Whirling Dervishes
Monday 11/16/2009 11:09 AM
On our last night in Istanbul, we went to see a Mevlevi Sema ceremony (whirling dervish) at Hodjapasha Art & Culture Center. I'd been warned that tickets might be hard to come by, so I reserved them online a couple of weeks before we left Podgorica. As it turns out, we had front-row seats for the ceremony. The Mevlevi is one of the most well-known Sufi orders, founded in the 13th century after Rumi's death. The idea, as I understand it, of the ceremony is for the dancers (who train for 1,001 days, by the way) to come closer to god through the meditative spinning.
The Center itself is sort of tucked away on a side road off the main tram road in Sultanahmet. We found our way there easily enough though, thanks at least in part to the numerous people who offered directions as we were headed there. We arrived early to secure (ie: pay for) the tickets we'd reserved online and then waited around about 45 minutes for the ceremony to begin. Alex was pleased to discover that there was apple tea and Turkish delight available for us to consume while we waited. After a while, as the waiting room filled up with people, we decided to go outside for some fresh air. Here's Alex waiting patiently on the curb outside the center:
Once the main hall opened for us to take our seats, I snapped a few pictures of the place. The lighting made it difficult to get a good shot, but this was the best I could do:
Meanwhile, Alex was jazzed on too much Turkish Delight:
The audience was supposed to remain absolutely quiet and not take pictures during the performance. Miraculously (due at least in part to the good-natured threats of the German woman sitting next to him), Alex behaved beautifully through it ... much better than several of the other audience members who took photos (sometimes with the flash!) and, worst of all, a few people away from us in the front row was the man loudly READING the brochure explaining the ceremony (which was given out when you picked up your tickets before the ceremony) to his wife DURING the ceremony. Thoroughly frustrating ... I actually shushed him a couple of times and then tried to just tune him out when it was clear he was ignoring me. Despite his rudeness (yes, I'm hoping that he might somehow happen upon this page), both Alex and I were able to enjoy the ceremony. I bought some postcards with photos of the dancers in action afterwards and tried scanning them in to show you. The scans didn't turn out very well at all, but here are a couple of them to give you an idea:
Alex struck a few Sema poses in the lobby afterwards and was literally spinning through the streets of Istanbul on our way back to the hostel:
It was an excellent way to spend our last night in Istanbul. You can read more about the Sema ceremony and Mevlevi order at the link of the day, if you're interested.
Permalink | Comments | Trackback