Winter in Istanbul: Fenerbahçe

Sunday 26 July, 2015 by Uncle Spike

When in Rome…. or Istanbul.

My wife is an avid fan of Fenerbahçe, one of our top three football (soccer) teams with a massive national following. I don’t know why I mention ‘soccer’; it’s ‘football’, a game played with a ball and feet… not a difficult concept. Anyway, let’s not start a war about that subject.

I’m not going to dwell on the football successes for fear of a painful and slow death – football is a VERY VERY serious business here. Me, I can take it or leave it, which often results in my wife staying up till all hours to ‘catch a game’, with me snoring in a cold bed upstairs.

Anyhow, Kadıköy, over on the Asian side, is often known as the Republic of Fenerbahçe. You see, not only is the team stadium based here (that’s it in the image above), the entire area is fixated on that fact, as is clearly visible after a short walk around the streets.

Even the bottle banks are in fuıll kit.

And even the harbour, where the away fans would arrive, has a certain obviosity to the local’s allegiance, with some serious graphic lettering welcoming the visitors.

There is even a team cell-phone package advertised, as well as credit cards and every other conceivable way to adorn oneself in the team colours of choice.

There was no match on that week, but I could just imagine the noise – Turkish football fans are well known for making one heck of a racket. And that’s just the girls.

Oh, and for the less well off fan, how about this one…. although this was spotted back down south actually, some 16 hours drive away from the Fenerbahçe stadium.