One dark winter evening, during my trip to Istanbul two years ago, returning after a day’s trip to the Asian side of the city, I walked past an attractive little coffee shop in one of the slopy streets around the Egyptian Bazaar, and a barista smiled and waved welcomingly through the window. I didn’t get a chance to visit the place that time, but made a mental note of it. Then the pandemic began, and it took me longer to get back to Istanbul than I’d expected.
This time, two year later, the cafe even was on my list, but so were many other things, and I thought I wouldn’t get round to it. Then, on the morning of my flight home I went to a post office, just following a local’s verbal directions rather than using a map, and on my way back to the hotel, passing by a cosy-looking coffee shop, I thought that I wanted another sahlep before I left. The rather cold and rainy weather was just right for this warming typically winter drink, and so I went in. Only after I’d made an order and sat comfortably at my table did I realise that I was in that very cafe, Bab-i Ali 1554 Kahve in Ankara street, which I’d passed by on 2 February 2020.
There was something magical about the atmosphere indeed. The friendly and relaxed man and young woman serving me. The cat they were feeding. The customers dropping in and looking like regulars. The desserts on display, the interior, the quiet music. On my table there was a catalogue of the Kütahya ceramics exhibition at Pera Museum, which I’d visited two days before. Oh, and the sahlep they made me was definitely the best I’ve tried so far.
