Turkey with all the trimmings

So the trip to Istanbul is just a couple of days of down time - time alone to chill, relax, wind down before I fly to the south of Turkey to meet my friends for the holiday proper.

The last time I was in Istanbul it was new year's eve four years ago, and it was cold. Grey, wet and cold.

This time the weather couldn't be more different if it tried. It's hot, sunny and dry. It's blue skies and not a cloud in sight. It's better this way.

The last time I was here I had a sticky moment with a belly-dancing lovely.

You see, me and my Best Girl Friend had come to Istanbul to escape the christmas overkill.

We'd been successfully avoiding the worst of the holidays for a couple of years by travelling to countries where christmas isn't the done thing. Morocco had been great for us, twice. Egypt had been excellent. Both had given us cold days, but blue skies.

While Istanbul didn't deliver on the weather, we fell in love with the place for many other reasons, including the friendliness of the locals.

Having visited a particular restaurant twice already (it was handy for late night food near the hotel) BGF and I ended up being invited to see in the new year there too - the owner told us it would be a special evening with good food and entertainment.

He didn't lie. The food was excellent, and there was entertainment in the form of local musicians and dancers. Alas, because of how my seat was positioned, I couldn't see much of the entertainment without pulling a muscle in my neck.

Thus, I was more than a little surprised when BGF whispered "She's coming for you, watch out".

And that's when I found a belly-dancer gyrating next to me.

As she wiggled her charms, the restaurant started to clap along to the music. I wasn't sure what to do next.

Should I stand and dance with her? Should I too clap along? Should I smile and hope it all stops soon?

I didn't do any of these things.

You see, she had on a sturdy-looking brassiere type device that had got notes tucked into it - obviously where she keeps her tips from the other customers that she had danced for. So being a brave man, and wanting to do what I presumed everyone else had done, I reached into my pocket and got out a 10 lira note.

I stood up in front of everyone, folded the note and tucked it inside the lady's brassiere.

Everyone stopped clapping.

She looked at me stunned, turned and ran off.

"What did I do?" I said to BGF.

"Everyone else just handed her the money...." she said.

Seems that I had just treated a lovely Muslim lady like a common or garden hooker, in front of the whole restaurant.

She didn't reappear. The rest of the restaurant soon got back to chatting and clapping to the musicians, but for me and BGF the mood was lost. The service from the waiters deteriorated immediately. When the time came to pay the manager, the money was received with a grunt rather than the usual friendly request to come back soon.

I walked past that restaurant this afternoon.

Well, that's a lie.

I saw the restaurant, I crossed over the road and I walked faster until it was behind me.

I'll be seeking out new eateries on this trip. Let's hope I can stay out of trouble.

The lady and the tramp

So, here’s a cautionary tale if ever there was one. It's a story that I’ve been building up to sharing with you, such is my shame.

Now, you know that if it’s something that I’m embarrassed by then it must be pretty awful, right? Well, it is. Awful and embarrassing and nasty and just plain awful.

I cringe every time I think about it.

I have only ever told one person about it, and he claimed to be very supportive. I guess he was, if you count ‘rolling on the floor laughing, clutching his sides in hysteria’ being supportive. I actually don’t.

So, it all takes place a while back. Long enough ago for me to have gotten over it, recent enough for me to still be dying a little every time I think about it.

I’d been in one of my usual haunts in Paris and had had a couple of beers.

This handsome guy came up to talk to me. He was fortyish, greying, handsome. He had a great smile and a compact yet sturdy body. "Be still my beating heart", thought I.

Turns out that he’s Italian, speaks basic French and tells me that he’s on a training course in Paris. He’s a dental technician – makes false teeth – and he’s training in a lab in the 16th. He tells me that he’s living in a shared house in the 'burbs.

So we chat – as best we can with the language barrier – and we dance and we have a good fun evening. As it gets later, we do the usual….we kiss, we have a bit of a pash and we decide that we need to take this elsewhere.

With him living out in the suburbs, I take him back to mine. We walk home from the bar, stopping occasionally to top up the passion levels. This guy is hot. He’s wearing a leather jacket, black shirt, dark jeans and loafers. He was carrying a laptop bag. Classy enough for me.

We get to mine and before we head to the bedroom he asks if he can shower.

While he’s in the shower, I have to get something from the bathroom and notice that the water is filthy. I don’t really think too much of it – those Paris streets are dirty and loafers with no socks can leave your feet dirty, right?

I also note that he is washing his underpants and socks in the shower. I don’t think this is odd, curiously enough.

So, eventually we make it to the bedroom. It’s already early in the morning and we spend the next few hours doing what you’d expect. It was dirty (in a good way), hot and passionate. I still rate this amongst the best sex that I’ve ever had.

The sex is over and it’s time for him to leave.

"Can I stay for a bit longer?" he said.

"Well, not really," say I. "It’s already 6am and I have to get some sleep and meet friends at 9.00"

"Well, maybe I can sleep here while you meet your friends?"

"That’s not really going to happen is it? I don’t know you, so why would I leave you in the house on your own?"

"OK" he said, and he went to the bathroom to collect his still-wet laundry.

"Maybe you could give me some money?" he said, as he got dressed.

"Why would I do that?" I answered, somewhat stunned.

"Because I have no money, I need to eat".

"What?"

"I have nowhere to live, I am on the streets, give me some money!" and at this point the penny dropped.

I’d been fucking a tramp.

The dirty feet, the washing of the underpants, the laptop bag filled with junk.

He was tanned because he lived on the streets. His whole story had been a lie.

Thank goodness that I only ever have safe sex.

I started to look around and make sure that nothing had been taken. I’d had some english money on the sideboard and noticed that it was gone. It was only a tenner, but still.

He caught my eye as I twigged that the cash was missing. He looked sheepish and handed me the note.

"I only wanted it to buy something to eat" he said.

And that’s when I grabbed his sorry ass and dragged it out of my apartment, furious.

In the hallway, I emptied his bag to make sure that nothing else was in there. I pulled out his pockets and checked that he had stolen nothing else.

Then I got him out of the building.

Holding him by the neck against the wall of my building, I did my best ‘macho gay’ thing. It was more Vin Diesel than Bruce Willis, but I'll live with that.

"If you are not gone from here in ten seconds I will call the police. I will kick your thieving ass and I will then call the police. If I see you anywhere near this building ever again I will kick your ass and then I will call the police".

I let him go and he dropped to the floor.

He picked himself and ran off. Really, he ran away.

I went back to the apartment and took the longest shower of my life.

In some ways this is a funny story – I mean, fucking a homeless guy is kind of hilarious, in a life-out-of-control kind of way. But it is more sad than funny. More scary than hilarious.

I told you it was a life lesson, and boy did I learn something that night.

I learnt that drink isn’t always my best friend, but equally I’m not sure I wouldn’t do the same again, given the evening that we had spent together.

I also learnt that if someone has filthy feet it’s possibly because they sleep on the streets.

Equally I learnt that I’m not a pushover. That I can handle situations. That I can be strong of body as well as of spirit when needs be.

But I also learnt that I need to calm down. To sleep around less and to focus on finding l’homme de ma vie.

A couple of weeks later I met Florida Boy. And the tramp faded into the past.

Getting preposterous on the Bosphorus*

Holidayeee! Celebraaaate!

Oh yeah, it's that time of year. Every so often I get the opening bars from the Madonna classic in my head and I know that summer vacation is here.

Such joy.

No work for three weeks.

Tonight I'm taking a flight to Istanbul and I'll be getting all preposterous by the Bosphorus for the next few days before heading to a fabulous villa on the Turquoise Riviera for a couple of weeks.

I'm guessing Istanbul will involve a whole raft of ridiculousness - a little hammam therapy, a little mosque visiting, a little bit of Topkapi palace harem envy and a spot of nocturnal Turkish bear-chasing.

No doubt there'll be a kebab and a cocktail in there somewhere too.

So, while you are all slaving away at your day jobs, think of me, cruising past the Golden Horn, enjoying the sun on my face, the wind in my hair and the view of Turkish sailors in their cute little uniforms.

Before I go, I'm going to leave you with one more post. As tales go, it's comedy, tragedy and a life-lesson all rolled into one.

It'll be with you soon.

Meanwhile, take care of yourselves in my absence. I'll try and post from the coast, but I'm not making any promises. If all else fails, I'll see you at the end of the month!

Miss me loads!

TBNIL xxx

* credit CB / Bette Midler

My mom and the BBC (that's Big Black Cock, between you and me)

Now, you may think that this post title is just there to get me loads of extra hits.  Trust me it's not, but I've no doubt it'll up the numbers somewhat.  

I don't know about my fellow bloggers, but I use Google Analytics to keep track of readership stats, etc.  I know, it's a bit OCD of me, but I like to know how many people love me.  A usual month these days sees around 2500 visits - I'm not sure if that's good or bad, but it's a treat for my poor undernourished ego.  

Anyway, that's not what this is about.

You may remember my experience with the DumbAss Yank in Brussels at the Taschen store?  Well, stupidly (or brilliantly perhaps?) I ended up in the Paris branch of Taschen with my Mom last weekend.

I was hoping that she might spot something to buy me for my birthday in there.  She didn't.

Anyway, I had my head in a lovely book of Eero Saarinen architecture when I realised that I'd lost her.  She'd left the pretty architecture and fancy hotel section of the shop and was nowhere to be seen.

And then I found her.

In the 'adult' section.

Now, not only was she in the 'adult' section, but she'd found herself a lovely copy of the 'Big Penis Book' to leaf through.

When I caught up with her, she was flush of face and not a little giggly.

"What would you do with this, bab?" she asked, opening the book to reveal a photo of a black chap with a penis that could only be described as, erm, long, thin and scary.  Really, it was hanging to the middle of his shin.

"I guess you'd wear it as a scarf" I said, trying to sound comfortable with the conversation.

"Well, I think it's awful" she said.  "But this one...." and she turned to the page that her other finger had been marking.

This second page contained yet another 'gentleman of colour' and his member.  But this time the penis was meatier.  It was less long, but what it lacked in length - and it lacked nothing in length really, but was just not as much of a record breaker as the previous offering - anyway, what it lacked in length, it certainly made up for in girth.

"I like this one" she said.  

"Right" said I, now visibly squirming.  "Let's go".

I took her for ice cream at the gelateria next door in an attempt to take her mind of the book.

As she tucked into her ice cream - she chose 'dark chocolate and cream', no lie - she turned to me with a pensive, serious look on her face.

"It's a wonder that you and your brother aren't coffee-coloured boys" she said.

I spluttered my Dulce de Leche over the shopping bags.

Sometimes I wish we could just bond over shoes.

Don't go chasin' waterfalls

While I’d been throwing some laundry in the machine, tidying the bathroom, making a drink and arranging some fancy snacks on plates, my Mother had been sitting watching the TV.

I'm not telling you this for sympathy. I'm not complaining, nor trying to make myself seem like Cinderella here. I just wanted to set the scene a little.

See, my Mom likes a bit of French TV, even though she doesn’t understand it.

She likes to watch the crappy gameshows and try to guess what the objective is. She also loves – as do I – the French version of Wheel of Fortune. Alas, she rarely gets any of the words, but enjoys shouting at the screen nonetheless.

Nonetheless, when I walked back into the living room with snacks and drinks, I was a little surprised by the scene that greeted me.

My mother was sat watching the French ‘Who wants to be a millionaire’.

Since getting back from a day pounding the hot streets of Paris, she’d taken the time to change out of her 'street clothes' and into her pyjamas. She'd folded away her clothes, taken her shoes and changed them for slippers. Alas, she hadn’t thought about changing her glasses.

So she was there, on the sofa, in pink pyjamas and oversized Dior sunglasses.

It was like a scene from Katie and Peter. Actually, she reminded me more of Ozzy Osbourne.

"Who are you trying to be?" I asked her. "The prince of darkness?"

"What do you mean?" she said, looking surprised.

"The glasses, Mom. The glasses".

At which point she realised that she’d been watching TV with her sunglasses on for the last hour.

Now, I’m a giggler and this is a trait that I get from my Mother. However, since my Mom reached a certain age, there’s always been a cautious side to her laughter. Laugh too much and she, erm, well, she 'loses control'.

And that’s exactly what happened.

Tickled by how ridiculous she looked, my Mom started to laugh. And laugh. And laugh.

She laughed to the point where she was crying, where she was gasping for breath.

To the point where she wet herself.

Yep, she pissed her pants, on my sofa.

And that’s when I started laughing too.

What other choice did I have?

What time is it? Mother time...

Yesterday was hot. I’m not complaining – Lord knows we don’t get enough warm days around here – but it was hot. Sweat-trickling-down-my-ass-crack hot. I know, you didn’t need to be told that, right?

So after a day of sweating in an office with windows that can’t be opened (because of the construction site next door), I ran home to change into shorts and a t-shirt. I had to be at the airport to collect my Mother, and if I was going to brave the RER B, it certainly wouldn’t be in my work clothes.

The RER B was as bad I had thought it would be, so, even though the quick change was a nuisance, it turned out to be a great idea. Arriving at the airport, I was happy to step out of the sticky train and into the airconditioned loveliness of Charles de Gaulle.

I say loveliness, but as anyone who has been there knows, CDG is not lovely. It is impressive and utilitarian, but not lovely.

I got to the arrivals just as my Mom’s flight was declared to have ‘landed’. ‘Posé – 19.40’, said the screen.

And then the status of the flight didn’t change.

I waited, and I waited. The Air France desk knew nothing.

An hour after the flight landed, my mobile rang.

"It’s me" said my Mother. "I’m still on the plane"

Whilst I’d been stuck in the bowels of terminal 2, I hadn’t noticed the weather outside. It had changed from hot and sunny to hot and stormy. With thunder, lightening and torrential rain. And therein lay the problem.

The aircraft was at a remote stand, and they couldn’t get the passengers off the plane and onto a bus until the risk of a lightening strike had passed.

An hour later, she called me again.

"I’m still on the plane, but it’s all ok" she said. "I have a ham sandwich, an orange juice and I can use the toilet whenever I like". Whoever said she was difficult to please?

Two hours later, almost three hours after the plane had landed, my Mother emerged from the French customs area.

I gave her a hug and the usual "welcome to Paris" and then realised that something was a bit odd. Her outfit was fine, her hair was its usual self, but the accessories….what was going on?

"Are you wearing three watches?" I said, looking incredulously at my mother’s wrists.

"Oh, erm, I suppose I am, yes" she said. "I couldn’t decide which one looked best."

"So you decided to wear all three?"

"Well, to be honest, I put all three on to see which one looked best and then forgot to choose". She said, sheepishly. "To be honest, I hadn’t really noticed it until you said".

And there we go. She’s here for the weekend.

Let the games begin.

First I was afraid, I was petrified

Last night I went for dinner with Skaterboy and a couple of his friends. The invitation seemed innocent enough, but as the evening progressed I got the feeling that I was there to get the approval (or not) of his friends. It was a bit, erm, unusual.

As we walked back to mine, I decided to ask him.

"Was I being assessed back there? Being judged?"

"What do you mean?" said Skaterboy.

"Well, I felt like Fantasia Burrito waiting for Randy Jackson to tell her that she's 'da bomb', you know?"

He laughed, as he does when he has no idea of what I'm talking about. I guess translating 'da bomb' into French didn't help.

"Well, if this is going somewhere" he said, "it's important that you get along with my friends..."

And that's when I slammed on the mental brakes. I screeched to a halt.

"If this is going somewhere?" I said.

"Well, you know, I like my boyfriends to get along with my friends."

While the idea of boyfriends seemed quite nice as we were walking home, hand in hand, through a balmy Paris evening, the reality hit once we got back to my place.

As we were getting down to business, I couldn't stop thinking about the Florida Boy. I'd missed his call while I was at dinner with Skaterboy. Given a choice between being where I was - in bed, banging the brains out of the hot frenchman - or returning FB's call, I knew that I wanted to be on the phone.

So, as I headed off to work this morning, leaving Skaterboy dozing in my bed, I realised that I had to sort this out. I had to stop this guy from thinking we were anything more than friends that fuck.

But, to be honest, I'm not even sure about the friends that fuck thing anymore. If I'm thinking of FB while I'm in bed with someone else, if I'm wishing it was him, if it's his face that I want to be seeing next to me, then surely this is telling me something.

As my DumbAss Yank friend would say, I'm a smitten kitten.

Oh boy. This should be a great moment.

So why do I feel scared?