Arrived in the city last night and instead of spending my night in my hotel room working hard on my presentation for today, I went out to dinner with one of my colleagues and his fiance who were holidaying here. Obviously a much better call - even though it immediately meant getting up with the sparrows or pulling an all nighter...
The Four Seasons Sultanahmet and a lovely dinner in the courtyard restaurant sitting outside. Pink champagne, a respectable Turkish Sauvignon Blanc, squid ink pasta and a lovely aged sirloin... Perfect.
The Maitre D - an Australian lady (so perhaps that should be Maitresse D?) - remembered me from my last time at the restaurant and greeted me warmly enquiring after the friends I'd been with before. To be fair the last time we ended up staying 7.5 hours and drank our body weight. Twice. So it was logical she remembered such a good customer!
My colleague let on that he had spent a vast sum (around $1,000 US) on what he described as an "antique Breitling" in the Grand Bazaar. I pointed out that Istanbul's bustling indoor souq is not the most likely place to find authentic vintage timepieces... And that in fact it was known globally for being a centre for knock-off watches and copies.... He considered his purchase in light of this information and took a couple of deep breaths before pronouncing that he might not rush to get the watch valued any time soon... Ahem!
After a long day and reasonably liquid dinner there seemed little point in flogging a dead laptop so retired more or less gracefully and slept.
Unfortunately I awoke several times in the night paranoid that I had slept through my early alarm only to find it was 3am, 3.45am, 4.30am and 5.15am. When my alarm went off at 5.30 I of course snoozed it several times feeling exhausted.
Hauling myself out of bed I worked on my presentation for a couple of hours before ordering up a lovely plate of menemen (Turkish scrambled egg with onions, tomatoes and chilli) and strong black coffee.
Then off to morning and lunch meetings before the big presentation to the C-suite team of a major Turkish multi billion dollar conglomerate and its operating companies. . .
3 floors below ground I went into a super hi tech auditorium and set up my gear and sat back and waited for my audience to arrive.
About 40 CEOs, Managing Directors and CxOs arrived and then we waited for the Chairman whose company it is.... He flew up from a meeting with World Bank officials to attend the session.
I ended up speaking almost literally non-stop for 4 hours. There is barely an aspect of corporate communications I didn't cover... All standing under spotlights and no chair in sight.
It seemed to go very well and the Chairman - whom I have met before - was pleased. I was presented with gifts and shook the Chairman's hand in front of the company photographer.
After it was all over I almost collapsed from tiredness. The same driver that picked me up from the airport yesterday took me back to my hotel. He looked like a natural born killer and had muscles in places where I haven't even managed to grow fat yet and no hair - but his voice sounded like a falsetto Mickey Mouse. I managed not to laugh and thus get myself whacked by the Disney Serial Killer of Istanbul.
And now I am about to go out with friends for drinks and view an apartment which I might rent. It looks over Topkapi Palace.
Tomorrow I go to see another place near the Bosphorus University...
Soon I will have a home in Istanbul! Hurrah!
No comments:
Post a Comment