The Tattoo Cafe.
No...this is not what you think. I mean...well...after the Turkish bath experience, it seems natural that we might decide to get some tattoos...but that's not what happened. Instead, feeling rather exhausted (instead of refreshed) we headed towards town in search of a cafe where we could sit a spell...drink some tea...read and draw. And so, we did. We found a small cafe in an alley, and sat down on the floor amongst pillows and rugs at a low table with a water pipe. We ordered a beer and some hummus and proceeded to make ourselves comfortable. jake pulled out "War and Peace" and I pulled out my sketching stuff and started drawing. Soon, the waiter came over and said he liked the drawing I was doing and almost immediately asked me if I would draw something on him. Weird, eh? This is something that I do occasionally...but rarely I am asked to do it on someone I don't even know....totally out of the blue.
So I agreed and drew a snake on a dagger...as that's what Muslim, the young waiter had asked me to do. Well...I added the dagger part. Next thing you know, there is a line of waiters asking for me to draw something on them...one of them wanted his name on his arm (Ozturk) ...the other left it up to me (so I gave him a classic heart with the word "MOM" on a scroll)...and the youngest one of all (Agit) asked me to write his name on his arm also. This was the highlight of the day. Jake engaged Muslim in conversation...and the young man soon disclosed that he was in love with a girl from Latvia...but she had left to go to work in London and they had corresponded for a year on the internet, but now he had not heard from her in a while and seemed quite broken hearted. Apparently they had only spent two days together in Turkey...but they had kissed and hugged...and he fell hard for her. It was a lovely story...and we felt lucky to have met these people...who seemed so nice and innocent and genuine (much unlike the Kurd from the other side of town).
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