It was an outrageous luxury, a treat, a frivolous expense that we'd spent 3 days trying to justify: A genuine Turkish bath. The Hamam. We've all seen it; Michael Palin getting smothered in clouds of bubbles, countless Blue Peter presenters having buckets of water thrown at them (a natural reaction. They get that a lot).
And here in the heart of Istanbul's ancient city is arguably the most famous bath house of them all, the Çemberlitas Hamam.
The impressive bath was built by the architect Sinan in 1584. My bathroom was built by Bob 'the builder' Smith in 2009. Both have heated floors. That, though, is where the similarity ends.
The first bonus, on descending the steps into the peaceful reception area was that the kids were half price (about a tenner each), which, given that Edie only visits the wet end of a bathroom about as often as Halley's Comet visits the inner solar system, made it reasonable value.
There are 3 options for patrons - for 35TL (£14) you can relax in the bathing area, lying on the heated marble platform and soaking up the calm for as long as you like. But you're washing yourself. No one's touching you. (In retrospect this sounds very appealing). For 55TL (£22) you get a sound soaping down, scrub, massage and wash from one of the Hamami attendants. For 95TL (£38) you get all that plus a half hour massage involving oils and a table.
We spent days deliberating which option we would choose. The leaflet was keen to stress that men and women each have their own identical bathing areas, but the level of nudity seemed a little vague. Guide books talked of 'taking a bikini', so at least I had that option. The Lonely Planet guide said that you should decide on whether to strip naked only after 'gauging the atmosphere', a phrase that became something of a running joke in our family in the build up to the event. 'Why oh why didn't I gauge the atmosphere?' we would joke, imagining the possible embarrassments that lay ahead.
Opting for something a cut above blue stripe 'value range' but not as lavish as 'taste the difference', we chose the 'mid price' option.
Touching had been given the green light.
And so we parted, Jill and the girls to their soapy spa paradise, and me, on my own, being shepherded to what appeared to be a tiny Butlins chalet.
This tiny box of a room had a slim door with frosted glass, just enough room for one three quarter size bed and a little table. I was instantly taken back to Butlins in Bognor, where I had 'gigged' as a Children's BBC (ahem) 'star' back in the 90s and they had put me up in a room almost identical. If the Hamami attendant had re-appeared with a big furry aardvark on his arm, I probably could have done a glittering 45 minute set. Momentarily disoriented, the man explained with the words "change" and "lock" that this was my cue to get my kit off and use this room as my 'locker'. He handed me a tiny 'petemal' printed cotton cloth about the size of generous hand towel and graciously took his leave, leaving me to ponder Today's Big Decision.
It was remarkably hard to 'gauge the atmosphere' from inside my Butlins chalet. In for a penny, I thought and stuffed my boxer shorts with the rest of my clothes in our instrument bag. (Yes, I really had visited the ancient Hamam carrying a ukulele, a squeezebox, a flute, sundry percussion instruments and a collapsed pop-up goal bearing our Beatnik Beatles signage. It was a busy day.)
Rather sheepishly, I made my way back out onto the landing area wrapped only in the briefest of cotton tea towels, and remembered that this raised gallery overlooked the busy reception one floor down. Clinging to the wall to avoid being gawped at from below I found the old 'change and lock' man who pointed me not to a wondrous glowing doorway billowing steam and golden sunlight from around its gilted edges, but back down the staircase to reception.
Courtie you fool! You could have been sipping coffee and eating Baklava in a charming cafe, but oh no, you just had to get your clothes off in public. Idiot.
I took a deep breath and descended the stairs, nodding politely to the anorak clad crowds gathering in the reception doorway to shelter from a blustery squall which had decided to break at that precise moment. Did I mention that God hates me?
"Afternoon" I said, as if I was in the queue at the post office, and continued towards a burly looking Turk who was beckoning me towards another door.
I knew from the pictures in the leaflet what to expect. The central domed room has a large raised circular marble platform in the middle, on which bathers sit or lie gazing up at the tiny glass holes in the dome which let daylight puncture the gloom like tiny stars. Around the edge are stone arches that lead to smaller bathing rooms in which you can scoop hot water in large copper dishes and sloosh yourself down with the kind of gay abandon that would normally lead to flooding the living room below.
As I felt the humidity hit me my eyes adjusted to the dim light. The leaflet had pictured a few svelte girls, artisticly lit, stretched out on the marble platform, but I knew from countless travel documentaries that the mens section would be occupied by one or two overwheight Turks and possibly a middle aged banker or two. Today, however, the Çemberlitas Hamam appeared to be hosting the wrap party for Elite Model Agency's 'World's Top Male Model' contest. Girls, you might be surprised to learn that we men, despite our bravado and gruff exterior, do actually notice how handsome/ugly, fit/fat other men are. You know that thing all women have that makes them hate Kiera Knightley? Well it's not that bad. But it's just an unconscious thing, probably deep in our tribal instincts, that reassures us that we fit in. Or, in my case, that I didn't. About 2 dozen twenty year old lads rippled about 2 dozen washboard stomachs as I entered the arena, tensing my love handles. I didn't know what to do. It was like walking into a house party on your own but there was no kitchen to flee to. I'd been handed a yellow plastic tag at reception which was to alert the attendants to the services that I'd paid for, but no one took it from me or seemed very interested, so I found a spot on the marble platform and shuffled uneasily into the middle to lie down.
The Elite Models were, like any bunch of lads in a slightly uneasy near-naked scenario, doing all they could to prove they weren't gay. If it hadn't meant exposing themselves, they'd have been flicking towels at each other (although I did actually witness this in the showers later). They were splashing water at each other, arching their wet backs on the marble to make fart noises, some were even playfully rubbing each others shoulders, laughing in a 'wouldn't it be funny if we really enjoyed this sort of thing' way. I don't think they realised they couldn't have looked more homo-erotic if they'd thrown on a Kenny Loggins track and started playing volleyball.
I wandered over to a vacant side room and had a sloosh. I tried to catch the eye of one of the wiry old men who was washing and scrubbing a man at the edge of the big platform, but there didn't seem to be a system to who got washed and when. I sat in the stone annexe surveying the central scene of joshing and hilarity and waited. I'd found my kitchen.
Soon, I was summoned by a mountain of a man to approach the platform. He was the shape of Obelix in the Asterix cartoons and a man of very few words. "Come" he ordered, so I did. "Lie", he pointed at the edge of the circular platform, so I did. Probably out of nervousness, I tried to strike up a conversation with him as he donned a scrubbing mit and started to rub me down.
"What is your name?" I asked. His stern face remained emotionless.
"Safad"
And that's where the conversation ended because he was leaning on my chest so hard I couldn't speak. I don't think Safad was much of a talker. I was just pondering how Safad sounded like the name of terrorist splinter group, when he removed the mitt, squeezed a cotton bag of soapy bubbles over me and started his own reign of terror. In becoming a Hamami, Safad had clearly sacrificed a sparkling career as a cage fighter. What started as a vigorous rub down developed into what Safad would later call a 'massage', although the War Crimes Committee at The Hague might have taken an altogether dimmer view.
We got off to a bad start. I was on my back and Safad was pushing his rivet-gun thumbs deep into my thighs causing me such considerable pain that I was clenching my teeth, squirming and shouting 'Argh' quite a lot. Then a random man came up and started arguing with Safad. He was in some sort of dispute over the colour of his white plastic tab, and was clearly venting his frustration in Turkish to the first person he could find who worked there. Safad was having none of it, and continued to pummel my deepest muscles while arguing with this bloke.
And then it happened. I burst out laughing. It was completely involuntary. The ridiculousness of the situation I was looking up at coincided with a surprising twinge of pain from Safad's evil hands and I started laughing. The random guy looked down at me, furious. Safad was unrelenting. This made me laugh even more. I was now in that horrible place I call a 'church laugh'. My dad's a vicar, so obviously I spent a lot of my childhood in church. I also spent a lot of my childhood in whispered conversations with mates during services and know the perils of getting trapped in a 'church laugh'. It's when something funny happens exactly at the moment when you mustn't laugh. When a congregation is at its most silent, contemplating some enormous tragedy like Ethiopian famine, or the untimely death of a much loved parishioner, that is when your entire body will be aching, bursting, throbbing to explode into laughter at some private joke only you and a friend are aware of. The fact you mustn't laugh, makes it all the funnier.
The angry man tried to continue venting his spleen at Safad, who continued to pummel ruthlessly while I laughed like a drain, helpless to the situation. It was horrible. Inside I was aware what an imbecile I looked, but I was out of control. The fact the angry man may have thought I was laughing at him just made me laugh even more. The fact I so desperately wanted to stop laughing just increased the hilarity. As the disgruntled customer stormed off Safad took my mirth as a sign that I wasn't taking his work seriously and stepped up his campaign.
Now on my stomach I took deep breaths and tried to get a grip, which is exactly what Safad was doing with my feet. He was pushing them so hard into the marble that I was squirming like a fish out or water trying to find a position where my bones wouldn't be crushed to dust. And still I giggled. What the hell was wrong with me? I considered that perhaps Safad had inflicted internal bleeding and I was experiencing the euphoria that is sometimes reported just prior to death. Please let it stop.
By the time he had pushed my shoulder blades almost through my chest to touch the marble beneath, I was actually banging my hand on the wet surface shouting "I submit".
He concluded his torture with a final wallop to my back and stood back, happy with a job well done. I tenderly picked myself up and looked around. A few of the Elite Models were glancing at me unimpressed. I knew I was getting picked last for volleyball.
After being shown to a second room for more soaping of hair and slooshing with gallons of water, Safad bid me goodbye with a vice like shake of my hand. "Massage good?" he asked.
"Yes" I replied. What else could I say? I wanted to say "No. You clearly have anger issues. You hurt me, and furthermore, you appeared to take considerable pleasure from inflicting pain. You are a very bad man, Safad." But he was much bigger than me.
"You tip good" he said.
"Of course" I said
"You look" he added, not letting go of my hand.
"You find"
"Yes, yes" I urged. "I will look for you when I'm changed." Dear God let me go.
Some bloody chance I thought as I made my way back, wrapped in dry towels, to my Butlins chalet. It was weird enough that I'd endured some sort of sadomasochistic humiliation. Paying my torturer for the pleasure?! What would that make it? Too flippin' wierd, that's what. I gingerly got changed and headed for the stairs back down to reception where a cool drink and glossy magazines would while away the minutes until the return of the girls. I swung around the bottom flight and who's standing at the foot of the stairs, hot and sweating with a face like a bulldog chewing a wasp? Bloody Safad.
I pulled 10TL from my pocket and stuffed it into his volumous palm. I felt dirty. Which was ironic given where I'd just been.
And that's not the end of the story. That evening, while my shirt gaped open at the kneck, Edie said "Woah! What is that?" pointing at my chest. I looked in the mirror, and sure enough, she had reason to be alarmed. A large lump had appeared on my collar bone. It didn't hurt, but it certainly looked odd. Like all medical queries, I turned to Doctor Google for advice. What I was seeing, and what was making my entire family go 'eurgh', was my sterno-clavicular joint, where the clavical (collar bone) meets the sternum (big bone in the middle of your chest). It is held in place by ligaments and can sometimes dislocate forwards (or, rarely, backwards), usually as a result of car crashes or sports unjuries. Lots of people have visited their doctors with one clavical sticking out unsymmetrically with the opposite side only to be told 'live with it'. So I guess I will.
It is my special lump and I shall call it Safad's Trophy. He tried to break me, and medically, he did. But mentally, I'm a rock, and I fully expect to be able to bathe again in as little as a year or two.
