I made a top five best things, to stay on the positive side, but I just have to vent about my least favorite things too...
1. The tourist traps...everyone is trying to get you. They want your money, they want to rip you off. I can't stand being hounded by people at every turn. If a vendor is in his shop and he sees you start to walk by, he will rush out the door and start calling you in. I hate not being able to look at people, it feels rude, but you just have to there. If you looked at everyone who talked to you, you would never get out alive. These people are vultures and their behavior is despicable.
2. The smoke...you can smoke everywhere except inside mosques and museums...at the airport, in the bazaars, in restaurants, etc. It is awful. People are so rude about their cigarettes and cigars. I don't mind hookah smoke, but smoke in general is so nasty. Don't get me wrong, I respect people's rights to do what they wish to their bodies, but when I don't have a choice about what I breathe, then I get upset. It made me very grateful to live in the U.S. where the stuff is banned in most public places.
3. The cars/traffic...people drive like maniacs over there. Turkey has one of the highest rates of of vehicle accidents in the world. People don't wear seat belts and they routinely ignore pedestrians, speed limits and other vehicles. Most of the taxis and shuttles I was in were not properly equipped. I often felt like I was on a wild roller coaster ride. My favorite shuttle driver from Novotel did drive very well and I was grateful for the seat belt.
4. The pollution...this is always one of my least favorite things about major urban areas, and it also going hand in hand with numbers 2 and 3. Over the skyline there is this brownish smog. Gross. The smell of diesel fumes was also quite strong and it gave me a headache. Additionally, when all of the street markets would close the amount of trash and crap left lying on the ground was disgusting.
5. I'm finding it hard to come up with a fifth one, so I'll just leave it at four. I could say that the high prices were annoying, but that goes with number 1. I also don't like crowds. These are things that are true of any major tourist destination though. I guess I am just not an urban woman.
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1 comment:
Turkey sounds kind of like a clusterfuck of cool and poor developing city. Like the market stuff - that bothered me in Florence, that "you dropped something" snare. And even I, the smoker of blog smoking, disdain entirely smoke-everywhere situations (france). But hey, you could only think of four - what'd your Rick Steeve's rating be?:)
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