Again a new day and the last one in İYTE. After finishing all the relevant duties, a car brought us to the city centre of Izmir. Being that close to the airport hopefully makes getting to the airport it easier for us.
The temperature’s still well above the average I’m familiar with. However, it seems that I slowly adapt to the quite different environmental conditions including not being understood well enough. Considering the kind of summer we currently have in Germany, getting used to the heat is quite insane. Improving communication abilites where possible, at least to get some tea, in turn, should be a well-thought idea and seems to work out somehow. Except for this Wednesday evening: we decided to walk along the water front, looked out for some nice restaurant, and eventually passed by one of these nice-looking seafood places. Ok, less nice-looking than clean and organised but the menu read quite well. And as I thought of having some appetisers which the menu promoted in a really tasty way, we dicided to risk it. In the end it really was risky, though.
Looking at the dishes promised something really worth the prices — price-wise, they’re all well above what we found elsewhere in Izmir. We started with some appetisers for 6 TL each, as we found out later (2 TL relates approximately 1 EUR). Quite expensive for what we finally got. Water was obviously not included as they charged another 8 TL (refill, I suppose). The cover charge was 6 TL per person. Then we wanted to eat some fish, which actually was the reason why we hung around that place. I called for the waiter and asked him how to order fish; the main dishes seemed to have nothing to do with sea or food or seafood. He explained to me that we would be charged 100 TL per kilo of (fresh?) fish and that the fish weights quite exactly 1.25 kg. Being charged by kilo is perfectly ok but not that price for that fish. So I told him that we first have to discuss and that I’ll come back on him or his colleague later. He looked like being a bit annoyed and threw the fish back into the box.
We finally decided to only have some salad for 9 TL and 19 TL respectively. Not that cheap but still not that expensive either. And it really was enough. Just in the middle of our green meal, a waitress approaches with two pices (halves) of fish, grilled and plain without any side dishes. Quite astonished I told her that we didn’t order fish but salad. She, looking quite confused, took the fish and called for the other waiter. He approached, again with the fish. I again told him that we did not order fish but a salad. Fortunately, he vanished immediately, though with a quite fierce look. From that moment on, he always looked very annoyed when passing by.
We finished our salads and ordered the bill. Something around 70 TL (including an already added tip of 10%) for a salad with some appetisers. Well done, tourists!
A photo and the name of this place with the not-so-friendly waiters will follow. By the way, they even only offered paper napkins, so really no high-class place but something with exclusively high-class prices (also food-wise). I’d guess that there are many restaurants in the centre of İzmir that offer good service and quality. So try to look out for these or maybe give me some hints? Don’t actually know when I’ll be back ™ but who knows? :)
Except the fact that I was almost knocked over by a taxi (taksi) because I just didn’t notice that something very fast approaches me just as fast, nothing else worth to be mentioned happened that evening.
Tomorrow’s the last regular day in Izmir. We’ll start preparing ourselves for Germany and try to buy some nice sweets that might help bridging the gap between 16°C and 36°C.