The Bosphorus Dinner Cruise

Our Cruise Boat in daylight

We’d booked an evening dinner cruise on the Bosphorus and we were excited, despite the onset of pouring rain as darkness fell. A driver came as part of the deal and I waited at the hotel door for the vehicle to come up the hill. Suddenly, a horn beeped and there he was: driving a white minibus and going down the street. I was surprised – I’d thought it was a one-way street.

We were already late and we climbed in and headed on down the hill. The bus was almost full. Once we got to the bottom, I realized I’d been right – the driver had to do some significant manoeuvring to get out of our street. Initially, I’d thought he was on his phone shouting for guidance, but soon realized he was swearing at other drivers; the entertainment continued all the way to the boat!

The boat cast off the moment we stepped on board. We were ushered to our seats in the lounge that took up most of the boat; a young couple in Turkish folk dress offered Turkish delight. The lounge was set for 100 diners, in tables of ten, on each side of a dance floor, and it was almost full.

As I sat down, I looked around – it felt like we were at a strangers’ wedding – there were families, young couples and oldies like us. The guests were of all nationalities; our table had two Chinese women and a young Turkish couple, an Indian family sat at the next table, with a woman in a niqab and her husband. Small children ran between the tables. Dinner was served quickly and it was delicious – Turkish mezes (humus, yoghurt, cheese, with bread), then a main course of chicken or fish, then a fruit dessert. We’d bought the package ‘with alcohol’ and they kept it coming until I had to tell them to stop. Like most weddings though, not everyone stopped…

The Belly Dancer

With dinner cleared it was show time and the dance floor was bursting with Turkish folk dances, performed by three couples, telling a story of courtship, marriage and bridal celebration. Towards the end, one of the ‘jollier’ guests decided she would join in. Now, these dances filled the floor and were strenuous, complex and well practiced. The intrusion proved chaotic; it took many appeals from the DJ and headwaiter before her partner would intervene.

No Turkish show would be complete without a belly dancer, and ours was no exception, as the slim, voluptuous girl gyrated embarrassingly close to several of the younger men, the audience began to lighten up.

The ‘Dwarves'

It was time for the ‘dwarves’. As silly music (think Turkish chicken dance) started, two guys appeared; they held their arms above their heads enclosed in a ‘hat’, faces were painted on the front of their T-shirts, and false arms sprung from their waists – one dressed as a guy; one as a girl. They jigged, jumped up and down, and pressed their bellies together as if kissing. Then, they launched on the audience; the ‘girl’ approached me, initially banging into me with her hip, almost knocking me off my chair. Then ‘she’ laid right over me as I tried to fight ‘her’ off. But as Carol pointed out after I’d gotten over the assault, I think she was meant to be kissing me! As inappropriate as it seemed, by the time they’d finished, pulling their hats down and revealing themselves to great applause, the whole ship was laughing.

After they’d left, the DJ played the Titanic theme ‘My Heart Will Go On’. We were cruising along the Bosphorus by now – this busy waterway divides Europe and Asia and forms the only sea link between Russia and the Mediterranean – a song from the famous shipwreck movie seemed equally inappropriate. So, Carol and I got up and slow danced. I was thinking others would join us but no; they started to clap and take photos of us. An awkward but warming moment…

The final dance

Then there was one last folk dance. More awkwardness; the inebriated woman decided to lurch forward in one final attempt. She was nowhere near as synchronized this time though and the dancers quickly neutralized her, as they switched into Turkish line dancing and encouraged the rest of us to join them – it got very crowded on the dance floor – we all did our best to follow the steps without tripping over or kicking one another.

We all finished the night on the dance floor to music requests from everywhere: Disco, Bollywood, Turkish, Russian, Techno. The folk dancers stayed to pull reluctant guests from their chairs as we each tried to learn new moves from each other. Embarrassment, awkwardness, fun and pure joy, like the best of weddings.

The Maiden’s Tower on the Bosphorus - featured in the Bond movie ‘The World Is Not Enough’