A WILD NIGHT IN TURKEY

My favorite vacation really was a bunch of mini vacations all rolled into one. You see I was stationed aboard the USS George Washington (cvn-73), She is a United States Navy Nimitz Class carrier. While serving onboard between the years 1999 & 2000 on our regularly scheduled deployment, we made numerous port visits to foreign ports of call, and well, from the very first one in Antalya Turkey I knew this would be a Cruise to remember.

The port visit started out like any other, long liberty lines in the hangar bay to get on a liberty boat headed to shore. Long lines and guys wearing way too much cologne to hide the locker smell and the 95+ degree weather didn’t help at all, or the ridiculous liberty policy of wearing pants and no shorts, made standing in line for 4 hours all that more unbearable. After we finally went down the ladder wells and boarded the liberty boat we headed to shore to check into the hotel and head out from there.

After checking into the Hilton we browsed the streets of Antalya visiting the markets, and window shopping for trinkets and souvenirs, we found a nice mom and pop shop to eat at and enjoyed some rather good Mediterranean cuisine. After we had our fill, we decided to go back to the hotel and head to the local beach on the Mediterranean. The beach was roughly a mile walk from the hotel so we stopped and got some orange juice to mix with the terrible vodka we picked up at the store across from the hotel. To our dismay there was no orange juice so we settled for some orange Fanta soda.

I remembering feeling like I was back in High School, sneaking some booze to a party where there was going to be none, or into the local theater back in Wisconsin. So we mixed our vodka and orange Fanta and started our walk to the beach, when we got to the beach we realized there was no sand there at all, instead we were greeted by a beach full of river rocks, which I am sure you can imagine our not very fun to walk on. So we were at the beach enjoying the nice water the scenery around us and the locals. It was a fairly hot day, and the Vodka/Fanta combination was going down all too easy, and by roughly 2pm we were all completely hammered. So we gathered our things and made the mile trek back to the Hotel, not sure if we got lost a few times along the way, but for some reason it took us 3 times as long to walk back as it did to get to the beach. When we got to the hotel we decided to get a shower and a nap and head out later to get something to eat and enjoy the nightlife.

We had learned from some locals while we were at the beach some nice hot spots to go to and headed there advice and headed out later in the evening around 11pm or so… we bounced from one hot spot to the other and were dismayed as everywhere we went all we saw was fellow sailors from the ship, and we were looking to get as far away from as many of them as possible. So off we went again to the next club and after hailing a taxi, on the busy and congested downtown streets of Antalya we asked the cab driver who spoke decent English for the local hot spot when the ships were in port, he started laughing and saying it was in an area that was on the edge of the Liberty policy the ship had set, we all agreed that it wasn’t out of it, so we went. Whizzing through the streets of downtown I realized that the cab driver had some deft skill at maneuvering his cab at breakneck speed through downtown congestion. It was then I noticed the driving shoes and gloves extra gauges, one of which said Boost on it (a boost gauge is a measurement of compressed air into an engine from a turbo or supercharger) and I realized this cab driver wasn’t driving for the fair he was driving because he enjoyed it. When we got to the club he talked to the Bouncer for us, and arranged for us to get inside and said he would be back at 4am to pick us up, I gave him a nice tip, and paid for the cab fair back to the hotel in advance, I realize there was only a 50/50 of him coming back but he seamed cool enough and shook my hand and hopped in his cab and speed off like he was leaving pit lane.

So into the club we went and to my surprise we were rather early I ordered a local brew, and was scanning the club and saw everyone drinking this crazy blue and silver can, I asked the bartender what it was and he said it was an energy drink and handed me one, I looked at the can and read the English said and it said “Red Bull” I had never heard of it but when I tasted it I immediately liked it. So I asked him what you mixed it with and he said Jaegermeister or vodka, and me being a Jaeger fan ordered 5 of them for myself and my buddies. The bartender poured 5 Jaeger shots and filled 5 glasses with red bull, I asked him in ignorance what the heck, and he poured one for himself and showed is that you drop the shot in the glass and slam it down. So we all followed his lead and proceeded to do 5 or 6 of these, getting us completely buzzed when the club was barley half full. I switched up to Red Bull and vodkas at this point and proceeded to maintain this drunken energized state I was in. Before I realized it the club was Jam packed with locals and I was out on the dance floor doing my best to attempt and dancing to Rave Euro type dance music.

We were having a good old time and before I realized it I was drenched in sweat and my buzz was gone. Chatting with some locals on the side of the dance floor after taking a break from the locals that were giving my 22 year old body a run for its money, a waitress showed up with some interesting shots, to this day I don’t know what they were but, not wanting to be rude I took the shot, and almost instantly went back to that crazy drunken energized state which words put me at a loss for, after doing a few more shots with these locals we noticed a lone girl who had moved to the center of the dance floor and was dancing at half the beat, the locals and I were cutting it up, and watching as she moved in total rhythm to the beat but at half the speed, it took me a while in my drunken state to realize that she was doing a traditional Turkish belly dance, in the middle of the dance floor. Several would be suitors attempted to garner her attention and we quickly shut down by her, as she was perfectly content to dance alone. In my utter amazement at what I was watching I believe I lost track of time and soon the cab driver showed up and helped me gather some of my friends who were not to happy as they were attempting to swoon some of the local girls into coming back to the hotel with them to continue the party.

So we left the club and apparently while in there pissed off some of the locals who had some not so pleasant words for us, and well us being sailors tossed them right back, before I knew it there was a mini brawl right next to speed racers cab, the details are kind of vague, but after landing a few solid shots to the side of some guys head and cold cocking some guy in the jaw, and seeing speed racer the cabbie body slam some guy on the stone sidewalk we all hurriedly jumped in the cab and held on as speed racer sped off before the local police arrived.

We went to the hotel and paid speed racer the cabbie again, for getting our back outside of the club, he thanked us repeatedly and hoped in his cab and sped off. Outside the hotel we were all talking about the events of the night and the ones that just took place, to my shock no one was the worse for wear with the exception of a few fat lips. We all went inside to sleep the Red Bull and Vodka off, and as I lay there in bed I couldn’t help but think, what a great way to start a deployment.