Istanbul - Constantinople by Maureen Barry

Istanbul - Constantinople...! Constantinople — Istanbul...! I can remember jumping a skipping rope to this children’s rhyme and wondering about the significance of these two exotic names. Together with words like seraglio, harem and Turkish delight they hinted at the mysterious, the sensual - full of forbidden Eastern promise. My great-aunt had married a Turkish spice merchant and I always felt I had Istanbul ‘connections’; many travelling years later, I knew I had arrived in a very special place, a heady blend of sights, smells and sounds that have been some 3,000 years in the making.

Constantinople, Istanbul... today’s duality is not so much between East and West as between Old and New. The mosques, minarets, markets and mouthwatering menus of Asia contrasted with the vibrant modern European city across the Bosphorus, with its multi-national companies, grip on the fashion heights, hectic café society and scintillating night life.

Istanbul triumphs as one of the world’s great cities, having been capital of both a great Christian and a Muslim empire, geographically boasting the unique contrast of being European and Asian, the only city in the world built on two continents. This complex city changed with its conquerors from fabled Byzantium through Christian Constantinople to Ottoman Istanbul. If the city can be said to have a centre, it’s Eminonu, where the Galata Bridge links the old city with the ‘modern’ Istanbul across the Golden Horn to the North, the spot where redoubtable Aunt Hester started her Anglo-Turkish dynasty from what we called the Spice House on account of the army of exotic aromas that battled for your nose’s attention, emanating from her kitchen.

Hester’s house had an unusual and amusing claim to fame; in the 1880s her predecessor used to meet regularly with another English family living on the opposite side of the Golden Horn for a game resembling dummy whist. They used to cross the water alternately, depending on whose turn it was ‘to bridge’ - to have a game. Thus, according to Auntie, did the addictive game get its name.

With spice permeating the family’s veins, a pilgrimage to Misir Carsisi, the Spice Market was called for, unmistakable for the predominant smell of coriander, and next door the flower and cage-bird market. Markets always win hands down over minarets on my agenda — Istanbul is a shopper’s paradise — so it was off to the Grand Bazaar, Carsi, which though touristic, has to be seen to be believed. It has grown into the largest covered market in the world, boasting over 4,000 shops as well as cafés, restaurants, mosques, banks, schools — a complete city in itself.

Some trades have died out, there are no more fez makers along Fezmakers Street, but shoes, furs, brasses, carpets, kilims, leather and jewellery shops were all doing prodigious trade. When the noise and the crowds became a bit too much, I retreated to the Old Book Market, Sahaflar Carsisi, outside the Grand Bazaar, and browsed on new and used books in all languages against the restful splashing of a courtyard fountain. Curious to see what the Grand Bazaar was like before the tourists moved in, I wandered towards the Golden Horn and found myself in Mahmut Paca; longing to make myself invisible I watched and eavesdropped, fascinated, as the Turks did their daily shopping, with gnarled porters in attendance ready to carry enormous loads home on their backs.

No-one would ever starve anywhere in Turkey; the produce and the prices are quite unbelievable. The markets are a cornucopia of plenty and the prices won’t make a hole in your pocket. Melons cost a few pence a kilo, mountains of tomatoes, aubergines and peppers are incredibly cheap in season.

One of the nostalgic memories all visitors to Turkey bring home are the cries, along with the call to prayers, of the ubiquitous street sellers. It doesn’t take you long in Istanbul to learn that the Turkish palate has become delicately refined down the changing years of foreign influence. So refined in fact that it’s not only what you eat but where you eat that matters; the origin of the open-air café was in Ottoman Turkey and the idea was brought back to Europe by the Austrian Ambassador, who was ecstatic over the outdoor restaurants along the shores of the Bosphorus.

The only place to savour fish, said my host, was at a table alongside the water, and so sensitive is the Turkish palate that he could tell me where and when the fish was caught after one mouthful. Meat dishes, he counselled, are perfection savoured in bucolic surroundings — when you can manage it in this city of teeming millions. This sensitivity extends throughout the gastronomic spectrum and I was bemused to find people choosing their drinking water with the same care others would reserve for wine. One wouldn’t simply order an apricot but has to specify what type of apricot; while the age of the fish when caught is of paramount importance: chinakok is a generation younger than lufer, torik a year older than palamat.

All this finesse has resulted in Turkish cuisine being one of the world’s greatest, making Istanbul well worth the detour for the food alone. The Topkapi Palace was the basis of the delectable Palace or Saray cooking, which was the pinnacle of Turkish cuisine for over 500 years of Ottoman rule. Most professional cooks today are the great-grandchildren of chefs who cooked in the kitchens of the Topkapi Palace or in noble homes of the Ottoman Empire.

A meal out can be as inexpensive as you want, or it can be an exotic affair fit for a Sultan, at prices comparable to dining in any major city. The lokanta, restaurants, or gazino, probably have that luxurious buzz that you’d enjoy for a special night out. Some of the finest restaurants are in hotels where old Ottoman menus are revived in a setting of exquisite oriental splendour — at last your Arabian Nights fantasy comes true!

You don’t need a voracious appetite for architecture to fall under the spell of the Topkapi Palace, where everyone makes a beeline for that jewel of jewels, featured in the film Topkapi; the 86 carat Spoonmaker’s Diamond, nestling alongside the most drool-making collection of gems in the world, a fitting introduction to the labyrinthine 300-room complex of the harem. Fantasies of decadent odalisques can be dismissed, the harem was essentially the domain of the first wife and a power base for women. It served as a school where girls were trained in arts and crafts, household management, music and religion. The Mother Sultan carefully rehearsed the concubine before she was presented to the Sultan, but there are instances of girls resisting their master’s advances and living to tell the tale!

Minarets, markets and menus are alluring, but no visit to Istanbul would be complete without its mosques. The inspiring Aya Sophia stands outside Topkapi’s walls. For centuries this was the greatest church in Christendom and with its immense dome, it’s still one of the architectural wonders of the world. Just a short walk across the bosky gardens of Sultan Ahmet Square is the renowned Blue Mosque, enchanting in its elegant symmetry and exquisite colour — inside there are 21,043 blue Iznik tiles — hence the beloved Mosque’s colloquial name. For sheer awesome drama the mosque to beat all mosques must be the Mosque of Suleiman the Magnificent, rising majestically with its great dome and four minarets on a hill overlooking the Golden Horn; a fitting monument to the great conqueror, statesman, legislator and talented goldsmith, himself patron of the arts.

“Let’s go down to Beyoglu tonight...” my cousin’s suggestion projected us fast-forward into the future. Half of Turkey’s population is under twenty and modern Istanbul is witness to the energy and vibrant lifestyle of this new generation. We took the Tunel, the oldest and shortest subway in the world, one stop at the bottom of the hill and the other at the top, to emerge into a teeming modern city — over seven million at the last count — with any city’s problems — slums, eyesores and traffic jams. Here, in the Ottoman twilight, developed the greatest build-up of Turkey’s wealth, but it’s still the nexus of the nation, where big businesses maintain their head offices and all new trends in art, literature, music and film begin. Istiklal Caddesi, Beyoglu’s main street, has certainly seen better days, but its joys are the little alleyways and side streets that branch off it.

Easily the most notorious is Cicek Pasaji or Flower Passage, which is low on flowers but heavy on cafés and taverns, all with outside tables, which make navigating this heartbeat of Turkey both hazardous and entertaining. Turks come from far and wide, attracting a motley collection of strolling singers, aspiring poets, dancers, acrobats, magicians and street vendors. It’s bustling enough by day, but by night the joint is jumping. Who’s the entertainer, who’s being entertained? Impossible to tell and immaterial — the fun is infectious, if you like that sort of thing.

The Piccadilly Circus of Istanbul, Taksim Square, is at the end of Istiklal Caddesi. Everyone should go to a Turkish Club — a Casino ala Turca — at least once. There are hundreds of nightspots around Taksim, usually there’s a good lively show and the inevitable, mostly very entertaining, belly-dancer. Club 1001 and Valentino’s are renowned transvestite bars, while just down the street is the Taksim Sanat Evi, where actors and artists hold their subterranean trysts. Istanbul yuppies and the arty crowd like to flirt and exchange gossip in Arifs — the Istanbul Cinema Association bar-restaurant.

Istanbul — Constantinople... you can have it both ways. Europe meets Asia and antiquity meets a young, throbbing, vibrant city as hell-bent on enjoyment and innovation as any city in the West.