The beginning was like all love affairs are

Istanbul - What would be the right way to describe that city?

Arriving after dark I got the urge to walk those narrow streets, winding their way upwards. Not even the rain could turn the excitement off - instead it lured me into a love affair that would last for seven days and seven nights.

The beginning was like all love affairs are: Wild and exciting, promising, mysterious. I admired all that for me was new - my appetite seemed endless.

Like all love affairs that start off being wild and exciting, promising and mysterious, also this one came to its end. After five days and five nights it started to dawn on me: what attracted med like a cat to a bowl of cream was the feeling of having found something different, a jewel that glimmered in a different way than the other ones, reflecting its shine in my eyes.

The end was bitter, like in all love affairs that end after only seven days and seven nights of heat. Yet no hard feelings were left to linger. I knew it was because of the fact that we were too different, from two different worlds, strange to each other. And as Istanbul was a stranger to me, was I a stranger to Istanbul.