Location: Istanbul, Turkey
NP: Bonobo - We Could Forever
Mood: Down
By far the worst place we'd been to on our three months of travel was Istanbul in Turkey. Having experienced some of Thailand's cons in 2006, before the trip I did not expect Turkey to be worse. But it was.
The great challenge for us was whether we were going to be conned again. For the same kind of cons we saw on our last visit in Istanbul three months ago we would not fall for. That was what we decided. That would be our Turkish challenge. Would there be new kinds?
Yes, there would. Ahh the charm of Istanbul.
This time we decided not to visit Sultanahmet at all and went to the final stop we could get to directly from the airport by MRT. This stop was Aksaray.
There was nothing in particular in that part of town. Cars being parked badly, drivers honking furiously at each other and people walking about. There was a shopping mall and a couple of restaurants. We visited two of them.
At the second one there were already dishes on the table, basically some greens wrapped in plastic. "Free", the waiters said about them, and we ordered two dishes worth 12 Liras each from the menu. They brought a few plates of food to the table. At first we weren't certain if they were included in what we'd ordered or not. We decided to assume the worst - that they were not. And as we presumed (but did not ask), these extra plates were not included or free. In fact they cost a third of our meal. They showed us how to eat them as they brought them in. "You try", they said. The entire meal cost 37 Liras.
It was not unexpected, but it was still terribly disappointing. Luckily the food tasted good. And in two days Mika had fever and a stomach bug.
I did not care to stay longer. Home sounded just fine. Turkish Airlines' online customer service had been rude and Turkey in general not to my liking. However, I preferred Alanya over Istanbul.
We slept on the benches at the airport among several others. The flight to Helsinki could not come too soon.
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