Mike Dunphy examines the top ten biggest wastes in the city.

1) Water
It’s ironic the World Water Forum is being held in Istanbul, a city that splashes about the aqua  as if the reservoirs contained Noah’s flood despite repeated suffering from drought.   Might not the recurring water cuts beg the question: Does the asphalt in front of every shop really  need to be irrigated? If only they had a better system for collection the torrents of rain gushing down the streets this winter. If they can pump oil and gas, why not water? I’m sure Izmir would prefer not to have to decide between arsenic and surviving.   
2) Packaging
Perhaps it’s the lack of Christmas here that accounts for Turks’ love of excessive packaging. Bereft of mountains of gifts under the tree, Istanbulus appear to satisfy the innate human desire to unwrap retail life.  Cookies, tea bags, utensils and even individual sugar cubes are double, even triple wrapped like matryoshka dolls.  Getting to the proverbial tootsie-roll center may require the patience and skill of an archeologist. What’s more, the scarceness of public bins ensures much of the debris ends up on the street. 
3) Bagging
Paper or Plastic? In Istanbul, you’ll get plenty of both, whether you want it or not. No one
seems to recognize the ridiculousness of throwing a single tube of toothpaste in a bag,
capable of a hundred more or bagging a single simit first in paper then in plastic. Although their clothes appear to contain pockets, there is obvious aversion. Do bags increase social status? Possibly, since even turning down a bag often earns a bemused,  dog-staring-in-the-gramophone-horn tilt of the head, after which they’ll just bag it anyway. 
4) Littering
I’ve always been fascinated with the readiness of Turks to open their veins for love of their homeland and at the same time thoughtlessly throw garbage on it.  Stand on any major street corner and watch the multitude of cigarette butts, food refuse and packaging flinging from car windows and pedestrians. You may even witness the heartwarming imagine of a mother demonstrating it to her children; better let the schools take care of it. 
5)  Man-power
I don’t want to knock anyone giving out jobs these days, but surely I don’t require six
waiters attending me at a restaurant.  The same goes for those creepy sales assistants tailing me at the mall and the road crews at the barber shops.  Why not put them along with the street denizens to much better use picking up the mountains of garbage throughout the city, a national spring cleaning to polish the city’s image for the big to-do in 2010.
6) Time
Whether you’re trying to get your residence permit, an internet connection, a package at the post office or are stuck in strangling traffic snarl, time flies in Istanbul but you’re not having fun.  It’s worse yet for people of ambition who hear opportunity knocking but can’t get to the door in time. It’s best to just get rid of your watch and install the newest version of ‘Snake’ on your phone. Otherwise, you’ll go mad watching the seconds waste away.   
7)  Istiklal
The day I landed in Istanbul, the destruction of Istiklal began.  My first lovely stroll down 
the cobbled, past the street sellers and trees (Yes, I did say trees) let to a host of construction vehicles in Tünel about to tear up the street.  “Surely just repairs,” I thought.  But it became apparent to everyone that they meant business.  The following year witnessed one example of ineptitude after another, multiple pavings and even whispers of the Chinese mafia.  Someone needs to get tarred and feathered.
8) The Bosphorus
Once I lived in Ortaköy, a geographic hop, skip and a jump from Taksim. Yet a five-o’clock  bus ride could easily turn into a 2-hour torture session.  No glutton for punishment, I eventually settled on a round-about route to Eminönü and onto one of the just 3 rushhour boats there. Problem is, in Istanbul, every hour is rush hour, weekends included.   Also, Why not more from Kabataş now that it’s connected to the metro? Would not more intensive use of the city’s super highway alleviate the log jam on the Bosphorus road? 
9) Parks
If Ambrose Beirce’s Devil’s Dictionary had a Turkish edition, the definition of ‘park’ would certainly read something like, “An obligatory urban accent that thwarts economic
opportunity.”  Most of Istanbul’s parks contain less of their inherent nature than any other city I’ve visited.  Concrete, the dominant ingredient, seems to account for most of the topography,  while bushes, grass and trees are regulated to a pesky garnish.  The exception, Yıldız park, has been virtually left to rot as if in retaliation for its waste of prime Bosphorus real estate. Waste is certainly in the eye of the beholder.  
10) History
 I have a sneaking suspicion if Istanbul’s tourist sites didn’t bring in the kind of revenue they do, Topkapı Palace would become the new Reina.  Construction companies usually dread uncovering anything that might hold up construction and are suspected of willfully
destroying finds to keep the cement mixers churning.  But it’s those sad old wooden houses withering in their ‘preservation’ before my eyes that truly gives me that feeling of hüzün, so familiar to any Turk, expat or otherwise.