The Music

My roomie's band, Native Project, a couple of weeks ago in a neighborhood bar. 

How Bazaar!

 i wandered the ancient aisles above the spice bazaar again yesterday. weathered men hauling copious amounts of everything from high-dollar headscarves, to birdfood, to beautifully hand-stitched textiles up and down the crooked streets where no cars go. little old hunched ladies nodding curtly to me as i pause to watch them help their young grand-daughters select which bright, satiny headscarf fabric best expresses them. after a couple of hours of wandering, i found my primary target: what i like to call 'costume row.' influenced by centuries of belly-dance (or, 'oriental dance,' as they call it here) costume design, the shops here are a veritable mecca of costuming accouterments.  sequins, fringe, beads, stones, ribbons, feathers, gold coins, hand-stitched trims of every flavor imaginable. my intention being to purchase a smattering of the selection to bring back to nola for my friends who have already started working on their mardi gras costumes. ran into two guys from miami who were in istanbul for the sole purpose of pricing and purchasing costume supplies for the big carnivale fest there each year. they've already picked out their group theme and have story-boarded their outfits. the sheer scale of retail in this city is truly staggering. its impossible not to be drawn in and hypnotized  by scents, colors,textures.... jewelry, bedspreads, shoes, scarves, clothesclothesandmoreclothes, intoxicating spices, teas, soaps, electronics, fresh glistening produce, rich fabrics.... and the food...mygod the food....i could walk mere steps in any direction and be confronted by carts selling slow-roasted chicken, beef and lamb, cig kofte (a bulgar 'meatball' wrapped in a tortilla), fresh squeezed orangegrapefruitcarrotpomengranateapple juices, stuffed mussels, borek, turkish delight, baklava, so many sweets and candies that i couldn't possibly learn the names of all of them,gozleme flatbread stuffed with potato spinach and cheese, kebab, bakery after bakery....this city loves its food. last week i ate lamb that was hung on hooks and slow-roasted over a pit, by a kurdish family who has supposedly been preparing lamb this way since the late 1800s. tender, juicy, rich, served with yoghurt over flatbread in the shadow of the ancient roman aquaduct. Ahhhh, life.....

Public Perspiration- I Mean, Public Transportation

For a city of 12-17 million people, Istanbul is surprisingly easy to navigate without a car. I'm infinitely grateful I don't have to drive in this place. The traffic snarls on the major roadways many hours a day, but its not for lack of providing other public options. Public transportation here is damn good. Diverse options. Several public train lines, tramlines, bus systems, ferry boats- all of which you can use with the same rechargeable transportation card. Super easy! There are also a couple of different privately-run bus options, the mini-bus & the Dolmuş, which are dirt cheap and take cash. I don’t really ever see anyone on bicycles, but people walk everywhere. There are taxis, and they always seem busy, but I can barely count on one hand how many times I’ve taken a taxi here since January.

One of the bus systems is called the Metrobus and it runs on one of the major highways between the airport and Kadikoy, across the Bosphorous Straight on the Asian side. I love the Metrobus because it has its own lanes in the middle of the highway so it doesn’t have to fight traffic. I took it a lot when I was living in Bahcelievler because the stop was right in the middle of the pedestrian bridge near my house. It was a relatively quick trip into to Taksim or over to visit Umit in Kadikoy. And super cheap- like 2 Lira. I don’t take it much anymore because my apartment is pretty far from the closest stop. Being that this city is so densely populated, inevitably you end up crammed with what feels like about a million other people on all of these busses, trains, trams, etc. And its only getting more crowded now that tourist season is here.

There are a few things that Turkish people are famous for (well, more than a few), that seem exacerbated by close quarters on public transit:   1) pushiness and a general lack of spatial awareness. I noticed this for my first time when I was in Greece last summer actually. There is just an entirely different concept of personal space over here, meaning, it really doesn’t exist. The only rule is that there are no rules. This goes for standing in line, walking on sidewalks, walking in overly crowded spaces… It is an accepted fact that you don’t really wait in line. Anywhere. You push your way to the front- along with everyone else. In most American cities I’ve been to, when walking in crowded places, there is a certain level of flow and spatial awareness. In Turkey? Not so much. One of my coworkers calls it Istanbull-dozing. Totally accurate. 2) STARING! Oh. My. God. The staring. Especially as a woman. Especially as a foreign woman. 3) Body odor. I don’t know why, but, at the risk of overgeneralizing, Turkish folks don’t utilize the benefits of deodorant. I noticed this with some of my students in the winter. Powerful stuff, I tell ya…. Of course, the weather is getting much warmer now, and much more humid. And the public transits much more crowded. So……you can probably do the math. Ripe. Potent. Palpable.

All of that being said, there is a TV advertisement for the Metrobus that I want to share with you. I’m only sharing the actual advertisement because I reallllllllly want to share the spoof of the ad with you, which shows how it actually feels on the bus. It features the three things I just mentioned. Enjoy!

The Original Ad (watch this one first, or the 2nd one won't be as funny):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RBPdi0K29U

The Spoof:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHdzOMNR_Do

Well now, that's better!

I just said goodbye to my new ‘landlord’/sometimes flatmate, Volkan as he took a breather from practicing his clarinet. We were just admiring this fresh, gorgeous spring weather, looking out from our balcony across the Golden Horn to Suleyman Mosque, on what is one of the clearest days I’ve seen here in Istanbul. It stormed last night and there is a freshness and cleanliness in the air today~ I can tell that some of the thick smog has been pushed out. I put on my sunglasses and walk down the five flights of worn marble stairs, each floor home to a different music or art studio, and out onto the narrow, steep cobbled street. In less than 2 minutes, I’m passing one of my very favorite landmarks, the Galata Tower, heading down another narrow alley to the coffee shop where I’m sitting.

Galata Tower

The past few weeks have monumental.  

First, I moved out of the ‘armpit of Istanbul.’ Peace out, Bahcelievler. I found a big, super groovy apartment in Galata. The guy who owns it is my age, a Turkish man who plays a hybrid of traditional Turkish, gypsy, Balkan, jazz clarinet with a few outfits in town. The flat is huge: 2 big bedrooms, a big living room, and a soundproof music studio space with a drum kit, hand drums, guitars, among other things. Tall ceilings, old jazz vinyl hung on the walls, framed photographs of Miles and Dizzy, taken by my favorite music photographer, Herman Leonard (who lived for years in New Orleans), a west-facing balcony over- looking the iconic Golden Horn. It would be an understatement to say that I am pinching myself regularly. I am in heaven. Band members come over regularly to practice, so there is a steady stream of musicians passing through. They are all so sweet and kind. And they are GOOD. Last week I had a Macedonian accordion player kicking ass in my living room. Totally surreal Istanbul moment….. I saw their band last week. Insane! The rhythm section was unreal. He’s assembled a really solid group of musicians.

Second, I quit my job. I started working at another language school part time, and am working on building up my private lesson practice. My old school was so horribly mismanaged, they treated their teachers so horribly, the hours sucked, plus I was way out by the airport in a soulless neighborhood of stripmalls. Palpably painful.

So, I’ve pretty much carved out a whole new life for myself here, all put in motion exactly on the Spring Equinox, which I love because it symbolizes the return of the light after the dark of winter. I can’t even describe how much happier I am living here. Steps away from everything that I love about this city…. History, artists, historic buildings, museums, young people, countless restaurants, courtyards, narrow cobbled streets, dark alleys, transportation to anywhere…. I feel like here, I have finally found the Istanbul experience I’ve been craving, but that has been eluding me since my arrival. This is one of my absolute favorite parts of the city. The streets are lined with music shops. The tower never gets old to me. Now that the weather is nice, there are always people sitting in the square surrounding the tower drinking beer, wine, coffee, tea… Buskers, circus performers, food vendors….. It is never boring. Ever.  It feels so right. I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be. Finally. Spring is here. Life is good.

Just an average night of amateur circus performers at the foot of the Galata Tower

Click here for updated pics.

Tarlabaşɪ

As soon as the Dolmuş belched its way onto the tiny, steep lane, I knew it. I knew it by the colorful, historic homes reaching to the sky. I knew it by the narrowness of the streets. I knew it by the drying clothes strung high above the street between buildings. But mostly, I knew it by my gut. I felt it. This place was different. This was Tarlabaşɪ.

Recycler in Bahcelievler (photo by Oji)

Let me back up a bit. When I first moved to Bahcelievler, I noticed what appeared to be a relatively ‘organized’ effort of people diving in the dumpsters pulling out recyclables. What struck me was that they were all on foot, pulling large tyvek sacks, approximately 4x4x8, attached to a large dolly all hours of day/night. They are everywhere.  I wondered: Is this government sanctioned recycling? Is this one of the indications of Turkey’s still-developing status? The collectors are generally men, although I have been seeing more and more head-scarved women lately. None of them ever make eye-contact with me. Of course, my wheels start spinning with questions….  Where do they take it all? Who are they? What are they collecting? Where do they live? Are they part of one big group or do they work as individuals or families? Are there turf wars?

Then my favorite researcher came to town….. One of my favorite things about Oji is that he just can’t stand not knowing the answers. I pointed out these recyclers to him, and by the time I got home from work that night, he was beside himself with excitement. He had a full report ready for me. It started with, “We’ve got to go to Tarlabaşɪ.”

It turns out that they are a group of primarily Kurdish people who make their living pulling recycling. They make the most money from paper. They typically pull in about 30-40 TL per day, which is the equivalent of about 15-20 USD. They are not government sanctioned. In fact, the municipality views them as competition and often confiscates their carts and bags. Many of the recyclers are from the city of Van in Eastern Turkey. After the big earthquake there last October, recyclers pooled their earnings to send 12 lorries full of blankets, jackets, hygiene products, and food to the devastated areas (Click here for a link to an article about their efforts).

It was this research on the recyclers of Istanbul that led to Tarlabaşɪ. From what I can gather, this is where the majority of the recyclers live. It is an old neighborhood, with the first homes built as early as 1535 for the non-Muslim diplomats during the Ottoman Empire. It was largely destroyed by fire in 1870 and was rebuilt with stone to protect from fire danger, as was common practice during this time (this post-fire transition from wood to stone also happened in New Orleans around the same time). Tarlabaşɪ is located between the Golden Horn and the hip, modern, bustling, neighborhood of Taksim/Beyoglu.  At the turn of the 20^th century, this hood was inhabited by non-Muslim lower-middle class Armenian, Greek and Jewish craftsmen who sold their stuff to the diplomats over on Istiklal Street. The buildings are 4-story Levantine bow-fronted homes with the ground floor typically used as commercial or studio space. A series of anti-non-Muslim laws and events took place in the 20s, 40s and 50s, which caused large portions of the non-Muslim population to take off. As Istanbul developed out into the ‘Burbs instead of up, as is common in urban development, the Tarlabaşɪ hood was sort of left in a state of arrested decay.  In the 1990s, Kurdish refugees from the Turk-Kurd civil war came to Istanbul. Tarlabaşɪ was the only hood they could afford, or in some cases, squat in. Flash forward to present day and we have the homebase for the dumpster-diving recyclers.

Enter ‘urban renewal.’  The government has now decided that Tarlabaşɪ is prime real estate and they have begun a campaign to ‘renew’ the area. The Kurds have been pushed out of their homes, some bought out, some forced to leave. The old historic homes are slated to be demolished. Torn down. Destroyed. And ‘redeveloped’ to something shinier and prettier. I’ve noticed this practice here in Istanbul. Rather than restore existing historic structures, there is this push to tear down and rebuild ‘in the style of’ the former structure. "In the style of....." Kind of like Karaoke…. The melody is recognizable, but you can’t quite place the artist, and the person singing usually butchers it. There is little resemblance to the original. In an attempt to pay tribute, we actually destroy the very thing we are trying to honor. (Click here for a link to the project's Official Website)

This is when the two-years-dormant planner in me kicks in. In the US, we have distinct definitions and regulations dealing with the semantics of preservation, reconstruction, restoration, rehabilitation of historic sites. Historic preservation is guided by The Secretary of the Interior’s Standards and Guidelines for Historic Preservation.  There are a few different types of treatments allowed for protection (forgive me for going all planning-nerd on you):

Preservation is defined as the act or process of applying measures necessary to sustain the existing form, integrity, and materials of an historic property.

Reconstruction is defined as the act or process of depicting, by means of new construction, the form, features, and detailing of a non-surviving site, landscape, building, structure, or object for the purpose of replicating its appearance at a specific period of time and in its historic location.

Rehabilitation is defined as the act or process of making possible a compatible use for a property through repair, alterations, and additions while preserving those portions or features which convey its historical, cultural, or architectural values.

Restoration is defined as the act or process of accurately depicting the form, features, and character of a property as it appeared at a particular period of time by means of the removal of features from other periods in its history and reconstruction of missing features from the restoration period.

In California, anything more than 50 years old must be assessed for historic value by a qualified historian, archaeologist, architect, etc. Now, I’ll be the first to admit that the 50 year threshold is a bit cumbersome. Does this mean we have to start assessing tract homes from the 1950s for historic value and integrity? Gaudy 1960s suburban shopping malls? There is a grey area there, for sure. But, there are some periods and styles that are no-brainers. Such as old homes in the Tarlabaşɪ hood.

Istanbul has chosen to go the ‘reconstruction’ route in Tarlabaşɪ, which, from what I’ve seen, is one of few remaining architecturally in-tact neighborhoods. As I mentioned in previous posts, many historic structures have already been torn down all over the city and replaced with the homogenous apartment cubes. I’ve seen some examples of other reconstructions here and I haven’t been impressed. They look über modern and remind me of cheesy, shiny replicas of historic styles that I used to see in California. It makes my heart hurt to think of Istanbul going in this direction with their ‘conservation’ strategy. I think its something they will regret in the long run, once all the buildings with any character and soul are gone and forgotten. Meanwhile, the demolitions have begun in Tarlabaşɪ, slowly but surely. Some of the property owners have sued the government for attempting to force them out of the neighborhood, presumably using something similar to eminent domain. I hear that these court cases have slowed, maybe even halted, the demolitions for the time being.

So, where will my recyclers go now that their hood is on the fast track to gentrification?

Oji and I had a lengthy conversation with a suit-and-tie guy in a back-alley hole-in-the-wall (literally) nargile café (aka hookah) about this displacement. Clearly educated and middle-class if not upper-middle class. His response: the government finds a place for them. The government put them in Tarlabaşɪ and the government will find a place for them now that they want to redevelop the hood. He wasn’t concerned at all for their future because, in his mind, they were taken care of. He spoke of the Muslim tradition to take care of the less fortunate. Cultural values… “There is no homeless problem in Istanbul.” He was floored by the homeless problem in America when he visited Los Angeles. He didn’t understand how we could just let people live outside on the street. It should be our (ALL of us) duty to take care of them. Listening to him talk, it sounded like there is less judgment of the poor here than there is in the US.  He said this was something that was shifting now in the younger generation, as people begin to make more money in Turkey. Is this one of the byproducts of increasing westernization/globalization? As the gap between rich and poor increases, so does the level of judgment? “Well, if I can do it, everyone should be able to do it.” But is that really true? Is there really space in this world for everyone to be ‘rich?’ What if people just want to be relatively comfortable? Or what if they want to collect recycling for 40TL/day? Who are we to judge that? I’ve watched these people, they are working their asses off! I'm still in the process of trying to determine whether or not Istanbul actually has a homeless problem or not. its surprisingly difficult to find information on it. So, there either isn't a huge problem, or its ignored at such a level that it has been imagined away.

As I rubber-necked the beautiful Levantine bow-front houses in Tarlabaşɪ from the Dolmuş in the late afternoon amber light, I felt different. I felt like I was in an in-tact neighborhood in a way that I hadn’t experienced here in Istanbul yet. I wanted to jump out of the van and wander the streets in that moment because I was unsure if it would even be there the next time I came through. I am indebted to the recyclers and Tarlabaşɪ for providing an incredible lense through which to view so many of the current issues of an ever-expanding, ever-Westernizing metropolis.

For more information about Tarlabaşɪ, visit this blog: http://www.tarlabasiistanbul.com/

I am a bad blogger.....
I have many articles, stories, history lessons floating around in my head for you, some of which have made their way to paper, but haven't made their way to this blog.... I have been working, working, working... Have discovered some amazing places.... Spring is springing here, trees and flowers are blooming.... The city is coming alive. Everyone, myself included, is welcoming this change with open arms. I hope to write more soon. 


Things I've Learned:


* As punishment for their choosing the wrong side in the conflict, the Ottoman Empire was divided up by the Allies after the First World War. A certain general, Ataturk, rose up against this separation to create what is now modern-day Turkey. He is responsible for uniting the post-WWI fragments, making Turkey a Democracy, as well as secularizing it (which was no small feat, considering that most people and governments in the region followed Islamic Sharia Law. I still don't understand how he managed this). If Turkish citizens have a superhero, Ataturk is it. Sides of buildings are plastered with him, always dapperly dressed, sometimes on horseback, sometimes with rainbow light shining on him from heaven. He is revered in the most serious of ways by schoolchildren to university students to grown men and women. He fought hard to keep Turkey secular. So it is interesting to note that the current Turkish government is trending the opposite direction. 


* There is a group of gypsies who cart massive tyvek sacks on wheels around collecting recycling. Photos forthcoming.


* In Turkey, 'architectural preservation' = 'architectural redevelopment.' Rather than restore, they tear down the old historic buildings and rebuild them 'in the style of....'


* Homelessness: Problem Yok! (really???)


* Sufism vs. Islam


* My Turkish vocabulary is improving. I'm nowhere close to speaking in sentences, but I feel good about my vocab. 


* Potentially some major changes on the horizon as we enter the Spring season... I am working out the details, but hope to have some news to report soon.


I miss you all much! Know that I carry you all around with me.