Bear Among the Ruins

I feel sorry for Izmit - and I know that it must sound strange (feeling sorry for a city) but as far as much of the world is concerned, apart from the 1999 earthquake, Izmit doesn't really exist. But I know it exists but maybe that's because I am, by nature, a very compassionate bear (it's pretty much a prerequisite if you want to be a Freelance Goodwill Ambassador). And I'm also currently living in Izmit.

Today, I took the bipedals for a little outing to Izmit's Archaeological and Ethnography Museum which is down by the railway station. In fact, they've incorporated the grounds of the old train station into an open-air museum for most of the marble artefacts. Of course, if you google the museum, you probably won't find anything, or if you do, it will actually be for the Archaeological Museum in Izmir not Izmit in the south of Turkey. Poor Izmit.

It's important to remember how important Izmit once was in the ancient world. I know I talked a bit about this in a previous post but it bears (!) repeating. Izmit was founded over 2720 years ago and was called Astacus or possible Olbia (how scholars confuse those two names is beyond me) and eventually was rebuilt and renamed Nicomedia. One of the most famous philosophers of the Roman period, Arrian, was born here. His writings on Alexander the Great (not born here) are still the most widely read account of the young warrior-god.

In 244, the Emperor Diocletian made Nicomedia the capital of his eastern Roman Empire. Although a reformer, he is probably best remembered for his savage persecution of Christians. He believed that his palace in Nicomedia had been set on fire by them (with the help of a few eunuchs) and although the ensuing investigation found no evidence of this, heads quickly started to roll. Literally. And bodies flayed and boiled alive over an open flame. Some 3,000 Christians were killed and many more tortured and imprisoned. And people think bears are dangerous!

But ultimately, Diocletian was unsuccessful: within 21 years, the Emperor Constantine (who would later die just outside Nicomedia) made Christianity his religion of choice. Diocletian was the first Roman emperor to voluntarily abdicate and spent his retirement pottering about in his vegetable garden in modern-day Croatia. Not such a bad end, all in all.

Anyway, this is my long-winded way of saying that with so much Greek and Roman history - and I didn't even mention the Ottomans (the people not the foot stools) - there are lots of bits of statuary (some headless, some with other parts cut off!), mosaics (although nothing to rival Ravenna's tiles), columns & fountains (see above right) in Izmit. Or at least in Izmit's Archaeological & Ethnography Museum.

Of course, it was awfully nice of the guard not to charge us the usual 3 lira ($2 Cdn) entrance fee and I suspect that he did so because he recognized me and not because - as my female bipedal attendant suggested - it's Sunday and perhaps museums are free. I mean really. She's just miffed because I caught her in a lie: she and my male bipedal attendant skipped off to Istanbul the other day and not only did they not take me but they told me they were going out to buy a carton of milk. For 12 hours? Do I look like I was born yesterday? - although, I admit that using a light moisturizer and sunblock takes years off my face.

I doubt this posting will put Izmit - or Astacus/Olbia/Nicomedia and Kocaeli (rhymes with 'toe jelly') as it is also known - on the tourist map but even if it gets to outshine sunny Izmir for one minute, then my job is done. At least for today.

A Bear & His Bong

On Thursday I finally gave in to my bipedal attendants' constant grumbling about the poor quality of the waterpipes in Izmit's tea shops and bought one for the house. Honestly, I hadn't heard this much whining since our days in Bratislava.

Anyway, I popped by a narghile shop in town and picked out one with a lovely blue jar - of course, my female bipedal wanted a green one but this particular blue one had a beautiful golden fish design on it and that reminded me of my two friends, Ken & Gerard the Goldfish, who died 3 years ago. Apparently those niceties were quite lost on her.

Now, the important thing about buying a waterpipe is selecting one with a proper "body". The body is comprised of the long hollow tube with a gasket and grommets, through which the smoke from the burning tobacco is drawn from the clay bowl on top and then back out through the hose. Uninitiated narghile puffers often mistakenly buy a cheaper body - saving money is good, no? - but then quality is sacrificed. A less expensive body is made out of some tinny alloy that you can bend with your hands (of course, as a bear, I can crush almost anything in my paws) while its pricier counterpart is made out of brass. As a former international fashion model, I know that you get what you pay for - and let's face it, you want your narghile to last more than a week, right?

I confess that I wasn't very impressed with the narghile merchant's packing abilities (see photo, above left), especially considering that the box was custom designed to hold a narghile properly. He was a little tape-happy. Maybe he was just anxious for us to leave his shop - my female bipedal was making a lot of noise about not getting a green waterpipe.

The same way that I'm known as GB or Grey Bear, the waterpipe goes by many different names too: in India it's a hookah, in Iran it's a ghelyoon, in Egypt it's a shisha, while here in Turkey it's a narghile. They were probably invented thousands of years ago in a much simpler form - the Iranian word ghelyonn actually means "coconut" which is probably a clue to its original material - in either India or Persia. Some people even think they were invented in America - I mean, really! America? Anyway, our first honest-to-goodness reference to the waterpipe is from the royal court of the Mughal (Muslim/Persian) Emperor Akbar the Great, almost 500 years ago in India. In fact, it's because of the later British presence in India under the Raj that most of the English-speaking world knows the pipe as the hookah. India had a huge impact on the English language: the British also introduced the Hindi words bungalow, pyjamas, jungle and shampoo into English, but that's for another blog.

In some parts of the world, the water hose is covered with silk or cloth, but the narghiles here have what looks like a bit of Turkish carpet on it. You can see from the photo (below, right) our groovy blue, yellow & white "carpet" on the hose. Turkish narghiles also differ from others because the wooden part of the hose, which supports the mouthpiece, is actually quite big. I feel like I'm conducting an orchestra when I had a puff.

Speaking of puffing, the best shisha tobacco in the world - bears don't do drugs - is Egyptian ma'sal (honey-molasses tobacco) but I've been told that it's illegal in Turkey. I was able to find Egyptian apple tobacco in Istanbul which is pretty good - not as heady as ma'sal but better than the local stuff. I'm going to keep looking though because as anyone will tell you, anything is possible in Turkey.

I probably didn't need to buy a narghile - apart from putting an end to my bipedals' griping, of course - because I don't really need anything to help me relax. I admit that, as a Freelance Goodwill Ambassador, I do find myself in the middle of a lot of stressful situations. I'm actually here in Turkey trying to talk some sense into the Turks about their decades-long occupation of Northern Cyprus - and of course, to enjoy the baklava! In any case, we bears don't get all stressed-out the way you humans do: we meditate, practice yoga, hibernate and enjoy a nice glass of sherry from time to time.

That doesn't mean that I won't enjoy our narghile. But knowing my bipedals, I'm going to have to draw up some sort of timetable and make them stick to it. I don't want to name names, but some people just don't share very well. And as everyone knows (or should know), smoking a waterpipe is supposed to be a social experience.

I hope I don't regret this ...

GB Travels 1st Class

I haven't been doing too much lately - although the Istanbul Jazz Festival isn't far away - but I wanted to say something about the bus we take when we do go to Istanbul.

First of all, Efe Tur is our bus line of choice although it's possible that it's the only bus which connects Izmit and Istanbul. Honestly, I'm not really up on my buses but I do know what I like.

What I like about Efe Tur is its attention to detail - but maybe that's just the former International Fashion Model in me speaking. But what separates a good bus ride from a great bus ride is the little things - just like a matching purse and the right shoes make a great ensemble.

Once an Efe Tour bus is on the road, our bus attendant brings us a bottle of toilet water and a towel with which we may refresh ourselves. On our most recent trip, the 'fragrance' was lemon and based on the expression on the gentleman in the seat in front of me - who had applied it quite liberally to his face - it was a few top notes short of Yves St. Laurent. I usually pass on communal cologne as I like to wear a nice musky scent designed for me exclusively by - well, I don't want to name drop. Naturally my female bipedal attendant made some usual snarky remark about it (although I had to agree with her) but at least my male bipedal attendant's sinuses cleared up.

Next, we are given a choice of coffee or tea. Because it is instant coffee with dehydrated creamer, I usually opt for the tea. What's the point in being in Turkey if you have to drink instant? The tea isn't Turkish either - it's Lipton's - but I can live with that. I do wish they'd fill the cups up higher but I suppose that full cups of hot tea and coffee would be a safety hazard on a fast-moving vehicle.

After everyone has their hot beverage, the bus attendant brings us a platter with a selection of packaged cookies (or bisküvi - just like the French pronunciation), crackers and muffins - which my female bipedal attendant lovingly refers to as chem-cakes, possibly in reference to the 317 ingredients which go into the making of one of these. I usually opt for a chocolate creme-filled bisküvi.

After all of this, we are offered a foil-covered plastic glass of water. Finally the attendant brings the driver his own cup of tea. Really, the only thing missing is an after-dinner mint, but I don't know if they eat those here.

Considering that Istanbul is - depending on the traffic - only an hour or so away, this is excellent service. At least in this bear's opinion. Especially when you bear (!) in mind that the cost for the trip is 10 lira - less than 5 euros. I mean, it's not like travelling on the Concorde, but I get recognized less on an Efe Tur bus than I ever did flying from London to New York. And sometimes you just want to enjoy the ride with a nice cup of tea and a chocolate cream-filled bisküvi without having to sign autographs and pose for photos.

Taboo Bear

Are you sitting down? - we finally made it to Istanbul! Seven weeks we've been in Turkey, and what with false starts, bad weather and "insufficient" funds, I finally managed to organize a day trip for my bipedal attendants. Being that Istanbul is the largest city in Europe, there are thousands of things to see, so for today, I'm going to talk about our visit to the city's historic Topkapı Palace - but more specifically, the Royal Harem.

Now, what with all my years as an International Fashion Model, sharing changing rooms (and sometimes curling irons) with the world's Super Models (Naomi was such a pill ...), I'm pretty comfortable in restricted women's quarters and - since everyone recognizes me immediately - it wasn't too difficult for me to get permission to enter the harem.

The harem at Topkapı Palace, which dates from the end of the 16th century, was the home of the Ottoman Empire's Sultans' mother, wives, concubines - concubines, not porcupines like I first thought - children and their servants.

Among the various buildings and corridors and hallways are nestled at least 100 rooms. I couldn't visit all of them but I was able to peek in a few, although my bipedals let me know in no uncertain terms that I was inconveniencing them. Jealousy just doesn't become those two.

The women were guarded by eunuchs - castrated (ouch!) male slaves - and most of their rooms opened up onto the courtyard (right) - which is now known as the Courtyard of the Eunuchs. They were answerable to the Chief Harem Eunuch, who also controlled the princes. The princes' apartments were known as "the cage" - in fact, the harem itself was called "the golden cage" - and they stayed there until they were released to become sultans or executed. It was common for a new sultan to execute his brothers in order to eliminate any and all rivals from the throne. That's a dysfunctional family for you ... talk about putting the fun in dysfunctional!

The largest and best situated of all the apartments (upper left) in the harem belonged to the sultan's mother. Her apartments included a dining room, audience & receptions rooms, a music room, prayer room and bedroom.

Of course, no Turkish bathroom would be complete without a toilet - naturally a Turkish one - and a sumptuous bath of gold and marble. We bears love a nice hot bubbly bath. The Queen Mother had a double bath and consisted of a caldarium (for a hot soak) tepidarium (for a warm soak) and frigidarium (for a soak worthy of a polar bear). Her bathtub was even protected by a golden lattice-work screen to protect her from murders! What a swell Mother's Day gift that must have been.

Interestingly, the word harem comes into English from the Turkish word harem (duh!) which comes into Turkish from the Arabic ḥaram. The word ḥaram was eventually used to refer to the women's quarters but it originally means "forbidden". It's the same word that's used to describe forbidden things in Islam, like pork and lizards. Why would anyone want to eat a lizard anyway? Or a pig for that matter?

I feel badly that for hundreds and hundreds of years, women were hidden behind walls - even beautiful walls like the ones in the Royal Harem - for most of their lives. Poor women! But in a small way, I think I know how they must have felt. A few years ago, a cleric from the Islamic University of Islam said:

"Oh believers! verily is the cotton of the teddy bear haram [forbidden]. Enjoin yourselves to keep your names clean from its defilement. Let he or she who associates a teddy bear with Allah or His Prophet be subject to the lash, one each for the days of Ramadan."

A teddy bear! A bear! Honestly - sometimes I just don't understand you people at all.

GB to a "T"

I'm trying to be an understanding bear - and I think I am quite understanding by nature - but the truth is, we've been in Turkey for 6 weeks now and we've done nothing "Turkish" - except eat baklava (which was excellent, by the way) and hang up our evil eye amulets. I finally put my paw down and told my bipedal attendants that even if we can't all go to Istanbul for another few weeks, we can still explore life in Turkey - here in Izmit.

And nothing says "Turkish" more than tea and water pipes. Except for maybe baklava and coffee. And maybe carpets and evil eye amulets. Oh well ...

In any case, yesterday afternoon we went to a small tea shop in town and sipped çay served in tiny glasses with cubes of beetroot sugar and smoked a narghile.

Many people equate coffee with Turkey and so prevalent was coffee in Turkish culture that their word for breakfast - kahvaltı - means "before coffee". In fact, until recent times, Turks drank more coffee than tea, but these days, tea is the drink of choice. After World War I, it became very expensive to import coffee into Turkey, so, because it's grown here, our friend Atatürk encouraged Turks to drink tea instead. I guess they listened because Turks drink more tea than any other people in the world - over 2.5 kilos of the stuff per capita a year. Not surprisingly, they sell a lot of teeth whitening products here too!

Turks use small clear glasses to show off the colour of the tea, which is something, as a former international fashion model, I completely understand. Never underestimate the importance of colour.

We also ordered a water pipe - or a narghile as they are known here - because socially, tea and water pipes go together like bears and honey. I've had water pipes before but this was my first one in Turkey. The pipe itself was quite pretty - a lovely green coloured glass - and the fabric which covered the hose was just like a Turkish carpet. (Again, that's the former international fashion model in me talking!)

Each pipe comes with its own hermetically sealed plastic mouthpiece (see above photo, right) because you can never be too safe when it comes to your health. I can only imagine what germs my female bipedal attendant picked up sharing water pipes with strangers in the back alleys of Egypt. It's amazing she didn't contract TB or something. Anyway, I'm making her keep a spare mouthpiece in her purse these days. I swear, it's like living with a child sometimes!

Anyway ... too be completely honest, I was a bit disappointed with my narghile. I confess that I'm a bit of a purist when it comes to my water pipes - or more accurately, to the tobacco in my water pipes - and maybe it's because I'm a bear but I prefer a plain ma'sal or honeyed tobacco like they use in Egypt. The flavoured "blends": cappuccino, banana, pineapple - are not for true connoisseurs. Honestly: banana tobacco??

And to make it worse, there was no tobacco in it! What's the point? Apparently, it's becoming common now to burn a tobacco-free fruit concentrate - a fruit roll-up for adults - which has no nicotine. It tastes good - I guess - and is guilt free. On the other hand, there's none of the euphoria of smoking a real water pipe. You humans! Must you always try to "fix" what's not broken?

You can still find real water pipe tobacco in Turkey, but you have to know where to go and how to ask for it. Clearly, this was beyond the abilities of my bipedal attendants yesterday afternoon so I'm going to sign them up for Turkish lessons. I mean, what's the point of having attendants if they can't even manage a simple thing like ordering a water pipe correctly?

GB Keeps an Eye on Things

Yesterday my bipedal attendants & I moved into our very first Turkish flat - and since this is a Turkish flat (we are in Turkey after all), I decided that we should do as the Romans (or Turks) do and protect ourselves from any & all forms of negativity. Not surprisingly, as a freelance Goodwill Ambassador, I strongly advocate Good rather than Evil. So while they were unpacking their suitcases and unwrapping glasses stolen from every bar and bodega in Spain, I spent the afternoon making sure that our home would be safe against any evil thoughts.

(Not that too many people ever envy my bipedal attendants but sometimes, I get some very odd fan mail from my international fashion modelling days. Thank goodness I don't have any enemies - as for my my bipedal attendants ...)

Anyway, the unofficial symbol of Turkey is the nazar boncuğu, or evil eye amulet. The amulet is usually made from blue glass and has concentric circles or droplets of blue (or black), white and light blue (or sometimes yellow). At the risk of sounding vain, they set off my grey flannel quite nicely.

I am not exaggerating (bears never exaggerate) when I say that in Turkey, there are evil eye symbols everywhere. Adults and babies wear evil eye amulets; you can find nazar boncuğu's on the sides of airplanes, boats, horses, donkeys & mules, cell phones, cash registers, and shopping bags. Amulets are affixed to the outside door lintels of apartments and tucked into the corners of thresholds.

The symbol has its origins in ancient mythology and spans many different periods and cultures, from ancient Egypt to Rome to Bangladesh. That's a lot of negative energy! You don't see bears needing evil eye amulets. Depending on who you ask or where you are, people will tell you that the amulet is used to bounce the malevolent gaze of cursing evil wishers back to the evil wisher, while others believe that the envy of others can unintentionally direct evil to the person (or donkey) envied. In both cases, the amulet diverts the negativity - whether it's deliberate or not - away from anyone wearing a nazar boncuğu.

So how did I make our home more Turkish as well as more safe? I started with the door to our apartment (above right). I was relieved to see that the people who own our flat already had protected the door knocker on the front door with a tiny nazar boncuğu. One less amulet for me to buy!

We already had one amulet. Miss K, one of my bipedal attendants' friends (yes they have friends), had brought them one from a trip to Turkey a few years ago, so I was quick to hang that one up (top left). The flat is so big though (apartments tend to be bear-size) that I felt it needed a bit more - or should I say that my bipedals needed more protection? - so I stuck up an adhesive version of the evil eye on the window of our balcony door.

Lastly, just to ensure that the day gets off on the right foot (or paw), I found these nazar boncuğu coffee mugs at a neighbourhood store, and although the coffee inside the mugs isn't typically Turkish, at least what was on the outside was! After all, the best part of waking up should be knowing that no one is going to cast the evil eye on you and ruin your day!

Hopefully, the amulets I hung around the house yesterday will keep everyone safe. When we were in Morocco, we hung a khamsa-hand (the hand representing the hand of Fatima, the Prophet Mohammed's daughter) - which is supposed to keep evil away - on our apartment door. Unfortunately, someone stole our amulet! How brazen is that? I don't know if Fatima stopped protecting us or not, but I bet the khamsa-hand thief earned a whole lot of bad karma. Don't you humans ever think of the consequences of what you do??

At a Boy! Atatürk! At-a-Bear!

It's been a while since I last posted but I've been cooped up indoors because it's rained almost every day since we arrived in Turkey. I know that I'm sweet and all, but I don't melt like sugar in the rain, but nooooooo, my bipedal attendants wouldn't take me anywhere. Now that they're working again, they're going to be impossible to live with!

Anyway, today the clouds held off - just barely (!) - and they took me into work with them, so I finally got my first peek at Izmit, our new adopted home.

Izmit is about 45 minutes south of Istanbul (not Constantinople) and is the capital of Kocaeli Province. It was in the spotlight 10 years ago when a horrible earthquake devastated the city, killing 20,000 people. I don't know if any bears were killed. I hope not.

The city was founded in 712 b.c. but was later destroyed. In 264 b.c, it was rebuilt by Nicomedes I of Bithynia and took the highly original name of Nicomedia. It became a hugely important city in northwestern Asia - even Hannibal (the guy with the elephants) visited, although he would later commit suicide in a nearby town. You could hardly blame Izmit for that.

From 286 until 324, Nicomedia was the eastern and most senior capital city of the Roman Empire and was even Constantine the Great's capital until Byzantium (or Constantinople or Istanbul) stole the crown. In fact, it is said that there are more ancient Roman and Greek ruins in Turkey than in all of Italy and Greece. I haven't seen anything very ancient in Izmit (there are supposed to be a few ruins) although the earthquake of '99 may have had something to do with that.

Turkey's most famous son is Mustafa Kemal Atatürk (1881-1938) and although I'm only using my bear intuition here (yes, we bears have intuition too), I bet every town in Turkey has a monument to him. He's like the George Washington of Turkey. He was an officer in the army, a statesman, founder of the Republic of Turkey as well as its first president. He was the modernizing force behind the country (in 1935 Turkey had 18 female members of Parliament!) and introduced, among other things, surnames (like 'Bear' for me) and he replaced the Arabic script (which Turkish had been written in) with the Roman alphabet but with lots of little dots and squiggles.

Constitutionally, Turkey is not an Islamic country - say the way Morocco is - and it was Atatürk who ensured that it remain secular. So rather than being a Muslim country, it's a country with a lot of Muslims - about 99% of the population. I guess I won't be seeing too many churches for a long time (although I think Italy cured me of that) but the mosques here sort of look like Italian duomos - except they have a minaret - and sometimes several - attached to them.

Unfortunately, because my bipedal attendants were "tired" and the weather wasn't looking too good, we didn't have a chance to see very much in downtown Izmit. We did manage to pop into a café for a Turkish coffee though, and while we were there, we all had a plate of baklava - maybe Turkey's greatest gift to the world - after the waterpipe.

I always thought that baklava (phyllo pastry stuffed with chopped nuts and honey or syrup) was a Greek confection but according to every Turk my bipedal attendants have spoken with, the Greeks definitely stole the recipe from the Turks. Although many groups claim the title, it does seem that it was created during the Ottoman (Ottoman! - that's the clue from my last post!) period (1299–1923). Baklava, as we know it today, was certainly a product of the imperial kitchens of the Topkapı Palace in Istanbul.

Did you notice the "i" in Topkapı? That's one of Atatürk's funny new letters and is pronounced like the "e" in the.

Anyway, the baklava was amazing! Like I've said before, I thank the Bear Gods that we bears don't have to watch our waistlines because each serving had four humongous slices of pastry. My male bipedal attendant ate all of his and half of my female's while I managed to eat all of mine. I was a little disappointed with the coffee though. My first coffee in Turkey and all they had was Nescafé. That's not as bad as my bipedal attendants though - they come all the way to Turkey and what's the first cup of coffee they have? - a coffee from Starbucks! Some people! Philistines!