Istanbul : A Wedding the Day after
A Wedding The Day after and the Shepherd….
Surprisingly I had slept very well after such an event from the previous day, it is 8am and my friend Nick has a plane to catch to London Gatwick from the Asian side of Istanbul at Sabiha Gökçen Airport. We must get him to Taksim for 10am to meet the shuttle bus .Two hours seems a long time but it is Sunday morning and he his recovering from too many beers and myself I am now a married man but at this point in time the change of status has not really sank in.
Having managed to get him to move his backside albeit I can hear him grumbling a few swear words and telling us he feels like crap and is not relishing the task of packing his suitcase in a rush. He is a man that takes his time but this is Istanbul and time does not wait for anyone here . Having finally got to Taksim with ten minutes to spare , we said our goodbyes and wished him a safe journey, me knowing full well having a hangover and a four hour no thrills flight to London is no fun , I only hope he lasted the flight without any hiccups if you know what I mean ! .
Taksim is always a place that has a few daily surprises and my first surprise of the day , has I turned away from the shuttle bus I saw a man walking a sheep yes a sheep , just has if he was walking a dog . He walked past us into the park, stood there whilst the sheep munched away on the bushes absolutely amazing and so funny to see in a city environment .You would expect this in a remote countryside town or village but in a district like Taksim well I suppose anything can happen. That is why Istanbul is what it is never blink or you may miss a suprise.
[SinglePic not found]Having seen the shepherd of Taksim go by , myself and my new wife decided to walk into Taksim Square and the military parades were in full swing , it is military day and the Turkish flag was dominating the skylines of every tall building. I love to see this patriotic show of a nation that is proud of what it is and what it stands for, back in England everyone in the last few years seemed to be obsessed with this politically correct phrase ”it is not politically correct” . This prevented many from showing there patriotic beliefs ,which unfortunately is typically a English way of thinking “do not want to upset the neighbours”. Try telling any Turkish person you can not do that , something drastic may happen in the response.
Heading of through Taksim towards Istiklal Street seeing the old Trams go by with children hanging on them for a free ride , suddenly it all hit me I was a married man and my beautiful wife was hanging on to my arm has we walked slowly along the Istiklal Street . A street that is normally congested with tourists and shoppers was relatively quiet on this Sunday morning. It was here and then we both suddenly started to walk at the slow pace and both realized everything going on around us was surreal , we were in our only little world both admiring each others rings we had exchanged the day before. Having slowly got to our destination MADO at the end of Istiklal Street we had the perfect turkish kahvalti (breakfast).
Taksim often gets a reputation of being a central point of tourists horror stories of theft,fighting,muggings , however I really believe just like any other city in the world you visit has a tourist you have to follow a really simple rule and fact. This applies to whether you are in London, New York, Istanbul or any other foreign city just simply do some homework , do not go off wandering alone in back streets , do not walk around flashing your money about, try and be conservative and do not walk alone at night!!. Simple has they may sound that is all you need to do to avoid the horror stories you read about. On the positive side which there are many ,Taksim is a unique district of Istanbul that offers a multi cultural trend of young and old traditions. Here the young students meet up in trendy bars and coffee outlets like Starbucks, Gloria Jeans, and so on and mix this with traditional Turkish food outlets it creates a positive central point of culture.
[SinglePic not found]Heading back home on the metro from Taksim to Levent 4 the staring eyes raise there eyebrows again , by now after a year I am fully accustomed to this curiosity from commuters. However somehow the day after our wedding my wife Figen and I find it hard not to show our affection for each other. It is not polite here in Istanbul to be flirtatious in public but even simply holding hands can raise eyebrows in an enclosed public enviroment like the metro , like any other metro or underground system in the world you can drift into a moment of thought . It is strange how the sounds of a moving train from inside can create a moment of deep thought and the surroundings and people just drift into the background. That morning I was deep in thought of the events from the previous day these were thoughts happiness and questions of was it real or I am going to wake up to the sound something different. Thankfully I have yet to be woken up .
Back home it was time to unwrap the wedding gifts , it felt like christmas morning back in England, all the gifts wrapped with ribbons and something new I was to discover. Gold a traditional turkish wedding gift a small but heavy coin in various sizes , on first look I was not to overjoyed however upon picking one up and handling the gift I soon realized it was Gold . The following fifteen minutes revealed gold after gold coins , I am not about to brag about the amount I just want to say how unique and different this type of gift is from my traditional style back in England . Back in England the traditional gifts of kitchen and cooking items is great but giving Gold is special . I now know why Turkish families like to see 300 or more people come to there weddings and this is positive thinking has newly weds from not such a wealthy family can use the gold and cash it in for money an ideal way to get a good comfortable start to a marriage in a modern day world..
yes, at he last pharagraph you got the meaning of gold coins. but also, you should have got some kitchen tools too:)
ali forgot those yes we did hand crafted ones
)) thanks brian
so sweet and so honest .
yeah all we got for our wedding was a cooker
cok guzel askim x