two euros, one gyro

We were introduced to the Greek gyro on our first day in Thessaloniki, and we spent the rest of our time in Greece finding various street vendors, and becoming connoisseurs of this delicious and inexpensive sandwich.

Personally, I had two favorite vendors: one below the Acropolis, across from the bottle bar (the best chicken souvlaki EVER), and the other at the tram stop after the Acropolis, up a shady hill, and into a neighborhood.

The gyro: a grilled pita that is topped first with onions and tomatoes, and then slathered in tzaziki sauce. Meat freshly carved off the slab is added (usually beef, but sometimes pork or chicken) and then the sandwich is topped off with a handful of crispy French fries before being carefully wrapped up and handed to you. Occasionally mustard and ketchup are added, but I recommend avoiding that if at all possible.

We just couldn’t go back to doners (the Turkish equivalent) once we sampled what Greece had to offer. As a group, we decided that while there were several important differentiations between the gyro and the doner (crispy fresh fries, the absence of pork in Turkey, etc…), the biggest difference was the tzaziki sauce. Upon arriving back to Istanbul, we realized that we couldn’t live without it for the next few months, and Daniel became the first to successfully re-create it.

The recipe is fairly simple, and you all should definitely try it. We don’t have measurements, but everything is easy to estimate.

Tzaziki Sauce:

Ingredients:
Cucumber
Sour cream
Yogurt
Garlic
Olive oil
Lemon juice
Dill
Salt and pepper

1) Grate the cucumber and salt it. Then, squeeze all of the juice out of it.
2) Add everything else together
3) Mix, and chill (the longer you chill the better)

While the tzaziki is amazing on pitas, you can use it for just about anything. It’s great with any meat, or bread, and most recently was used to make “tzaziki potato salad”.

Note: NONE of this is particularly healthy, so unless you are walking 10-12 miles a day like we were, I don't recommend the two-a-day diet of gyros.

planes, trains, and automobiles.

Opa!!! We just returned from a week backpacking through Greece, and the first thing I learned was that "Opa" does not mean cheers. All those years of watching movies, and I realize that Opa is nothing more than a jibberish word, used in lieu "oops" and "congrats". Yiamas! is what you say.

Our trek started when seven of us boarded a 12-hour night train from Istanbul to Thessaloniki. What do you get when you cram seven people into one of our three cabins with twelve hours to go? madness. It only took an hour or two before we all became exhausted and seperated to go to sleep. After 6 hours on the train, we hit the Greek border.

Customs on a train is by far one of the most disorienting, exhausting things I have done. Picture this: you are all sound asleep on a train when two intimidating police men pound on your door, asking for your passport in broken english. You look up, dazed and confused as they stare you down, comparing you with your passport photo. They say nothing and leave with your passport. (For anyone who has never traveled abroad, being separated from your passport is a really bad feeling) You doze off again, still out of it. Five minutes later, customs officials bang again, slam open the door, turn on the lights, and ask you questions about your trip. They leave as quickly as they came, and you doze off again. They come back a third time to return your newly stamped passport. That was for leaving Istanbul, and ten minutes later Greek officials come through to do the same thing.

The weather report had informed us that we would be traveling in non-stop rain, so we were all relieved to get to Thessaloniki and find 65 degrees and sunshine. Thessaloniki is typically described as "the Seattle of Greece". I'm not sure what that is supposed to mean, but it is a smaller college city on the water, full of cafes, bars, and restaurants. Around 4pm, the coffee shops and small bars lining the water front become extremely crowded.

After exploring Thessaloniki, we took another train to Athens, where we spent another two days. We spent half a day at the Acropolis, and the rest of the time wandering aimlessly through the city, stopping only long enough to eat a lifetime supply of gyros. Our last night in Athens, we bought a few bottles of wine, olive bread and cheese, and hiked up to the top of the mountain to watch the sun set, and the lights come on at the Acropolis.

Our last few days in Greece were spent at a shady beach, about an hour from Thessaloniki, where we finally slept, and were able to walk on the beach, look out at the water, and see an island with a snow-capped mountain on it.

We are all back in Istanbul now, getting ready for school to start. The language is still somewhat of a barrier, but in general, Turkish people get a good laugh out of Americans speaking pitiful Turkish.

my hour in asia

We took a ferry from Europe to Asia (all still in Istanbul) and it only cost 1.4 liras (around 80 cents) and about ten minutes of my time to get across. Traveling across the Bosphorus was beautiful, but freezing. The weather took a change for the worst today, and we were so cold that we only stayed in Asia long enough to eat lunch, and take a walk along the shore. We were moderately unprepared and did not know where to go once over there, but it's still really awesome to be able to say "I was in asia for an hour."

On a side note, I would like to comment on the madness that is the Turkish grocery store. There are several types of stores in Istanbul: the market and the Bazaar being the most used by us.

The Bazaar is a cleaner version of a Mexican Market and is full of people shouting at you to spend money in English. Some of the more entertaining sales tactics included "We give lots of discounts to Chinese people" and "I've got spices that can kill your mother-in-law". The best way to get through the Bazaar in one piece is to pretend that you do not understand any English, and to keep minimal eye contact. This is really only found over by Hagia Sophia (on the other side of the Golden Horn from where we are staying) and takes a good bit of time to travel to.

The market, on the other hand, is found every other shop throughout our main street. Imagine an average US grocery store. Picture the aisle, and the amount of space you have, and immediately subtract about four feet from that space. Then triple the amount of people in the row, and you have a standard Turkish grocery store. Navigating it is difficult enough, but check-out is where it becomes disasterous. With 10 people behind you, the cashier throws your groceries to the bottom of the shelf, and expects you to pay (in a currency you are still moderately unfamiliar with) while simultaneously bagging your own groceries. To most this may seem trivial, but I can assure you it is still a stressful experience.

On a better note, all of the produce here is extremely fresh, and extremely inexpensive.

I still can't post pictures here....our internet is mediocre at best, and it takes hours to load even a single photo. Keep checking facebook for photos and I will find a more effective way to post them as soon as possible.

better late than never

I am well overdue for a post, as I have now not only braved the cold of Munich, but have also now settled down into our new apartments in Istanbul.

To sum up four days of Munich with as few words as possible: beer, freezing cold weather (it was five degrees farenheit when we walked off the plane), ice skating on a pond in front of a palace, a train ride to Neuschwanstein Castle in the Bavarian Alps, and tons and tons of great food. We stayed in a nice hostel and for the most part, had great roomates (2 architecture students from Northern Germany, a Korean businessman named Jesse....and Erick the non-bathing drug dealer who stayed in the hostel all day/all night playing computer games.)

The highlight of the trip started at what we thought was the end, when the four of us woke up at five-thirty, dragged all of our luggage through the forty minute train to the airport, and went to check in with Turkish Airlines, only to realize that the day we thought was the thirteenth, was actually the twelth. We checked our bags into the airport lockers, and spent our last day wandering, ice skating, and talking about how ridiculous the morning had been.

All in all, I would call it a successful trip, thanks to the joint efforts of our communicator (John), our mapper (Chris), the keeper of important things (me), and our napkin eater (Jamie.) I wish I could say I became fluent in German over the four days we were there, but everyone seemed to enjoy speaking English to us.

my photos don't want to post as of now, but I will update as soon as I can make everything work properly.