The bigger girl from the group of four must be the older
sister, ringleader or simply has more confidence than the others.
Sitting outside the café, we notice that she sticks her hand
out first to the group of smartly dressed men sitting opposite us. In her hand is a packet of Kleenex tissues. The men ignore her for a couple of minutes. I have to admire their tolerance as I watch from another table. The rest of the
girls are eyeing up the half-eaten cake, making motions with their hands at the
cake then up towards their mouths. No words are really spoken, just verbal gestures.
Eventually a packed of tissues is sold and a few coins
dumped into the bigger girl's now empty hand. The rest of the girls have sweet caramel sauce now coating
their fingers and the cake plates are empty.
Then, out of nowhere two burly men appear. Dressed in plaid
clothes but with matching camel coloured vests, one of them seizes the bigger
girl by the arm. The other girls have started shrieking. The bigger girl is
dragged out into the middle of the pedestrian only street. Two of the other
girls follow her. One isn’t sure what to do and hides behind an empty café
chair, perhaps weighing up her options.
At the same time, whilst this is all happening we notice
that out on the street two guys who were initially selling perfume from their
backpacks have ‘exited stage left’ up a staircase next to a women’s clothing
store. One minute they where making quick sales, the next they’ve gone with the
blink of an eyelid.
One of the burly men is on what looks like a walkie-talkie.
I’m wishing that right now Shazam had an app where you could point your phone
to the person speaking and it could directly translate what they are saying
(with a high volume, as we are sitting far away). Nevertheless between us three we’ve already started
speculating what that conversation might be.
We notice that the little girl
who wasn't with the others decides to reunite herself back to the group and is standing
with them, watching and waiting to see what will happen next. Just like us. The
burly man hasn’t let go of the bigger girls arm this entire time.
A large blue unmarked Ute turns up. All four of the girls
are loaded inside. One of the burly camel vested men has a short chat to the
driver, then they are all gone. The Utes drives off. The burly men leave. The
perfume sellers return with backpacks to the same spot like nothing happened.
The smartly dressed men have left their table. The three of us turn to
each other, sit back in our seats, pick up our shitty lattes and comment how someone should recommend people
watching from the tables outside Starbucks on Istiklal Street for every visitor
to Istanbul.
Toodle pip x
PS the following photos are not, I repeat not related to the above written content. Shame.
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| Çay anyone? |
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| Loving the 'Bye Bye' message. |
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| Ferry chaos. |
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| Galata Bridge fishing. |
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| Siesta time. |
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| Prince's Isl: Heybeliada. |
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| Ottoman/Victorian style architecture. |
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| Clash of old v. new. |
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| 17 million people in Istanbul. Small? |
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| Aquarium 'beach.' |
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| Sultanhamet at sunset. |
