Today, Saturday, and the organic market in Ferikoy was on, so we strolled there. We took the route through Dolapdere, with its vertiginous stairs, crumbling churches and beautiful neighbourhoods, and up to Ferikoy itself. It is yet another of the parts of Istanbul with truly lovely old houses, easily the equal of Balat, but very far indeed from gentrification. In Dolapdere we passed the Arter gallery and popped in for a truly refreshing-to-the-mind hour or so. It’s a very good gallery, and I thoroughly enjoyed the exhibitions, particularly one with colourful models scattered in a huge beautifully lit room. It reminded me of my grandfather’s plastic factory when I was very little (where I was once attacked by a goose) – not that that was a particularly white cube-ish environment, but it was also strewn with brightly coloured objects, ordinary household wares that were strangely distorted. I fear I forget the rather elevated interpretation, so this is a rather banal one, but I did really enjoy it. Another piece was a really joyful depiction of music.
The gallery itself has big glass windows all around, and feels consciously set on a level with its surroundings, but it is still very odd for that sleek, modern building with its ticket counters and electrically operated revolving doors, surrounded by shabby row houses with clotheslines and teetering illegal constructions around them.
The market was in full swing, a joy to see. We got our supplies and walked over to a very Scando-international cafe in Bomonti where we’d had a good meal some weeks ago. This meal – and the coffee and cake – were all less good, but still a pleasant trip.
And so a return. We caught a taxi in the street. He tried very hard to charge us tourist prices (100 lira) but finally agreed to put on the meter and didn’t even take a very looping way back to Galata. We had to get off early, though, as the roads were blocked for some sort of municipality event, and walk past the tower which was rammed, and I soon found myself longing for lockdown when it was quiet and peaceful and one didn’t commit a photobombing with every step.
We dropped off our purchases and stepped out again to a t-shirt shop I’d read about, which is right on one of the tattiest streets around the tower. It looked like all the others, but did in fact have excellent t-shirts. The GF bought one he is very pleased with, and I plan to look on the website as well – and I really should go back and try them on and perhaps buy from there.
We walked on, over the bridge to Gulhane park, where we went up to the Column of the Goths – as usual, much quieter than the rest, and sat there for a bit looking over the sea through the trees. There is a lot of sea-watching in Istanbul, but not enough of it is through trees.
Then we returned, and I made dinner which was absolutely disastrous, truly the worst meal I’ve cooked in a while. It’s often so when we come back from the market (though less spectacular in scale), as I get caught up in some sort of decision panic. Truly vile, I don’t even know what it is I did.