Visiting
Istanbul, Turkey/Carlos Pueblo
I left
Frankfurt, Germany on October 18, 2016 for a week stay in
Istanbul,
Turkey. This is one of a trip in my mind for a long time
even though there
is a minor security concern of political activity,
a military
coup. There are 3 million Turks in Germany and the round
trip is very
convenient and inexpensive from any of German cities to
Istanbul via
Turkey Airway. After twice travel to Germany, I understand
why German
are so friendly toward Turks that I believe to be back to
the friendly
Germany Empire and Ottoman Empire. Albrecht Von Roon
who was one
of the figure along with Otto Von Bismarck was an army
attache to
Ottoman. After WWI, both empires collapsed.
The second
reason of my interest is that I like to see myself of the current
day of the
ancient legend Gokturks, one of the old empires north or west
of the great
Wall of China. Gokturks were pushed gradually toward the west
along the
silk road by Chinese Tang Dynasty and the Mongolian and finally
got a break
at the current day Istanbul as the Ottoman Empire. I didn’t have
such romantic
trip in Istanbul and let me explain the reasons.
I ran out of
my cash for almost a month and refused to get a re-supply from
home that
made my trip very hard. I developed a method to get by with a
credit card.
I broke my last one hundred dollar bill to pay something in the
hostel and
got 4 twenty dollar bills and put them in two stacks in to my wallet.
An old shoe
polisher guided me to an inner bay of Bosphorus on the European
Side. We
communicated well enough in English and finally at a corner of an
office building
ground with trees and green grasses. He gave me a penny like
of Turkey Lira
for souvenir, then also asked to polish my tennis shoes. I felt that
I should
give him something in return. I opened my wallet trying to find a dollar.
I saw my stacks
of twenty dollar bills and opened his eyes in surprise. He asked to
see if he
could see the money and I was so stupid to comply. He touched and viewed
those money
in the front and back then returned to me. This was all in front of my two
eyes widely
opened. After we departed in just a few minutes, I didn’t feel comfortable
and check my
wallet and found out one stack of 40 dollars were gone.
I did
mention to some for such experience to release my stress of stupidity in this
trip until I
got tired of it.
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