I made the most of my culture shock going from Allah Akbar in Morocco one morning to the next afternoon, July 4th, at Gay Pride in Leicester Square of London backstage with drag queens and, believe it or not, Boy George. Yes, one of my friends in London had connections and got us backstage passes where not only BG was hanging out but all kinds of half-naked characters. I chuckled at the fact that I had gone from backstage passes to the Gnawa Festival and famous maalemin singing about Allah to backstage with Boy George and folks singing, I can´t wait to give you Syphillis. But the most memorable of the performances at Gay Pride (and the most memorable lyrics) was the adaption of the song, I Wıll Follow Him to I Wıll Swallow Him.
Several times, my friends asked if I was okay... maybe my eyes were bugging out. It was definiıtely a hilarious but overwhelming shift, going from Allah Akbar to I Will Swallow Him... and then back to Allah Akbar when I arrived in Istanbul the next day.
The rest of the adventure here to Istanbul has been fine except for I was detained and questioned at Immigration in London for close to 45 minutes. I was a bit scared that I wasn´t going to be allowed into the country. In the end, when I started getting visibly frustrated with the Scary Intimidating Man´s questions. he let me go and said that my travel routine was suspicious... I guess meaning from two Muslim countries (Morocco and Mali) to the UK then onto another Muslim country.
The fact that I arrived in London at 11 PM meant that I was not really in the mood for all the questioning but my dear friend, Ajeeth, made up for all that when I finally got to his house, pampering me with hot tea, a fluffy bed to sleep in and an amazing breakfast the next day.
I love Istanbul. I usually do not like cities but I could definitely live here. I have had a good time walking around the city the last two days. Tomorrow, I am going to a whirling dervish sema ceremony and, possibly, taking a boat ride up the Bosphorus between the continents of Asia and Europe.
Still, I will also be glad to get away from the tourists when I fly to the NE on Wednesday.
I should say that my last day and night in Essaouira was very moving and tearful. A couple really interesting coincidences made me feel like there was something much bigger at work than just me and my plans. I will write about that later. I am still just trying to get my head around the fact that I won´t be seeing any of those beloved people again for a long, long time...
