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Day 18 - Back in Istanbul
Arrived in Istanbul after a long ride via KOC coach. Really comfortable bus but I am suffering from transportation fatigue. Almost all of us are.. I think. Recall that we wanted to give Simit another chance? So today we had breakfast at Sirkeci after checking in at Ali's Papa place. We were suspecting that Ali Papa might pass away before our arrival as his breathing is so heavy! So yes, we had Simit, muffins and tea for our slow breakfast. At the right hand side corner, a rather old couple is making out. Anyway we had a conversation on Turkish Men. One Turk told me " Turkish men are really gentlemenly right?". SK felt that they are quite charming overall. I feel the same too! They are indeed charming and knows how to please a lady!
Life is back to the fast paced one here in Istanbul and I was getting used to the laidback lifestyle in Cappadocia and Selcuk. Wait till I reach back to reality in Singapore. So we had more photo whoring as we realised that we have a lot more photos to spare!
After this, we went to the Asian Side (Harem) via ferry! We saw Mado, desserts place and went window shopping for a while. Saw this really neat factory outlet selling quirky shirts but the prices were sadly not within my budget! After walking for a really small while, we were tired! Hence boarding onto the bus to Harem. SK & Vivi booked their tickets to Armasra and we took a ferry back to the other side! We were getting more and more upclass towards the end of our trip seriously.
From the 1st 4 days of intense walking and hostel living to bus & hotels and now we progress to taking taxis! So here we go...to taksim! Had our lunch at Dilek which we really adore. Afterwhich we went on a hunt for maggi mee as we were thinking of ending our last night together with a bang - who cook the best maggi mee contest! Vivi said she would win hands down.. I agree! She cooks really delicious maggi mee, the one I had in Cyprus could attest to this. But hey... with some luck and not too bad culinary skills, I could win too right? haha. But there is no maggi mee to be found! We went back to Ali Papa and found out that Carrefour in Turkey sells maggi mee for $3 lira per packet (not the 5 packets in a bundle being sold in Singapore, but 1 individual packet). Ali Papa says that he is an expensive man and wants to sell us at 4 lira! We felt that if we paid too much for maggi mee, our ultility would become very low.. so we had to shelve our maggi mee contest! Everyone was concussed and we had our last dinner together in Turkey at this not too expensive restaurant. Adana Kofte, lentil soup, more bread, chicken wings.. will soon be foreign to me once again..
Day 19 - Gule Gule Friends & Turkiye!
Getting emo again in the morning. Last breakfast together. Ali Papa is the only clever person to customise his breakfast. He knows that Singaporeans like us do not dig into olives and we had cherries instead! Yay! Bought our tokens to our tram stations. Hugged my dear friends SK and Vivi good bye at Sirkici Station where Twm and I were getting off. Spent our last few hours at the Spice Bazaar and even taking passport size photos (really cheap! 7 Lira for 12 shots & 3 lira for the soft copy). I will definitely miss Turkey.. I have grown to really love this place. For now, it's gule gule (bye bye in turkish) Turkiye!
previous travel blog entry
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