Bill's Travel Blog:  REFLECTIONS

Relaxing in the pleasant afternoon sun at my neighborhood sidewalk café in Prague over a glass of beer I try to reflect on what, if anything, I’m learning. 

To my first surprise I do not feel like a foreigner.  Language is the obvious exception, but that notwithstanding, everybody I encounter looks, acts and dresses like folks back home.  Jeans, T-shirts and sneakers are the uniform of the day.  Autos, traffic lights and driving decorum are just what I’m used to.  Some exceptions: there are more bicycles, fewer motorbikes and public transport is everywhere.  Streets are cobbled and are not regular – they go every which way.  Of course street names are impossible to pronounce and seem to change willy-nilly.  Map-following is a nightmare.  Even so, people are uniformly polite and helpful.  At no time have I felt any concern for my personal safety.  I feel welcome.

The cities I am visiting are all historic, most having origins over a thousand years ago, but somehow they don’t look old.  That perception varies of course.  Warsaw, for example, was largely destroyed during WWII and has been rebuilt with modern high-rises.  Krakow and Prague escaped the ravages of war and have some marvelous castles, bridges and churches.  Even so all these old cities have what they call Old Towns, but these are an amalgam of the old and new and do not convey a sense of history.  Unless you are a genuine scholar it is difficult to gain a sense of the past from seeing relics here and there.  Also in places like Prague, Tourism is the prevailing industry and the hoopla obscures the genuine.

Meeting people is what I have really come for and that has not been so easy.  Language is of course the principle barrier.  From my research I was prepared to find that significant elements of the native population were learning English, and they are, but not at the conversation level.  So most of my valued dialogues were with native English speakers - other travelers, in other words.  I have recounted many of those in this journal.  I don’t know what if any significance to attach to the fact that there were virtually no minorities in the countries I visited.  I saw only two Negroes in the three Baltic States and only six on the whole trip.

My budget dictated that I stay in modest accommodations, or hostels.  These are surprisingly plentiful, pleasant, clean, cheap and comfortable.  What I could have foreseen but didn’t is that hostelers are young, numerous, from everywhere and bent on seeing the world.  Backpacks with wheels are 95% of the luggage.  Hostels are lively places - noisy and gay until the wee hours.  Pub crawling is international.  Beer is everybody’s favorite libation.  As an old guy I was a distinct rarity and regarded as quaint.  But they went out of their way to accommodate me.  Incidentally, except among the Tourist Industry tipping is uncommon.

I’m freshly impressed at how universal the Internet and computers in general have become.  All the hostels have free WiFi and have open access computers which are rarely not in use with people waiting their turn.  The world is undergoing an information revolution and society is changing fundamentally.  The age of secrets is passing away.  Globalization and WiKi-Leaks are inevitable.  Whatever you want to know is available now, on-line.  For some societies and some individuals the effects will be (are being) traumatic.  I won’t live long enough to see the full effects but I’m fascinated by the unfolding.

Right behind the ubiquity of the Internet is the universal acceptance of VISA as a medium of exchange.  In 3 weeks I traveled through seven countries which use six different currencies.  Without exception the most convenient form of exchange was to buy with my CHASE VISA card.  The transaction was at the official conversion rate (less 2%) with no limit, high or low.  I bought bus tickets at $35 and a beer at $3 with equal ease.  Carrying local currency was pointless except for trams and phone booths, neither of which I needed.  And anyway, in Tallinn the tram was free for those over 65.  And when you wanted to exchange currencies at a border the agent would not accept coins.

 Another occasion to marvel at the digital revolution was the discovery of the merits of my new camera.  I don’t think it is special, rather an example of what passes for modern technology.  It is remarkably compact: 3.5” x 2.2” x ¾”, fitting easily in my shirt pocket.  Lens is retractable, self-focusing on a visible target, plus and minus zoom, full backside display, still or video with sound, removable battery and memory (capacity of over 10,000 images), and playback, plus editing software.  It is Japanese and I bought it in Latvia with my VISA for about $100.

Touring Auschwitz was a unique experience but not for the obvious reasons.  I’d done my homework before I left and knew of the mind-boggling numbers of plain people destroyed there.  Auschwitz was the largest and worst of the camps but I was astonished to discover there were literally hundreds of them scattered over Eastern and Northern Europe, on a scale that beggars the imagination.  The Germans were not and are not Barbarians.  How could an enlightened, literate and modern society whose forebears include distinguished and notable writers and philosophers have been the instrument of such horrors on so vast a scale?  I have to wonder how far civilization has yet to go to become civilized.

In the U.S. Europe is talked of disparagingly as neo-Socialist.  Not Socialist as was the U.S.S.R. of course, but government dominated and controlled.  Maybe.  But there is no poverty to be seen and the range from the most wealthy to the least is visibly less than in the U.S.  Also there is virtually no litter or waste – they are clean countries.  I wonder what we can learn from them.

An adventure is the best word I can think of to describe this sojourn.  I’m certainly glad I went but I don’t know if I will want to do it again.  It was a bit of a chore.  Without exaggeration I think I walked a good 50 miles; I didn’t think I had it in me. I think my next trip will be to Australia and New Zealand – I think what they speak there passes for English.

I can’t assign any relevance of the following to the above, but these thoughts come to mind, for what they may be worth.  Everyone must be motivated to act in his own best interests, but enlightened.  Let the collective will prevail.  Your own interest should not diminish your neighbor’s.  Contribute to the general welfare.  Work, love, enjoy – know thy fellow man.  Greed is not good.  Enlightened self-interest is – they are not incompatible.  Rewards must reflect contribution.  We humans are more alike than different.

Bill's Travel Blog: Istanbul  

Intro by Dave:  My father is a would-be writer who loves to read books, 4 to 6 a week, and loves to travel. I've been to at least a dozen countries, he's been to seventy-four.  Based on works like those featured below,  I think he would be a good writer.  That's why I asked him to review books and write about travel.

 I am on way to Amman, Jordan, to visit King Abdullah, for whom we are building several Raptors.  The Raptor is a security vehicle which is a Chevrolet Suburban mounting a gatling machine gun behind the front seat for the protection of the King and his entourage of passenger vehicles in the city.

The day started routinely enough.  I was out of my hotel in London at 0600 and on board my plane to Istanbul at 0800.

At the check-in counter I am dismayed to see a hand baggage limit of 8 Kg (18 lb).  The lady at the counter can’t see the bag at my feet and I show only the brief case.  Turns out not to be a problem – plane (a Boeing 757) is half full and there is plenty of room in the overhead.  But now I worry that I might get caught up by these ridiculous limits before I get home.  Breakfast looks like an Egg MacMuffin with juice, yogurt and a roll.  Coffee is welcome.

I read a copy of the London “Daily Telegraph”.  It’s full of violent crime – murders, rape, theft, even racial crime – a lynching.  Just like home.  My seat mate was a middle aged lady from London, Ontario.  She is on her way to Cyprus where she and her husband “winter”.  She asked about my business in Istanbul and I showed her the brochure and she asked for one to show to some “highly placed people” in Cyprus.

The flight was uneventful; I had a window seat and the skies were mostly clear.  I watched the fields, towns and alps go by as we flew over Brussels, Luxembourg, Salzburg, Zagreb and Sophia to Istanbul, a city of 7 million people.  It was sunny but cool.  Having only carry-on luggage I soon cleared customs and immigration, having to pay $45.00 (U.S. currency) for a visa.  I had to pull up my shirt to get the bills out of my money belt.  I found my way to reception where I see a young man holding a sign, “Mr. Lawrence”.

He is the driver for Saracen’s sales representative, a company called Federal Defense Inc. (FDI), which is owned by a Mr. Cenk Tuncay, a Turk by birth but now a U.S. citizen living in Miami.  The driver speaks no English.  As we drove into town (about 15 minutes) he called ahead on his cell phone.  On the way we pass a MacDonald’s and an Arby’s.  I was delivered to the Boyuk Someli Hotel, classy, uniformed bellboys, an atrium, although my room was ordinary by our standards.  The hotel has a metal detector at the entrance.  It beeped as I passed through, but nobody took note.

I cleaned up and was then joined by Selda Mermut, the Turkish manager of Federal Defense.  She was born in Baltimore of Turkish parents, both medical doctors in the Turkish Army, although she is an engineer.  Although an American by birth she was raised in Turkey and English is her second language.  She is unusual in a muslim country being a lady entrepreneur.  Turkey is thoroughly westernized.  She is about 30, bright and unmarried.  She doubts she will ever have a family.  She thinks she has missed the boat.  But that is OK, she is having a very interesting life.  She travels about 5 months of the year, mostly to the U.S. although she has never been west of Florida.  If business develops between FDI and Saracen she will come to Phoenix. She has only the dimmest idea of why I am here.

It turns out that the Istanbul manager of FDI has arranged a meeting with the chief of the Istanbul POLIS (police) department, whose name is Tuna (honest).  Also in the meeting is the chief of their Special Forces (Swat team) and the Governor of the area where the earthquakes occurred, near Istanbul. They don’t know why I am here either.  I wonder if I know why I am here.

So I show them the brochure and it turns out that they are interested in obtaining armed and armored vehicles to aid in containing terrorism.  The POLIS in Turkey is a national organization like the Army, as distinguished from the U.S., where the police are an agency of a city.  Commander Tuna (Selda calls him “Manager” but that does not seem to be his actual title) leads a force of 6,000 officers who look and act like soldiers.  They have 250 armored vehicles ranging from one the size of a tank (they call it the “Dragon”) to a van they dub the Cadillac, to a jeep size which I called “the Volkswagon”, which they thought was a funny name.  This is very convivial group and everybody laughs a lot.  It seems that doing business here is a decidedly social activity.

The meeting breaks up at about 6:00 p.m. and I learn that we are all having dinner together.  They ask what is my preference.  I say, nothing luxurious, rather plain Turkish food and restaurant, please.  That seems to go well.  We gather at the Evren Restaurant in Kumkapi, a very old district, now a place of local color, with cobblestone streets and pedestrian traffic only.  You choose your fish dinner from a street display of today’s catch on ice out front.  The décor is plain and the room brightly lit.  Everyone is in casual clothes, except the waiters. 

There are eight of us at a long table.  I sit opposite Selda, the only one who knows more than a smattering of English.  First I am poured a half glass of Raki, the local fire water.  It looks like water but when the glass is filled with water it turns milky.  I am warned - Raki is powerful stuff although it does not have a strong taste.  So I sip only.  I learn the Turkish word for “Cheers” which is “Serefe!”.  I use it a lot.

We start with appetizers: garnished eggplant, juicy honeydew-type melon, marinated octopus with olives, a very tender raw fish, lima beans cooked in olive oil, a crumbly white cheese, raw carrot sticks, cucumbers and tomatoes.  I learn IYI (Eyeh) = Good, KOTU (Kutoo) = Bad, and TESEKUR EDERIM (Teshkuh Ader’m) = Thank You.  With lots of Raki and laughter.  The main course is a grilled local fish, about 6 inches long, complete with head and tail, best eaten hot and with your fingers.  I’m told to remove the backbone as I go along.  It is really quite delicious.

Dessert is pieces of banana over ground pistachio nuts in honey and thick cream.  In Turkish there is much laughter and nudges to Selda, who blushes.  I gather it is supposed to have aphrodisiac qualities.  Selda refuses to translate.  I ask if it will make me sleep better and when Selda translates that, they all break up.

Now we are serenaded with a folk orchestra, a kind of Turkish marinachi.  They play the UD, a mandolin, the KANUN, a sort of zither, the DEF, a tamborine, and a violin.  They sing Turkish folk songs with gusto and everybody but me joins in.  Everyone is having a real fine time. 

Then comes the belly dancer.  Blonde, with big boobs barely contained.  Lace-trimmed hip-hugging yellow-green silk trousers, low slung.  She has castanets and clicks them rapidly while undulating with arms waving in a sultry fashion and the band in lively accompaniment. The men rise individually and dance with her, belly to belly.  Me too.  Then they push 500,000 Lira notes (about $1) into her brassiere and cop a feel.  Some tuck money into her G-string.  The scene is sensuous but oddly not salacious.  Just good Turkish fun.  I have a photo record of all this.

The police chief has not been to the U.S., so I suggest that if we do business he come to Phoenix for the   vehicle buyoff.  He wants to know – is Phoenix close to Las Vegas?  Yes, only about an hour away in my airplane (I show him a photo of the Mooney).  Well, he’s not so sure about that.  OK, it’s just 5 hours by auto.  Can he see Hollywood?  Sure, do you want to go to Disneyland, too?  (General laughter)  No, he just wants to meet some movie stars.  I’m winging it now, so I ask if he’d like a date with Julia Roberts.  No, Sharon Stone is more to his liking.  It’s a deal, I say, but does he understand that the price of the vehicle is going up?  Everyone at the table is taking on this dialog with glee.  Later, after the game has played out, he says, still smiling but with an edge, that any deal had better include Las Vegas and a girl (not necessarily Sharon Stone).  I get his message.

We break up after midnight and part with multiple handshakes and many “til we meet again’s”.  I can see that doing business in Turkey will be lively.  I have the feeling that it can be very profitable as well.  Later I learn that business is done here this way – through the good ole boy network.  You just gotta know the right people.  Through absolutely no fault of my own I seem to have fallen in with the right guys (and gal).

Although the city is mostly closed down there is still a lot of life.  Selda tells me that Istanbul is one of only five cities in the world that are open around the clock, along with New York, Rio, Vegas and Bangkok.  The great mosques – the Blue Mosque and Topkapi, and there are several more, are lit up dramatically and create an exciting night panorama.  This is really one of the great cities of the world to visit.

Back at the hotel I am not sleepy – it is after all, only 4:00 p.m. in Phoenix – but I go to bed anyway with the Quran to read and, what do you know, I fall asleep and wake up at 7:30 a.m. local time.  So much for jet lag.

To watch a promotional video of the Raptor security vehicle follow the link.  I guest star at minutes 5:45.:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C73EZOM0nrY