thieves/internet

I have one piece of fantastic news - my neighbors and I jerry-rigged an ethernet cable from their apartment to mine (through the window - it's awesome), so now I have internet at home. I don't have the Turkish to be able to express to them how much this means to me. Now you can bother me at any hour, day or night!

My other news is more sobering, perhaps. First, the backstory - my first week here, I met two nice Americans: Anil and Emily. They were stopping in Istanbul before touring more of Turkey. We had some drinks, and talked a lot. Anil wrote me this week saying he was back in Istanbul (though Emily had to go home, unfortunately). We met this evening for dinner and more drinks. We went to a cozy little bar in Beyoglu that was full of normal looking young people (all Turks). I put my purse and jacket on the seat next to me, as I always do, but at some point I think my purse fell on the floor (in a corner) and I was straining to hear Anil over the music so perhaps I wasn't paying as much attention as I should have. At one point, Anil said, "are you missing anything? I think that girl just walked by and took something." I looked, and lo and behold, no purse.

Without thinking, and with adrenaline surging through me like a mother protecting her children, I stormed out of the bar onto the street, which was filled with people sitting outside having beer and cigarettes. They were all watching. I looked for my purse and saw it in the hands of this girl who was walking with her friends. I guess she saw me, because she walked over to the corner, dropped the purse, and continued along as if nothing had happened! I ran to my bag, checked it to make sure my wallet was there (it was, nothing taken) and then ran up to her and pulled on her shoulder, yelling HEY! (the only thing I could come up with to say - I need to learn some swear words in Turkish). I've never fought anyone before, but believe me I was ready to, pardon my French, kick the living shit out of that bitch. I was ready to pull her hair and punch her, if necessary. I could have, too - she was probably half my size, and her stupid friends looked pretty tame. They were definitely not professionals. Plus the whole street was watching at this point, and I had a feeling Anil had followed me outside (he had). The group of girls looked at me with their stupid pouty expressions like I was the one who'd done something bad, and I huffed at them in disgust and walked back to the bar, shaking.

So that was my adventure. I was lucky. I am always careful, but clearly tonight I wasn't careful enough. I'm so glad I had an extra pair of eyes there. When I got home, Kramer opened the door as soon as I walked in the building (as always) and helped me get the cable through the window. What a place!