istanbul night train

It's going to have to be a series of rushed impressions, but in any case, that's how it felt when I was doing it.

utrecht and amsterdam

Church tower ringing out full-on baroque tunes, glissandoes and all, every quarter hour. Reefs of bikes in every open space, some with plastic foliage wrapped around the handlebars to make it easier to pick out your own rust bucket from the mass at the end of the day. Jolly superimpositions of architectural styles in the houses flanking the canals, somehow managing to show each to advantage. Hanging out with Eefje, a housemate of mine from ten years back. She reflects on what a scatterbrain she thinks she used to be. All I can think is how marvellous it is that she has somehow kept all her good qualities from the age of eighteen and added that calm knowingness that we all assume we'll have by our late twenties but rarely attain to.

berlin

The three days I allowed for it completely inadequate. Bauhaus museum--mmm, utopian desklamps. Checkpoint Charlie museum--many of the exhibits dating back to pre-1989, present tense references to Stasi and snipers. But oh, the glorious escapes! Home-made light aircraft, one-man submarines, girlfriends folded neatly into suitcases, a lot of fast talking. Hurray for ingenuity in the face of despotism. A punk-metal balcony barbecue party with my German friend Kiki, everyone very sanguine and polite as metalheads usually are, trundling out their best English for me on a lazy Sunday night.

venice

A week-long stop with the Zambonis, knocking about from Dolomites to Biennale to beach house to take our minds off how long it might be before we see each other next. Gorging on tuna carpaccio, ricotta cake, grinning, saying how it's a hard life. I do a little leaking from the eyes. Turns out, every time you move to a new place you meet new people to miss. Well it was worth it.

sofia
A day spent in the station and in the fast food restaurant shanty town across the road, waiting for my night train to Istanbul. Everything extravagantly run down, old women suck on their few remaining teeth, young studs slouch in cafes wearing outfits the Zoolander costume department would have rejected as credibility-stretching. I try to teach myself cyrillic, but I keep getting my algebra symbols mixed up. Advertising billboards urgently trying to tell me something, without success. Bulgarian keeps turning into Italian in my ears, must be tired.

balkan express

Not your gaslit dining car, flirting with secret agents kind of a deal. More of a conversations through the wall, passive smoking in your sleep, inexplicable draughts thing. But still! My very own sleeper compartment, night light, fold down bed, sink in corner. Read about the fall of Constantinople, tried to memorise some Turkish phrases.

istanbul

Muezzins do a loudspeaker call and response between the mosques of Sultanahmet. Poor old Aya Sofia all scaffolded up, Muslim calligraphy retained, Christian mosaics restored, looking in its hybrid state as it never looked when it was a consecrated plaee of worship. The hippodrome reduced to a few sad stumps--a raw obelisk that was stripped of its figured bronze plates in the fourth crusade; the trucated column that used to be three intertwined snakes--Mahmet the conqueror broke the jawbone off one of them on his way into town to show everyone who was boss. The imperial cistern, a resounding subterranean space, carp swimming around the ankles of dozens of gorgeous columns. I order a Turkish coffee, find I have to chew every mouthful before swallowing, it grates my stomach all day. An old woman with fine eyes, scarfed head and skull-motif Von Dutch t-shirt reads me a very rosy and non-specific future in the dregs of my cup. After dark the Sultanahmet district becomes a big street party, the nightly kiss-off to the Ramadan fast. The Istanbullus pile out of over-packed cars to find a spot on the grass in the mosque gardens and eat corn on the cob, kebab, a strange gooey toffee sold on sticks. I go about unnoticed in the crush, except by the odd guy who steps out in front of me to unfurl a carpet, calls me lady, asks well if I don't need a carpet then what do I need? A beer, an internet connection, and some sleep, in that order. I'm easily satisfied, really.