Today was the last day of our two week “sampler” holiday of Europe, and we ended in Istanbul, Turkey, on the European side. We started the day very early, meeting our friends for our last breakfast at the amazing Hotel Anthemis before trotting out for what we expected to be our last “experience” of the trip – indulging in a Turkish Bath.
We’ve been collecting “experiences” all through the trip, doing things the locals would do or going out of the normal touristy areas to do something very different or adventuresome – riding the donkeys down the massive hill in Santorini, trying specialities in cuisine like the traditional Turkish clay pot testi delicacy, smoking a Turkish nargile, or hiking up a volcano in Sicily, Italy. These are the things that make our trip. These are the experiences we’ll remember when we’re 70 or even 90 with any luck. We don’t want to sit, washed up at some resort for the whole of our time where that said resort could be anywhere in the world and no one ever leaves its property because it’s “not safe outside”, if we can help it.
In Istanbul, we were certainly in a lot of instances where we didn’t know exactly where we were, no internet, with a Rick Steve’s guidebook in our hands looking up words for “How do we get to this hotel address?”, etc. I mean, what do you do when you have all your luggage, and you’re just off the cruise ship, and now also off the tram (thanks Rick Steves) and supposedly at the stop we need for our hotel but can’t find it? We walk back and forth, stopping in at hotels to try to find out where to go, but to no avail. After hailing down a Taksi large enough for the four of you and your bags, he looks at the address, waves his hands, says “No”, and gets back in his cab to drive away. What do you do? We hailed the next one, same reaction, but he was at least able to tell us the road was blocked with bad traffic where we were going, so “Bye”.
So today was going to be an experience, and that it was. It lived up to our wishes, but remember the adage, be careful what you wish for. So I left you with the Turkish Bath last, which was such an experience. We had intended to go last night before it closed, but after our relaxing and most wonderful dinner, complete with Turkish water pipe/hookah/nargile, we didn’t leave ourselves enough time and had to return this morning. While we were at the bath house last night, we talked to a woman who had just finished her bath about her experience. She was cautious, said she would never do it again but that it’s an experience you must live, so she’s glad she did it. That doesn’t sell it entirely well. However, one of our friends was committed, and we would all be going in the morning.
I’m not yet sure how detailed my readers want me to get or how much people want to read, so here’s the short version. In a Turkish bath, people are either naked or partially naked with just a thin wrap for men or loaner underwear for women. There’s not a single part of you that won’t get wet, and someone will place their bare hands on your skin. Lots of suds are involved, and the room is much like a sauna in that the air is thick with moisture and very warm. You’ll sweat on your own, and your pores will love you for it, especially after a two week journey. For me, we went as soon as women were allowed in the bath at 7:30am, and I was the first bather to arrive. For the men who went with us, they were in a separate room at the bath house we chose, and they had 7 or so people in the room with them.
For my experience, there were times it was really nice, and others it was altogether surreal. This bath house has existed here since 1584, and the locker key they give you reminds you of this while you lay in the steamy silence: “1584 Çemberlitaş Hamamı”. The paint is chipped off in many areas of the wall, the room is filled with a large, gray marble centerpiece platform on which you lay. It’s warm, either heated underneath or heated from the room. Everything is damp. Eye glasses were a poor, poor choice for this girl who got ready too quickly this morning. They fog instantly. Don’t slip on the marble.
The woman who leads me in is the woman who will eventually bathe me. What a strange phrase. Either I feel like a sick child or Anastasia Steele, neither seems right, but I go along anyway with an open mind. I walk in, glasses fog, don’t slip, woman removes my wrap….um, thanks?, and places it on the marble and leaves me to lie down and relax.
During this time I notice more of the architecture, noticing the date on the keychain, trying to remember how to say the name of the place which has the different C and different S in the name, seeing the beauty of the place and not being able to capture it in film, so I start counting shapes and sizes of the geometric shapes within the room. The platform is around 15’ wide with 12 sides, made of gray marble, overlooked by a high arching dome with dim-lit holes in the ceiling. They’re not perfectly aligned; there are seven rows of large cut out circles and elipses, nine in the center. Maybe this means something. Sounds are of the single water fountain worker #52, my bather, left on for me. It’s a little more than a trickle, but its sounds reverberate throughout the expansive hall, bouncing from the domed ceiling to the nooks where other bathers might be with other silent fountains. I kiss the air aloud and hear it bounce around. I do it a few more times.
Worker #52 returns and pours warm water all over me, scrubbing with a loofah glove and sudsy craziness. I say craziness, because I think she sadistically gets pleasure from making it fall in your face, as she reinforced later while washing my hair and rubbing soapy hands in my eyes. She never told me when she was going to pour water in my face, which I didn’t like, but again, all a part of the experience, with as much leisure time in the bath that I wanted. What an experience, and that was only 45 minutes at the start the day!
Now…to our unexpected last “experience”, our flights. It started with the overly delayed flight from Istanbul to Rome, landing over an hour past its time, leaving 20 minutes between gates…
