3/27; Night 3; Istanbul, Turkey
My friends and I had seen a lot of Istanbul in the past few days -- the Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, the Grand Bazaar, the Bosphorus Cruise -- but we still hadn't done what we had really set out to do there; smoke some Turkish hookah.
It was just me and two other guy friends -- as for everyone else they were either too tired or did not want to smoke. So, after drinking the handle of Smirnoff I had bought in the duty-free section of the airport, we set out from our hotel to find a place to smoke hookah all the while having no idea where we were going to go. Earlier in the evening, a man working at a café had recommended an area called Taksim where all the nightlife was located, so we went in that direction.
On the walk there however, while appreciating the beautiful night and being freaking happy, we were approached by a promoter. We had clearly explained to him with English and hand gestures that we wanted to smoke, do hookah, use a water pipe, whatever. He seemed to understand saying, "Yes, water pipe!" and led us to what we thought was going to be a hookah place.
It turns out it wasn't. He ended up taking us to a club, where we were promptly sat down at a table with the promoter. There was a group of about 10 people, all unattractive, dancing in the corner, and between them and us there was no one else at the club. A waiter came to us asking if we wanted any drinks.
I told him, "I'll have a beer -- but wait, how much is it going to be?"
"Twenty Lira"
"WHAT?!"
That was a ridiculous amount. Twenty Lira is about $14, so there was no way I was going to sit there. I had drank a little, but I hadn't drank enough to lose my wits. Feeling tricked, the three of us promptly left the club. Looking back, I had a gut feeling that this guy was sketch, but being buzzed at the time I put my suspicions aside and put my trust in him. At least the guy had taken us to the Taksim area, so once we got out of that sketchy club we immediately discovered a hookah lounge open a couple of buildings down. Happy we had found what we desired, we went in and proceeded to smoke.
This was the guy who changed our hookah coals and tobacco and was really nice. He didn't speak much English, but we were able to exchange a couple of words with him. I have to say that he was a pro at blowing smoke rings, which we should have known since he did work at a hookah lounge. In an attempt to try and blow smoke rings ourselves, we would call him over from time to time asking him to show us how exactly he did them. "No, no, my friend, like this~", he would say as he blew a perfect smoke ring -- nice, thick, and doughnut shaped. In response, we would exclaim, "Whoa-ho! Oh my god, that's so good!" and clap and cheer. We tried to blow our own -- ours ended up more like failed streams of smoke.
By the end of the night, our attempts to blow those elusive smoke rings led the three of us to share two hookahs together. Even Ricky who started out the night saying he was "not going to smoke that much" was, by the end of the night, smoking just as much as the rest of us, all because he wanted to get that smoke ring.
However, smoking two hookahs between the three of us did not come without consequences -- the next morning we felt a little queasy in our stomachs because of all the smoke we had inhaled. On a normal night, a hookah would be shared between three to six people if that gives you an idea of how much we smoked. If you ever do go to Istanbul and want to try hookah, go to Taksim and try to find the place in the picture -- it's very nice (the house special is excellent!).
-Emoinacloset
