Today we went and ordered most (though not all) of the lights for the flat. The place the GF had discovered seemed to have good quality and was certainly a slick operation, very helpful folks. So we have ordered single and double spots for the side lights, rod-shaped hallway lights, pendants for the kitchen, and a picture light for a place where we definitely want a painting. All of these in an aged brass, except for the lights going in the kitchen which will be in matte steel.
We also bought our fans, deciding to go for the same Australian brand we had had in Malaysia. I was very fond of how our living room fan looked – rare, as usually I avert my eyes from fans, and now I have two, both intended for the two lobes of the living room. The bedroom and study will have a different kind, something flatter against the ceiling, as the rooms are quite small. I’m uncertain about them, worried that the fans might be too big, but it turns out to be very hard to find small fans that don’t have lights in them, which I absolutely loathe.
We celebrated this achievement by taking a ferry across to Kadikoy for dinner and a coffee, and had a pleasant evening strolling through the streets and enjoying the kind of people who live there – artistic, open to difference, largely with leftwing politics. I hope some of them come to our side of the water over the coming years as that is the great lack in Galata these days. We had an excellent burger (or I did; the GF had a vegetarian one) at a tiny place run by a husband, wife and child, all of whom had their dinner of vegetables on the next table as we ate. Then we had coffee, sitting on a bustling street watching old men watching intently as a young man repaired some sort of wiring.
A satisfying day indeed.