout every time.

I really liked the room. It had a lot of green, which is my favourite colour. It was also very clean and modern, which is just my taste. The previous room was bigger, but for some reason I liked this room better. I guess it just felt more like something that I would do.

Review:

Comfortable atmosphere

This hotel is very well situated. It’s relatively close to the historical centre, and also on the outskirts of the Zeytinburnu district with all the shops. There is also a train going behind it to the centre and also to the ferry port. However, the train can get loud in the room towards the end of the hotel.
The staff is very nice and friendly. There is a pantry by the reception and quite a large bar area. In case you need conference rooms, they have those as well. There is also a small gym in the basement and that’s where you can go to the underground garage.
The room is nice, though a bit smaller. However, I really liked the atmosphere of the room, it felt comfortable and relaxing. The TV mainly has Turkish channels. There are a good amount of plugs, but no wired internet. Wifi works well though. The bathroom has a large shower and a good amount of counter space. Do check out my video on my YouTube channel, Izzy’s Travel Diaries for more details.
Breakfast is nice, though relatively smaller than what I’m used to in Turkey. They had a large amount of people, and quickly ran out of everything. I often used cereal bowls for soup.
Overall, nice, comfortable hotel. I had very good sleeps on the bed, maybe a bit too good as it was hard to drag myself down to breakfast. Especially, because it was often so crowded. I wish I could have packed up my breakfast and taken it on a tray to my room. I did take my coffee.

After a bit of rest we headed to the Olivium for dinner, and then a bit of shopping. 

I was very happy to fall into my bed, and had the best sleep since I got to Turkey. Very comfortable bed.

Turkey - Konya - Day 3

I was still very tired in the morning, and dragging myself to breakfast was hard. At least, I finally got some pancakes! I also took my coffee back to my room. They never have lactose-free milk at breakfast, so I have to use powder. However, then I also have to wait for the coffee to cool down, which takes forever. So instead, I took my coffee to my room. No one said a thing, so I was planning on doing the same the next morning.

Then there was work again, and it was rather long. I was still a bit tired, so it was hard, because it ran rather long too. Interpreting can tire you out quickly. We went to lunch, and it was another great restaurant. We actually wanted to go to a different one at first, but it was closed for renovations. We ended up in a very nice, white tablecloth place called Asya Lahmacun & Kebap.

I had a delicious and creamy lentil soup. Then they brought out a pastry filled with spicy meat. The main dish that I had was the Asia Special. A kind of pastry stuffed with meats and cheese with a spicy sauce. T was so good, but sadly I couldn’t eat it all, or I’d burst. No dessert this time. I really enjoyed the place. The waiters were lovely, and spoke pretty good English too.

On the way back to the hotel we stopped at a small bakery and got some food for dinner. I was hesitant to get some carbs, but I got a simple simit.

In the evening I got a small break, and then worked with my boss well into the night. I was pretty exhausted when I went to bed finally.

Turkey - Konya - Day 1

I woke to the sound of the fan going off, and my alarm. The road was quiet, though before going to sleep I had to pull in the blackout curtains as there was a really strong light outside. The smell, however, was back in the bathroom. Not good. I decided to talk to reception about it.

I went down to breakfast and took my camera to do the video of the hotel. I managed to get all the footage I needed. I had large breakfast, as I knew that I wouldn’t eat much while exploring the city. I had a couple of böreks, a bit of egg with dill in it, some cucumbers and Turkish sausage. They can’t spell sausage. On the card it’s written like “sousoge”. I had a good laugh about that. I wanted to have some pancakes, but by the time I got to coffee, they were gone. I had an orange with honey instead. I really love the honey here, as it’s one the cone. Lots of sugar, but good for fighting off infections. I was happy to have a quiet breakfast, though the dining room was full of people. I watched them as they ate. Noted how the younger women served the older, the women the men. There were a lot of women dressed traditionally, though some modern ones as well. An older guy sat in front of me, a granddaughter on each side. He didn’t look at them much, for the most part he just stared in front of him. I wondered what he was thinking.

After breakfast I went back up to the room. I was still pretty tired, but decided to quickly finish up the hotel’s video, and upload it to Youtube. The uploading part didn’t go so well. It was going really slowly, and I wondered if it would upload at all. It didn’t even finish until I left for my excursion.

Before I left, I talked to reception about the smell in the bathroom. Communicating in English wasn’t bad, but I got the feeling they were having a hard time understanding me.

I headed from my hotel towards the Mevlana museum. As a preparation for my trip, I had read up a bit on the whole Dervish thing, though I wished I could have done a bit more. Work sometimes gets in the way of plans. So on the way there I came upon this place that looked a bit like a mosque, but not. There was some religious sounding music coming from speakers. I wondered if I could go in. As I was taking pictures, a bride in a white dress stood in the gate, with a white headscarf. She was very pretty. It’s kind of strange, but often when I travel abroad I see brides. There was this one time in Italy, where there was a chapel connected to my hotel, and they actually had a wedding there.

Then I saw some women dressed like me go inside, so I decided it was okay. It turned out to be some sort of military museum, with scenes of war and old village life inside. It wasn’t very interesting to me, because I didn’t know much about the details of Turkish history. However, the courtyard was very beautiful with a fountain and carved ceilings.

Finally reached the Mevlana museum. There were a lot of tour groups going in. I saw some ticket offices outside, but they were closed. It’s actually free, so I’m not sure why they had the offices. After the security check I entered a small garden. There was a place to get the audio guide, but I generally don’t like them. Since it’s spring, there were tulips in vibrant colours everywhere. Sadly, some of them were beyond their prime, but others were in full bloom. To the left was the mosque (camii) converted to a museum. Through a narrow gate I entered the inner part and reached the courtyard. Surrounding the mosque was a long building with little rooms that housed artefacts. The doors were very low, and a lot of people kept banging their heads. In most of them there were a couple of items. As they were very crowded, I first looked through the window, and if I liked the room, went in. A few were set up to look like occupied rooms. I wanted to take pictures of course, and video, but two women took forever to stand and observe the room. As I waited, another girl with a camera, of course a lot bigger than mine, stopped next to me. We looked at each other and smiled, probably both thinking how much we just want to get the picture and move on. Once we got inside, I actually stayed longer. Getting out of the room was hard, because some women wanted to crowd inside, and I had to shove them a little to get out of my way.

There was a fountain and I saw people washing their heads. Mothers their children’s heads, men their own. I didn’t stay to find out why though. I also went into a house labelled as a kitchen, but there was really just a small space set up like that, and the rest was a scene of discussion.

Next I visited the old mosque itself. It was very crowded and it didn’t help that some people decided to start praying in the middle. I quickly did my video and took some pictures. It was very pretty, actually. I do love the designs in Muslim architecture. The intricate patterns fascinate me. I think that not being able to depict humans in art only benefited them. In European art humans, people are always centre-stage. In Muslim art there is a different picture from afar and another from up close. In one part of the mosque they also used green lighting to a very good affect. There was a place where people could properly pray, and there were several doing just that. Men and women separate, of course.

Outside I walked around a bit, but there weren’t very interesting things left to see. So I had a tea in the café. I exited the Mevlana museum on the right side, around the place where I went in. There I found a couple of nice shops and a statue of a massive whirling dervish. I wanted to take a picture, but of course the moment I got there a bunch of women also reached it, and wanted to take a picture in every combination imaginable. I also found a shop with some very nice jewellery, and naturally had to buy something. I thoroughly recommend the shop, as the prices were good and the jewellery pretty.

Leaving the Mevlana site, I headed towards the Alaadin hill. I hoped that there would be a good view from there. The path was easy enough, just walk down the really wide road with the tram going in the middle. I got to a working mosque just when the call for prayer went out. I didn’t see anyone hurrying, but the mosque looked very nice from the outside.

The road to the Alaading hill is filled by shops and eateries. I stopped at an ice cream shop, and took a video as I got my rose (gül) ice cream. A girl in the shop asked me if I was doing a vlog, and when I said yes, she smiled. I talked to a guy there as well, and he spoke pretty good English, though he couldn’t say “rose” properly, and I had a hard time realising that’s what he said. Now I know the Turkish word though, so I won’t have that problem. Actually, “güzel” means beautiful, so it’s similar. The ice cream was delicious, BTW. A lot thicker than what I normally have. I think it could be made from goat milk, as there was a goat on the sign. Which is very good for us lactose intolerants too. I ate the ice cream all the way to the hill.

The hill itself isn’t a big deal. You have some restaurants up there, a nice park and a mosque, which is under renovation. They had some nice tulips, just like everywhere else, and I sat down to stare at the city below a bit. That is actually why the hill was built in the first place. Rich people wanted to have a place to look down on people. Kind of twisted, but makes for a nice park. I was thoroughly exhausted by that point, so decided to head back to the hotel.

The walk was relatively long, and while the hotel is nice, that is a drawback of not staying at a hotel in the city. However, on the way there I took a little detour and discovered a part of the city that is filled with old, two storey buildings and shops. It reminded me of the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul. I also passed a very pretty mosque.

I took a different route to the hotel, and discovered that not too far from it was a part that had old, dilapidated houses. 

Getting back, I wanted to discuss the fact that I reserved a quiet room, and with the busy road outside, the room was anything but. However, the receptionist spoke practically zero English. I ended up using Google translate. Did manage to get a more quiet room and the bathroom was fine there as well, but it was a hard thing to do. I wish the guy from the morning had still been there. Oh well, can’t expect that. I know how difficult it is to do 12-hour shifts on reception.

In the evening I had dinner and a cocktail at the hotel restaurant. The food was nice, though the cocktail maybe a bit stronger than it should have been. Not too special though. In Turkey, it's very common to have a dish where you get three things on your plate. One is a salad, then a pasta, and the third is a meat. It was tasty.

I was pretty exhausted, and went to sleep quickly. I hoped that by the next day I would be a lot fresher.

Turkey - The long day of two flights

I wasn’t looking forward to the travel portion of this trip. The thing I hate most about travel is waiting. Waiting for your plane at the airport is the worse. Changing planes and waiting for hours in between is pure torture.

My day started at home, with trying to get in as much rest as possible. Then at around 10am it was time to leave my home and head to Budapest to the airport. Weirdly enough, more times than not, when I have to go to Ferenc Liszt airport, it rains. It was no different that day. The sky was covered in thick clouds, and the occasional icy wind ruffled my jacket. Drops of rain fell enough to annoy, but not to open an actual umbrella. I was glad when I could finally be in the protection of the airport terminal.

The change at the airport was that the usual wrapping company had changed to a different one. I heard that it used to be an Italian company that security wrapped the bags, but their contract had expired. The new company is Hungarian, supposedly close to the government, but I like to stay out of politics. The important part is that the fee had gone up. There was a very long queue for the Turkish Airlines flight to Istanbul. It was a mixed bunch of people, with a group of Koreans, some Americans, and also Hungarians. My bag was fine weight wise, and we got all the papers for both flights as well. We opted not to pick the bags up at Istanbul.

Security went surprisingly fast. Costa Coffee had reopened, but I didn’t have a lot of time to drink my coffee. Ended up finishing it on the plane.

The plane was not the usual affair. It seemed to be an older model, no personal screens, a bit less legroom, and I had an aisle seat. I couldn’t watch the clouds from above, which made me a bit sad, as I really like to do that. The plane was unusually cold. Without a screen to entertain me, I decided to study a bit of Turkish. I downloaded a very good book for it recently, and upon closer inspection I found that it was indeed very useful. The grammar explanations clear, and the right amount of words to study. I have been doing Duolingo, and that is very good to learn Turkish, but I prefer detailed grammatical explanations.

Food was the same as always. A cheese, tomato and olive sandwich, a chocolate mousse for dessert and I chose tea for drink to warm me up. I tried to order in Turkish, but I got lost when he asked me if I wanted sugar. He said it so fast, and all those suffixes made the “şeker” part lost. Oh well, I’ll get it next time. Not bad for learning on my own.

The plane landed in a sunny Istanbul that had a strange darkness in the air. I wondered if it was the pollution of that busy city. However, a chilly wind still snuck under my clothes, rushing me to the terminal building. The passport control was as busy as always, but kept a steady pace, and I was quickly processed. To get to the domestic terminal (İç Hatlar Terminali) I had to exit the International (Dış Hatlar Terminali) one, keep going and going, until I got to the equally busy point of departure for local planes. I was still a bit hungry and got some fries at a small eatery. Only later did I realise that after the security check there are a lot better places. Still, there were hours and hours of waiting to come. I kept myself busy by watching Gundam. I want to finish Iron-Blooded Orphans season 2 by the time I go to Japan.

We could finally get on the plane. I was in the last row, 22 and next to the window. I was happy about that, because that way I could see Istanbul at night from above. I decided to do a video as well. As people were boarding, I watched as the workers were putting the bags into the belly of the plane. There was one that arrived by an airport car, maybe a late check-in. One came back on the belt, they put it on the ground next to it. The suitcase just sat there for a while, and I wondered if the plane was going to run over it. Then the workers came again, and three of them stood contemplating over it. In the end they put it back one, and it came with us. Glad that wasn’t my pack.

As I watched the people of the airport bustling about, I started to think about how much effort it took to run the place. All the coordination, the organisation that went into making the planes move about as if to a silent symphony. It still baffles me that these steel birds can leave the ground carrying tons of weight through the air. I know that there’s aerodynamics and all sorts of physics involved, but to me, it’s one of the wonders of the world. Humans, these highly evolved apes are capable of such wonders. It’s a sad thing that we can turn our minds to destruction as well.

I wasn’t lost in my musings enough to not notice when the plane finally got into position to take off. I happily recorded it all, and kept my eyes glued to the twinkling lights. Sadly, it wasn’t perfect, as there were some clouds. Even through them, I could marvel at the different shapes the lights gave the fantastic new buildings, the boats floating in the sea as tealights on a pond.

When I stopped the camera, we passed through a thick cloud to gain altitude, and the plane was thrown about a bit. One rather large bump gave me such a fright – I hate turbulence to begin with -, that I gave out a little scream. Of course, everyone looked at me, and I laughed it off. Don’t ever scare me, seriously. I’m a screamer.

We got the usual sandwich, but no chocolate this time. ☹ The only had orange juice (portakal suyu). On the way the sky cleared, and there were small settlements everywhere. From above they were campsites warding off the night with fire. Then a bigger stretch of lights arrived under us, and I knew we have arrived to Konya. It didn’t look all that big though. Supposedly, it has as many inhabitants as Budapest, but it looked a lot smaller.

I took my camera out to shoot the landing, and then we taxied for some time. The airport felt huge, or they just put the landing strip too far. As a domestic arrival, there was no security check, and we just went straight to the bags. We waited for a while at the wrong belt, and then the other belt finished without our luggage. Some other people were also looking around perplexed. An employee came and started rattling something off in Turkish. Now I may know a few words, but it wasn’t enough. So I asked him to say it in English, and he managed to get out that transfer luggage arrived at a different section of the airport. There was my bag! Such a relief! We got a taxi to the hotel, and I checked on my phone if he was taking us on the short route. He was, good job! The only problem was that the car smelled so strongly of smoke, I kept the window open all the way. I’m getting really intolerant to the smell.

Arrived to the hotel, and of course check-in was a drag. The guy saw two people in both rooms in the reservation. I made it myself, so I know there was only one. My name wasn’t anywhere, when I did put it down in the system. We also asked if the rooms could be on a higher floor, but higher floors are smoking.

When I finally got into my room, I was ready to hit the hay, but at first I wanted to make the room video. Overall, I quite liked the room, even though it wasn’t quiet like we asked, overlooking a busy road. The bathroom had a sewage smell, and the fan in there was loud, as per usual. The floors around the edges not as clean as they should be. The TV all in Turkish. However, at least the bed was comfy. I finished up some things and went to sleep fairly quickly. I did wake up at night a couple of times as I often do when sleeping in a new place.