One of the great pleasures is that it gives me time to explore every hammam in the city.

Yesterday, I went to the hammam which used to serve the Jewish community as ritual bath, for example. Every hammam is a jewel, a pleasure, a steaming hot humid lay-about, an hour and a half of complete do-nothing.

Another pleasure is that it gives me time to write, and if there's nothing on our site about Cyprus it's because I'm working on an article about that island which, once finished, someone might just have the good taste and judgement to publish.
Dubious Pleasures Funny thing about travel is having to adapt yourself to other cultures without having the recourse of language. You learn to talk with your hands and are fully dependant on other peoples' body language.
There's nothing more horrible than trying to get vital information from a Turk who doesn't speak with his hands; the language keeps flowing out at you, his eyes and our ears are desperate for understanding, but it hasn't occurred to him that a few hand gestures would go a long way.
Women are much better than men at this, but because of the macho nature of the society, women can't be expected to know where a petrol station would be. In Islamic society, even a society as Western as Turkey, men and women are cut off from each other to a horrible extent.
Guys go out with guys, sitting around drinking teas and smoking Marlboro 100's and the girls shuffle on home, their heads scarfed over. In the students' quarters it's different, and the young mingle.
They are so right! Give a Turkish girl the chance to dress nicely and she's a show! But in the mean time, men are horribly insular and the little bit of body language they do posses can be nerve-wracking. I am referring, of course, to the omnipresent 'Yok'. Yok (pronounced 'yoook') means, 'there isn't any', either is singular or plural, and is accompanied by an upward jerk of the chin and a slight tssk of the tongue against the front teeth.
When you go into a shop and ask for something, the Yok and the gesture combined make you feel like he's saying either, 'go look elsewhere', or 'fuck off and leave me alone', depending on the size of the chin jerk.
If you're not used to it, it can really put you off, like the time I went into a shop asking directions to an ancient Roman temple and they didn't understand me.
Yok, get out, fuck off, I'm too busy. Yok, of course, means nothing of the sort.
It just means, 'there isn't any', and any ill intent is purely a figment of our imaginations or fatigue.
In Arabic countries the most horrid hand gesture has got to be the one which accompanies the word 'Shooooo?' It's a question, meaning 'what where why how?' and is accompanied by the right hand, opened, turning at the wrist in a clockwise movement very very quickly.
Also, the speaker opens his eyes very wide as if to express astonishment. The over-all effect is that the speaker just looks like a cross-eyed idiot, even though he may be a Nobel prize winner. Marie-Do and I often 'shoooo' each other just for fun.
Also in Arab countries and in Israel is the 'shwaya', or 'rega' in Hebrew.
It means, 'wait a second, let me breath, it really won't be long'. For the Arabs the gesture is all five fingers held together upward. The whole forarm is then wagged up and down with an elbow articulation.
If the speaker has a really good reason for making you wait, he's open his fingers after a second like a flower. In Israel the gesture is more hurried, just the five fingers.
Personally I think this is a very handy gesture, but it drives Marie-Do crazy. Ah, the French! Strangely enough, in Turkey, the same gesture is used to express admiration at beauty.

Morning Coffee
Now here is something that can really drive you crazy when you're travelling: coffee. This is a very personal thing and no one is to blame. It just drives you crazy.
In the morning, Arabs drink tea, and Americans drink a dark coloured transparent cat-piss. Continental Europeans drink a crème or a noir with lots of body and Israelis drink something called 'bots', which is Hebrew for 'mud'.
Before leaving France, Motherland of good coffee, we bought a little Italyn expresso maker which is just perfect for our morning crème.
When you're in a hotel, using this means filling it up in your room and finding the kitchen, negotiating the gas burner and - worst of all - engaging in pre-coffee conversation while waiting for the thing to boil. Then you've got to carry it, boiling and steaming and spilling over up four flights of stairs to your loved one who has spent her time making your morning tartines. A less than perfect, although delicious, solution. Like I mentioned, the worst part of it is that people think that since you are there in the kitchen waiting for something to boil you cannot be ignored.
Conversation is maintained at all costs, even though ignored is exactly what you want to be. The novelty of the Italyn system always draws questions, and you've got to answer them, eyes puffed with sleep, your hands fluttering around the bloody thing to signify boiling water, the place for the coffee and the whole lot. Which brings us to the solution of bots. First of all, it's very difficult to find coffee ground just right for the Italyn gizmo around here (except in an amazing shopping complex built under a mosque in Ankara. More of that in another rubric!), so we make bots.
The recipe: you take Turkish coffee and add to it boiling water and voilà! It takes some time getting used to this but it gives you the appropriate kick in the morning. To this effect, and to be totally autonomous in hotel rooms, we bought a little resistance thingee which you put in a cup of cold water. All you need is a plug.
For this reason you have to negotiate your hotel room without breakfast. If they offer breakfast, then you're in trouble because the only type of coffee they know how to make in these places for tourists is the infamous undrinkable Nescafe which is a fate worse than death.
It is then that Marie-Do calls me, her hero, into action.
Please, she'll say, her large doe eyes pleading, go into the kitchen and make us some bots. The nightmare begineth. Into the kitchen I stalk and ask for some Turkish coffee.
They don't understand.
You want Turkish coffee? Fine.
Out comes the finjan and they're ready to make you coffee as thick as oil(the recipe for Turkish Coffee: put it in a finjan with water and bring to boil thrice). No, no, let me do it. A guest working in the kitchen is unthinkable, and so, eyes puffed with sleep you've got to force them to leave you alone, but they're fluttering all around you like doves trying to help when you know that all you don't need is anyone's help. The real drama comes when the moment arrives to pour boiling water on the Turkish coffee.
The last time this happened was in a wonderful Ottoman hotel in Safranbolu (The Hotel Hatice Hanim Konagi, telephone 0 370 712 75 45. Ask for room 116). When the two boys saw me pouring water on the coffee they let out screams of dismay and even tried to stop me! This is one incident, but it happened a hundred times all throughout Jordan and Syria and Turkey.
The Cockroach Hilton The old Ottoman hotel in Safranbolu was a treat. Beautiful little windows giving out onto a calm street filled with ancient houses. In the room was a fireplace in plaster surrounded by carved wooden niches in which we placed our newly bought bronze candle holders, tchatchkais for tourists but so beautiful; you light the candle inside, close the little bronze door and warm shadows are sent across the room.
Hand woven carpets cover the hardwood floor.
Paradise! Well, we thought checking in, we've all got to die sometime, why not go to heaven now?
It was our little treat to ourselves, because while in Ankara waiting for visas and money and that bloody carnet we stay at the Cockroach Hilton.
In fact, the place is very clean, it's just plagued. We set traps in our room, the type that poisons the beast with just the right amount of poison so he lives long enough to make back to his buddies, die in their arms, and infect them as well. And so instead of seeing them scampering about when we come back and turn on the light, we have them dead and greasy lying on their backs on the floor.
Other than that, it's a great place. No one speaks a word of English, but we manage to communicate and there's a kitchen downstairs we can use. In the lobby the T.V. drones on day and night and the night watchman receives his cronies there and they drink tea and smoke Turkish cigarettes until they have no choice but to go home and face their wives. The lobby has some potted plants but is otherwise a great cement rectangular cavern. Not exactly a hang-out. We found the hotel by discovering the neighbourhood, Samanpazari, which we discovered while looking for the ancient synagogue on Birlik street in the heart of the old Jewish quarter. I had, by the way, the great fortune of going into that always-locked synagogue on the first day of Passover and taking part in services there. There was no mynian (mynian yok!) and it was kind of sad to see the great and beautiful structure emptied. Standing there with 7 other men and no prayer books it was not so easy to imagine the life of this once vital community which set down roots after the Exile from Spain. At any rate, the area is fantastic.
A far cry from neo-fascist Ankara, it is filled with little alleys and old tumble-down houses. An ancient Caravanserai near the citadel is used as a public toilet and shops overflow with antiques, carpets and more tchatchkais. Also, right next to the synagogue is the old mikveh now used as a Turkish bath. For 2,000,000 Turkish pounds, much less than how it sounds, you can get clean and relaxed.

Maïr et Marie-Do