Touchdown in Taksim Square

We set down in Taksim Square and all our fellow passengers dispersed quickly. We followed the path down the hill through an open space where the city’s metro resurfaced. At the bottom was a festival which seemed to be setting up for the day. There was a stage, lots of food stalls and plenty of pop-up shops. After a quick browse, we went to inspect the monument erected to dedicate the foundation of Turkey. We took a short break in front of one of the traditional trams, then followed the tracks down the main precinct where a huge range of modern-day shops surrounded it either side. We then wandered south to take in the Galata Tower. There was quite a long queue to enter this which astonished us and other people. I followed the queue to the front to ensure that it was moving then we waited in line for about half an hour.   

As a European, if you could or have to live in the US, what state would you choose and why?

I’ve been to the USA on three different trips. I’ve visited a number of cities and met some great people. I think most people would commonly answer New York; and while I’ve visited and enjoyed the sights of New York; I wouldn’t like to live there. In some ways it’s the commercial cesspit of America. I think I’d like to be further west. I really enjoyed visiting San Francisco and regretted not having enough time there. I missed the opportunity to ride a trolley and didn’t get to go out to Alcatraz. But living in California would be difficult as I wouldn’t appreciate the heat all year round and I don’t have a beach body. One of my favourite cities was Boston and I did enjoy the city’s culture there; but I also enjoy travelling. If I’m choosing a state, I’d like to be in a central hub so that I can explore as much as possible. So I think I’ll settle in Colorado. It’s not somewhere that I’ve been but it’s central and I’ve heard excellent things from people that do live there. Time to sort out my skis…

The Big Bus of Istanbul

We decided to see a few more of the sights that were in the modern part of the city. Our primary destination was Taksim Square. I was all for jumping on a tram, but Mum wasn’t that keen riding on public transport with people that didn’t speak our language. I wondered if this was because of our tram mix-up yesterday but Mum didn’t confess to this. Instead, we picked up a map for a tourist double-decker bus and this seemed the best option as we could get a guided tour along the way. We approached the bus but there was a bit of confusion over the fare as it was advertised in both euros and lira, so I had to nip back to the hotel for more supplies. After boarding, it took us a while to get the on-board commentary up and running, but we recognised where our stop was and got off to explore.

 

Late for a not so Important Date #dreamdiary 102

I’m late for work with no excuse. I was due to start at midday, but I didn’t arrive until 2pm. What possible explanation could I have come up with? I actually awoke at midday but I still can’t account for the two hours that it took to travel the half mile journey. If this is to be a regular occurrence then it’s certainly going to portray something about my character and reliability. I’m tempted to lie but I just can’t think of anything that sounds reasonable and honest. Luckily, it’s been a well-staffed day and there’s enough people present to cover me. The managers aren’t mad but they are concerned about this behaviour, and we’re all standing outside the goods lift trying to figure it out. They’re not letting me go about my duties until I give a valid reason. Oddly enough, I don’t seem to care. I’m just waiting for them to make a decision about whether I should carry on, be let go, or be sent for a psychological evaluation. Fortunately, when I wake up, it’s just under two hours before I’m due to start a shift at 7am.

Kebabs and Corn

I love trying different foods. I like to eat with my eyes rather than by taste, and I hate missing out. That’s why I’d rather eat in a restaurant that I’d previously walked by and looked in to see what people are eating. But there were two must dos when visiting Turkey. The first is a kebab. You can order a kebab in any restaurant and it’ll come with as much meat, sticks and vegetables you can order, but the best is the donner kebab. The best ones are served in booths on the street where you can see that the meat has been grilling slowly all day. I had mine with yoghurt and he offered Turkish spice rather than chilli on it. I asked for a little to try and it was certainly a powerful spice! The other thing I tried was grilled corn on the cob; again from a street vendor. These came in various sizes and were fresh from the field and still had the green kern attached. They just add butter and pepper, and it melts in your mouth. Delicious! 

 

"If you're doing anything interesting in the world, you are going to have critics. You can't stop it. Move forward. It's not worth losing any sleep over."

 -Jeff Bezos.

People will always be jealous of your success. To them it seems that you’ve earnt your reputation overnight, but you know that you’ve been putting the time in to achieve your goals for years. It’s only now that people are beginning to hear of you, and success and fame also come with publicity in all forms. You might not be able to do everything perfectly, but at least you can learn from your mistakes. You can use the criticism to make improvements ready for the next time. If not, you need to put it behind you and move on, unless you can see that there’s a plausible gain from attacking your critics. You might get satisfaction from this, but it might also change other people’s opinions of you which could affect your future. And if you’re going to reflect on every little bad thing that happens to you, you’ll run out of opportunities to make progress.

Roaming About

I relied too much on technology for this trip. Sometimes it was out of sync, and sometimes it didn’t work at all. I’d downloaded a local map of the area to save data, but I still had to rely on GPS to ensure that we were going the right way. And because I was using a foreign network, it took a bit of time to update and determine the actual direction we were travelling in. This cost us quite a dash one morning as I thought that we were following the tramlines down to the harbour but what I didn’t realise that one of the stations that we passed fed into a second tramline. This meant that we had to turn around and make a dash so that we could catch our ferry. What also hit hard was the phone bill. It ran up to £50 for using data outside the EU area. Ouch!