Anytime you are traveling, you are bound to get ripped off. This happened to us twice in Istanbul. Saturday for lunch we were all craving doner kebabs, and we went to a place that offered 6 Lira kebabs (that’s about $4). We decided on a kebab shop on a quiet little street corner and sat down to enjoy our meal. After ordering (the only decision we had to make was chicken or lamb) I asked to use the bathroom. The owner pointed me upstairs and I ascended into the second floor of the shop—a 10ft x 10ft room with 7 foot ceilings and three tables in it. In the corner of the room were three pieces of floor-to-ceiling plywood, one of which was on hinges and served as a door. Inside this makeshift room was a lone toilet—this was the bathroom’s restaurant. I kept thinking what if I were eating up there and someone came to use the bathroom—you could hear and smell everything. Not appetizing, but it beat the neighboring shop’s bathroom which consisted of a back room with a hole in the floor. After doing my business, I went back downstairs to our table outside. The shop owner brought out our make your own kebabs—each of us got our own plate of meat, and every two people shared the sides of a tomato/onion mixture, different sauces, lettuce and pitas. The kebabs were great, until we got our bill. The owner advertised his 6 Lira kebabs but failed to mention each of the sides costs 5 Lira! If we would have read the menu closer we would have noticed, but the owner made it seem like all the trimmings were 6 Lira total. There were shops around the corner that served 4 Lira kebabs with everything included. I was quite mad at that shop owner.
The second time we got ripped off was later that night. We went to a restaurant that had a package deal—dinner with a belly dancing show afterwards for a set price. The dinner was great, we had appetizers, wine, and a solid main course (I had lamb chops that were deliciously seasoned….yummmmm). After dinner we went upstairs for the “show”. We expected a few different belly dancers to do some sort of routine for about 30 minutes. All we got was one, surgically enhanced belly dancer who was more concerned with flirting with the single men and working for tips than actually belly dancing. The music was an old CD that skipped every once and awhile (remix!) and the loud speaker wasn’t set up properly so the music came out surrounded by static. The belly dancer just kind of sashayed from one end of the room to the other, while shaking her surgical enhancements. The show lasted for about 10 minutes.
Pictures: The bathroom at the doner kebab shop; our belly dancer
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