Prince's Islands

After taking a bus from Ortakoy to the bus station in Eminunu I booked it under the bridge past all the merchants selling the fresh fish sandwiches and doner’s for a dollar through mass amounts of people along the sea side about 100 meters to the fairy port praying that I could make the boat my friends were on going to the Island. I got there just as the men were closing the gate to board the boat, somehow I convinced them to let me in. Thank god, or otherwise I would have missed out on an absolutely lovely day.

I got on the boat just as it was leaving and surprised my friends sitting in perfect seats as they got their early just to get them. Sweating, I squeezed myself in between Monica and an old fat lady in a vail. The vailed lady didn’t seem too happy about my presence but I really didn’t care. We watched a few sales pitches in Turkish, one for a set of knives and the other for a lemon juicer. Even without understanding the language we were very impressed and a few from our group ended up buying the juicers and the fat lady in the vail bought the set of knives. Something to keep us entertained during the 2 hours it takes to get to the island.

Once on the island we walked around for a bit checking the place out getting used to the sound of horse carrage drivers yelling pardon for us to move out of the way instead of hearing constant car horns just confusing us as they do in Taksim. We had lunch, walked along the sea and had ice cream. I was of course having a hard time deciding over chewy dondurma (turkish ice cream) or a waffle which I became obsessed with the day before. Because of the warm weather I went for the dondurma and even if they ice cream man tried to scam us, believe me it was well worth it. I got Karasik, a little bit of each flavor all on one cone. Dipped in chocolate and nuts, its Absolutely amazing I tell you.

We rented bikes and biked all over the island. Ringing the bells on our handlebars going down hills in a line through the forest with the summer breeze against our face we felt just like kids again. It was the best! It didn’t matter where we were from (Venezuela, Portugal, Netherlands, Canada, and USA) or what the history of our country was. It was all lost in the fun just as if we were children without a care in the world. While dodging horse carriages we passed little shops and beautiful old mansions on the road. From the tops of the hills we could see the Bosphorus and parts of Istanbul in the distance.

After getting lost for a short period of time because of my and Martin’s adventurous nature, we hurried back to catch the 7:30pm fairy. We arrived just in time but the departure was then changed to 8:00pm. We sat next to the water as the sun was setting and ordered elma chai (apple tea) and tried to figure out how they got the bread around the breaded peanuts as we waited for the fairy. Once we boarded and the boat started to move all five of us passed out for 2 hours until we reached our final destination, Karikoy, Home Sweet Home!

Another lovely day with the trianees in Istanbul :-)

Touring the Island

I know it was a long night last night, but open your eyes girl!  

Buyuk Ada 

Is someone sleeping? 

mmm...ice cream... 

Basilio 

We're ready!! 

Moni modeling with her bike and Istanbul in the background. 

Woo Hoo! 

Yea!! 

Horse! 

Ferry port at Buyuk Ada  

The Love Boat

I just reached the ferry port in time to board after saying farewell to my father as he was leaving Turkey to go home to the states. I felt bad for leaving early but I really needed to have a good night with all my friends. I was a little worried as a boat party pretty much means you’re stuck out at sea with the same people for 5 hours. It was actually really cool because all of the trainees decided to go together. It was a kind of "bonding" if you will.

The city of Istanbul is absolutely gorgeous at night and from a boat in the Bosphorus it's pretty much indescribable. All of the Mosques and Palaces are all lit up and reflect beautifully off the water.

The first hour was nice as we were all starting to get a little tipsy, a few more hours and we became more than a little friendly. The trainees pretty much became incestual. It was so surprising. People I never would have imagined having chemistry for each other fell victim to their libido that night. I think there must be something about the sea that brings people together.

It's too bad I didn't care to pay attention to any of the love escapades of the night. I could have taken some wonderfully incriminating photos. But as you can see by the ones taken that even those of us who didn't meet our match that night had an absolutely wonderful time ;-)

Random Dude, Christiano as part of the Turkish Mafia, and Aakash 

Iva, me, Sara aboard the Love Boat not really knowing what we are about to get ourselves into. rrrr.... 

Maarten!!!! 

Hmmm.... 

Basilio and Aakash while helping me with the sim card situation. Thanks guys!! 

Basilio grilling out the window on the ledge of our building (6 floors up and once shimmied along in order to salvage contact solution from the next room for our friend Monica who's poor drunk eyes were too dry too wait for standard entryway to be unlocked) for our so-called BBQ where all I got was toasted bread and a slice of tomato�All is well at least we created a great atmosphere for the party with a palm tree. Although no one really has any recollection of when or how we obtained it we attribute it and other random objects once seen in a bar, found the next morning in the dorm to, �the belligerent bandit.�

Me, Iva, and Sarah starving at the BBQ. At least we had canned peas:-)