On wednesday's trip to Bratislava I had great time consumimg conspicously: I ate sushi for a lunch with friends and we spent some time in few übercool cafés. In in the evening I went to the airport. It is only slightly larger than Cetral Train Station there, on the lawns in front junkies with backpacks lounge and policemen carry their stamps damn low. Kid's corner is next to smoking room. Except of that hand luggage incident everything went smoothly. Xray machine staff decided that air baloon for cleaning optics looks suspiciously like handgrenade and they slightly nervously sent the bag through the machine again. It did not calm them them much but they seemed to be too lazy and so they handed it over to me… And then I boarded plane to Istanbul.
So how is Istanbul (or Turkey)? Bus is called otobus, automatic is otomatik and hotel is otel. Concrete lobby still runs loose and pavements are still bizarely high. Over those six years from my last visit nothing much has changed in Istanbul. Perhaps the water in Bosphorus and Golden Horn looks cleaner and hostel where I stayed last time no longer exists. The biggest change is striking of the zeroes on the money: what used to be one million liras is now one lira. It used to be more fun with the zeros.
And because I have been here before and I have seen everything, I spent those two days here boldly taking random ferries to places where no one has gone before (Çengelköy for example) and I went ice skating. To shopping mall Galleria in Bakırköy. They lended me the skates which went well with colour of my t-shirt and I shared the rink with future Turkish female dance-skaters in dashing tight dresses.