Well, I tend to write a lot, so I'm trying to avoid making this a super loooooong post. In late April, my wife and I traveled to Turkey and Greece for two weeks. We landed in Istanbul, Turkey, and while there we met up with Bird Lives, the TSD's resident jazz master, injector blaster and all-around great guy. I found Lloyd when looking for info on how to get a traditional Turkish shave and haircut in-country. I messaged Lloyd about it, and that is where this whole thing started. He and I traded tales, and figured out that we could trade up some blades. I took injectors that he can't easily get in Turkey, and he handed off boxes of Rapiras, Astras, Derbys and a few other very cool things. He and his wife, Aydan, helped my wife and me on where to go, and we all had some wonderful meals that are among the most memorable and best meals of my life. I have some pictures, and my wife even took some video while I had a shave and haircut from a third-generation Turkish barber. And yeah, he finished with fire in the ears, as is the custom.... yeow! I'll be glad to share the pics and stories. But there is simply too much to put in one long narrative. The videos might be worth their own post. So are details of Lloyd's self-guided tour to Istanbul's cramped shaving district, where he helped us haggle for Omega brushes. Good times! By the way, a few of you lucky fellows have some goods on the way very soon. More on that later. I wish I could have brought back something for all y'all, but our bags were about to USPLODE with all the wine, souvenirs and shaving stuff we were packing. Maybe I'll just post here over the next few days or whatever. The shaving scene in Turkey is amazing... and I'm now an Arko man through and through. So many good times. We're definitely going back, if for no other reason, to get my ear hairs singed off by a man who knows how to do it. :eatdrink004
Very Nice! This post sort of took me back 20+ years to when I was in the Navy and had a port call in Antalya, Turkey. What a blast it must have been to meet up with Lloyd! Very cool indeed! Feel free to forward me any pix you want to forward! jeffreystryker@gmail.com
Erhan Kuaför (the barber shop on the corner) http://maps.google.com/maps/place?hl=en&safe=off&client=safari&rls=en&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&um=1&ie=UTF-8&q=istanbul,+erhan+kuaför&fb=1&gl=us&hq=erhan+kuaför&hnear=0x14caa7040068086b:0xe1ccfe98bc01b0d0,Istanbul,+Turkey&cid=6934188053985296415
Thanks fellas... It's going to take a little while to get the videos posted. I think they're worth the wait, though. You can see in the first picture that I am clasping my hands. I'm so freaking nervous! I don't know why, but it was nervous making having a person shave me for the first time. You can really see it in the video. haha! Can't wait to share them... just give me a little while and they'll be posted.
I remember some years ago being in Istanbul on a business trip. I went for a haircut and a shave in a barbershop not too far from where you got yours. The barber was a very, very nice man in his early 70's, and he was really impressed that I speak some Turkish. He spoke no English, but he spoke perfect French, which was a big help to me, because I speak French perfectly also, and he noticed I was wearing a Jewish Star of David around my neck. He asked me if I was Jewish, and when I said that I am, he kissed me on both cheeks, and started to speak to me in Hebrew. (Great for me, I'm Israeli) It turned out that he was Jewish as well, and he invited me to his house for the Shabbat dinner the following evening. The next morning, we went together to the Ne've Shalom synagogue, which is near the hotel I was staying at, and near to his home. This gentleman gave me the best haircut and shave I ever had in all my life. He also sent me home with a bunch of Arko sticks.
Here's Pt. 1, the haircut. The barber was moving so fast around my head with the scissors, but it turned out to be the best haircut ever. Pt. 2 will have the shave and fire! http://youtu.be/dJ2dlyEAtz0 P.S., I'll edit and embed the video directly, if possible. (Does anyone know how to embed youtube videos here? I'm using the HTML tags to wrap the embed code, but, eh, no luck. Or at least it isn't showing up in the preview. I appreciate any help with this.)
Just copy and paste the url. No tags needed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJ2dlyEAtz0&feature=youtu.be
Wow, sounds like a great trip, thanks for the pics and video. :happy088 Probably worth the price of airfare just to meet an uber-cool cat like Lloyd.
Yo 'C'....Glad to see you're Back on the scene! Back with your friends in the cozy confines of our Den... Hey man...I know how to do the 'Fire in the Ears" business...So the next time I'm State-side, I'll have to burn a path through ear-hair, from one side of this Den to the other :shocked003 Hey man; you and 'K' were a pleasure, and I had a blast...Which one of you guys has mastered the fine art of Turkish Coffee making ?? I know you have the BEST Turkish coffee in the world...the coffee making rig...and the know-how...now it's just about practice, and drink, practice and drink :happy102 Now you'll have to post the 'Mehmet Effendi' in your SoS posts...:happy102 Thanks Bill and Jeff, for the kind thoughts and vibes...
Great photos and video, I'm looking forward to seeing the bearning ear hair. You are braver than I on that one! Glad you had such a nice time. Thanks for sharing.
Jeff, that is a great story. We found the Turkish people to be extremely gracious hosts everywhere we went. Lloyd, you and your wife were the best! We had a blast! K and I did not know the Turkish language, but my wife speaks almost fluent French as well, and that did help quite a bit as we traveled across the country. But nothing nearly as unusual as what happened to you happened to us. We had an amazing experience as we traveled from Istanbul to Ephasus. We are already trying to plan our next Turkish trip, but we're probably a couple of years away. Lloyd sent me home with a bunch of Arko sticks, and we even went into a store that was the MOTHA LODE of Arko sticks. I mean, boxes and boxes of Arko sticks on a big ol' shelf. Lloyd fashioned me up an old deodorant stick canister, which works extremely well. I know I still like my creams, but now I keep reaching for the stick. Something about that tallow-based lather and boar brush combo leaves my face feeling perfectly silky smooth unlike anything else I have tried. My face feels almost buttery post-shave in the best way possible. I'll be posting the Pt. 2 video this evening after work. I learned how to lather from just those few moments with this barber. He spent about a minute massaging my face and using the bristles of the brush to work the lather into my beard. I learned so much. I had no idea that the lathering was supposed to feel that way, almost like an aggressive face massage. Mehmet Effendi! My wife is the coffee cook, and she's making DFC now since we got the best of the best.
Wow! The inside picture of the shop looks fairly modern, but other than newer automobiles, the stree scene looks much as I remember from 39 years ago. I was a newlywed Air Force officer and was posted to Izmir for two years, and fortunately was able to take the wife along. We had a little one man with helper or apprentice barbershop across the corner from our hospital. Most of our hospital personel used that shop instead of the "BX contract" shop which was about six blocks away. From the outside it looked much like that one, but the inside was light years away. The barber used hand (manual) clippers, nothing electric but the lights which he only turned on when a customer arrived. To heat water for a shave or cleanup after the haircut he used a little single burner propane stove, mounted directly on top of a small propane bottle. It was a pleasure to get one of those relaxed haircuts with the gentle sound of the hand operater clippers vs the buzz of the modern electric types. I could not speak enough Turkish, nor could he speak enough English to carry on a real conversation, but we both knew enough to make what was desired known. I never knew about the string or fire treatments and at that point would have probably passed. From your pictures things look much cleaner now. We had a lot of horse drawn carriages operating in the city at that time, in fact there was a stand just around the corner from our apartment. We often used one after visiting our commisary(grocery store), it was close enough to walk there, and hire a carriage for the return trip with all the bags, and much easier than using the car and hoping for a convenient parking place, plus the wife liked it. Occasionally we would see small caravans of heavily laden camels going down the street, as well as flocks of sheep being driven through the city, and on one occasion we saw a flock of turkeys, yes the birds, being driven down the street. Several times a year a gypsy would come by with either a dancing bear, or a trained monkey. We were there from Sept 72 to Sept 74. One thing I remember was all the old American cars, early and mid 1950's models being used as taxies. The drivers would pull up to a stoplight and turn off the engine until the light turned green, then start and go. Driving there was really an experience, sometimes you literally had to bluff your way through an uncontrolled intersection. We had one in Izmir where I think five or six streets came together with no control, talk about a nightmare. It was a great two years, sometimes I wish I could go back and try and repeat it. It was a much more relaxed way of living.
