TRAVEL | ISTANBUL | TURKEY

I is for Istanbul — My A-Z of Favorite Travel Destinations

I’m convinced that there is no other city quite like it

Growing up in a small town of 2500 people in Canada means that I’m not a city person. I do love the glitz and glamour of them, but as far as staying long-term, it’s a hearty ‘no thanks’ from me. That was, at least, until Istanbul came into my life. It was here that my partner and I spent 2.5 months at the tail end of 2020 as we attempted to ride out the pandemic amongst a diverse group of other travelers that occupied our hostel.

But this wasn’t our first foray into Istanbul. In 2015 when we were flying from Varna, Bulgaria to Athens, Greece we had a few hours of layover at the airport. I had never seen an airport so packed with people, and I shuddered to think what the rest of the city looked like based on what we witnessed that day.

An excerpt from my blog at the time:

We ascended the escalator to the upper level and filed in with yet another massive amount of people. I swear I have NEVER seen so many people coming and going in an airport in my life! We found the sign pointing to our gate, and immediately felt like we were swimming upstream.

We kept looking for signs pointing to our gate number. I don’t think I have ever seen so many signs pointing every which way. The gate numbers went into the 500’s! We even passed a digital clock that told us how long of a walk it was to our gate…it said 15 minutes! Wow!!! ‘How bloody big IS this place?’ I thought to myself.

I must say, I wish we had made the time to stop and smell the roses a bit. I saw all sorts of neat things that we could have checked out. One of them being a little kiosk that was selling Turkish Ice Cream. It was attended by a guy in the cutest little outfit I think I have ever seen. He reminded me of Abu from Aladdin, with a cute little boxy hat and everything! However, nothing got more than a sideways glance as trying to move through the wave of people would have been like playing a life or death game of Frogger to get to the far side of the stream.

We were exasperated when we finally got to our gate and we couldn’t wait to leave the hectic airport. I had no intention of ever returning to this crazy city after that experience.

However, after being locked down in Morocco due to COVID in 2020, and staying in the country for 9 months, Istanbul was one of the only destinations that was accepting flights from Morocco. It was a direct flight and we knew that it was a large hub from where we could figure out where to go next. We certainly had no intention of staying in the city for long.

It was my birthday so we used our credit card points and booked a hotel near the Blue Mosque for 4 nights. We figured that would be ample time to check out the city, and we were certain we would be sick of the chaos that 16 million people must bring by then.

However, we could not have been more wrong.

I stared out the taxi window wide-eyed and in shock as we made our way from the airport. I thought it would be a city of donkeys and carts, dirt roads and garbage strewn about — the reality could not have been more opposite.

“This is a modern city!” I exclaimed to Chris as I gawked at the brightly lit bridges, exquisite buildings and spotlessly clean streets.

We fell in love with Istanbul immediately. We still aren’t sure if it was the fact that we had been stuck in Morocco for so long, and we were just excited about the change of scenery. Maybe it was the diversity of cultures that the city presents — a true melting pot of different people if we have ever seen one. Or, maybe it was the fact that the food was amazing, the people wonderful, and the sights — out of this world!

It was only our second day when we decided that we had better figure out a way to stay longer. As mural painters, we normally paint murals in exchange for accommodation as we travel. This allows us to not only save on expenses but to spread our art, and our message of love, around the world.

I got busy straight away looking up hostels in the city and then e-mailing them to see if they were interested in having us stay. A couple got back to us so we made arrangements to visit the first one to see what we thought about it.

It was located just below the popular shopping district of Taksim. We met with the owner in the common room and he told us that he wanted one of the Taksim trolleys painted on a wall outside of some of the rooms. We told him that wouldn’t be a problem as we toured the space.

A couple of days later we arrived at our new temporary home. We were given a comfortable private room and were excited to meet the other travelers who were staying there. We found ourselves engrossed and in awe of the wonderful conversations that we could have with so many different people from all over the world. In Morocco, we were some of the only foreigners in the country, and consequently, we only spoke with Moroccans. We didn’t know that we yearned for different people to talk to until we found ourselves there.

Of course, most of us had stories about where we were when we got locked down. It became very cathartic to hear of what other people went through during this crazy time and it seemed like just the medicine we needed to start to heal from our crazy COVID ordeal.

When we were nearing completion of our first mural, the owner told us of another wall where he would like to see something painted. I was given free rein to come up with whatever I wanted, as long as it was colorful. We loved where we were staying and we had a nice group of friends who were also staying there long-term, so we saw no need to leave. Besides, our financial resources were very low at the time, so it made sense to stay put.

We ended up staying in the hostel for 2 whole months and painted four murals during that time.

We then got fortunate and found ourselves pleasantly surprised by a vast upgrade. Being that it was the end of the year, my Dad emailed us one day to tell me that he had a bunch of hotel points that needed to be used up before they expired on December 31st. In normal years, he and my mom would have used them on their worldly travels, but because they weren’t traveling due to COVID, he offered the points to us.

Suddenly we found ourselves staying on the 21st floor of a Sheraton hotel. We went from rags to riches in a moment as we enjoyed the luxury of this upgrade.

After thoroughly enjoying our time staying on the Asian side of Istanbul, we found a $49 flight to Egypt and we headed off on January 2, 2021.

Fast forward to August 2022. We had spent most of the past year and a half in Uganda on two separate visits. We had some very interesting experiences in Africa, and over time, instead of feeling more at home there, we felt more and more foreign. No matter where we went, we were hassled relentlessly on the streets for being foreigners, and we started to feel like we just wanted to hide from the world. We knew that if we could get back up to Europe, we would disappear into the throngs of people and would not be pinpointed as foreigners as much.

When I started to look into flights to leave Uganda, I realized that there were direct flights to Istanbul. Perfect! In these crazy days of travel, direct flights are the only guarantee that you won’t miss a connection, plus we were less likely to lose luggage!

We immediately became very excited about this prospect. Already we were drooling over the diversity of food that we knew was waiting for us, plus, let’s not forget the diversity of people. We knew that we could disappear into Istanbul and nobody would give one care in the world about where we were from.

But, we were in for a bit of a shock when we arrived to Istanbul this time around. You see, the last time we were there, it was not only winter, and a slow season for visitors, but we were in the thick of COVID. Very few people were traveling at all. However, by the summer of 2022, travelers were back out, and with a vengeance.

We couldn’t believe how busy the city felt in comparison to when we were there in 2020. Lines for the Blue Mosque and other popular tourist sights wrapped around buildings and went on for many city blocks. When we were there initially, we walked straight into the Blue Mosque with barely any other people in sight. Sadly, while in the city the first time, we didn’t take advantage of the low amount of tourists, and didn’t see many of the sights that we should have.

We were amazed at how busy places like the Grand Bazaar were. When we were there in 2020, it was almost devoid of people. But by 2022, it was wall-to-wall crowded. We discovered this the first day back to the city, and sadly didn’t return there again because of the chaos of it all.

This time around we ended up staying at a friend's hostel. She is from Jordan and we had initially met her at Leventan Hostel, where we stayed back in 2020. It was there that she told us that she was going to open a hostel in the city and was busy trying to locate a good spot to do so. She told us then that she wanted us to paint some artwork for her in the new location.

I messaged her when we arrived to the city to see if she had actually gone through with the process. As only fate allows, she had finally just opened it two weeks before our arrival. We immediately made plans to visit her and she told us to move our stuff in.

“Treat this place as your home.” She told us with earnest.

We had full intentions of painting her some artwork in exchange for our accommodation, but she was so busy just getting things started that she didn’t seem to have time to get supplies and get organized. Plus, I don’t think she had any idea what she wanted us to paint at that point. I did, however, paint her a feather at the entrance.

We stayed with her for about three weeks and spent most of our time exploring other areas of the city that we hadn’t seen on our last foray. Nearby neighborhoods provided endless entertainment for us as we walked the city streets to take it all in.

Eventually, we felt as though we were spinning our wheels and not getting anywhere, so we told her that we were going to head off. She understood our situation and admitted that she just didn’t feel ready to make any major decisions about the decor of the hostel. We told her that when she did, we would be happy to come back.

It was then that we made plans to head off to Bulgaria and were excited about the next leg of our journey!

Istanbul will always hold a fond place in our hearts. Turkey is a country that we are not finished visiting, so we know that we will certainly be back someday. If you haven’t been to Istanbul, please go. I am convinced that there is no other city that is quite like it.

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