Istanbul, Turkey
I had the opportunity to go to Istanbul from March 17-22 as part of a
mid-year conference for my teaching program.
Special thanks to the English Language Fellow Program for sponsoring
this trip.
This is intended as a quick-reference guide for anyone
planning a trip to Istanbul. I have a full travelogue
as well, but it should be noted that many of my experiences in Istanbul
were a by-product of living in Ukraine.
For example, if I had come to Istanbul
from America
I probably never would have gone to Migros, let alone gotten excited about
seeing Doritos and Ruffles potato chips there.
· Sights
· Food and Drink
· Recommended Restaurants
· Bargaining
· What to Avoid
· Transportation
· Lodging
· Money
· Language
PHOTOS

·
Topkapı —the
Ottoman Sultan’s former palace. Be sure to
check out the room with antique robes, and the rooms of the Sultan’s
harem.
·
Ayasofya—a
former church in the time of Constantinople
that was converted to a mosque and is now a museum. Some parts of it may still
be under renovation.
·
Sultanahmet—also
known as the Blue Mosque. Lots of beautiful tiles inside.
·
Suleymaniye—another
beautiful mosque in Istanbul.
·
Istiklal Caddesi—a
pedestrian street of Taksim Square
with shops, restaurants, bars, movies and more.
·
Spice Bazaar (Mısır
Çarşısı).—A bazaar in the Eminönü
neighborhood that specializes in spices, but other textiles and housewares are
available.
·
Covered Bazaar (Kapalı
Çarşısı)—The mother of all bazaars. A small city of leather, clothes, housewares,
jewelry, etc.
Döner—a kind of thin meat sliced off a
spit. Served either on a large section
of a baguette/batard as a sandwich (750,000 TL), or over rice (menu with soup,
dessert, and drink 4,500,000 TL).
Kebab—if you have only had shish kebab,
you are in for an education. There are
varieties of kebab based on the preparation of the meat (sometimes based on
regional specialities). On my trip I had
pan kebab, iskender kebab, and urfa
kebab. Restaurants have many varieties
prepared; you can look in the window and just choose one!
Baklava—a sweet puff pastry with lots
of sugar and pistachios. One of many fine Turkish desserts.
Simit—A round pastry with a large hole
in it, often eaten for breakfast (300,000 TL).
Like many pastries for breakfast or tea, simit is salty, not sweet.
Helva—a desert made from peanuts; a
hard, drier form of peanut butter.
Incir—dried figs. One of many dried fruits that Turkey exports
to other countries such as Ukraine.
Çay
(prounounced like “chai”), the Turkish word for tea. Turkish çay is served in small glasses that
have no handles and curve inwards on both sides near the top of the glass. It’s not a handle, though, because you are
supposed to hold the glass at the very top with your thumb and index finger.
Rakı—the national liquor. Called “Lion’s Milk” because when you mix it
with water, it turns cloudy. Has a flavor like licorice or anise.
Recommended
Restaurants
Hala—A café and restaurant on Istiklal
Caddesi which offers great Turkish home cooking. They have great yufka, a very thin bread like a crepe that is handmade on the
premises (you can watch the women working through the window) and filled with
potato, goat cheese, or other savory fillings.
Another food they claim as a specialty is mantı, a pasta filled
with meat and covered in a yogurt and olive oil sauce. Everything is reasonably
priced too. The dishes range from 1
million to 2.5 million TL. And the
service is very friendly. The çay
may be free at the end of the meal.
Olympiat—In the Karaköy neighborhood,
probably on Rihtim Caddesi. Excellent
fresh grilled fish with a view of the Golden Horn
harbor area.
Doğa Fish—a short cab ride from
Istiklal, this restaurant (pronounced Doya) has good fish and salads and from
the eighth floor it has an amazing view of Topkapı (the Sultan’s palace),
the mosques, and the scene on the other side of the Golden
Horn.
If you are shopping in Istanbul, you must be
prepared to bargain, or be prepared to pay the tourist rate. Some bargaining tips (based on my Turkish
friends’ advice):
·
You
should aim to bargain the price down to half the seller’s initial offer.
·
Your
first counteroffer should be ridiculously low so that you can work your way up
to half the seller’s initial offer.
·
Don’t
be afraid to walk away from a negotiation if you change your mind or the
negotiation isn’t going well.
Purely based on my personal opinion
and/or bad experience:
·
Carpet
salesmen (unless you want to buy a carpet).
·
Anyone
who offers to give you a service (e.g. shining your shoes) and says you can pay
“what you want” at the end. Always agree
on the price first.
·
Anyone
who offers to give you a tour of a mosque.
There are no official guides or tours for mosques.
·
Any
taxi whose meter seems to be broken, unless you want to use this to negotiate a
fixed price before driving to your destination.
·
From
the airport, an airport bus to Taksim
Square is run by Havaş about every half hour
and cost 4,500,000 Turkish Liras (TL), a little over 3 U.S. dollars. A taxi to the same area costs about 14
million TL.
·
There
is a trolley that runs from Taksim
Square down Istiklal Caddesi (less than 1 million
TL).
·
At
the end of the Istiklal trolley line is the Tünel, a kind of funincular that
runs down near the bridge that goes across the Golden Horn (Yeni Galata
Köprüsü) (500,000 TL).
·
There
are many ferries that run along the Bosphorus between the European and Asian
continents. There is a special ferry
that runs for tourists once per day (at about 10:15 a.m.) and takes six hours. If you don’t have time for that you can take
a regular passenger ferry for about 800,000 TL.
·
Across
Yeni Galata Köprüsü in Eminönü, there is a tramvay that runs to tourist areas
like Topkapı, Sultanahmet (the Blue Mosque), and the Covered Bazaar
(650,000 TL).
·
There
is a Metro system in Istanbul
but I didn’t use it.
Lodging
Because I
was on a company budget, I stayed at the Hotel Richmond on Istiklal
Caddesi. I saw an AYH hostel near Topkapı and Ayasofia, and another hostel
up the hill from Blue Mosque.
ATMs are everywhere in Turkey, and
many banks will exchange U.S. dollars. Turkey’s
inflation rate is improving but is still high at 61 percent, so only withdraw
or exchange as much money as you need.
Credit cards can be used widely (though having gotten used to living in
cash economy, I used my credit card sparingly).
Language
Many people in Istanbul
speak English. The only exceptions I
found were telephone and post office employees.
Food servers, hotel staff and bazaar/carpet salesmen are often
multilingual. I met people who spoke
German, Russian, Hebrew, Spanish, and more.
If you are a language philologist like me, you can go to the Foreign Languages for Travelers
site and learn some Turkish words.
“Lütfen” (LOOT-fan) means “please”; “Teşekkür Ederim” (Tuh-SHAY-kur
EDurem) means “Thank you”.

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