My OperaIstanbul - what to remember?
Sunday, June 7, 2009 8:32:27 PM
Its all about Istanbul
1. The flirty and over-chatty guys, from 10-year old boys to over 40s men
2. Meat, meat, and meat - And the consequence is that Number 2 aint come easy!
3. Mosques make up the beauty of the city. But the thing is, how many mosques can you see before finding them pretty much alike?
4. The Grand Baazaar, another version of Dong Xuan market or Ben Thanh market
5. Use your bargaining skills. I bought a large bowl for 10 YLT from the offer price of 50 YLT! (well not to mention being flirted a bit!)
6. Save some coins, in particular the 50 coin, as you will have to pay even for the "holes on the ground" with no toilet paper! Yuck!
7. Most ATM machines rejected my beautiful debit cards (no matter if it was issued in the US or UK). They could actually smell strangers or smth.
8. Taxi drivers could be cheaters. Lan & I were literally ripped off in the middle of the day, though we gained back a bit by agreeing the amount prior to the trip, even for the meter cab.
9. Salespeople at nice malls could not speak English as well as street vendors.
10. The female elderly actually look like one another (white scarves on the heads, big round 3 measurement)
11. "Where are you from" can be heard anywhere, anytime
Memories from the trip:
1. Conversations always surrounded: Number 1, number 2, "air" and hence smell. Tactics to let "it" out.
2. the 2 Warwickers who would get in front of the camera ANY TIME and could pose ANY TIME
3. But also the same 2 guys who helped my night bus rides not so bad (thanks La'I for the leg and Duc for the shoulder, hehe)
4. Best tiramisu ever, LTD should feel extra special cos it was also the crew's love for him on his bd
5. Lai' lost his luggage on coming to Istanbul and was almost forced to buy CK at the Grand Baazaar
6. LTD has a cool camera and was the main photographer for everyone
7. Lan seemed to be the most "loveable" in Turkish men's eyes (evidence? Ask the victim!)
8. Duc lost to the Turkish hostel man in the arm wrestling game (too much pressure from girls I guess, hehe)
9. Creativity in photographing, eg. Brokeback mountains, imitation of rock shapes at Capadocia, strike faces… Well done guys
10. Our room 23 with no light and the bathroom door uncloseable, let alone lockable
11. we learnt another drinking game: if divided by 3, stay quiet, if divided by 7, skip & reverse. I think 30s was the max we got up to. You think it's easy? Try when you are tipsy and see.
12. We can now all tell the difference between handmade and cheap carpets - and thankfully we still love Lan enough not to exchange her for 10 camels! Otherwise next time you are in Istanbul, check out the carpet store in front of Grand Bazaar cos you might see a little VNM girl making carpet while weeping, hehe
13. On the tour day-out in Capadocia, we met a very interesting family with 4 beautiful kids (especially the youngest girl - who could fight back against any "enemy" that is in her way! - Lai' had some experience in this. They took one year to travel around the world. The kids are doing remote study over the internet. They keep an amazing blog (
www.sixintheworld.com) writing and capturing their travelling memories. Btw, we were mentioned and photographed in their Turkey section!Istanbul was no impressive, but we had good laughs. It’s the L-T-D crew!
