We had our first Christmas in Galata, Pera as was. In the morning I dashed to finish some work, and managed just as the GF arose. We went off to bring a Turkish breakfast from a nearby cafe, along with a couple of glasses of freshly squeezed pomegranate juice. Since our dining room is dark and the table is small and uncomfortable, I spread out this feast on the living room floor, on a number of table mats and tea towels that rather miraculously were in harmonious colours – with each other and with our flowers as well, not to mention the pomegranate juice. So it turned out to be a reather pretty spread – not perhaps the typical Christmas, but one which felt like an event. Capturing that feeling of specialness is I think, more important than trying to get it right.
Before we left the doorbell rang: a man stood there with a large bag. We had sent a message to a bread shop last night to buy bread and croissants but received no reply so it was rather a surprise. Even more of a surprise, the man refused to take payment. This seemed unlikely to be a Christmas gift, and indeed it emerged this was accidental so we paid by bank transfer instead.
News arrived of a friend’s father’s death this morning, which saddened me as I like her and he was once very kind and helpful to me.
After a leisurely breakfast we had a call with the GF’s family in the UK. A pleasant conversation despite occasional technological interruptions of which the best was when the eldest and most serious sibling accidentally found himself ‘memoji-d’ to have the head of a sparkling unicorn. Then we went out for a stroll – a quick stop at the flat where the door was locked but we could hear the walls being scraped of plaster inside. Then a stroll across the Golden Horn, up to the Suleimaniye and across to the Shehzade mosque. On our way to the tram we walked past the archaeological park, a rather odd place just by the aqueduct springing over a motorway, and filled with broken columns. Next to it, low in the undulating green ground and surrounded by traffic, was the ruin of a very old Byzantine church, one which had been the most imposing in Constantinople before the Hagia Sophia. It was crumbling but still imposing in its ruins, but rather sad as it was fenced off with a rather makeshift, uninterested barrier and when we went inisde through the gap it was clearly mostly used as a public convenience and a place where the homeless take shelter. As the GF said, in other cities this would be a major monument; here it’s a public urinal. It was sad to seem this wilful aggression towards the parts of history that are not cared for.
Soon after we encountered a part of history that is very much cared for: a very large monument to people who died in the 2016 coup attempt. complete with statues of several of them bending over a fountain and a sign describing their martyrdom and their only desire as for ablution before death. Interesting bit of history making.
We finished up in Cihangir as we had to collect our weekly fresh milk delivery, and also purchased some tea and, on the way back, a pair of towels. So we are back and have chatted for a bit, ordered some fish for dinner, and I am not sipping my tea and contemplating the largest pain au chocolat I have ever seen, while the GF does the same and watches Breaking Bad. It really is huge, almost spherical, like something a dwarf might bake.