A short New Year's post

Happy New Year! I got back from Turkey two days ago and immediately vomited after getting out the car. The only thing that came out was the little bit of orange juice I had, the half tablet of Meclizine I tried to take 5 minutes prior, and some water. No one was there to hold my hair back, and I sat in silence, sweating, thinking it would’ve been so much better if I had my phone in my hand to take a 0.5x photo of myself.

On my first night (Christmas), Maddie and I went to a hamam (Turkish bath) where you get completely naked, they bathe you and beat you, and then you have some turkish tea afterwards. I really felt like Tanya McQuoid (Jenny Coolidge in the White Lotus) when she went to the spa – it was an extremely spiritual event for me, and I started chanting that one Indian mantra in my head “om bhur bhuva swaha” as my bather cracked every bone in my back and scrubbed every dead cell off my body. I laughed, I cried, and I wish everyone can experience that sort of treatment one day. My trip really felt like I was in The White Lotus – especially the part when Olivia and Paula discover all the medications they brought with them. I brought my entire medication cabinet with me and was so glad I did. 

We went on a food tour with someone we found on AirBnB – his name is Hasan and I think he was just oversharing enough for us to learn that he has a really good tarot card reader who can’t really speak English or Turkish (sadly we did not visit her), fell in love with someone in New York City for 5 days, and goes to the same restaurant every night when he does food tours (which had the best chicken shish I’ve ever had).

Turkey must have some record for rhinoplasty and hair transplants, because every 5th person I saw on the road had bandages on their nose or head. Istanbul is also so interesting because it lives at the intersection of so many major religions.

I had a lot more I wanted to say during the trip, but think the pictures will better capture what I want to say. Also, one of my resolutions this year is to be more mysterious and recenter myself as the narrative – and part of that is not overthinking this blog. Another resolution is to be unbothered, which I think may be extremely challenging. Thank you, Maddie, for taking me along to Turkey :,)