Planning an Arctic Cruise

Everyone has a dream destination, or an idea of it, however vague it be, the kind of place that wants us to leave everything behind, go out into the world, look deep into our hearts and find out what it truly wants and then do it. For me that place has always been the two extremities of the earth, the two poles. Whether it's the animated penguins or gigantic glaciers in Antarctica or the quintessential image of a polar bear digging out a seal from the burrows in the Arctic sea ice, something has always drawn me towards the north and south pole alike. And somehow, last year the pull got so strong that I could no longer resist and caved in. Thus began the planning for the greatest adventure of my life so far!

The travel window for the Arctic is fairly limited, due to the extreme cold and lack of sunlight for half the year, roughly June to August. After much deliberation about expenses and leave from work, I finally managed to book an arctic cruise in Svalbard for 10 days in July 2016. I was super excited about the prospect of encountering Polar bears in their natural habitat. Till now I had only seen one in the Detroit zoo.

A polar bear jumping across the sea ice

And now that I am back from the trip, I am proud to tell you that the polar bear count stands revised to 25! That's about 15 more than my wildest imagination, yes I was that lucky! Watching a polar bear on the sea ice is such a fulfilling experience that everything else, the midnight sun, the walrus, various kinds of seal, reindeer, arctic fox, bird colonies on vertical cliffs and mountain slopes with hundreds of thousands of birds and almost miniaturized flora unique to the Arctic region felt like an added bonus. A big surprise element was the spectacular landscape. I was expecting sea and ice for most part but the terrain varied from barren polar deserts to islands lush green with vegetation primarily due to the fertilization by tons of droppings from the bird colonies! I did not even foresee the amazing vistas created by the hundreds of fjords in the Svalbard archipelago, like this one below:

Brash ice in front of a glacier at Magdalenefjorden

For more photographs from the trip, feel free to check out my Facebook page:

https://Facebook.com/himanshusarafphotography

Or my Instagram feed:

https://Instagram.com/himanshusarafphotography

Now a lot of you have asked me about details of my itinerary or how to go about planning a trip to the Arctic. I will share some of the things I learned while planning this trip and if you want further details you can leave comments and I will try and address them as quickly as I can.

First of all, the Arctic Circle isn't a very well defined place, loosely speaking anything north of 66° latitude is part of the Arctic region (not exactly but let's ignore that) and that would include parts of Russia, Scandinavia, Greenland, Canada and Alaska. So you can visit the Arctic from any of these places. One of the most popular destinations in the Arctic is an archipelago called Svalbard, which is a part of Norway but located quite north of the mainland Norway. This is what I had visited and for the rest of the blog, I will talk only about Svalbard.

Although part of Norway, Svalbard is party to an international treaty which allows free access to almost everyone. Now before you pack your bags thinking you don't need a visa - there is a catch! The only flights to Svalbard are from Norway, so you will require a valid visa to Norway, which means a Schengen. So flying to Svalbard generally looks like this - you fly from your city to Oslo in Norway and then either fly SAS or Norwegian Airlines from Oslo to Longyearbyen, the capital and only city of Svalbard. Being almost a monopoly, these airlines would charge you quite a bit for the relatively short flight but the views from the window are stunning.

Longyearbyen is a small town with a population of about 2000 or so and used to be a mining town at some point. Now it's the point of origin/end of all Arctic voyages in Svalbard. The most common and practical way of touring Svalbard is on a cruise ship. Many people come here just to board their ship and don't spend much time here, however there are a lot of day tours that are offered and if you want to take it slow you can easily tag a few days here on either side of your cruise. Just like the flights, expect to pay dearly for the hotels.

So far so good. Now comes the toughest part - how do you choose a cruise ship? I took months to answer this question for myself and I realize that it is very subjective. Instead of telling you which ships/cruise companies I think are good I will list down the questions you should ask yourself and evaluate potential ships against these to figure out what's right for you. Remember, this is the single most important decision you will make regarding the trip that can make or break your overall experience so give it enough time and thought. Here we go:

1. Creature comforts: Ships sailing to the Arctic range from basic ones that were once used as research vessels and have now been refitted to take passengers to ultra luxurious ones (think Titanic! well almost). The price differential between ships and among different accommodation classes on the same ship is huge so your budget might dictate thus choice as well.

2. Size of the ship: these ships can range from a privately chartered 20 passenger boat to a large ship with over 500 passengers. Size of the ship matters in more ways than you can think. A larger ship is more stable in rough waters, has more amenities and avenues of entertainment, more passengers to mingle with (easy to avoid the obnoxious ones too!) and might be more economical. On the other hand a smaller ship is more intimate, you get to know the other passengers and crew closely, can go to places a big ship can not, can unload and load passengers faster (this is crucial when you go out of the ship for a zodiac cruise or a shore landing - don't worry, I will explain both in a while).

3. Ice rating of the ship - Depending on how strong the hull of the ship is for navigating around ice, it has a different ice rating ranging from 1D to 1A (nomenclature can vary depending on the system used). 1D is the weakest and 1A the strongest. Now 1D doesn't mean that the ship is unsafe. It only means that the ship won't try and navigate through ice and choose it's path based on the ice condition. Whereas a class 1A ship will go about more freely and won't have to worry about navigating through thin ice (and thin ice only). Icebreakers are a different category altogether (think north pole) and I won't touch upon them here. Essentially, if you want to see the polar bears or seals up close in their natural habitat on the sea ice you want a ship that has an ice strengthened hull, basically a rating of 1A or 1B.

4. Expedition leader and staff: This is perhaps the most difficult factor to evaluate but in my opinion the most important factor in choosing a ship/company. An expedition leader decides the course of the ship every day/hour and his experience in making the right calls on the weather and the sea conditions and animal behavior can completely make or break your experience. However, these trips are booked an year or so in advance generally and it's tough to get the information about the expedition leader before booking (or even after that for that matter). Scouring through online reviews, using your personal contacts and diligent follow-ups with the companies can get you the right answers.

5. Timing: not every ship is sailing in the Arctic at the same time and the best time to watch different animals is different. So depending on your interest you have to figure out the best month to sail and you will have to check which ship is sailing during those days.

6. Budget: it's influenced by many of the factors above but after you have narrowed down your choices based on the above questions you may find that some or all of them do not fit in your budget in which case you will need to re-prioritize or make compromises e.g. choose a sharing room over a single room. Another way to cut the budget is to choose a shorter cruise. The cruise duration ranges from a week to three weeks. I find 10 days to be just about right.

With your flights and the ship sorted out, you are almost done with the planning. You need to worry about two more things:

1. Appropriate clothing for the Arctic climate and the nature of activities on the ship.

2. Photography equipment (I think even if you are not a photographer, it's unlikely you will go all the way to the Arctic and not want to take pictures! I will tackle both of these in separate blog posts in the future.

In case you are wondering if I forgot... I didn't! Coming to the topic of zodiac cruises and shore landings - these are two of the main activities (kayaking is a third option, but I will take that up in comments section if someone is interested) that you will perform outside the ship almost on a daily basis, once to thrice a day.

Zodiacs are small inflatable boats (like white water rafts but with engines) that can carry about 8-10 passengers and you cruise around in the waters on that when it's not possible to land onshore. It's a great way to get up close to icebergs, mountain cliffs, shores and sometimes glaciers.

Zodiacs and Kayaks tied up on the Aft of the Ship

 Shore landings basically mean you are taken from the ship to a nearby island on a zodiac and then you get off on the island and walk around either in an organized hike or you move freely within a set perimeter. Each of these activities can last anywhere between 2-4 hours.

With that out of the way, let me go back to the question of size of ship. Passengers board the zodiacs in serial and it can take a while to board everyone. So if you are on a large ship, you may have wait 30-45 minutes for your turn to board whereas a small ship can have everyone out and about in under 15 minutes. When you have just spotted an interesting animal on the shore, who is walking away, and want to get close to take a glimpse of it, that extra 20 minutes might be the difference in you seeing or not seeing the animal. A small ship by the same token, is more capable of making use of fleeting opportunities because of its faster turnaround times in getting people out on the boats.

Well, it's been a very long post but I hope it has been worth it. I am sure you will have some doubts or unaddressed questions, so feel free to comment and I will try and respond at the earliest. The Arctic is a wonderful place but is being significantly affected by the climate change, more than any other part of the world. The sea ice that is the home of the polar bear is fast melting and according to some estimates might be completely gone by 2030. If you want to give yourself a chance to experience this magical part of our world, the time to go is now.

Jambo Kenya!

"Guys, I am going to speed up a little. My friend has just spotted a Cheetah and we are going to try and catch it!" - those were the kind of words I had imagined I would hear during my visit to Kenya but I couldn't imagine what sort of a reaction from me would such words evoke.  I was about to find out.

It had barely been 3 days into the trip and we were slowly warming up to Kenya and its wildlife, having spent a day in Nairobi and Lake Nakuru each. On the 3rd day, we were in Amboseli and were on our way back to the campsite from a visit to a Maasai village. It was getting dark as the sun had already set and our driver and guide Jackson was driving slowly looking out for birds and other animals. He would stop the Land Rover whenever he would spot something interesting and would share his knowledge about it and give us a chance to take pictures. We managed to see a few small birds and animals so far and were enjoying the experience as well as the landscape.

Jackson, who was connected to a few other drivers via radio, suddenly took a sharp turn, sped up and announced that his friend has spotted a Cheetah so he is going to drive a little fast and see if we can catch it. That had got to be the most exciting thing I had heard in a very long time! I and the 5 other tourists in the safari held tightly to our seats as we saw Jackson transform from a laid back driver to Jean Reno running away from Godzilla!

We stopped for a few minutes to allow Richard, our spotter, to take out a red flash light to enable us to see around at night. We could sense an urgency and excitement in both Richard and Jackson, something that was not there so far. All of us had forgotten about the colorful birds, the cute Gazelles, the shy Giraffes, the imperial Rhino and anything else we had seen till then. The pecking order in the African wild is very simple, the big cats - the lion, the cheetah and the leopard overshadow everything else when it comes to demanding your time and attention.

With the target clear in our minds, we kept driving in the dark, not sure what to expect. Other than the occasional communication Jackson had over the radio, no one spoke anything. I didn't know how likely we were to actually spot the cheetah, it was a huge conservancy, very dark, we were far away from where the cheetah was spotted, and the cheetah is quite elusive. I didn't have very high hopes, in fact, I was so excited and content just with the thrill of the chase that spotting the cheetah would definitely have felt like a bonus.

We crossed another safari vehicle on our way and Jackson exchanged a quick word with the driver in the local Maasai language before moving on. With every passing moment I attached a lesser likelihood of us finding the cheetah. It was so dark and we drove that fast that I wouldn't be surprised if he had crossed a few of them on our way without noticing them (or so I thought). Suddenly we heard a sound of excitement from our spotter pointing in a direction - Cheetah! And that's when I realized what does being on the edge of your seat really mean. He had every one's attention, we all looked in that direction and there I could see a Cheetah resting calmly… and another one nearby… and a third one! At that moment I knew this was definitely one of those rare trips that live up to all the hype - Empire State building didn't, Buckingham Palace didn't, Grand Canyon didn't, Lochness Monster didn't… IT did!

Jackson told us they are three brothers. By this time we all had our cameras out and ready and were taking pictures like crazy though it was pretty dark and getting good shots was very tough. Someone in our group enthusiastically used the on camera flash which annoyed the cheetahs. They all got up and started walking away from us. Jackson was quick to follow them in the vehicle and Richard did a good job at keeping the red flash light on them (animals are apparently not bothered by the red light). The cheetahs found another resting place nearby and we stopped the car a good 15-20 meters away at a good view point.

Jackson told us they looked well fed and have probably eaten a fresh kill they made (next morning we found the remains, skeleton and feathers, of the Ostrich they had killed). We sat there watching every movement of theirs through our binoculars and I tried to get a few pictures as well. After a while Jackson suggested we should let them rest and we will try and find them the next morning. As luck would have it, this would be the first and last time we spotted a cheetah on the entire safari.

As much as I am disappointed not being able to see a Cheetah chase a Gazelle in the open plains (our fellow tourists did later on), I am quite fortunate to having seen them in the wild and being able to observe them from so close. With the cheetah now extinct in India it was rare opportunity and I am glad Africa cares about its wildlife and still offers the less fortunate ones of us a chance to be there and get a flavor of the real wild.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly - confessions of a lone traveler

Scene 1 - The Good

Location: Istanbul
Time: About 10:30 pm

Taksim Square

I am walking back towards my hotel after taking a cruise in the Bosphorus river and stopped to enquire at an eatery in Sultanahmet about their vegetarian options. I didn't find anything interesting so continued to walk when I heard someone ask me something in Turkish. I turned back and saw a young guy, in his 30's, Turkish looking who was asking for directions. The look on my face made it clear that I was the wrong person to ask the question so he politely apologized. Here is how the conversation went-

Stranger: I am sorry, I thought you were Turkish.
I: Not a problem.
Stranger: So are you a tourist?
I: Yes.
Stranger: Just like me (with a smile, and by this time he had started walking along with me, apparently not needing directions any more).

So where are you from?
I: India. How about you?
Stranger: I am from Cyprus (I didn't know what men from Cyprus looked like, I assumed they look similar). So, first time in Turkey?
I: Yes.
Stranger: It's my second time. So what brings you here?
I: Tourism, holiday.
Stranger: You traveling alone?
I: Yes, how about you?
Stranger: I came today and am waiting for a friend, he will come tomorrow.
I: OK (Typically when I give such one word or one phrase answers, people loose interest in the conversation pretty quickly but this guy kept on going undeterred).
Stranger: How long have you been here?
I: Two days.
Stranger: So what did you do today?
I: The usual tourist spots - Blue Mosque, Aya Sofya, Bosphorus Cruise etc. How about you?
Stranger: I went for a Hamam.
I: Nice. where?
Stranger: Cemberlitas. (that's one of the most popular places for a traditional Hamam, and very expensive too, I think he chose to mention it on purpose to impress).
I: That must be very expensive.
Stranger: No, not much, it was about 65 Liras (close to 2000 Rupees, I thought it should have been more expensive but later on realized he was about right on the price).

So, this went on for a while, he kept talking about India, Mumbai, the weather and other usual conversation starters but I tried to keep it to a minimum as I had some idea where this was heading and I was playing it safe. And as I expected, the conversation soon took that turn -
Stranger: So, which hotel are you staying in?
I: (I deliberately ignored the question) I am finding it so hard to find good vegetarian food here.
Stranger: (He mentioned something about a place in a different part of the city which he thought was nice and came back to his original question). If you don't mind me asking, which hotel are you staying in?
I: (I ignored him again, now pretty sure that he is up to something). I am just looking for a good vegetarian restaurant and can't find it!
Stranger: You know, I am heading to Taksim Square, there are some nice clubs there, if you want to come have a drink you are welcome.
I: No thanks, I am pretty tired, I think I will eat something and rest.
Stranger: Well, there are some nice clubs there. We will take the train have a couple of drinks and then we can be back in an hour or two.

For the next few minutes he kept on talking about the benefits of going there - drinks, girls, friends, belly dance, fun and so on and I kept sounding disinterested.
I: Thanks, but I am too tired to go. How are you going there by the way?
Stranger: I will take the tram.

And this was the last and final clue that this was all a setup - we were walking in the opposite direction of Taksim where he wanted to go, and on the way we had skipped two tram stations, his mode of transport. Meanwhile we had reached the place where I had been eating for the last two days and I didn't waste any more time in ending the conversation.
I: Well, it was nice meeting you. I am going to eat here, you have fun at Taksim! (shook his hand and walked away)

So, in case you are wondering what his intended setup was then this is how the whole scene plays. Had I gone with him, he would have taken me to a nice bar/club and soon we would have been joined by a few more people, at least a couple of pretty girls (remember he was a tourist, but somehow he will have friends at the bar!). Everyone will have drinks, talk, laugh and later when the bill comes it would have been handed on to me and would have run into a few hundred Euros (could be ten times more than the actual cost of drinks and they might even have a fake menu to support those prices!). The bar owner is usually a part of the scam and I would end up paying the entire amount. If I didn't have enough cash they would have kindly escorted me to the nearest ATM.

It's a popular scam in Istanbul and is usually called the single male traveler scam. Fortunately I had read about it before I left for Turkey so was quick to recognize it. I don't think I would have gone with him anyways. I mean seriously, a guy from Cyprus wanting to have drinks with me in Istanbul by first taking a tram to some other part of the city? I know I am a good company but let's be honest, I am not that good either :)

Scene 2 - The Bad

Location: A bus from Antalya to Goreme
Time: 11 am

The Kent bus that threw us out

I had to go from Olympos to Goreme, I booked the ticket from my tree house hotel guy in Olympos and the route was like this - I take a shuttle (called Dolmus) from the tree house to the main road, then a mini bus from there to Antalya bus station and then an overnight bus from Antalya to Goreme. The bus was at 10 pm and I barely managed to reach Antalya bus station by 9:50 pm. Actually there were 4 people going to Goreme from that hotel that night so till the time we reached Antalya we were together. The bus station was pretty big and we had to hurry to find our bus. We showed our tickets to a few people and they directed us to our bus. We reached there just in time, loaded the luggage and took our seats. By this time, two of us had gone somewhere else and it was just me and a Canadian girl. The bus left promptly at 10 but made a lot of long stops over the next 20-30 mins to pick some passengers on the way.

Anyways, after we had been on the road for over an hour, the conductor came to check the tickets, looked at my ticket and appeared shocked. Went up to the driver and started talking loudly in Turkish. Came back to me and started talking in Turkish. I didn't understand everything but the essence was this - "You fool! you have boarded the wrong bus. Your bus is Nevsehir transport, this is Kent transport!" I was like but I asked so many people including one person who boarded this very bus, and the driver of the bus itself! I showed my ticket to him when he was putting the luggage in and asked him if this is the bus and he happily took my luggage. I of course said all of this in English and the conductor didn't understand a word of it. Anyways, he concluded the conversation saying - No Problem!

So I assumed all is good and he will do something about it. He tried to call my bus company to see if they are behind us and if I can be transferred to that bus. Unfortunately because of the many stops we made, the bus had gone ahead of us so a transfer wasn't possible. After a while, he realized that the Canadian girl has also boarded the wrong bus (of course, we boarded it together). Now he lost it. He first asked her that she will have to get down, then said she will have to pay the fare again. She and I had a conversation later on and figured that in the worst case we might have to buy the ticket again but will try not to since it's their mistake that they took our luggage in. All this while he is on the phone talking to different people and looking in amazement at our tickets and talking the driver in a tone that was getting madder and madder with every passing minute. My next seat neighbour meanwhile was kind enough to translate his conversations to me from Turkish to sign language and some simpler Turkish. The last thing I understood the conductor said was - Problem!

The previous day I had read a story on Lonely Planet about two women who were left stranded on the highway at night by a Turkish bus company with their luggage and nowhere to go. This was when they had valid tickets! So, I was aware of what these bus people were capable of doing and was getting mentally prepared for the worst. At around 11:45 the bus reached a station called Manavgat and I saw the Canadian girl get down from the bus. She told me that the conductor is asking her to get off the bus. He didn't say anything to me so I wasn't sure what to do but figured that the wise thing to do is get down. One, I didn't trust that guy and two, I didn't want to leave the girl alone at a random station at midnight.

There was one guy on the bus who understood English so he tried to help us check if we could somehow catch our original bus or take another bus to Goreme but both were not possible. He suggested that we should spend the night here and take a bus in the morning. We were both reluctant to do that as we would loose a lot of time, and when you are traveling time has a lot of value so we talked to a guy on the station and he helped us look for other buses.

We walked from the reservation counter of one company to the other till we could find one bus which was leaving for the town of Konya, somewhere halfway to Goreme. They said we will have to wait three hours in Konya and then can take a bus to Goreme eventually. To make matters worse, both of us were out of Liras, she had Euros and I had credit cards... so we were busy at each subsequent stop looking for ATMs or some place to exchange Euros for Lira. Anyway, we took that bus, reached Konya at about 4 am... waited for three hours, took another bus at 7 to reach Nevsehir (not Goreme yet) and then had to take another shuttle from Nevsehir to Goreme. So, what my hotel guy initially told me to be a direct bus, 16 hours and 60 extra Liras later turned out to be a five stop journey. A single journey in six buses - that is definitely a record I never intend to break in my lifetime!

Scene 3 - The Ugly
Location: Goreme
Time: 5 pm

Goreme - the dirt path with the ranch and tourist attractions in the background

My 2nd day in Goreme. This is after I posted a status message on facebook in the morning saying - "The Best Morning Ever!". I had a relaxed late morning early afternoon and at around 4:30 I decided to go for a walk/hike. It was getting quite hot so I decided against my original idea of mountain biking. I started walking towards a nearby town of Avanos which was about 4-5 kms away or so. I was walking along the highway (in the service road) as the directions were easy to follow along the highway. Almost parallel to the highway I saw a dirt road that was closer to the valley, the stone caves and in general seemed more of a scenic path than the highway. I noticed that there was a sign that it was a private ranch but then in a distance I could see some tourists on their quad bikes so I thought will take the dirt road instead. As I was about to cross the main road, I saw a car drive past and it slowed down as it went past me. The driver looked at me, probably to check if I wanted a ride somewhere, easy way for him to make a few bucks but I didn't want a ride so I didn't pay attention and crossed the road.

I would have barely walked a 100 meters along the dirt road when the same old white car came from behind and slowed down near me. This time the driver, Turkish looking, around 40, spoke to me in Turkish. I couldn't understand but he was suggesting that he can offer me a ride. I signalled to him that I wanted to walk instead and said thank you. He asked a few more times pointing towards the passenger seat but I said no and started walking again. He felt disappointed and took an unusually wide and slow U-Turn almost stopping in front of me once but drove away eventually. I barely walked for another 500m and had stopped to take a few pictures when I saw him again this time coming from the opposite side towards me. Now it started to bother me. I thought I will step aside to take pictures and he will drive away but as I stopped, he also stopped at a short distance from me. I must have waited there for about 5-10 minutes and he waited there as well.

Anyways, I had to move on sometime, and as i walked past him, he asked me in English what was my name. I answered politely and kept walking and then he said something else in Turkish. I didn't get it so he repeated it, this time pointing his finger apparently in the general direction of his dick! This was outrageous and I didn't know how to react but I definitely didn't feel any further obligation to be polite and I started walking away. A few moments later I turned just to make sure he was not following me and to my utter disgust he stepped out of the car with his pants down!! I was shocked and appalled and at this stage let me add, a little scared too. I immediately turned away, left the dirt track and stepped on to a large patch of grass that divided the parallel tracks as he couldn't drive on to it.

Now I was moving towards the ranch where I could see some tourists at a distance as I was pretty much alone on the dirt road. I heard the engine a few seconds later and turned back to see that he was driving away from me pretty fast. I wasn't sure whether he was gone for good or was going to make a U-Turn and come back. So, my immediate objective was to reach somewhere where I can see other people and meanwhile stay on a path where he can't drive. Unfortunately, the area was almost uninhabited and the tourists were few and far between. I was not able to figure out whether I should move towards the highway in which case I give that Psycho the chance to intercept me on the dirt road in between or to move further towards the ranch where he had little chance of driving by but which was much more isolated.

I kept on walking for another 20-30 minutes thinking of all possibilities (hiking, sightseeing and photography was the last priority at this moment) and feeling surprised at how something like this can happen in such a touristy town, with apparently so many people around (not too many at that time though) and so close to the highway on one side and tourist attractions on the other. I was perhaps lost in these thoughts when all of a sudden I saw that car appear on a parallel dirt road coming from the opposite direction. Now I was really scared! This time I started running and after a few minutes of sprinting saw a house in the seemingly deserted area with an old man attending to his garden. I was quite relieved at seeing him and walked up to him and just had a conversation (he spoke broken English) and waited for some time till I could no longer see the car. I understood my location on the map from him and how I could get to the highway from there. The highway wasn't too far from there and I figured I could walk it in max 5-10 minutes, which I did with a brisk walk keeping an eye out for that psycho.

This was the third time in life I was delighted at the site of a main road, the other two were when I was utterly lost once in Scotland and once in South Dakota. Now, I could see shops and other cars along the way and felt quite relaxed. I did go along the highway for another km or so before deciding to get back. This time I made sure I stuck to the highway to be safe, but still couldn't help getting alarmed at the sight of any white car. People talk of the dangers of traveling alone for women, I say it's not easy being a solo guy traveler!

IstanBlue

I think there's something funny about a guy smoking in a jogger's park. And it gets intriguing when you find most men and women doing the same. And then you realize, for most people in Istanbul going for a walk in the park is no different from taking a stroll down the bustling city markets, having a cup of tea or smoking a waterpipe at one of the numerous joints in the side streets of the city. They are just going about their life doing what they like to do - and the list is not long - having tea or coffee, chit chatting either among themselves or with travellers, playing backgammon(arguably Turkey's national game), smoking and finally either buying something or selling it (depending on we are talking of a tourist or local) usually in some combination of each other. And if you happen to be in this park that I am sitting in at the moment (Gulhane Park - the city's largest and most popular park by the way) add making out to the list as well!

It's a Monday afternoon and I wonder how do so many young Turkish men and women manage to be in a park. It does say something about the employment rate or the attendance level in the Istanbul University! The park reminds me of the Central Park in New York City - prime location, very green, beautiful landscaping, well maintained - not as big but then Istanbul isn't as big as NYC either. The similarities between the two cities go a little further than the park. Both are very popular tourist destinations, Istanbul surprisingly is quite cosmopolitan and liberal as well, both a shopper's paradise and both quite expensive! (yes, that's right, gone are the days when Istanbul used to be the poor tourist's destination in Europe).

Turkey is often referred to as the most liberal Muslim country but you have to see it to believe it. Take a 360 degree look around you anywhere in the city and for every woman draped in a head scarf you will find three wearing a mini skirt, and its not just tourists I am talking about. What surprised me is that women can wear almost anything even to a mosque though to enter the prayer area they have to cover themselves up (the mosques provide scarfs and drapes to women). Even women who choose to wear scarves in public are very comfortable holding hands of their partners, cuddling and sometimes kissing in public (otherwise they have this park!).

It's my fourth day in the city and I am still struggling to assign a theme to the city, or at least to put it in words. I have so many, sometimes conflicting, characters of it ever since I stepped out of the Ataturk airport. For the first 20 minutes you drive along an international class 6 lane highway full of modern expensive cars, Mercedes and Volvo buses (there are too many buses in Istanbul by the way!) and you think well it's a pretty modern looking city and all of a sudden your bus makes a left turn to enter Sultanahmet, the main tourist area and you are greeted with a maze of narrow cobbled streets that has Europe written all over it, a maze only your driver can decipher (you will eventually get the hang of it in a couple of days). My driver happened to break the side mirror of a parked car while manoeuvring a tight corner on one such street.

Sultanahmet is full of mosques and monuments of religious and historical importance that cut across religions, countries, empires and centuries. Cross the Ataturk or Galata bridge and come to Taksim and you will be forgiven to think that you are in SoHo (without the sky scrapers). You will find a nostalgic tram in Taksim and a state of the art metro train service elsewhere in the city. No matter what you want to buy, Istanbul has something to suit your taste - from high street shopping in Taksim to haggle your way to death in the Grand Bazaar, and various intermediate options spread across the city. Grand Bazaar is unique in itself - over 5000 shops in 60 streets, it's a jigsaw puzzle daring you to take a shot at it. It will take you days to see them all but fortunately you don't have to as many shops sell similar stuff. Be prepared to bargain shamelessly and don't ever make the mistake of thinking that you found an original Gucci bag for a steal! The stuff looks nice but if the price is too good to be true, it most certainly is a fake. Leave the expensive stuff for authentic stores, Grand Bazaar is for trinkets and souvenirs, in other words, things that if you end up over paying for, won't haunt you in your sleep :) Most of what you find here will be available elsewhere in the city at a more reasonable price but you may have to look a little harder. But if you really like something at a shop and decide to check out other shops for a better price, make sure you have a way to make it back to the shop, as I said it's a maze - I got lost multiple times and in one case kept coming back to the same shop no matter how hard I tried to get away from it!

There is so much more to talk about Istanbul - the spice bazaar, the numerous mosques, the food (not necessarily in a positive way), belly dancing, backgammon, the special treatment meted out to Indians along with some other third world citizens at the airport, the beautiful weather, the cruises along the Bosphorus river, the carpets, the single tourist guy scam (topic for another blog!), the history and so on. But just like I had only 4 days to spend here, I am sure most of you have a limited time to read my blog so I will skip some of these for a later day. As I said before, I am not going to be able to do justice in characterizing the city but one thing is for sure that as much as the Bosphorus river tries to separate the European Istanbul from the Asian one, the cliche of West meets East finds its true meaning in Istanbul.