What a difference 3 months make

The last time I was in Istanbul, in February, it rained every day bar one and I left to return to France in snow. I arrived last Wednesday night at around midnight and came straight to my hotel and when I left at 1.15pm the next day to head for the clinic for my first dental appointment of this trip it was already around 25 degrees C.

As usual, Istanbul was swarming with people just as it was at midnight the night I arrived – it really does seem to be a 24 hour city – and this time most were out in tee shirts and shorts. I was in jeans and a polo shirt and by the time I got back to my hotel early in the evening I was feeling a bit over-warm! Summer does seem to have arrived in Istanbul and already three ginormous cruise liners were berthed at the Galataport when I walked along there on Thursday afternoon of which more later.

I am in a different hotel this time and to say I’m underwhelmed by it is an understatement. We Brits have an expression that describes it – fur coat but no knickers. What that means is that it looks good on first impressions but when you get down to where it matters, it’s somewhat lacking.

The outside and interior of the hotel look pleasant enough, clean and in good condition, but it’s where it matters, in the room, that it falls flat on its face. To start off with, my room is small and airless – reminds me of a prison cell, not that I’ve been in one except when I visited Alcatraz.

There is a window that opens onto a filthy gap between the buildings that has a large metal extractor pipe in it from a kitchen next door that roars away through the evening until the kitchen closes, but I suppose I should think myself lucky as the adjacent rooms along the corridor have no external windows at all – just ones with curtains that look inwards onto the corridors themselves.

Because it was hot when I left for the dental clinic I left the window open thinking it would be OK as there’s an insect screen on the outside. Wrong. When I got back there was this big boy lying on the floor in front of the step up to the bathroom – an enormous cockroach (let’s just call it a beetle) about 20 cms long on its back waving its legs in the air.

I managed to pick it up and put it out of the window, but imagine that thing crawling across your face in the middle of the night! And talking about the middle of the night, the wall between my room and the one next to it is thin enough that I had a problem getting to sleep on the first night because there was a gentleman snoring like a stuck pig in there and still was when I woke up a couple of times in the night because I was hot.

I asked for a room with a large bed and that’s what I got. The trouble though is that the room is so small, there’s no room for anything else. There’s nowhere to put your case, even, let alone anywhere to put clothes which, apart from my overcoat, I’ve had to leave in my case. The case itself I have to open on the bed.

And the smallness continues into the bathroom. On first glance it looks OK until you realise that there’s nowhere to put your washing and shaving kit except a rather suspect looking cupboard – even a small shelf would be nice – and worse still, there’s only one tiny double hook for your hand and shower towels.

At least there’s a shower, I hear you say. Yes there is, but getting into it is a challenge. Luckily I’ve lost 6 kgs in weight since I was last in Istanbul and I can just squeeze through the roughly 30-35 cm gap between the shower cabinet doors.

Anyone more portly would have great difficulty getting in and out and I can just imagine the catastrophe that would ensue when the shower does what it seems all hotel showers in Istanbul do, which is switch from cold to scalding hot in an instant. They would squeal and jump and probably bring the whole shower cabinet collapsing down.

But I’m not yet finished with the bathroom. There’s more in the shape of a roughly 30 cm high step going in and out. Going in would definitely be challenging for anyone with mobility problems but anyone could come skidding out if they weren’t careful coming back into the bedroom with wet feet.

OK, am I finished? No, far from it I’m afraid. The room is advertised as having tea and coffee making facilities, and it does, or at least did when I arrived. They were in the form of 2 airline sized cups of water (you know, the thin plastic ones with peal-off foil lids), 4 tea bags and a few sugar lumps. I could see where this was going so while I was out I bought 3 litres of water, a pack of Liptons tea bags and some sugar, and lucky I did because when I got back I found that the ones originally provided by the hotel which I’d used hadn’t been replaced.

And neither had my room been made up even though the young lady who should have done it saw me leaving.

Is that it then? Well, no. When I booked my room back in February I’m pretty certain that I included breakfast in the cost. Why wouldn’t I? However, I was told when I enquired this morning that it isn’t and was directed to a small café next door where I was provided with a very indifferent meal consisting of lots of cheese at a cost of 8€.

So there you have it. Errr, no you don’t. The free wi-fi must be ADSL because it runs at a snail’s pace. When you can connect to it. Absolutely hopeless. I don’t think I’ll be coming back 😕

Oh, I forgot to mention. As I’d had an injection and couldn’t eat much at lunch time on Wednesday, I just had a (large) portion of chips (frites) and a beer in a café on Galataport followed by a Starbucks latte and lemon cheesecake later on. So that evening I decided that I’d stick to just fruit and treated myself to a box of juicy ripe cherries.

Lovely. Highlight of the day 😀