Nights 243
Turks are tradisionally traders. They were part of the traders in the Silk Road and the remnants of the historical Silk Road activities could still be seen in
Bursa.
Bursa was the last leg of the Silk Road and if you have the opportunity to visit Bursa, take a look at the Caravan-park (
caravansare) sites where the exchanges of goods by the caravans took place centuries ago.
Today, you could still find some hotels that was previously a caravansari. In the olden days, traders would pay for a 'room' to sleep overnight at the caravansari. The caravansari has an open corridor where they could keep an eye on their goods and the 'animals' (ponies, horse,camels etc.) which are tied below their corridors. So...its almost like the roadside motel that you can find in the USA and other countries.
Of course, I am not exactly right in saying that ethnic Turks are tradisionally traders as most ethnic Turks were trained to become soldiers during the Ottoman empire (more on Ottoman empire in later postings). The traders are either Armenians, Kurdish or Greeks. Only after the fall of the Ottoman empire and the rise of Kemal Ataturk, were the Turks trained to be traders and craftmen.
Some people say that Turks are like the Chinesse. Same industrous and acument for business but the only difference is....Turks have emotions while the Chinesse don't (is it true?). So...expect the Turks to work, think and act like the chinesse. They are very industrous, very enterprising, very improvising and very sharp in doing business.
 |
cherries,,,cherries...everywhere! the strawberries are almost gone and its now replaced by these cuties!
had cherries for breakfast, lunch and dinner....superb !!! |
 |
| the fresh market near my place....notice the strange looking fruits.....miniature peaches and apples |
 |
| Duygu and baban (her dad)....my helper's hubby and daughter. they have a stall selling clothes at the pazar (market) ....very enterprising family indeed.... |
 |
| Duygu's merchandise. the dad worked in Libya for 4 years previously, so he knows how speak Arabic |
 |
| more cherries! the Turks spent a LOT of time on mobile phones. they're forever talking on their mobiles and its common for a person to have 2 or 3 phones at the same time ... |
 |
| Turks are really friendly people and love having their photos taken.......now..how do i give them copies of their photos? err...because i was with a camera, i was over-charged (double) for a rock melon arghh.. |
 |
| this man ran to this cart to have his photo taken with it.....its soo interesting to be a camerawoman here...thats 'simits' in the cart, their national bread with sesame. delicious for breakfast and any time of the day and they are really proud of it. there's even a doctoral study on it about the optimized number of sesame to be put on the 'simits'. |
 |
| my all time fave. anginer (artichokes) ....until i learnt the difficulty in preparing it....but isn't it beautiful? |
 |
| olives in all forms...black, pitted, stuffed, pickled etc..etc...the Turks have them for kahvalti (breakfast) ....look at their healthy and gorgeous hair...thanks to olives !!! |
 |
| my fave bakery lady...she tolerated me from Day 1 when i used sign language and today i can order them in Turkce.....everything is freshly baked and OMG....the aroma when you passed thru' the shop...its heaven! |
 |
| fruits...glorious fruits everywhere.... in front of a famous fruit stall in Yenikoy but be prepared to pay 2 or 3 times more. of course...the fruits look better here ! |
People who do not understand the way the Turks work and behave would complain that they have been played out by the Turks in their business dealings. The truth of the matter is......the Turks are smart and shrewd tradesmen and the best men deserve to win. Its as simple as that. Survivor of the fittest.
And that explains how I got to be 20TL (1US$=1.51TL) poorer today !!
Its
karpuz (watermelon) season now and the last melon that we bought from
Uyum supermarket was very sweet tho' it was pricey at 12TL. So when hubby wanted to have more melon, we decided to buy from a man selling from his van by the roadside at the roundabout at
Ataturk Oto Sanayi Station in
Maslak. Its cheaper at 3TL per kilo and since its so huge, the whole melon cost us 20TL. No....he didnt allow me to taste but assured me that its sweet.
Turned out...not only was it not sweet, almost the whole melon was bad and rancid! And that is not all. When we weighed the melon, it was 2 kg less than what he claimed. I wanted to go back and demand a refund from the man but hubby said .....for 20TL, it's not worth picking a fight for. Just consider it a scam and that maybe we should just consider it a 'charity' to him. Huh !!!
Morale of the story?? Play it safe and buy from a proper supermarket where the prices are properly shown and the weighing machine is properly calibrated ( I hope!). If you are a
Yabanci ( foreigner) you are always fair game to them. So...play the game well ! 1 to them and 0 to me.....ouch !!
 |
| now...these..are.....big people's toys....... |
 |
| what a wonderful accessories.....these will definitely go very well with the leather jackets......not ? !!! |
 |
| my neighborhood baker....its so authentic as they still use 'woods' to burn the kiln. it smells sooo nice when you pass thru his bakery. someday when i can communicate with him, im gonna ask him to bake for me a special bread. i was told that the Turkish government subsidize all breads in the country. it only cost 1TL a piece. |
 |
| business done for the day...all sold out! note the beautiful tiles on the wall of the kiln.... |
despite all these tiny setbacks , it still is . . . a beautiful city......Istanbul'u, cok seviyorum !!!
