Watch your tongue

"Sheep's head is usually served roasted or boiled," I said, pointing at the flesh-covered skulls in the corner of the butcher's case, their tongues lolling out between stubby teeth below their bulging eyeballs. "Here's the sheep's liver, and its heart. And did you see the cow tongue back there?" I asked my tour group, indicating a chunk of whitish meat roughly the size and shape of a human forearm.

"No, no," one of the butchers interjected. "It's kaynana tongue."

I racked my brain for the meaning of the unfamiliar word. Was it water buffalo, like the animal whose liver he'd already said was even bigger than the massive cow liver on display? No, that's manda. Was this little shop alongside the Spice Bazaar doing a secret trade in exotic animal parts? Perhaps I should have paid more attention during that useless-seeming Turkish 1 lesson where we studied the words for "giraffe" and "kangaroo."

The butcher repeated himself, clearly dismayed at my still-quizzical expression. "Are you married?" he asked, pointing to his ring finger. I shook my head. "That's why you don't understand..."

As I continued explaining the different types of offal to my guests, the other butcher took pity on me. "Senin beyin annesi," he said with a slight smile.

A-ha. Mother-in-law's tongue.

Tomorrow I'll have to tell them that we have a plant with the same name -- one that's sharp and a bit poisonous.

Seeing the light

Whether dancing on the water, casting a warm glow on the hills, piercing through the clouds, or finding its way through the cracks in a crumbling building, the light is one of the most beautiful things about Istanbul, one of its most alluring characteristics.

But as with any romance, the day-to-day drudgery of life can dim the appeal of a city that once seemed exotic or exciting, making it just another place where the weather can be foul, the traffic is bad, earning a living is hard, and people seem not to care. In other words, it's easy to forget about the light.

Seeking to beat my latest bout of the "Istanblues," I turned to my typically reliable three-step cure: 1) Find something new to go check out -- usually an art exhibit, sometimes a lesser-known historical sight or area; 2) Identify somewhere promising to eat in the vicinity; 3) Wander at will. (Note to self: Cure will not work if you attempt to employ it in your own neighborhood.)

As the clouds passed back and forth across the sky, I hopped on a bus to Unkapanı and then set off walking west on the narrow, broken sidewalk as traffic on the Halıç road zipped by. So far, not so good. But the sun was out, the tulips were in bloom on the median, and the Golden Horn glistened. Noting that St. Stephen of the Bulgars, the "iron church," was closed for renovations, I ducked into the unmarked door of Köfteci Arnavut, taking a table in the low-ceilinged back of the eatery onto which a heaping plate of piyaz and a tasty, tender portion of köfte was soon placed.

Thus fortified, and a few wrong turns later, I arrived in front of a plaque heralding the UNESCO-funded restoration of a historical Balat residence into the "Arte İstanbul Balat Art Square and Dimitri Cantemir Müzesi," a project seemingly left uncompleted despite the announcement of its opening two years ago in the Turkish press. Around the corner, though, a staircase led up between old stone walls to the massive neo-Gothic "red castle" (actually the Fener Rum Lisesi, the city's oldest Greek Orthodox school). Wandering back down by another route, I spied bits of the skyline through gaps between buildings -- and painted across the exposed side of one structure. Handprints covered another wall in the shape of an angel's wings, and colorful graffiti flowers sprung up where no real ones did.

Old Göksu and Anadolu Hisarı, 1909

Finally I reached my ostensible destination, the Reza Has Museum at Kadir Has University, which is showing the work of Nazmi Ziya Güran until Tuesday. (The museum is open 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day.) Güran, who died 75 years ago, was one of the first Turkish impressionists, members of a group of artists whose style of painting often sought to capture how changing light makes a scene look or feel rather than its every detail.

Though some of the paintings were lovely (the depiction of Göksu creek, above, was a particular favorite), the real point of the excursion was trying to find the light again. I like to think Nazmi Bey would have approved.

Going Dutch in Istanbul

"Wager cup with hunting scenes
and allegorical tableaux," c. 1642-44,
Unknown artist, Rijksmuseum

Is it so wrong that my favorite thing about the exhibit of Dutch Masters currently on view at the Sakıp Sabancı Museum wasn't a painting by Rembrandt or Vermeer, but instead a silver windmill cup used for 17th-century drinking games?

As if the idea of trying to chug-a-lug the entire glass before the little windmill's blades stopped turning wasn't entertaining enough, the cup -- aptly known as a "drink-up" -- is displayed alongside paintings and drawings of poor Dutch souls who failed to hold their liquor. Depicting fat, slovenly, and lecherous figures, these types of pictures were the PSAs of their time, according to the exhibit text, which explained that they were meant to show the dangers of drinking too much.

The pairing of paintings with objects depicted in or related to them is one of the clever touches in the fine, but otherwise mostly unsurprising "Rembrandt and His Contemporaries" exhibit, which brings together more than 100 works from the "Golden Age" of Dutch art. Alongside the expected range of stern portraits, dramatically lit still lives, and gorgeously rendered landscapes, the decidedly modernist-looking "The Golden Bend in the Herengracht in Amsterdam" stands out, its crisp, spare composition seemingly a couple of hundred years ahead of its time.

"The Golden Bend in the Herengracht in Amsterdam,"
1671-72, Gerrit Adriaensz Berckheyde, Rijksmuseum

The museum's free audio guide offers some useful interpretative tips (who knew a painting of a ship at sea on a wall was an "instantly recognizable" symbol of romantic passion?) while occasionally lapsing into condescending platitudes. (I can decide whether I think the ducks on the pond add a charming detail or not, thanks.)

The Sabancı's Rembrandt exhibit is just one of the many Dutch-themed art shows that have been popping up around town like so many spring tulips, part of a commemoration of 400 years of diplomatic relations between Turkey and the Netherlands. (Or, as they were known back then, between the Ottoman Empire and the Dutch Republic of the United Provinces.)

Unknown painter,
17th century,
Pera Museum

The trade relationship embarked on in 1612 sparked, among other things, the Dutch mania for tulips, a wild flower in Central Asia that was cultivated in the sultan's gardens in Istanbul and features in one section of "Sultans, Merchants, Painters: The Early Years of Turkish - Dutch Relations," another anniversary exhibit, this one at the Pera Museum. In the text accompanying a lovely set of tulip drawings, the museum's curators note that "the famous motifs seen on 17th century tulip leaves" are now known to have been "caused by a viral infection." Talk about bursting one's bubble.

TO VISIT: The "Rembrandt and His Contemporaries" exhibit is on display until June 10 at the Sakıp Sabancı Museum in Istanbul's Emirgan neighborhood. The museum is open Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Wednesday and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. General admission is 12 Turkish Liras.

The "Sultans, Merchants, Painters" exhibit ends this Sunday, April 1, at the Pera Museum in the Beyoğlu district. The museum is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Sunday from noon to 6 p.m. General admission is 10 Turkish Liras.

Ali Usta's place

"Ayakkabı tamırı." Those two words, printed on a small piece of plain white paper and taped inside an upstairs window, were the only advertisement for the shoe-repair shop a friend had directed me to, explaining, as people generally do here, that it was "across from the phone store and above the bad accessories shop."

Poking my head around the corner of the building, I spied a dark, narrow doorway, beyond which an even narrower set of stairs wound steeply up to the next floor. I pushed open the door on the landing and squeezed alongside the elderly shoe repairman's desk into a bathroom-sized space stacked floor-to-ceiling with dusty boxes, tools, shoes, and bags. A television blared and a heater ran full-blast, trying to ward off the chill outside.

Waving me into the one vacant seat, Ali Usta picked up my two pairs of tattered leather boots, turning them around in his wrinkled hands, and pronounced that he could have them fixed by the next day for less than 10 dollars.

Eclectic art in an unexpected location

Artistic rabble-rouser Robert Rauschenberg photographing puppies? A serene sunset cityscape by the sexually provocative Nan Goldin? A photograph by Cindy Sherman without the artist in any of her many guises?

Collectors Can and Sevda Elgiz enjoy finding and buying works by artists that depart from their best-known styles, Billur Tansel, the manager of the Elgiz Museum of Contemporary Art, told me on a recent tour. Starting with the first pieces by Turkish artists that the couple acquired in the 1980s, they have let "gusto" guide their collecting decisions.

The result is an eclectic, eye-catching mix of works in various mediums -- from a mannequin-like figure made out of dead beetles (by Belgian artist Jan Fabre) to an inflatable PVC "cloud" shot through with rays of sunlight (by Turkish artist Iskender Yediler) that expands and contracts as if it is breathing above the viewer's head.

A selection from the collection is currently on display as part of the museum's 10th-anniversary celebration. If you haven't heard of the Elgiz Museum before, you're not alone; according to Tansel, the institution is much better known to people outside of Turkey than to local art-lovers. Despite the quality of work exhibited, this doesn't come as that much of a surprise; the museum's location behind an office tower in the Maslak business district is far off the typical Tophane/Nişantaşı/Galata gallery-hopping trail, but well worth a visit.

When Can and Sevda Elgiz decided to use some of the wealth from their construction business Giz İnşaat to establish the museum's predecessor, the Proje 4L art space in 4. Levent, back in 2001, platforms for contemporary art were limited in Istanbul. That is now far from the case. It will be interesting to see how the Elgizes maintain their reputation as trendsetters now that nearly every major family-managed firm or holding company in the city seems to have an art space to its name.

TO VISIT: The 10th-anniversary exhibition "Elgiz 10 Istanbul" is on view until this Saturday, March 17, at the Elgiz Museum of Contemporary Art in Istanbul's Maslak district. The museum is open Wednesday to Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is free. Take the metro from Taksim to the İTÜ Ayazağa stop and walk toward the Beybi Giz Plaza building. The museum is around the back to the right of the main entrance.

Word on the street

If it's Saturday, there must be a protest on İstiklal Caddesi. Of course, the same is true on most Sundays, and plenty of weekdays too. Anyone who regularly transits Istanbul's busiest thoroughfare can pick out the chants from blocks away and say to themselves with just a glance as the marchers pass by, "Oh look, the union folks are out again" or "Hey, there go the communists."

Some regular presences don't fade into the scenery quite as quickly, of course. The sight of the stalwart Saturday Mothers, quietly displaying pictures of missing loved ones to passersby, never fails to pull at my emotions. But the sight of something decidedly different from the usual fare -- a sea of Turkish flags in light blue instead of red; tables and chairs held aloft -- can turn the street itself into a news source.

Walking up İstiklal around dusk this past weekend, I came across a circle of people near Galatasaray, the avenue's halfway point and a major landmark. From a distance, it looked like the kind of crowd that gathers around street musicians for a few minutes and indeed a song was carrying out of the center of the group. The crowd, though, was thick enough to block the "nostalgic tramway" in both directions, and as I drew closer, I saw the musicians were backed by dozens of placards: "Selling concert tickets is not a crime." "Revolutionary art cannot be obstructed." "Listening to Grup Yorum is not a crime."

A headline I had skimmed over earlier suddenly made sense. The members of Grup Yorum, a band that expresses left-wing political sentiments in its songs, have previously become the target of police raids; one musician is still in jail after being taken into custody in mid-December.

Last week, six fans, including four university students, were sentenced to between 1 and 13 years in jail for selling tickets to or attending a concert featuring the group. The charges? Being "members of a terrorist organization" or "spreading propaganda for a terrorist organization" -- increasingly catch-all accusations that seem in this case somewhat akin to jailing M.I.A. fans because of her support for the Tamil Tigers or charging Clash listeners with inciting riots.

UPDATE (Feb. 28, 2012): Posters advertising a Grup Yorum concert in the western city of İzmit have been taken down ahead of the show as part of what officials called a general effort to "get rid of environmental pollution." The ticketing company Biletix (the Turkish arm of the much-reviled global firm Ticketmaster) has meanwhile denied reports that its sales agents refused to sell tickets for the group's shows "because they provided funds for terrorism."

Turkey's 19th-century Renaissance man

Osman Hamdi Bey's "The Tortoise Trainer"

Maybe it's all the bad knock-offs of his most famous painting, "The Tortoise Trainer," for sale on İstiklal Caddesi and around the Galata Tower, but I always found it a bit hard to understand what all the fuss was about Osman Hamdi Bey.

Turns out painting was probably the least of the sad-eyed, long-faced Ottoman intellectual's contributions to Turkish culture. As the exhibit "Osman Hamdi Bey and the Americans" details, old Osman Hamdi essentially invented Turkish archaeology, conducting important digs at Nemrut Dağı in central Turkey, Assos along the Aegean coast, and Sidon in modern-day Lebanon.

The small, well-put-together exhibit -- which admittedly is likely to be of most interest if you've visited some of the places Osman Hamdi excavated -- ends this weekend at the Pera Museum but the fruits of his labors can be seen in perpetuity at the Istanbul Archaeological Museums across the Golden Horn in Sultanahmet.

Chillin' at Nemrut Dağı

Now one of the most important institutions of its kind, the museum's "collection" was essentially just a pile of booty from Ottoman military campaigns when Osman Hamdi was appointed director in 1881.

His focus on scientific classification and protecting antiquities turned the museum into what it is today, while the enacting of the Antiquities Law he wrote kept Ottoman treasures within the empire at a time when they were being increasingly hauled off to Europe by whoever found them. (Whether the famous Alexander Sarcophagus and other discoveries from Sidon should now go back to Lebanon is, I suppose, another question altogether.)

And for my money, his richly detailed painting "The Fountain of Life" (also on display at the Pera Museum) runs rings around that damn tortoise trainer any day.

Weekends at the office

Unlike any office in which I've ever worked, the headquarters of Borusan Holding is eerily tidy. Nary a stray piece of paper mars the crisp white interior, where the few framed family photos and coffee-table books placed just so seem more like movie-set props than actual personal belongings.

"Everyone has to gather up their things before the weekend," a security guard explains, confirming my suspicions. I wondered if the owners of the one pad of Post-It notes and the one empty water bottle I spied on desks would get their pay docked this month.

On the weekends, this corporate office turns into a museum, allowing visitors to walk through its hushed hallways and executive suites to peek at the company's contemporary art collection and -- no less a draw -- inside one of the most distinctive buildings along the Bosphorus.

Built beginning in the 1910s, the Perili Köşk's red-brick turret soars alongside the second Bosphorus Bridge, affording sweeping views across the strait that, strikingly framed in the building's many windows, often threaten to overshadow the art on display in what Borusan touts as "Turkey's first office museum." Seven new acquisitions, all video/multimedia works, are given their own screening area, while the current selection from the Borusan collection (dubbed "Segment #1") is spread throughout nine increasingly vertiginous floors of offices and meeting rooms

A smartly chosen mix of works in different mediums, the collection appears to contain very little that could potentially offend workplace sensibilities, though many pieces are bold in color, size, or placement, and generally pleasing to the eye, if not particularly challenging to the mind.

With no more than around 15 works on any given floor, the nine stories of art aren't nearly as daunting or exhausting as they may sound, but just to be on the safe side, fortify yourself first at one of the many all-day breakfast places lining the road below nearby Rumeli Hisarı, which are packed to the gills on weekends.

At Rumeli Kale Cafe, a tea server squeezes through the crowd as voices echo off the wooden walls and metal ceiling in the narrow dining room, its tables overflowing with little plates of cheese, olives, cucumbers, and tomatoes; single-serving frying pans with eggs and halloumi cheese; baskets of olive-studded bread; and dishes full of tahini paste and big slabs of thick cream soaking in honey. It's the kind of breakfast that will keep you full until well after dinner time.

TO VISIT: The exhibits "Segment #1" and "Seven New Works" are on view until December 11 at Borusan Contemporary in Istanbul's Sarıyer district. The museum is open Saturday and Sunday only, from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. General admission is 10 Turkish Liras. Bus 42T will get you there from Taksim Square.

Rumeli Kale and the other breakfast places are just a few meters south along the water. Go as early as possible to avoid the rush, and bring a good book for when you inevitably get stuck in traffic on the way back.

Famished in Phaselis

Schedules may often be more like suggestions, "no"s may sometimes mysteriously turn into "yes"es, and procedures may change from day to day, but if there's anything you can count on in Turkey, it's that there will be a dolmuş (private minibus) going where you want to go, and that when you get there, someone will be selling something to eat.

So there was no reason to doubt the Lonely Planet Turkey guide when it said you could buy snacks at the site entrance to Phaselis, the ruins of an ancient city set along three small bays on Turkey's Mediterranean Coast.

"Snacks," though, turned out to be a cooler of sodas and a few overpriced candy bars. My faith in the certainties of Turkish travel badly shaken, I bought a Twix bar and headed onward. I had spent three hours on the dolmuş to get here; there would be no turning back in search of tost.

The ruins and beaches, fortunately, were exactly as advertised.

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Cellular confusion

Despite their many and long-held animosities, Turkey and Greece have a lot in common. Not that either of them would admit it. When I visited Athens a few years ago, people often stiffened noticeably when we told them we were from Istanbul, and then insisted we absolutely must try "Greek baklava," "Greek coffee," or "Greek kebab" -- all of which tasted pretty much exactly like their Turkish counterparts.

See my toes? They're in Turkey. That island offshore? That's Greece.

The similarities are so strong that while riding in a minibus on a winding road hugging the cliffs along Turkey's Mediterranean coast, even my cell phone got confused about exactly where it was.

"Sayin musterimiz, yurt disi operatorden sinyal almakta oldugunuz icin Turkcell Dunya tarifesi ile ucretlendirilmektesiniz," read the first in a barrage of text messages explaining call and SMS fees in Greece and touting the "avantaj" of Turkcell's international calling packages.

Dear customer, you are getting a signal from an international operator and will be charged Turkcell World fees...

The nearness of Greece is particularly keenly felt on Turkey's Aegean and Mediterranean coasts, where places like Ayvalık, Bozcaada, and Kalkan retain the distinctive architecture of their historical "Greek quarters," if not the residents, relocated in the population exchange of 1923. Near Fethiye, an entire town, Kayaköy, stands empty, its stone homes never re-inhabited after their owners were forced to leave. Continued saber-rattling today over Cyprus and an Aegean territorial dispute are further proof, though, that closeness doesn't always lead to comity.

Up the stairs and back in time

With its clean-swept sandstone steps and lush, well-tended foliage, this little neighborhood staircase could be located in any number of warm-climate, well-to-do communities around the world. I could easily see people in Los Angeles, or maybe Santa Fe, or even somewhere in Spain, walking up these stairs after work, and going home to one of the handful of houses lining the steps on both sides.

What these imaginary people wouldn't find at the top of those doppelgänger stairs, however, would be what these particular steps led to: a 2,000-year-old Lycian rock tomb, carved into the hillside above.

There was a pretty nice view of the sunset from the top too, but those aren't quite so unusual outside this beautiful and history-rich stretch of Turkish Mediterranean coastline.

TO VISIT: This tomb, and some less-well-preserved ones nearby, are easy to get to from the town center in Kaş, though you won't find any signs until right at the base of the steps.

Go up from the town square on Uzun Çarşi Cad. (you'll pass an impressive free-standing sarcophagi dating to the same era on the way) until you see the big Phellos Health Club on your right. Turn left on Likya Cad. and continue uphill until you reach the tombs.

İftara davet

Amid the general hustle and bustle of a 550-plus-person-capacity ferry traveling to Istanbul on a Saturday night, a few people quietly unwrap take-out packages of food, arranging each item carefully on the plastic table in front of them and then turning their focus intently to the flat-screen TVs hanging above the boat's lounge. Onscreen, a flashing countdown clock ticks off the minute iftar, the breaking of the Ramadan fast, begins in each of Turkey's provinces, moving from east to west with the setting sun.

While cars speed down Sıraselviler Caddesi in central Istanbul, two men open up a Tupperware container on the back hood of a taxi parked at the curb, ready to share a simple meal when the evening ezan rings through the air.

On a back street in Nişantaşi, a pair of security guards scurry outside with a small table on which to lay their iftar meal in the dimly lit courtyard in front of their workplace.

Unlike in countries where dawn-to-dusk fasting is nearly mandatory, and people adjust their schedules to a more nocturnal rhythm, these small scenes in Turkey are carried out following a normal workday, next to people eating, drinking, and smoking as usual. This year, they also occurred amid increased concern about an "iftar divide" between rich and poor in the evening Ramadan meal. Though the debate could perhaps be compared to the annual appearance of pundits in the United States saying the "real meaning" of Christmas is being lost under a pile of wrapping paper and empty eggnog cups, the wrestling over whether lavish meals defeat the spiritual purpose of Ramadan also has a strong thread of social justice running through it.

Image from the program "İftara davet" on 24 Haber.

The tale of the disappearing tables

Tucked as it is down a sparsely populated, dimly lit alley on the second floor of a unremarkable-looking building, it's often hard to tell if there's anyone home at Mohti. Pushing open the door tonight and peeking my head inside, I saw only the usually gregarious owner of the cozy Black Sea meyhane, hunched over a laptop in the far corner of the room.

"Are you open?" I asked.

"We're open, but we don't have any customers," he said, rising to shake our hands. "It's because of Asmalımescit... I'm sure you know about it."

We did. For the past month, tables and chairs have been forcibly removed from sidewalks and patio areas at bars, cafes, restaurants -- even closet-sized kitchens serving up scrambled eggs for breakfast -- throughout what had been central Istanbul's liveliest district. Rumors still swirl about what sparked the "masa operasyonu" (table operation), as the Turkish press breathlessly dubbed the ongoing events in Beyoğlu. Had the business owners failed to pay the required bribes? Had the country's teetotaling prime minister, enraged at the sight of people drinking on the street, himself ordered the crackdown? Would it all blow over after Ramadan?

Whatever the impetus, streets that used to be pulsing with people into the wee hours of the night are now empty of everything but stray cats and some old plastic bags blowing through like synthetic tumbleweeds.

"It's very bad, all black and white. No middle way," I said, shaking my head sympathetically. Yesterday, the progressive news site Bianet reported that 2,000 people have lost their jobs due to the sweep, which hit businesses during the busy summer months, when Istanbullus live as much of their life as they can out of doors. Mohti never had any outdoor tables, but has been abandoned along with the rest of the area.

"We don't really have a menu right now. I'll just bring some things and if you don't want them, I'll take them back," the owner said, even more solicitously than usual.

Out came a small plate of tangy cheeses. A large bowl of salad tossed with mint and hot peppers. Fresh-baked Georgian börek with potatoes. A savory pancake made from brined hamsi and shredded vegetables. Baked palamut, de-boned at the table. And, finally, a plate of watermelon slices.

We didn't send anything back. After politely declining a cup of Turkish coffee to top the evening off, we left the restaurant, as empty as it was when we came in.

Bravo, güneş!

Perhaps everyone was just in a laudatory mood after spending the afternoon cheering runners (myself included!) as they passed the finish line set up in the little town square during the first Bozcaada Half Marathon and 10K Run. Or perhaps it was an island ritual little observed by big-city dwellers.

In any event, a few hours after the run concluded, as the warm early summer's day began to draw to a close, caravans of cars headed to the far side of the island. There, a long stretch of rocky cliff near a row of wind turbines overlooked the ocean, offering an unobstructed view of the setting sun.

In groups and pairs, people chatted and drank wine and snuggled up and plucked out a few tunes on a guitar. The blue and gold sky turned to shades of pink and purple as the sun dropped toward the horizon, casting a long glowing reflection on the Aegean Sea. When it finally dipped out of sight, everyone applauded.

Around the world with 40 travel bloggers

I don't think of myself as a travel blogger, really. The blogs of people who spend all year (or many years) on the road seem as far removed from my life in Turkey as, well, my life in Turkey probably does for many folks who've never lived away from home. But my musings on learning a foreign language, trying to understand a different culture, and, yes, sometimes traveling were apparently enough for me to qualify some while back for Lonely Planet's "Blogs We Like" program -- later dubbed the "Blogsherpas."

I stayed on the margins of the group for some time, occasionally reading a discussion thread here or tagging a post there, until I saw a notice seeking contributions to an e-book. Intrigued, I spent a few hours on the terrace of my pension in Ayvalık (for once, I was actually traveling at the time) putting together two pages of photos and text that I felt represented my blog. Thirty-nine other bloggers -- expats, adventurers, and family travelers -- did the same.

This week, the final product, the free e-book "Around the World with 40 Lonely Planet Bloggers," has been released, full of inspiring photos and commentary on destinations from Alberta to Uganda. As Lonely Planet put in it their writeup of the book, it "explores our beautiful world from street level through the eyes of travel bloggers." I hope you'll find a new blogger or two worth following in its virtual pages.

NOTE: The Blogsherpas also have a World Travel lens on the website Squidoo, where you can read the latest posts by bloggers from around the world, all in one place.

A wide-eyed look at an Uzbek bazaar

In late March 2004, two suicide bombings tore through the Chorsu bazaar area in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, killing 15. I found it hard not to think about this while touring the sprawling market eight months later, but if the vendors and other shoppers felt any nervousness about a potential recurrence -- or tension due to a then-ongoing dispute over selling licenses and regulations -- there were no obvious signs of it amid the bustling trade on a crisp November afternoon.

The outer rims of the bazaar were filled with rickety stands and itinerant vendors selling staple items of modern life -- watches, belts, sunglasses, clothing, cassettes -- while the covered area at the core of the market held foodstuffs of all sorts. Squash and pomegranates were splayed open to display their colorful interiors. A rainbow assortment of candies for the Eid al-Fitr holiday marking the end of the Ramadan fasting period spilled out of their sellers' stalls.

We dipped our fingers to taste honey dripping from a knife and spices sold out of canvas sacks as nearby vendors sat and churned huge vats of a marshmallow-like substance and offered tastes to passers-by. From another stand, we sampled what looked like balls of dough, but turned out to be tart rounds of cheese.

(From a Nov. 8, 2004, journal entry.)

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NOTE: Other Lonely Planet bloggers share their experiences -- wide-eyed like my early encounter, savvy, or quizzical -- with market cultures around the world in the Blogsherpa Blog Carnival: The Marketplace, hosted by Kiran Keswani of Indian Bazaars.

The more things change...

It would be a lie to say that traveling and living abroad hasn't changed me at all. Instead of walking around lost until my feet hurt, too embarrassed to ask for help, I now readily make inquiries – in a language I speak only bumblingly, no less. I chat up complete strangers just because they happen to be speaking Turkish in France, or English in Turkey. I like to think I have a broader perspective on world events and increased empathy, but know that working in a foreign culture has also forced me to develop a more stern and assertive side. My elbows have become sharper from fighting to get onto buses or hold a place in line. Desperate and otherwise-unsatisfied desires for tamales and Thai curry have turned me into a cook. Perhaps strangest of all, I've become a runner in a country a fellow American expat once dubbed "the land the YMCA forgot."

But.

There's always a “but,” isn't there? When I moved to Istanbul, I fantasized about making a fresh start, about trying something totally new, about shedding my responsible skin and becoming the heedless, adventurous kid I never really was. Instead, like a homing pigeon flying unerringly back to its coop, I've wound up with a desk job, a reputation for earnestness, the same bad habits, the same fear of flying, and all the same worries that I’m not doing enough with my life. I left many things 7,000 miles away, but for better or worse, I can't seem to run away from myself.

NOTE: Has travel made you a better person, a worse one, or not changed you at all? Check out other Lonely Planet travel bloggers' answers to this question in the Blogsherpa Blog Carnival: Has Traveling Changed You?, hosted by Nina Fuentes at Just Wandering.

Going back to Berlin

What I remembered most about Berlin was the cranes. They towered over the city, sprouting from blocked-off squares and empty lots and half-finished buildings. It was almost a decade after the fall of the Berlin Wall and to a wide-eyed visitor, the city still seemed to be in the messy middle of ripping itself up and starting again. The ruined tower of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church stood amid broad and empty avenues; the crumbling path along the remaining part of the wall, painted with faded murals, was eerily deserted. Berlin's scars had not yet healed, and in the scant day or two I spent there on my first trip abroad in 1998, I was moved by the way there seemed to be an agreement not to cover them all up.

When I had the chance to return in 2010 to cover an environmental conference, the cranes were gone, their work done. People strolled through parks, lined up to see the view from the Reichstag's glass dome (top right), rode their bikes along the spruced-up East Side Gallery (bottom right), ate Thai noodles in sleek restaurants, and drank in a beer garden in the shadow of an abandoned-department store-turned-prison-turned-artists-collective. I was saddened to learn that latter spot, the Kunsthaus Tacheles (left), is at risk of being shut down, and I could see how people who had loved Berlin through its tough times might feel that its gritty uniqueness has largely been lost. But coming from crowded, grimy Istanbul, it was hard to see much to dislike in this green, cultured, cosmopolitan -- and completely transformed -- city.

While wandering one day, I found myself in the vicinity of the Brandenburg Gate, a former barrier between East and West Berlin and an iconic symbol of the fall of the wall. What I saw there, though, looked so small and sedate that I had to ask at a nearby souvenir shop to confirm that it was actually the place I remembered. The area around the gate, like so much else of central Berlin, was attractively refurbished, pedestrian-friendly, and rife with outdoor cafes. I wanted to like it, but I didn't. I missed seeing cars whip between the once-barricaded columns, emphatically demonstrating that people were free to move and the city was one again.

NOTE: Revisiting favorite places can be comforting, vexing, or bittersweet. Check out other Lonely Planet travel bloggers' experiences with return visits in the Blogsherpa Blog Carnival: Going Back, hosted by Natalia and family at No Beaten Path.

Peeking inside the Aya İrini, and into Anatolia's ancient past

Marriages, divorces, broken betrothals, inheritance disputes, the selling of slaves, even the arrest of a spy -- it's awfully juicy material to be found in faded etchings on small clay tablets. Though they may not have the aesthetic grace of a well-crafted jug or bowl, or the obvious intrigue of icon-like animal figurines, these early records of the drudgery (field sales, donkey transportation fees) and drama of daily life in Central Anatolia some 4,000 years ago are perhaps the most compelling part of the exhibit currently on display at the Hagia Eirene Museum in Istanbul.

Even if you're not interested in ancient archaeological discoveries, the awkwardly named "Foreword to Anatolia Kültepe-Kanesh Karum: Assyrians in Istanbul" is worth a visit for the chance to peek inside the Hagia Eirene (Aya İrini), a mini-version of the more famous Hagia Sophia that's typically closed to the public. But unlike many such exhibits where endless rows of coins and pottery are displayed with little more than a date on the label, some effort was made here to interpret the findings from Kültepe (Karesh), an 18-level dig near the modern city of Kayseri, for a general audience.

The first written documents in Anatolia, those little clay tablets can be thought of as the beginning of history in the area. They also reveal the somewhat surprising fact that women in the settlement had legal rights and could sign business transactions -- abilities probably no one was willing to try and keep from women tough enough to guard their homes against robbers and collect from debtors while their merchant husbands were away. Equality only went so far, though: A man could take a second wife in the event of infertility, which was considered solely his first wife's fault.

Also striking were some examples of the extraordinary longevity of good design. A clay colander c. 1880 BC looked pretty much the same as the metal ones in today's kitchens, while a pair of gold hoop earrings from 1700 BC could have been the first pair I wore in high school.

Not addressed, however, was whether users of stamps bearing the image of a double-headed eagle -- a common motif apparently symbolizing "the meeting of East and West" -- were soundly mocked for resorting to cliché.

TO VISIT: The exhibit is on view until March 28 at the Hagia Eirene Museum in the Topkapı Palace Garden in Istanbul. The museum is open Wednesday through Monday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and admission is free.

The things I carried

I spent my first trip abroad staggering under the weight of a backpack that might actually have been bigger than I was, lugging separate guidebooks for countries I would spend at most a few days in, the contents of an entire medicine cabinet, and a month's worth of socks and underwear.

Since I still put my foot down at doing laundry on vacation, I'll never join the ranks of those who travel light. But I have trimmed down a bit since then.

Out quickly went the money belt, the portable locks, the ugly "travel towel," and, eventually, the dozens of rolls of film. A mini Ziploc bag of assorted meds still makes the cut, as does the flip-open alarm clock that's been digitally ticking since 1998. (It now stays at home on trips to places where my cell phone will work.) So does my Swiss army knife, though it's seen most of its travel action slicing bread and cheese for make-shift meals.

For long travel days, I have favorite pants (smart but comfortable) and a favorite fleece (the interior pocket is conveniently passport-sized). Since I really, really hate flying, plane trips require an iPod of favorite songs, perhaps a sentimental piece of jewelery as a good-luck charm, and Dramamine with which to knock myself out. (Ambien has been suggested as an upgrade.) And I'm still a sucker for a print guidebook, though I try to keep it down to just one per trip.

NOTE: What piece(s) of travel gear do you never leave home without? Check out other Lonely Planet travel bloggers' must-have items in the Blogsherpa Blog Carnival: Travel Gear, hosted by Vago Damitio of Vagobond.