Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Kasimpaşa



Today was an adventure to say the least. Me, Carlos, and Caitlin set off to explore the Kasimpaşa neighborhood. Our assignment? To observe 1. Paths, highly traveled channels of travel 2. Edges that create boundaries between locations or groups of people 3. Nodes, which are strategic locations with different modes of transportation. And finally 4. Landmarks, like easily recognizable reference points.





We set out full of ambition. With our map firmly in hand, we stepped from the ferry full of zeal for our cause. We had a clear plan on how we wanted to attack our assignment. First we would walk up the main street to get the lay of the land. We proceeded to follow the primary thoroughfares, all the while noting where the major landmarks were such as mosques, schools, parks,and naval bases. We walked and walked until we reached a major freeway. Once we realized this was the end of the line, we took a sharp right and hiked up a steep hill. We were a determined force... Shortly we found ourselves confused and lost in a winding maze of apartment buildings. I suppose our confused expressions communicated enough distress to a Turkish man who proceeded to point in one direction while saying "Sururi School." We nodded not knowing what else to do as he did not understand a word we were saying.








Following the way the Turkish man pointed us led to another busy street. We soon came upon an impressive stadium nestled between the highway and the neighborhood area. We kept walking and walking, determined to see as much of the area as possible. Eventually we ended up exactly where we started. A complete circuit around Kasimpaşa had been executed. We felt pretty good. Now our battle plan entailed getting lunch where we would enter into a deep conversation with the waiter who would most likely speak some English... No such luck. The menu was all in Turkish with no translation whatsoever. Our waiter was absolutely devoid of any English so the whole notion of conversation went down the drain. Did we give up hope? Of course NOT! After lunch, we started back up the main street again to find someone... anyone who could answer our questions.



We ducked into a spice shop in hopes of conquering our purpose (it smelled lovely inside). After looking around for a moment, I straight up asked the worker if he spoke English. He shook his head and kind of laughed. I looked at my group... we were all coming to the realization that our chances of conversation were fast eroding. We were troopers though! We left that spice store, walked into another general store and asked the cashier. No English. How about that vendor? Nope. Oh the Jeton stand might know English right? Yeah think again. As you can detect by the tone of the above, our zeal was fading.









Eventually we decided to give it one last shot. There was a supermarket across the way next to a hotel. Jointly we agreed that we would ask the grocery Turks and if that did not work we would hit the hotel. Walking through aisles of packaged food, we made our way towards the workers. Carlos had devised a genius plan to pretend not to know where the spaghetti was thus creating a reason to talk to a Turk. He would then attempt to engage that person in a deep conversation. Caitlin and I were walking up a random aisle when I looked to my right. Low and behold, there was the spaghetti. So I said, " Hey look, I found the Spaghetti." Caitlin and I started laughing hysterically. Understand that our sanity was somewhat strained after all the English depravity. It was at that moment that a store worker appeared in the aisle leading Carlos right to the Spaghetti! The worker could not speak a bit of English. Our last hope was the hotel. The concierge stared at us when we asked if he spoke English. Then when we tried to ask him a question, he started shaking his head, clearly bewildered.




We successfully discovered that Kasimpaşa is not oriented towards tourists as is Sultanahmet. Instead of cheap souvenir shops on every corner,Kasimpaşa appeared to be a middle-class, commercial area. While we got the lay of the land, our group noticed that gender was much more separated than in Sultanahmet. Women and children were primarily in parks or in the houses while the men walked the streets or smoked in all male lounges. Also the streets were not as busy here as other places in Instanbul. Most of the Turks owned cars so the streets were strangely absent of the bustle to which we are accustomed. The fact that we could not find anyone who spoke any English denotes that this neighborhood is not catered towards tourism as a major industry.






~Fineas and Forb? Oh Turkey...





What a day! So it was not as we had meticulously planned it to be but hey we tried! Boy did we try! Despite the English issue, our group felt that after completing this assignment, we understood how the neighborhood was compiled. Close observation helped us recognize geographic, societal, and economic factors that all contribute to the character of the neighborhood.

1 comment:

  1. Carol Bradfield La Sierra Learning Community Member and Admirer of LSU StudentsSeptember 10, 2011 at 4:12 PM

    Appreciated being able to experience your day from my chair in Riverside. Was especially intrigued by the artistic and symmetrical arrangement of the fresh produce presumably for sale. Any ideas on why? Was the merchandise in the grocery store arranged in a similar fashion? If, not, why might it have been different?

    ReplyDelete