"Did you feel safe in Turkey?" several people ask after we survived a trip to a Muslim country. My immediate answer is "Yes, totally."
Well... but...
I like to think I have good instincts for travelling safely in foreign countries. I don't walk on dark, deserted streets, and I'm hardly ever out late at night. If I'm alone I walk with Confidence with my purse slung across my body. Don't look like a victim they say. You know all this of course.
I've never been threatened or robbed, although I did fall in a hole on my first trip to Oaxaca in 2004. The sidewalks there are not always safe, they can pull you down when you least expect it.
In Istanbul the streets and palaces and mosques and restaurants and trams are lovely. Everywhere was liveliness and sunshine. Families pushing strollers, well-dressed teenagers staring at cell phones, smiling tourists from every country in the world busy taking photos and buying gift-wrapped boxes of baklava.
Of course we felt safe.
It felt like any large European city, except for the calls to prayer that interrupted conversations five times a day from minarets scattered around the city.
Dave and I felt comfortable exploring a little farther afield on our own after our 14-day tour ended. I had researched areas I wanted to visit so one day we hopped on a ferry on the European side of the city, and sailed to an Asian neighbourhood. I don't mean Chinatown, I mean across the Bosphorus to another continent.
As you may know, the city of Istanbul is partly in Europe and partly in Asia, the only metropolis in the world that spans two continents.
We still felt perfectly safe.
In the neighbourhood of Kadiköy on the Asian side, we found the street murals I had read about, and some traditional Ottoman-style houses. There were trendy little coffee shops, book stores and a ceramics studio where we bought two small Turkish coffee cups displayed in the window.
It's so interesting to wander in streets where creative people live and work. Quiet and pleasant, no tourist crowds or souvenir shops here, just normal day-to-day life in a densely populated city.
I loved the return ferry ride back across the Bosphorus. We had views of three of the most famous architectural masterpieces in the city of Istanbul. So exciting! My interest in the history of these Ottomans was increasing everyday.
I took this picture from the ferry. You can see the domes and minarets of the Blue Mosque (the only mosque with six minarets) and the most beautiful Aya Sophia Mosque (built in 537 AD as a Christian church), and the walls of Topkapi Palace (home to the Ottoman sultans).
We spent five days in Istanbul and everyday was a pleasure.
I knew that Turkey had a history of terrorism but the last major incidents were in 2016 and 2017. Personal security was never once on my mind during our 17 days in the country.
Until we returned home to Canada.
This happened just weeks after we left Istanbul. We were never on this particular street, one of the busiest in the city, full of restaurants and high-end shopping. But we weren't far away.
Six people were killed that afternoon and 81 injured.
So maybe you could say Turkey is not safe.
But that's not going to be what stays in my memory about the city of Istanbul and the country of Turkey.
I think I'll choose to hang on to my vision of a beautiful, lively city filled with thousands of years of history, gorgeous buildings, good-humoured locals who taught us words in Turkish, tasty lamb kebabs, smiling pomegranate vendors.
Turkey is a Muslim country but since the fall of the Ottoman Empire at the end of WWI, it's been the most westernized country in the Muslim world, maybe because it has one foot inside Europe. It has a secular government and its population is more liberal-minded and less traditionally Islamic than other countries in this part of the world. Many Turkish women wear head scarves (I tended to take pictures of their more exotic outfits), but many don't.
Things may be going in a different direction with the current leadership. President Erdogan is an authoritarian leader who has been turning away from western values and is intolerant of dissent. He has fired or arrested many thousands of soldiers, police officers, lawyers, judges, journalists and academics for opposing his views. The Turkish government has been accused of horrific treatment of the Kurdish population. Of course, it's a complicated situation with a very long history.
Back to the question of safety and terrorism.
As I mentioned in a previous post, I was at the top of the World Trade Towers just four months before 9/11. Violence and fatalities are a cold reality, but travellers keep travelling and so will I.
The world can be dangerous. Life can be dangerous.
Safety is relative. What can you say. I'm very glad I visited Turkey and would travel back tomorrow if someone bought me a plane ticket.
