Helen of Friggin Indiana

Istanbul, Turkey. An amazing city. Full of life, fun, adventure, and new experiences. By the time Betsy and I reached our (thus far) favorite city, we had already cemented our friendship. Which was fortunate, because otherwise I might have murdered her with the underside of my shoe.

Friendship!

Ha. No. Everything is fine, really. It’s just that in Turkey, Betsy had this incredible ability to make every single guy fawn over her. It was actually magical. At first I wrote it off as a part of the culture– in Turkey many of the shop workers and restaurant guys will stand outside their stores and heckle the tourists in. This will often devolve into bad pick up lines like “don’t you want to sit down? Aren’t you tired after running through my dreams all night?” and the ilk. But after a while, I began to notice a pattern. Or, more simply, I began to notice that I was being completely ignored in favor of Betsy.

Not to break out the world’s tiniest violin here. I wasn’t actually mad. Or insulted. I didn’t even take it as a personal criticism. Because in fact, I myself had a tremendous ability to attract the attentions of waitstaff and shop workers too. The only catch was that unlike Betsy, the people who were most willing to dote on me were around the age of 60. If I was lucky– often times they were older.

Essentially, it was like walking around with Helen of Troy as Helen’s not-to-shabby friend. I became more and more amused as Betsy tried to deny and deny and deny. And once I discovered what was going on, the ‘trends’ if you will, I began to capture photo documentation. As proof. Proof which I will now detail in the form of amusing stories:

1) The Scarf Guy
Betsy and I went to the Central Bazaar in Istanbul. A highly recommended tourist destination, shops have been there since before America was even conceived of by our founding fathers. Since before our founding fathers were mere twinkles in the founding fathers father’s eyes. Since I was missing my younger sister Emily’s birthday, she had requested I get her something from the Bazaar. I had already gotten her a gift (WHICH I AM NOT TELLING YOU HAHA EMILY HAHA), but it wasn’t from the Bazaar and I don’t go back on my promises. So I decided a nice additional gift would be a scarf.

We browsed by several shops, ignoring the calls of the increasingly annoying shopkeepers, and eventually decided on a nice store with a younger worker who hadn’t, in fact, tried to get us into his store. Eat that reverse logic, Turkey. We walked into the store and I told him, “Hello! I am looking for some scarves.” To which he replied, “Hello! Let me show you how to wrap this scarf around you, beautiful friend of annoying person who is speaking to me.”

Ok. Maybe I’m exaggerating. Regardless, despite my utter willingness to actually purchase several scarves from the man, he barely said two words to me. Betsy wasn’t interested in buying a scarf. And yet that didn’t stop him from draping all of his most expensive items around her, showing her various knots and ways to hang the fabric around her. Obviously this guy’s main focus wasn’t on the sale.

After putting the scarf on, Betsy became 200% more regionally hotter.

I handled all the items, I made a mess of his store. I even put a scarf into my bag to see if I could get any kind of reaction out of this guy. But no, he was too busy showing Betsy how to drape the wedding scarf around her head in the appropriate fashion. At some point in his antics he said to Betsy: “You are so beautiful!” and then he looked at me, searching for some kind of consolatory adjective before coming up with: “And you are smart.”

No, really. He said that. It’s just what every girl dreams of hearing.

2) Genie Pants Guy
Betsy and I decided that we needed to make a ridiculous purchase. We had, in our wanderings, seen various stores selling what we termed to be Genie pants. You know, the pants that puff out around the ankles. Cheaply made and cheaply sold, we really wanted a pair so we could return home and embarrass all our friends and siblings.

So we stopped in one of the shops and started browsing the various styles. There were the ugly ones, the uglier ones, and the ugliest ones. Naturally I gravitated towards the most hideous of them all, because why only go half way? We each selected several styles and patterns of pants and asked the shop guy if we could try them on.

“Sure!” He said, but the changing room was occupied. So we prepared to wait to try on our excellent new pants before he looked at Betsy and said “Oh! You should try these on” and handed her a new pair of pants. He then said that she could use the upstairs room (a storage room) to try on her pants and that “I guess your friend can go too.”

So we went upstairs, tried on the different pants, and went down to look in the mirrors in the main shop. We went down and immediately he began to compliment and praise. Well, compliment and praise Betsy at least. He then proceeded to bring out more and more items of clothing to dress us up with. Hats, belly dancer’s jingle scarves, and jackets. I took out my camera and we took some silly pictures. And then the shop guy himself took out a robe and donned it.

“Here! Take our picture [mere plebeian]!” (emphasis added by author) He told me, posing with Betsy. So I did. So I could have proof that this Betsy + Shop Guys thing was, in fact, a thing.

Pictured: PROOF

It was then that I realized I should really start documenting all of these guys with my camera. Just so I can look back and laugh. Well, no. Really it was just to make Betsy pose in as many ridiculous situations as possible. Yes, I know. I’m a great friend.

3) The Ceramic Guy
Later in the Bazaar, we stopped into a different store to look at the colorful ceramics and figures available for purchase. The shop guy was nice, a little older but still in his 30s. He showed us some plates and bowls, and eventually we decided on a pair of whirling dervish figurienes. Then we came to the haggling.

I went through the usual phrases. I’m a student, we don’t have a lot of money, I don’t have that much local currency on me (a tactic made much less powerful by the numerous ATMs in the Bazaar), shouldn’t we get a discount for buying two figures instead of one, yada yada yada. And although he was looking at Betsy while I made all of my pleas, he actually DID interact with me, so that was nice.

Then he smiled and said (jokingly), “How many goats for her?” pointing at Betsy.

I immediately said, “She is my favorite daughter. 12 goats and your whole shop.”

He agreed. Betsy was less than amused.

We laughed, talked a little more, and eventually got the price down to something much more agreeable. He then agreed to a much lower price, so long as he could get a kiss from Betsy. She laughed. I laughed. He didn’t. Awkward silence ensued.

We paid the higher price and left briskly.

3) Ice Cream Ring Guy
Another day, we stopped for Ice Cream. It was a street-side café and we were waited upon by a young waiter. He went through the usual introductions, the where-are-you-from, where-in –America, oh-that’s-very-nice, how-do-you-like-Istanbul pleasantries. His English was understandable, but it was clear he was using us as some practice. After we ordered, he saw that Betsy was wearing a nice turquoise ring (which we had actually picked up in Bucharest). He pointed at it and she took it off her finger to show him. He took it, put it on his finger, and jokingly flashed it about.

It was all quite amusing, really, until he couldn’t get it off again. He tried to tug it off and found it completely jammed on his much larger digit. He looked at us, embarrassed, and did the international “Oh crap, one second” gesture. Something akin to big smiles and lots of frantic waving.

We laughed, he went back to soap his hands up and get the ring off, and Betsy went to the restroom. While she was gone, he came back and put the now removed ring on the table. I smiled at him in a “no worries” kind of way and he brought our ice cream out.

Betsy was still occupied waiting in the longest restroom perhaps ever, and I sat awkwardly at the table, snapping pictures of this and that. I asked the waiter to take a picture of me at the table with my ice cream. He did. He gave me my camera and then went away and came back with a single heart-shaped cookie. I thought it was for me. I was mistaken. He put it into Betsy’s awaiting ice cream, smiled at me, and walked away.

Well thanks, Mr. Ice Cream Man. I feel really special.

Betsy came back (I was about to send a search party for her) and sat down. We laughed about the ring and the heart-cookie and got about our delicious consumption of the ice cream. That’s when the waiter came back and offered to take a picture of the two of us.

Great! I thought. We don’t have that many pictures of the two of us! Fantastic! He snapped a couple of pictures, started playing with the zoom on my camera, snapped a couple more, and handed us the camera. We thanked him, paid, and left.

It wasn’t until later, upon reviewing the photos, that I noticed he had zoomed in on Betsy’s face. Just her face.

I feel like something is missing here... hmmm. Maybe it's just me. (GET IT?)

Yup. I’m as special as a snowflake.

4) The pin incident
During our time in Istanbul, we made very good friends with the family who ran one of the souvenir shops in our neighborhood. The first morning we arrived, we were walking by on our way to the Blue Mosque and came across them having breakfast and tea outside their shop. They offered us some of their cheese (apparently from their hometown of Van, on the Eastern boarder of  Turkey) and much to their and Betsy’s surprise, I accepted.

This is actually a knee-jerk reaction from spending six months in Ghana. It’s pretty common for people to offer you their food if you pass by, and it’s also pretty rude for you to refuse. More often than not they just want to have a short conversation with you and let you go on your way, so when I turned and said “Sure, why not?” it was more of a reflex than anything else. Regardless, it turned out to be one of the best things we did in Istanbul.

We ended up sitting with them for about an hour that morning, talking to Yusuf and Murat, the brothers who were in charge of the twin souvenir and rug shops, both called the Artemis Store. We talked about mosques to see, restaurants to hit, and our trip thus far. They didn’t try to sell us anything, and we ended up making good friends with them.

At the end of the Istanbul stay, just before we were leaving, we stopped by to say goodbye to them. We went into the shop, sat down and talked for about an hour. Betsy and I really want to come back to Turkey and see the rest of the country outside of Istanbul, and we talked about how when we came back we’d have to visit them. We were mid-conversation when Yusuf walked in, holding a pin.

Or, to be more specific, he walked over to Betsy whilst holding a pin.

“Here. This is for you. To be safe on your travels.” She said thanks, and accepted the pin. I looked over expectantly. “Ah, but I could only find one so Laura doesn’t get one.”

Pictured: Betrayal

That’s when Betsy almost died of laughter. But, to be fair, these guys weren’t really on the creepy end of the spectrum. They never once used bad pick up lines or weird suggestions. They were just friends. Well, friends who preferred Betsy. (I kid)

5) Jealous Shop Guy
The first day in Istanbul, after we had breakfast with the Artemis Shop Guys, we wandered over to the Blue Mosque and the surrounding area, called the Spice Market. This market had a variety of stores, including ceramic stores, scarf stores, and jewelry stores, among other things. We were just browsing the first day, getting to know the area and what souvenirs we might want to buy, and we wandered into a shop that had a little bit of everything.

Betsy was admiring the plates, looking at the different ceramics while I was obsessing over a very expensive necklace that I will never be able to own (unless anyone knows of any available billionaires who like eccentric ladies named Laura?) when Betsy and I began our usual banter. We started talking about various inside jokes, this and that, and Betsy commented that maybe her boyfriend Paco might like to buy her some of the expensive jewelry. Instead of laughing at the joke, the shopkeeper froze like a dead fish.

No, seriously. He got upset. He escorted us out of his shop (not that we would have been able to buy anything in there anyway) and continued to tell us even as we were walking way that, “You can not come back here. You,” he pointed at me, “can, as you don’t have any friends. You,” he pointed at Betsy, “can’t.”

6) Candy Man
It seems we leave the creepiest for last. While everyone else on this list has been amusing and fun and not altogether serious in their advances upon my friend, this last guy hands-down wins the Creeper of Istanbul award.

It started out regularly enough.

We had arrived way too early for our night train out of Istanbul. Instead of waiting for an hour in the lounge, filled with smokers and questionable characters, we decided to see if there was a cafe or somewhere to sit on the square outside. We adventured about and found, right across the street from the train station, a sweets shop.

Turkish sweets! Score! We hadn’t had a meal consisting only of those yet! So we went in and were greeted at the door by the typical shop guys trying to wrangle up some customers. I went in the shop, immediately seeking a table so I could unload my bag and feel less like Atlas, but I quickly noticed that Betsy wasn’t behind me. She had been waylaid at the door.

“Betsy, why don’t we eat upstairs?” I called out, pulling her away from the questions of the front-door shop guy. She thanked me and we went upstairs to sit.

The waiter came and, after asking us the Standard Questions (See: Ice Cream Ring Guy) offered to get us a plate of sweets selected from the huge menu, since we didn’t quite know what to get. We agreed. Then he said we could have some free tea. Awesome! I love apple tea! Thanks magical Betsy of Troy!

It should be noted that in the process of this snack/dinner/sweet break I somehow managed to pull the sliding window off the hinge and leave it hanging haphazardly on its pane. It was very obvious to anyone who walked by. But it passed without comment from the waiters, somehow, the entire meal. Although every time one passed they did a double-take.

Our tea arrived, as hot as lava, with the rest of the sweets. We ate them pretty quickly, as we had the train to catch, and sipped the tea down as fast as we could. We asked for the check. The waiter brought it, we paid.

However, we had perhaps eaten the sweets TOO quickly. He got excited that we had enjoyed his selections so much that he showed up with an entire extra tray of sweets. On the house. Unlike the others, though, these were the single chewiest things I have ever encountered in my twenty-two years of life. They were like a trap. Give the polite girls loads of chewy candy and tea as hot as lava and make them miss their train! Bwahahaha!

During the whole process, he was also coming by to ask us increasingly creepy questions. Like where we were staying, how long we were to be in Istanbul, where we liked to visit while we explored the city. Fortunately, Betsy and I have learned to support one another’s lies very well, so no important information was revealed.

At one point, Betsy was a champ and downed her lava tea like a pro. I, of course, used this golden opportunity to pour more of my lava tea into her glass because we’re friends and friends share. Sharing is caring! Team work makes the dream work! But I knew it was serious when she reached over, took five of the sticky candy death cubes and shoved them all in her mouth. A noble sacrifice indeed.

We wolfed down the free candy and the lava tea and began to pack up our bags when the waiter returned, asking Betsy to take a picture with him. She did. And then he wanted another, with both of us. And the another with a different background that didn’t have the window I had ripped from its moorings in the background. And then another. And another. Eventually, I simply said: “TRAIN NOW” and pulled Betsy out the door. We sprinted (or more accurately hobbled with our gigantic backpacks as fast as our little legs could carry us) across the square and to the train station, all the while nearly dying of laughter and the oncoming diabetic shock.
Conclusion:
It was actually quite nice to be with Helen of Troy whilst in Turkey as she was a nice sponge for the creepers. And she could always use her “smart” friend as an excuse to get out of the sketchiest of situations.

But still, I have to ask:

Really, men of Istanbul? REALLY?

Love,
Lo

On Roommates

Hello, little neglected blog. It’s a good thing that Betsy is so much better at churning out posts, otherwise you’d be relegated to a dusty corner of the internet saved for old geocities pages left from the mid-nineties. We have just left Bucharest, and are on our way to Varna, Bulgaria. Varna is a costal city, so I’m quite looking forward to the wind and the ocean and not feeling like an egg, slowly cooking in a concrete jungle.

I’m sitting in a McDonalds at the Bucharest North Train Station (hey, it has free wifi and I ate those stupid salmon pancakes, I can take a McD’s break if I want to), and I thought this might be the perfect opportunity to talk about our roommates thus far.

Remember that feeling, the summer before freshman year? When you were refreshing your brand-new college email account and waiting for your roommate assignment so you could stalk them on facebook, open up a dialogue, and agree who should buy the refrigerator before getting onto the perfectly normal business of hating one another? And then that first day on campus, when you put the facebook photos to the person and fot through that first night?

OMG HEY We're gonna be BFFs until you leave your toe nail clippings in the carpet and then I'll kill you in your sleep! LOL!

Sometimes I think that rooming in hostels is like that. But then I remember that we have no idea who our roommates will be (no facebook, no contact, to emails), and the first night isn’t a magical “we can make this work!” mentality, instead it’s been a bit more of a “they can deal. They’re only here for a couple of days” mentality. Which is to say we’ve had some interesting experiences.

Some of the highlights?

– Our first night in Brasov, Romania a middle-aged man checked in quite late to the hostel, after most of us had gone to bed. He loudly came in, plunked his bags down, stripped his clothes off, and made his way around the room for ten minutes, somehow hitting every piece of furniture he could and exclaiming each time he did as if it were a brand new surprise. But eventually he settled into bed. Good, I foolishly thought, now we can get to bed. But oh, how naïve I was. For little did I know this man would snore through the entire night. But snore is too light of a word. A better way to say it is perhaps “drown in his own mucus” all night. It was quite simply the loudest, most disgusting, vile, gut-wrenching noise I have ever heard out of the mouth of a human being. At one point I got out of bed (I bunk on top, so this is usually a graceless event involving me tumbling to the floor and landing on my butt) to use the bathroom and on the way back in Betsy calmly asked me to murder our roommate. Fortunately I was too tired and lazy to actually do so, but we did entertain the thought.

– In Bratislava, Slovakia, we were already pretty cheesed off. Our train through the previous night had arrived at the station at 6 in the morning and, despite telling the hostel our arrival time when we reserved the beds, they told us we couldn’t check in until 3pm. We had been hoping to get the beds and crash until around 10, but instead we had to put our bags in the luggage room and awkwardly sleep like hobos on the common room furniture. When we finally got our beds, we were quickly followed by two guys. We did the usual small talk with them, “how are you where are you going how are you getting there how old are you yes we’re American isn’t that weird haha that’s so funny well bye now,” and we discovered that they were heading to a secret conference in the middle of the Slovakian woods hosted by a murder mystery writer. I’m not kidding. I can’t make this stuff up, unless I ripped it directly from an Agatha Chritie or an old episode of Scooby Doo. These guys were quite tolerable, if a little socially retarded. We encountered them in the pub and had endless small talk until we retreated to the room upstairs. And that’s when we met the single most annoying human being I have ever encountered in my twenty two years of living. Her name was something chipper and infuriating, like Piper. She was from Nottingham (“YOU KNOW LIKE ROBIN HOOD” She said about twenty times), and was incapable of speaking at a normal volume or with any kind of punctuation whatsoever.

What I picture when I think of England. Well, this and a new-found frothing rage.

She had already started drinking by the time she arrived, and she kept pointing out how BEER WAS SO BLOODY CHEAP HERE OH LAWD YOU CAN GET A PINT FOR ALMOST NOTHING DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY POUNDS IT COST BACK HOME CHAPS YES YES JOLLY OH AND GOD SAVE THE QUEEN? It was like watching a poorly performing stand-up comic do a horrible imitation of someone from England.

She fortunately left with the Irishmen who did nothing but egg her on. Betsy and I were grateful until, sadly, they had to return. Like homing pigeons carrying a deadly virus of crankiness they returned, loud and rambunctious. They woke us up, kept us up, and hand no manners whatsoever. Even AFTER they went to sleep we would get no rest, as Little Miss Nottingham kept waking up in the wee hours of the morning to spew out a couple of paragraphs in loud, poorly accented German before falling back asleep.

– If we’re going for “Most Awkward Encounter,” it would have to go to Mr. McPubby Pants of Krakow, Poland. First you must understand that Krakow is a student town. There is a nearby university, and many abroad European students will make it a fun weekend destination. It’s also a popular place for roaming Stag Parties (the UK equivalent of a Bachelor party). Which is to say, in fewer words, that Krakow is a lovely place to go drink some alcohol. Our Hostel there, Greg & Tom’s (which we recommend to anyone looking for a Hostel in Krakow—seriously the staff, the accommodations, the social atmosphere were all fantastic. It’s been our favorite Hostel thus far) provided nightly activities for the visiting tourists. Some nights there were vodka tastings accompanied with dinner, other nights the Hostel Guides took us out to some pubs and clubs, so that no one would pay more than needed or get taken advantage of by locals. The first night we were there, we decided to partake in one of the pub crawls. We figured we’d get to see the city at night, plus if we found anywhere we really loved we’d be able to hit it another night. And, for the most part, we were right. There was only one slightly hinky moment when a guy (who we presumed to be a local) bought us a drink. The Hostel Guide had told us this was pretty common, and a drink didn’t mean much here. A drink meant I’d like to have a conversation with you, but two drinks meant something more. So we agreed (dear Mom and Dad: we were also with some other girls from Brazil, so it’s all good) had a conversation, drank a beer, and chilled. It was about then that the group started to move onto the next pub, but our guy was adamant. He wanted to stay! He wanted to buy the girls more drinks!

I’ll take this moment to address a common complaint I hear from guys: “Why do girls always have to go in a group?” Well, the answer is: because it gives us super powers. Want to get out of a dance? Out of a drink? Want to head to the next bar? Socially awkward and often off-putting on your own, but in a group? No one can deny the wishes of the femme faction.

Hahaha! Just try to deny us, jerks!

We told him we’d rather not, and thanks for the drink. He pouted, made some kind of “women” hand gesture, and sulked at his table. We left. We pretty much forgot about him and had a lovely evening.

Until the next morning. We’d gotten back late, so we hadn’t turned on the lights before heading to bed. I woke up in the late morning, to find Betsy staring at me wide-eyed from the other bed.

“It’s him.” She whispered.
“Who?”
“The guy.”
“What?”
“The guy from the pub who bought us a drink.”
“hernngh?” (I had just woken up, to be fair)

Well, it turns out little Pouty McPubby pants wasn’t, in fact, a local from Krakow. He was from Warsaw, in Krakow for some training. Why he was at a Hostel was anyone’s guess, but there he was, in the bed across from ours. Yup. We woke up, showered, and got ourselves ready in record time, hoping to avoid the delicious awkwardness awaiting any kind of conversation with him.

Just as we were about to leave, he woke up and waved at us. We said hi. We said we were leaving. We made awkward small talk. We started to head out the door.

Betsy, in fact, said “See you later!”

He responded, “I would like that.”

We pretty much sprinted out of the Hostel and were relieved when he had checked out by the time we came back.

Those have been the winners, in any case. There have been more snorers, more loud-talkers, the Chinese girl who hung her matching bra and thong out to dry every night like a religious ceremony. The 31-year-old British architect who had just quit his job and was traveling down to work with Orangutans for a couple of years. The Californian who had just finished teaching in Korea for 2 years and was making his way home, the long way.

Betsy has pointed out that I should provide a disclaimer before signing off. During our travels we HAVE met some wonderful and interesting people. We have gone out to dinners, gotten recommendations, exchanged Russian Mafia stories, and made some friends. But they’re no fun to tell you about, are they?

Lots of love,
Lo

That one time Laura left me alone in Tallinn

I was skeptical of Estonia. Especially given that I was venturing into and out of the country on my own, I had never heard anything about Estonia and mostly, I have never heard anything good about Estonia. I knew they were a part of the EU which gave me hope that I would at least be accounted for while in the country and have better access to help if I needed it. Although really, that just meant that my body has a better chance of getting mailed home if I got kidnapped and murdered.

Another problem with traveling alone? It's very awkward to get pictures of yourself. Thanks for that, Laura.

Flying into Tallinn, I saw nothing. Literally, there was nothing. Just some trees, farms, and the sea. The airport was not quite anything either. Not all that bigger and more secure than Columbus. Where the hell am I again? Why did I decide on Tallinn, of all places?

Without a bag (my backpack wound up in Washington D.C. despite the fact that I didn’t even fly through that city…) I went to the desk to file a report for my lost luggage. With a few words of response in some of the man’s garbled English, I was handed a receipt and told that my bag would be there. When and how, I had no idea. So… I trekked on out to catch a taxi to the hostel. Turns out I was staying in the old town part of Tallinn which was definitely the best place to be. I stayed at The Monks Bunk hostel right past the old entrance gates.

When I got in, there were two guys from Australia working at the counter. The hostel looked okay, but definitely wasn’t anything special. I told the guys that my bag had been lost and I needed to go get some bathroom things and a new shirt.  It was already 6 in the evening and they said the shops should be open until 8. In my hurry, they gave me a map and kindly pointed out places to go, but leave it to guys to point me in the direction of some sketchy grocery stores and tell me that they have no idea where I could buy clothes… Thank God I managed to find a Zara!

I went out for dinner around 11 that night and found every restaurant open and busy. It was still very light out. That’s when I remembered that this is the time of year for the famous White Nights. The sun somewhat started to set around midnight, rose by two but never got fully dark.

I spent the next two days walking around the city and admiring all of the pretty buildings and old city walls. Despite my doubts, Estonia is a beautiful place that had a lot to offer in Tallinn’s old town… for a few days that is. With the endless light, the city is wide awake at all hours with fun shops, restaurants, and bars open to everyone. The second night I went on a pub crawl with everyone from the hostel which turned out to be a lot of fun. I met some great people while I was there and learned a lot about their travels as well.

The first sight I saw in Tallinn. Well, after Zara.

While being abroad is an adventure in itself, being alone and abroad is something else.  I was definitely ready for Laura to arrive! You can only eat so many meals alone and walk through the city  so many times until you feel like a loser and get pretty bored.  I will call the trip to Europe, time in Tallinn, and dealing with a lost bag alone character building. It was good experience and it helped me to prove to myself that I could handle new and bigger things on my own (since unfortunately now I am supposed to be a real adult).  But… being alone also means that you come home with one picture of yourself thanks to another tourist. And here picture amazing picture.

I got my bag that next day and then took off to St. Petersburg. I was even more apprehensive about Russia but was getting really excited to meet up with Laura! Oh, the adventures!