The Saz player ..

On my first night in Istanbul , I wanted to sit by the fire and listen to some guy play the Saz. The Saz is the traditional string instrument in Turkey and listening to it live , is as magical as hearing someone play the Spanish guitar somewhere in Argentina over a glass of wine. Well turkey has Raki to replace the wine, but the music stirs in the same euphoric feeling in me !

Being on tour and travelling with people is often very monotonous.  So drinking with a local or smoking like a chimney comes in play at times. Today when the group finished dinner and I was left with two options at 7.30  pm.. 1. Go to the room and bang my head on the wall out of boredom .. or 2. Go to a local café and bang a Sheesha (Nargile in Turkish).

After six days of being on tour and almost forgetting what I wanted to do on my first night , I came across the most amazing Saz player that I’ve witnessed in Turkey. Over the last week ,I’ve always curbed my smoking instinct because 15 TL seems a little too much to spend every night .. today however 20 TL seemed nothing.. Do I need to say more ?!

I really wanted to go ahead and clear the bill of that table on which the musician sat with his two other friends, but then I didn’t know if I would have enough cash to my clear my bill. All I could hear in those 90 minutes was music and then non stop Turkish, but i love the language and it too is music to my ears at times like these .. No , I did not understand a word of it and I was glad that I did not try and make a conversation with them ..Where I wud've had to answer the same questions about India .. what is your population ? ,What about Sharukh Khan ? etc etc .. I just sat there with the pipe to my mouth and the ears to music interrupted by random turkish.

I always smoke the Nargile till it nearly hurts my throat or I loose the appetite for it. But today I departed early .. the coal was bright and the smoke still thick.. But i chose to leave.

The musician next to me had left .. as for me ,it felt like I had just arrived in Turkey !