Baths, Boats and Whirling

7/18/2009

After breakfast on the ship, I set out with Eli, Sam, Logan, Julie, and Brooke to go find a Turkish bath.  We had looked up information on them the night before, so we knew which one we were headed toward.  Along the way, we were going to stop and check out prices and times for a boat cruise up the Bosphorus.  We were approached by a few men calling out “Bosphorus boat tour, ferry up the Bosphorus”, and we listened to what each had to offer.  The first one we ran into promised a two hour boat cruise up past the bridge, with a 30 minute stop on the Asia side of the channel at a palace, and so we took his card saying we would be back later in the afternoon.  I don’t think he believed us, but he told us where we could find him, and that his name was Rommy.  After that, we continued along to Cemberlitas hamam, or the bath house we were going to.
When we got there, there were options of treatments, from a basic entrance fee that was fully self service, to the traditional treatment which included an exfoliating scrub, a 15 minute soap massage and a shampoo, to the luxury treatment which added a 30 minute oil massage on top of what is included with the traditional treatment.  I opted for traditional, while all of the girls I was with selected luxury.  We were all handed small cardboard boxes, and tokens with the massage treatments on them, and then told ‘women on the right”.  We walked through the door indicated, which was a hallway curving around a corner, and then into a room with a marble fountain in the center, and cushioned benches all the way around the outside.  There was a juice bar in one corner, and a spiral staircase in another.  We were handed towels and ushered up the staircase to the second level.  We changed and made our way down the stairs.  We were then pointed through another door to an entry room full of plush towels, unlike the sarongs we had been given, and into the bath room.  It was marble, with fountains around the edges and small wash rooms, and a large octagonal marble slab in the center.  It was also ridiculously hot and steamy. The ceiling was domed, and there were circular holes speckling it to let in light. 
We all laid out our sarongs on the marble, and laid down on top of them.  It was very relaxing, and the marble was heated, which was very nice.  It didn’t take long before I was sweating, a lot.  After a little while of just relaxing, one of the ladies working at the bath house pulled one of us to one edge of the octagon, and told us to lay parallel to the side, then another, and pretty soon we were all around different edges of it laying with our exfoliating scrubbers (which were in the box we had been handed) on our backs and waiting.  It was very restful, and I was torn between looking around in wonder at where I was, and taking a nap.  Before I fully got a chance to decide, one of the ladies came over and claimed my token, and my treatment began.  First, the exfoliation, which left me feeling much smoother.  The lady that was giving it would pat my back and indicate a rolling motion when I was supposed to roll from my stomach to my back, or she would grab my arm when she wanted me to sit up.  After a thorough scrub down, she ditched the exfoliating mitt and grabbed a cloth sack out of a bucket of soapy water.  She shook the sack so that it filled with air, then closed the top and squigied her hand down it, sending a cascade of soap bubbles all over.  They smelled slight of lemon.  I then got a full body massage with the soap, and it felt very nice.  Lastly, she took the exfoliating mitt again, and did one last scrub all over with the soap and the mitt, then dumped some water over me to rinse away the soap.  I was sad that it was over, but she grabbed my hand and let me to one of the wash basins along the side of the room and told me to sit.  She proceeded to wash my hair, and then rinse by dumping water over my head.  The water felt so good, because it was just enough colder than the air in the room to be refreshing, but it wasn’t cold.  After my hair was rinsed, she asked a final “you like?” to which I responded “yes” with a smile, and then she pointed my to the baths through one of the doorways in the room.
There were two pools.  The one to the right was smaller, and had a tiny waterfall pouring in to it, and the one on the left was rectangular and had a little spurt of water trickling into it from one corner.  Both were filled to the brim.  Between them, there was a narrow walkway and there was a little ledge for shoes and sarongs across the way.  I got into the larger pool, which was cool and refreshing, and Julie soon joined.  All of us had started our massages at different times, so we finished at different times too.  After we had both cooled down quite a bit, we decided to move into the other pool, which was more like a hot tub, and sat in there waiting for the other girls.  They arrived shortly, and we moved back over to the cooler pool.  It felt even better in contrast to the hot water!
As the other girls went out to get their oil massages, I continued to alternate between the hot marble and the cool bath, talking with the girls that were either already done with their massages, or waiting.  After the last two girls finished, we went out in to the cooling room (the one with the marble fountain and the juice bar), where there was a basket for our now drenched sarongs, and piles of large, plush towels for us to take.  We sat on one of the cushioned benches for a while, all of us kind of in a trance from how relaxed we were, then went up to change and walk back to the ship.  Leaving the hamam, several people we passed along the sidewalk would make comments like “Turkish bath, so fresh, smell so clean”.  We thought it was quite funny, and figured it was our location and our dripping wet hair that was the giveaway.
On the way back to the ship we stopped at a Vitamin Bar, and I got a glass of fresh squeezed orange juice.  It was very good.  The other girls also got various fruit juices.  We then continued back to the ship, breaking in to almost a run once we got through port security, and springing up the stairway to the dining hall, where we made it to lunch just before they started taking the food away.  After eating and dropping off a few things in my room, we met up again to go find a Bosphorus tour.  A girl named Rudy, who is also from Oregon, joined us.  We also recruited Tommy as the token boy in our group (as it doesn’t matter how large the group of girls is, if there is one boy, everyone is treated with more respect), and his friend Nikki.  We walked back to where we had met all of the people advertising boat cruises in the morning, and found Rommy again.  He was absolutely thrilled that we came back!
He told us that there was some swimming competition going on, and he was now offering only a one hour and thirty minute boat cruise, with no stop in Asia.  We told him that earlier he had told us two hours, and he agreed, stating that we kept our promise, and so he would keep his.  Upon establishing this, we started following him, and he called up the “captain” to let him know we were coming.  When we arrived at the boat, it was tiny!  It had a U shaped bench seat around the back portion of the boat that had enough seating for the 9 of us, wish a little extra space, and that was about it.  We got on, paid, and then it was away we go.  It was a very rocky ride, as all of the large ferries were speeding around and making large waves.  The boat was put putting along, making very slow progress up the channel, and every now and then, as we paced a palace or mosque, Rommy would pop his head out and tell us what building it was and a little bit of history behind it.  We hugged the European side of the channel on the way up, passing right next to the MV Explorer.  We were talking with Rommy, and told him that we were living on the ship, and taking classes.  When we got up past the bridge, we passed to the Asian side of the channel, where we stopped.  Instead of pulling up beside the land, the captain just nosed in against the wall, and we were instructed to scurry along the edges of the cabin, and then crawl over a fence of the bow of the boat.  This was tricky maneuvering in a skirt, but we all made it and no one fell in.  We synchronized our watches with Rommy, decided on a meeting time, and then headed off into Asia.
We stopped at a fruit stand, looked at some shops, and made our way down the road looking for the palace gardens.  Tommy and Nikki split off from the rest of the group, and after spending time wondering around, we made our way back to the boat.  The captain was swimming, and so were several others.  We took some pictures, and four little boys came over to pose, telling us to take pictures of them too, and then asking to see them.  Rommy came back, and asked where the other two were, and we said they were on their way back, so he loaded us on to the boat again (just the reverse of how we had gotten off.  The captain stopped his swimming and hopped in the boat, and Rommy went searching for Nikki and Tommy.  We backed out of where we were, so the waves didn’t keep pushing the boat into the wall, and waited.  They all showed us shortly, and we pulled back up.  After everyone was loaded, we made our journey back.
When we got back to the first bridge, we were dropped off much closer to the MV than we had taken off from, because it had ended up being basically a private tour just for us.  We pulled up next to another boat about the size of ours, and climbed through it to get to land.  It ended up being much more fun than one of the large ferries that may go faster, but packs people in and does not give as much explanation of the history of the buildings.  We thanked Rommy and the captain, and made our way back to the ship in time for a free dinner.  Then, I had time to run down to my room and change and clean up slightly before it was time for one of the few SAS trips that I signed up for.  I was going to a Sufi Dervish ceremony.
Eli, Julie, and Amanda were also all going, and so I met up with them at the gangway, and we headed out to the buses.  We went inside, and first there was a gallery with pictures of the whirling Dervishes, and free Turkish delight.  The room where the performance took place was off to the side, and I had front row seats.  The band came out, and started playing, and then stopped for a while, then they started up again as the five whirling Dervishes entered the room.  While they claim it is a purely religious ceremony, I couldn’t help but feel that it was a little more showy that it needed to be, and that was purely for the sake of all of the viewers.  It was very interesting though, and they did go through ritual movements, and when it ended, one of them came back out to answer questions, where we learned what their motions meant.  Then, it was back to the ship, where I was exhausted after a very full day and just stayed in, downloaded pictures, and went to bed.