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SEPTEMBER 2012
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HEMISPHERESMAGAZINE.COM
THREE PERFECT DAYS
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ISTANBUL
BOARDING PASS
Want to go hunting for treasures in Istanbul’s sprawling Grand Bazaar, take in the city’s centuries-old art and
architecture and soak up views of the legendary Bosporus? United can get you there with direct service to Turkey’s largest metropolis from
our U.S. hub in New York/Newark.
Go to united.com to book your flight and get detailed schedule information.
large bowl of them, you’re feeling pre y
dolmuş
yourself.
A visit to Istanbul would be not be com-
plete without a trip to a hammam, so you
spend your a ernoon back at the opulent
Çırağan Palace Spa
reclining on a warm
marble slab and being scrubbed to within
an inch of your life. By dinnertime, you
are so clean as to be practically squeaking.
Having changed into something a li le
sleeker, you squeak down the stairs to
join the city’s vehicular squeeze along
Çırağan Caddesi to the waterfront bars
and clubs just north of Ortaköy. Your
destination is
Sortie
, a ritzy open-air club
containing seven restaurants, a dedicated
yacht dock and space for 6,000. Seated on
a plush couch and picking at sashimi hors
d’oeuvres, you watch stylish Istanbullus
dance and sing along to Turkish pop and
international technowhile awaiter contin-
ually replaces your half-empty champagne
glass with a fresh, frost-covered one. “You
really don’t have to do that,” you say, but
he insists that he does. He is also, appar-
ently, compelled to offer you a ride on the
Bosporus in Sortie’s own speedboat.
And who are you, in a town like this,
to decline?
Hemispheres
senior editor
JACQUELINE
DETWILER
kindly requests that someone
bring her a fish already.
THAT’S RICH!
Prices rise steeply just outside
Istanbul’s iconic market
While haggling in
the Grand
Bazaar
can be a
dizzying
affair, it’s
nothing
compared
with the high-
stakes game in
play just beyond
the Nuruosmaniye
Gate, one of its
busiest entrances.
Less than a minute’s
walk from the bazaar, on the
relatively quiet, tree-lined Nuruos-
maniye Caddesi, you’ll find shops
that deal almost exclusively in
goods bought by the kinds of travel-
ers who have their own customs
agent on retainer.
Take Sevan Bıçakçı, a jewelry
boutique favored by everyone from
Catherine Zeta-Jones to Lady Gaga.
It showcases rings in which scenes
are cut and painted in bas-relief
inside massive precious stones (typi-
cal price tag: $10,000–$20,000) and
mesh bracelets held together with
tiny dagger-shaped clasps. Nearby,
you’ll find Sofa Art and Antiques,
whose carefully curated collection
includes gold-leaf Islamic calligraphy,
Russian Orthodox icons and mosaic-
patterned ceramics.
Finally, there’s Orient Handmade
Carpets, which employs weavers who
work so single-mindedly that some
of them finish only 30 to 40 pieces in
their entire career. As you might be
able to afford just one or two of their
creations in
your
entire career, you
would do well to bargain wisely.
TABLE FOROOH
A view
from Sortie, where members
of Istanbul’s smart set
romance each other