Here are two of the pro arguments I’ve gotten. I don’t have much of a response to these, but thought I’d throw them up anyway to thank you guys for engaging on this topic.

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All that remains of three intertwined snakes made from melted bronze trophies captured from the Persians.  Istanbul does seem to be full of captured monuments.

Here’s the second counter I’ve received to yesterday’s post.

Tell “Americans” to stop being such assholes when they travel the world and the problem will be fixed.

Read the full comment and my response after the cut.

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Not surprisingly, my most recent post got a lot of comments. Also not surprisingly, they came in two varieties. I wanted to respond to them promptly. Here’s the first counter.

“Sorry, but you kill that many innocents and basically give a unilateral finger to the world for that long people are gonna be pissed…”

Full comment and response after the cut.

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Whilst enjoying a nice beer before jumping on a bus from Sofia back to Istanbul, Rob and I learned something very interesting about our names.

Serene can be translated two ways:
1. Cheese
2. Shit (the act, not the product)

Rob, on the other hand, only has one translation: slave.

Sweet.

Stop being such assholes to Americans, it’s getting old. Serene and I are here in Sofia, a charming, lovely city full of wonderful people–except for the large number of people that have given us the stink-eye and cold shoulder when they find out we’re American (we hung out with a French girl for awhile, and she definitely got off easier). There have been a notable number of too-cool-for-school hipsters at some of the cafes and hostels who have been rude to us off the bat, sometimes even before we open our mouths. Cut it out.

It’s not just Sofia (although it seems more prevalent here) I get this all the time, regardless of where we are– Japan, Vietnam, Korea. Take Turkey, for instance, where anti-American protests are basically a daily fact of life. Amid the accusations that Americans are baby murderers and racist trolls is a complete disregard for the absolute atrocity that seems to occur in Turkey on a daily basis. The suppression of unpatriotic speech, racial oppression and the disappearance of political dissidents are only some of the country’s problems– but like everyone else, it’s much easier to blame a scapegoat than reflect on yourself.

The US is an easy scapegoat, and we’ve done a lot of stupid things in the world. But just so you know, when you judge me for being American, you’re send a much more powerful message about yourself and your own ignorance.

I have not seen a single riot or protestor.  While Rob, Brian and Serene have molotov cocktails and tear gas launched at them, I sit in my nice air conditioned office in Sultanahmet reading about protests.

I too have been living vicariously through Jet Set Zero this past week.

Rob goes into work one day and sends me a quick message letting me know that Taksim is preparing for riots.  So what do I do? Pack a little camera and head out the door with no idea what to expect.  Here’s how my day went:

- Hop on a bus from our apartment down to Taksim

- Surprise!  Oh hey, the buses aren’t going to Taksim because of the riots, walk up the hill. Note:  I have a horrible sense of direction and figuring out where I was actually going was an adventure within itself.  My method included following the woman in the purple shirt who kind of looks like she knows where she’s going.

- Walk up the hill to find that every single glass has been broken on the bus stops, there are piles of trash ablaze in the middle of the streets, and people are walking around covering their mouths and noses with tears in their eyes.

- Finally get to Taksim to find that yes, there is indeed a riot going on.  The police keep running back and forth along the small corridor on which Taksim rests, chasing very loud and very passionate protesters.

- I kept my safe distance from the protestors and police, but keep trying to get the camera to work so that I can actually see something.  Trying to get close resulted in me almost getting knocked in the head by a tear gas canister.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how I ended up with my horrible, shaky, “Serene is obviously not a good cameraman” video below.  Yeah, when you see the camera go down and out for a second, that was the aforementioned tear gas canister landing about three feet to my right.

Thus far, I’m having a very interesting initiation to Jet Set Zero.

More from the protests.  They’re all wrapped up at this point.  No more tear gas and all the windows have been repaired.

The final day saw a lot of police, a lot of heavy vehicles, a lot of cameras, and much less violence.

Adding to the overall intense and eerie scene at the protests was a police helicopter that would slowly circle over the streets as the riot police moved through the alleys.