Good advice is worth its weight in gold.  When I decided to go to Turkey, I called my friend, Carla.  She and her husband are seasoned travelers and have been to Turkey a number of times.  And she knows me well enough to know some of my weak spots.

The first thing she warned me about are the touts.  And what she said was, 'Don't give the touts any face.'

What?  Don't give any what to the who?

Touts are a nasty cross between a used car salesman, one of those obnoxious jerks who hawk cell phones from kiosks in the mall, and carnival barkers. 

They are paid to get you to go with them to a restaurant or carpet store or other tourist trap that they claim to own.  They then use every high-pressure tactic in the book to get you to overspend on something you didn't really want anyway. 

My first encounter with them brought to mind every bit of research I've done on con-men over the years (yes, I have strange interests, I know.)

A con-man finds his victims by asking you for something that is out of line, but small.  When you comply, the requests get a little bigger and over time, you suddenly find you've done the equivalent of sending your confidential bank information to that
nice prince from Nigeria. 

Con-men are basically playing a numbers game, they approach everyone and keep pushing on the ones who are most compliant. 

Carla gave me very clear warnings about the touts and their attempts to use your own sense of polite
conduct and 'niceness' against you.  She told me to forget about being a Southern lady. 

A Turkish woman would never respond to a strange man who approached her on the street and so within the Turkish culture they are considered rude, to say the least.

By telling me not to 'give face', She recommended that I keep my face very still and not respond by word or gesture to ANYTHING that a strange man on the street said to me.  She said to keep very cold and formal, no matter how uncomfortable it is to do so.  

And boy, was she right.  These guys are mostly young, good-looking and sharply-dressed.  They stand outside of restaurants and shops in the tourist district and in the high rent/high traffic sections of the Grand Bazaar. and urge you inside.

Those guys are not too bad, mostly.  It's the guys in front of the mosque that are trouble because if you acknowledge in any way that they exist, they will follow you for blocks.

The Blue Mosque and the Hagia Sophia are on opposite sides of a huge square.  

The initial approach:

'You are looking for Blue Mosque?  I will show
you, here it is."

No kidding, dude, it's huge and it's right here.

"Where are you from?"

"Why won't you talk to me, aren't you nice?"

Um, no, actually.  Because I know you aren't either.

If you haven't responded by this time, the whole thing starts over in another language.  [It became a game to count the number of guesses.  When they guessed Turkish or Arabic, I was proud.  When they guessed Finnish, I was just confused.]

These guys aren't physically dangerous, they are just obnoxious and will waste your time and try to get you to overpay.  And I am stubborn by nature.

I also read a post by a Turkish woman in a travel forum that mentioned that one of the dead giveaways that you are American is that you smile too much.  And today I really learned how right that is.  I caught myself flashing a smile at the beginning of every interaction. 

In the US, the quick smile signals a greeting, it is considered polite.  In Turkey, if a woman smiles at a strange  man she is overtly expressing interest.  I ran into a similar issue about prolonged eye contact when I moved from Georgia to New Mexico for college.

Suddenly, all the stories I had heard about single female travelers being accosted by men who would not leave them alone made a little more sense.  It doesn't make sexual harassment right, but it does make me feel better about having clear and firm boundaries from the beginning.

So I spent much of the day discovering and trying to control my typically American gestures and facial expressions. 

In Turkey, the  head is nodded forward for 'yes' and nodded backward for 'no'.  Shaking the head side to side is for confusion.  So when I was approached by touts and instinctively shook my head at them, they said, "Oh, you are an American" and tried to follow me. 

I discovered pretty quickly that I need to adopt a posture and facial expression that is decidedly unfriendly by American standards but it kept the
worst of the touts away or made them give up fairly quickly.

I saw other American tourists happily chatting with touts leading them away to be fleeced and I had to fight the urge to 'save' them.

[The Turkish woman's post also made an interesting point about relative formality.  Interactions in Turkey between a man and a woman who are strangers is significantly more formal than in the United States and stays formal through the course of more interactions.]

[So it makes sense that being overly familiar or casual could make the mannerly Turkish men very uncomfortable.  So I spent the first few weeks trying to find a balance of appropriate formality and appropriate courtesy.  Considering how little Turkish I speak, I definitely didn't get it right all the time, but I did try.  And no man every truly harassed me or followed me for more than half a block.]
.

Well, I am back from three and a half weeks in Istanbul.  It was a life-altering journey and while this was somewhat foreseeable, the alterations were mostly positive.  While I was there I took several thousand pictures and kept a pretty detailed journal. 

Unfortunately, my internet connection wasn’t particularly fast or reliable so I decided to post everything when I got home.  

My intent for this website is for it to be a repository of my research
and to foster conversation and debate about medieval Central and Western Asia.

I am a graduate student but I don’t go back until the fall, so I will have time to get much of the information I have online so that it will hopefully be useful.

I have begun a blog on this website for research, but I’ve decided to add this second blog, about travel.  I felt that many people would be interested in one topic but not the other so I thought separating them might make this more
readable.

I do feel that I need to express some gratitude.  I have wanted to make this journey for many years but my dear friend Melissa Wolfley gave me the kick in the pants that I needed.  She works for an airline and offered to make me her designated travel companion for the year.  This is incredibly generous and brought the most expensive part of the trip, the airfare, within reach.

As I began to gather the resources I needed to make the trip, unexpected generosity arrived from many directions.  Two ladies who have asked to remain anonymous chose to sponsor my stay in Istanbul, each for several days.  They have both been mentors to me since I was a very young woman and I am still stunned and grateful for their generosity.

Two other wonderful mentors from the Society for Creative Anachronism founded a memorial grant in honor of a mutual friend who passed away recently.  The MacGumerait Grant is in memory of Ld. Aoghann MacGumerait (Lonnie Harvel). The grant is for SCA artisans and researchers in the areas of costuming, performing arts and food.  I am excited and honored to be the first recipient of this grant and I hope that I have done them all
proud.  
 
A professional photographer and dear friend, Tamara Di Firenze, asked me what camera I planned to take with me and when I shrugged and said I was taking my small point and shoot she objected strenuously.  She loaned me a wonderful cameral with all the gadgets and toys and I am honored that she was willing to trust me with her equipment.  I am thrilled with the pictures I took and want to say right now that they are the result of very good equipment and brilliant subject matter, not my skill.  Tamara and her husband Finn also gave me wonderful travel advice including a source
for affordable travel insurance and loaned me several wonderful travel
gadgets.

My husband, though not able to make the trip with me was incredibly supportive although I know he was not happy to have me away for so long.  I missed him terribly and can’t wait to take him back with me.

My first dance teacher, Carla Monnich, and her husband Ted, a museum professional saved me endless frustration and opened many wonderful doors for me in Istanbul and I adore them both.  Carla spent a lot of time on the phone with me and on email, giving me very specific instructions about how to find the things in Istanbul that were important to me and saving me endless aggravation with advice on how to function as a foreigner in Turkey and deal with the maddeningly aggressive and persistent touts that try to lure you into‘their’ restaurants and carpets shops. (More on those guys, later).  

Carla and Ted's website with travel information
was really useful, too.  They are part of a fantastic band called Turku, here’s their website.  http://www.turkumusic.com/

They also provided an introduction to their friend Bob Beer, an American who lives in Istanbul.  And I have to say that Bob is one of the most charming people I have ever met.  He generously provided practical advice, friendship,  social and historical context, a tour of the music and knitting scenes in Istanbul and several invitations to parties with interesting, charming people.  He was my guide into the parts of  Istanbul that made me feel that I could find a home there.

After airfare, lodging is generally the most expensive part of any trip.  Carla introduced me to airbnb.com.  It’s a website that connects travelers who want a non-hotel experience with locals who are willing to rent rooms in their homes and apartments.  Providence led me to Basma and her wonderful
flat, convenient to Sultanahmet and all the places I wanted to be.  Not only were the accommodations incredibly inexpensive compared to a hotel or hostel, but she provided local knowledge and advice, wonderful food and
made it possible for me to meet many locals as well as other travelers from the
USand all over the Middle East.  It would not have been as rich and wonderful a trip without her and I am pleased to say that when the trip began, she was a gracious host, and when it ended, she was a friend.

The purpose of my trip was to conduct research for a book I am writing on Ottoman tailoring methods for ceremonial caftans and other garments.  Most of the published research on Ottoman clothing has focused on the social and political uses to which these garments were put and the incredible skill and virtuosity required to weave the textiles from which they are made.

I have been pulling together information about the caftans for many years.  I have studied as many books on the subject as I could find, visited museums and traveling exhibits in the US and attempted to reconstruct these garments using the most appropriate methods and materials available to me.  (Check my 'photos' page for a few examples) 

But it is the construction and tailoring methods that have been the hardest to document.  When garments are displayed in museums and photographed for books, they are generally displayed to show the fabrics to their best advantage.  This means that many details of cut and construction are obscured.
 
I spent a total of 14 hours in the caftan gallery at the Topkapi.  I was not able to gain permission to work in the collections not on display, but I was able to learn a great deal from the items that were on display.  I will continue to work to gain access to the collections as Topkapi as well as the Victoriaand Albert in London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Smithsonian in Washington D.C.  I’ve been told by my contacts that it just takes
persistence.

I will be providing details of my work in the past and on this trip on this website and I have invitations to give several presentations over the next year in the Southeastern United States. (If you have an interest in hosting a presentation at one of your events, contact me privately and I will see what I can do.)

So the results of my research and the sources I was able to study will be made available on my Silk Road Conjectures blog.  This travel blog will with deal with my travels and additional interests.  I’ve been involved in the international dance community for many years and I love world music and
dance of all types.  I had the opportunity to dance with the Romani (‘gypsies’), explore antique shops, acquire antique textiles and textile tools and shop in the bazaars.  

I’ll tell you all about this stuff, and the food and street life and wonderful folks I met here.  I’m going to arrange this blog in chronological order, and then afterwards there are several topics that I want to discuss separately like Turkish women’s fashion and modesty, expat communities, food, practical stuff you might want to know if you want to make a trip like mine, dance and probably some other stuff.  I would appreciate it if you would leave comments to let me know what you want to hear more about and I’ll do my best.

I am also hoping to fit in another trip before my travel
  benefits expire at the end of the year.  To that end, I’m creating a page on the website to sell a few of the things I brought back, as well as some stuff that I’ve had for awhile and possibly some clothing commissions.  I was really inspired to de-clutter while I was there and so I hope to use that impetus to give me the start of a travel fund.

So, here we go.