To Asia, Scandinavia and Back
May 15, 2007
Dear Friends,
Yes, I am home. I am still adjusting to being an American again. In some respects, I think of myself as more of a Hungarian now. When I boarded the airplane in Frankfurt on the way to Chicago, I was sort of disgusted to see Americans again; they stick out. I will miss Budapest immensely.
I never told my adventures to the East and the North, and my final days in Budapest.
About a month ago I had my third extended weekend for traveling, and I met my friend Adam Ludvigson from St. Olaf in Istanbul. It was such a great time! It was great to actually see an Ole friend and also to experience such an incredible city. Istanbul is such a different city from anything I’ve experienced. I was slightly concerned about my safety before going, but that was not an issue. In fact, the people on the street, specifically the Muslims, were so friendly. I didn’t expect otherwise, but I was shocked how helpful they were to tourists. People aren’t nearly as helpful in Budapest. Also, when we were wandering through neighborhoods the Muslim kids were so excited to see foreigners and even more excited when we told them we were Americans. I did not experience any hostility for being an American. I walk around saying “Bush bad, Clinton good” and the Turks treated me well. While many places had a picture of Ataturk hanging on the wall, there were also many places with a Bill Clinton picture.
Adam and I took many, many photos. I haven’t uploaded mine yet, but I encourage you to see his, too: http://www.webmoof.com/adam. It was great to be on a trip with a fellow photographer because we could take our time in places and try cool photography tricks and compositions.
Aya Sofya was probably my favorite place in Istanbul, though I wish it were still a mosque, because it lacked the spiritual feeling of the other mosques now that it is a museum. (I know it was a church first, but I really like the islamic patterns in mosques.) It was an incredible space, sporting the largest unsupported dome for centuries; the structure seemed to defy gravity.
Seeing the Islamic patterns and calligraphy was my other favorite part. Adam, who is currently taking an Arabic class in Cairo, taught me some Arabic so I could recognize words in the calligraphy; I definitely had Allah’s and Mohammed’s down to memory. Also, it was much more meaningful to be in an Islamic culture after reading parts of the Koran in Great Con.
One day I went over to the Asia side (partly to say I’ve been to Asia—I don’t know if it counts by Jeff McLaughlin standards). I visited five mosques there and this is where I met many Muslim kids. Lonely Planet let us down, so we asked some Muslim kids how to get to a mosque and they led us there! We were trying to find this mosque for two hours and it turns out we had already been to it, but it was still really nice that the kids led us there.
That night we went to Taksim, which is a big touristy shopping district and 100,000 protesters were out that day. Unfortunately I left a day earlier than Adam, so I didn’t get tear-gassed like he did. This is the second time I’ve missed being tear-gassed by one day! Oh well…next city, hopefully (Northfield???).
That night we walked to a bridge and found that it had cafes underneath. There was also a shisha place, so we smoked shisha while lounging in beanbags, drank turkish tea and watched the sun set over the Bosphorus. Could life get much better?
Buying Turkish Rugs. I spent quite a bit of time in the Bazaar—lot’s of great things! I bought two Turkish rugs (one for me, one for my family). Boy—buying those rugs is the most stressful experience! The sellers really know how to guilt you into buying one. I went to three different places. By the pigeonhole principle, there is at least one place I didn’t buy a rug. At that place, when I said I didn’t want to buy a rug, the seller told me about how this will be his first sale of the day. He only has enough money to buy bread for his family. When I definitively said no, he threw his calculator on the ground. What an act!
I could go on and on about Istanbul, but I should talk about Copenhagen too. I stayed with some good family friends, the Enevolds, who were our neighbors over 15 years ago. Their daughter is four years older than I am and was a great friend for that half-year. So I finally got to see her and her family again! I stayed with the Enevolds and we talked a lot about European politics, America’s place in the world and Europe’s perception of America, which was really interesting. I went to a concert with Cecelia, the daughter, one of the nights. The next day I went to Tivoli Gardens, a Disneyland-like world that is much, much better and less hokey. I went on rides with two of the grandchildren, who didn’t speak English! Communication became a game of Charades.
I really liked the Danish product design, so I went to the Dansk Design Center and many shops to look at Danish-designed things. I realized that my house has many of those products. That’s what happens when your dad is an architect.
Denmark obviously has much more money than Hungary—it shows. At the beginning of this program I said that Budapest seemed like a green city. Well, in some senses it is, but I think the US is still doing a better job. Copenhagen, however, is a very green city! Some say the greenest. For example: A large portion of the population bikes around the city and they have made the city very bike-friendly, including traffic lights for bikes in some areas, little ramps on staircases so that bikes can easily be transported and even bike holders in the light-rail cars. Also flying into the city, I saw over 50 wind turbines on the water. It was pretty sweet.
My last day I went to Christiana, which is one of the only free places to live in the world. Hippies in the sixties took over this park and claimed that they would not pay taxes (which are up to 60% in Denmark). The Danish government thought it would be an interesting social experiment, so they let them do it. Now the Danish government wants that land, so who knows if Christiana will exist in a few years.
Daniel