The T1 tram line in Istanbul starts at the seaside in Kabatas, near the Besiktas football stadium, nestled between the blue shimmers of the Bosphorus and the apartment-covered hills that rise to Taksim Square.
Once you get on board the narrow tram with its large windows, it’s a slow-paced highlight reel through the city, winding along the water until it enters Istanbul’s old city. After passing from the Spice Bazaar to within sight of Topkapi Palace, Aya Sofya and the Blue Mosque, the route’s remaining 15km goes deep into the vast and historic Fatih municipality.
The tram is almost always packed, but I used to jump on board at the first stop each week, nabbing a prized window seat to watch Istanbul close-up as I let my thoughts roam.
And one of them in particular stuck with me. Although an American, and then in my early twenties, I held on to the idea that if I had a daughter, she would some day also come to know these streets.
I would sit with her on this tram, showing her the restaurant in Sultanahmet where her father got his first job playing guitar.
Or we’d be on the 154 bus, and I could show her where to sit to catch the perfect peekaboo view of the Bosphorus descending down Sariyer’s green hills, like I used to during my term abroad at Koc University.
Or I could take her up to the top deck of the Besiktas-Kadikoy ferry, which crosses between Europe and Asia, complete with a view of the sunset splashing orange and pink over all Istanbul’s Ottoman minarets. Red Turkish tea in hand, I don’t think anyone could ever get tired of that view.
Adulting in Istanbul left a strange mark on me, as if I had come to truly know myself (and the world) while living there, and I’m not sure if that feeling will ever fully fade away.
I approached Istanbul with the enthusiasm of an overachieving student, fascinated by the visible history and the many cultures that left their marks on the infrastructure, the food and the language. Many joyful nights were spent watching (and sometimes joining in with) my husband’s band playing into the early hours, followed by those wistful early-morning tram rides.
It’s the place where I landed my first job. It’s where I got married. But life has its way of moving you around.
My daughter Leyla (spelt the Turkish way) was born in Seattle, with snowy Mount Rainier visible from the hospital room. Applying for my husband’s spousal visa brought me back to the US.
Leyla spent her first months acclimatising to the cold Seattle spring, with us lighting the fire into May to keep the house temperature baby-friendly. She felt the rain, saw the abundance of green, and slept through the early darkness of north-west winters.
We didn’t use public transport in Seattle, but we took daily walks near Puget Sound, Leyla always in a bundle, and watched the sun set over the water and behind mountain crests. She was a real Seattle girl – loved the cold, wore second-hand clothes and was notably independent even as a one-year-old.
Leyla is now a toddler in Abu Dhabi, where she has learnt to embrace the heat. But before we moved here I got to fulfil my dream of seeing my daughter in Istanbul.
While most dreams tend to disappoint when they become a reality, this one was enthralling. I was no longer the 20-something that traded sleep for live music, but I was still the curious history-lover who felt immense joy seeing Leyla’s tiny feet walking alongside Byzantine walls.
While my husband rightfully complained about pushing her stroller up cobblestone hills, for me these impracticalities were overshadowed by the kindness of strangers who helped us load her onto buses, or who showed no shyness in pinching her cheeks and telling her “mashallah”, how sweet she was. Istanbul is big, and it’s chaos, and I realise parenting there must come with a good amount of headaches, but the city will always have a part of me.
Each stage of life brings its habits and rituals and I’m appreciating the routines I’ve established here with Leyla in Abu Dhabi, where life took us next. I cherish our calm after-work canal walks or practising the Arabic she learns at school together. But it is fun to know that should the need arise, I could wake up one morning, jump on a plane with Leyla and be on a Kadikoy ferry in just a five or six hours – and back home in Abu Dhabi just the next day.