First full day in the city

Tuesday morning starts with a breakfast with Ayşegül, again. She is a beautiful young lady with a mild smile. She says she will spend the day with me. We stop by the hair dresser and get a wash and blow dry on the way to Nişantaşı. It is a fancy area which can described as the 5th Avenue of Istanbul. It is in a walking distance from the the apartment. She suggests to take a short cut by climbing a few steps. We start climbing but I don't see where they end where she is pointing at up there.   She says she has counted 180 steps, and cheerfully adds that I can do it. We climb the steps one by one to reach the top. 


Then a steep hill awaits us. We keep walking up and chatting. This is a residential area. Both sides of the street lined up with mid size apartment buildings that were probably built in the 1970s.  Each building has a name like Lale Apartmanı, Cevdet Koçer Apartmanı as if they were named represent the strength or personality of the property's owner.

Finally, I see  the boutique signs:)  My hunter instincts are in full gear. I want to visit each and every one of them. I am now in heaven. Leather jackets, coats, shoes, frilly dresses etc. adorn the storefronts. Each offers something better than the other. I try on a leather jacket and like it very much but this is just a start we will look further.

Aygün meets us at a restaurant that Ayşegül wanted to try. It is a nicely, simply decorated restaurant with a pub feeling. Lots of nice looking ladies with expensive outfits having lunch.  There is hardly any man in the whole place. Actually there was only one maybe two guys in the place. I suspect that this place have very small portions that are expensive. Eventually I find out that it is both.

I had the most expensive soup of my life in Nişantaşı. You, my friends will never know how much I paid for a cup of soup. Because it is an embarrassing amount.

My brother and Nevin came over to have dinner with us. Ayşegül and I decide that we can not afford to go out to dinner. We made fettuccine with marinara sauce and had a wonderful time laughing and reminiscing old times.