a little bit of spice, a little bit of nudity...

Okay, so apparently blogging is hard to do/keep up with when you don’t have regular internet access. No worries, however – I’m stealing internet from a wireless router located somewhere near me in the SuperDorm. Thank you tsunami, whoever you are. Sorry my friends and I have made your internet connection mysteriously slow as of late.

Ritual update:
Wednesday was Spice Bazaar day. We walked across a bridge to get to the Bazaar, which, considering Istanbul is located on both sides of the Bosphorus, is a daily occurrence – crossing the water I mean. The bridge provided a beautiful view. And smelled like throwup and fish. It was a strange and confusing combination. The Spice Bazaar on the other side is infamous and smells much better. I’m sure it was used at one time mainly to sell spices, but it has fallen prey to westernization and tourism and now sells whatever the hell you want + spices. Surprisingly enough, I had a conversation with a local merchant in Spanish. He tried to tell me that his Spanish wasn’t great considering he had only been taking classes for six months. Not only was his grammar better than mine but his accent was better too. I declined to tell him that I have been taking Spanish classes for a cumulative 7 years.

After the Spice Bazaar we went to a local café for dinner and promptly got ripped off. We were not shown a menu upon entering but told the selection of food we could purchase. The selection was small. Not a big surprise considering we were told the costliest food on the menu. Ouch. We are the worst kind of tourists and it shows. Here at TIME we like to have what we call SCEs, or Successful Cultural Encounters. This was of the unsuccessful variety. Ah, hard life lessons…

Thursday was the most epic and most nude day of the trip. For the followers who don’t know me so well, I’m sorry, but you’re officially about to get a healthy dose of TMI. A group of girls decided to go to a Turkish bath. What is a Turkish bath? Come with me on an awkward journey dear reader…

We walked into the bath and decided to screw frugality in favor of having the full service bath experience. We were shown to a room after we paid and told to take off our clothes and wrap ourselves in a thin piece of cloth. We were given little wooden shoes with a strip of leather – kind of like a poor excuse for a flip flop - and guided to the bath room. The room is heated to a slightly uncomfortable temperature, sort of like a sauna, and is square with a domed top. In the middle of the bath room there is a marble table, and all around the four walls are faucets with water basins underneath. We barely had time to look at the room before large Turkish women in underwear came and yanked off our towels. So here we were, ten girls who knew each other to varying degrees, suddenly completely naked in front of each other. All we could do was sit down next to a basin and pretend to keep what was left of our modesty. Which was just not possible. Because the big Turkish women called us over to the marble table to scrub us down with an exfoliating hand towel one at a time. Goodbye modesty! Hello full frontal flash! The best we could do was grin and bear it. Or strip and bear it?

The Turkish women talked to each other while they were scrubbing. Probably about how blindingly white I am. And about how I totally hit one of the women's boob on accident. Then we got a bubble massage. And finally we got our hair washed. I felt cleaner than I have in…my entire life. After the exfoliating scrub and bubble massage and hair wash, in typical girl fashion, all ten of us congregated on the marble table and has some good old girl talk. Entirely naked. Surprise of the day? I COMPLETELY loved the experience. Women and men alike: if you ever have the chance, GO TO A TURKISH BATH. You will not regret it. And you won’t feel so awkward about asking people to check your butt for grass stains, considering they will have seen much more than your clothed tush by then.

Friday was relatively uneventful, as far as this trip goes. We had a progressive dinner in our dorm. My room was in charge of the vegetable entrée, which consisted of chopped vegetables, cream cheese and iftar bread. More iftar bread than strictly necessary, actually. When we asked the guy at the super market for “beş ekmek lütfen”, he looked at us like we were insane for asking for five loaves of bread. I didn’t think we were crazy at the time, but when 18 of us consumed only 2 of the loaves I had to reevaluate that thought. Double ouch.

Everyone here in Turkey is still really nice. Classes are still really cool – we’re learning about the political history of Turkey, which is a turbulent and radical one. To give you a sampling: Turkey was previously a Muslim state ruled by a sultan until a man named Ataturk came and completely revolutionized the broken system in the late 20s. Not only did he make the state officially secular, but he also reformed many of the institutions that had been dominated by Turkish tradition for hundreds of years. The man was truly radical and he’s immortalized in statues and monuments across the nation, but one has to wonder, with a population that’s 99% Muslim, if his extreme ideology is truly appreciated or even respected by the majority of the Turkish population. Kat and I think discovering the answer would be a cool sociological project. Minus the impossibility of conducting any sort of survey. Alas.

I won’t write about Saturday or Sunday just yet, because I think that might be overload. Know that I am still really enjoying my trip. I highly encourage traveling abroad at any stage of life. And going to a Turkish bath. Just saying.

Allahaismarladık!