İstanbul, rebuilt in sound

Seventeen everyday sounds of İstanbul, rebuilt from scratch in your browser: the street vendors, the ferries, the tea glasses, the call to prayer. Ten of them are played to you, and you name each one.

Ranks, from lowest to highest: Turist, Misafir, Kiracı, Komşu, Yerli, İstanbullu.

The sounds of İstanbul

• İstanbul ferry horn. City Lines ferries have crossed the Bosphorus since 1851, and the whistle marks every departure.
• Bosphorus gulls. Yellow-legged gulls follow the ferries, waiting for the simit passengers throw from the deck.
• Transit-card validator beep. The İstanbulkart reader beeps once, and the pitch drops a fourth. The old Akbil sounded much the same.
• Simitçi street call. Simitçis carry trays of sesame rings on their heads and call out as they walk.
• Bozacı night call. On winter nights the bozacı walks the streets calling “Boo-zaa”, selling a thick fermented millet drink.
• Hurdacı / scrap-collector call. Scrap buyers crawl through the neighborhood in a pickup, calling through a megaphone for old metal, broken fridges and anything else you’ll part with.
• Fish-market vendor chorus. At Karaköy and Kumkapı, fishmongers shout their prices over each other from dawn.
• Ezan / call to prayer. The call to prayer rings out five times a day from thousands of minarets, each a little out of step with the next.
• Ramadan sahur drummer. During Ramadan, drummers walk the streets before dawn to wake people for the sahur meal.
• Tea glass & spoon. Tea comes in a tulip-shaped ince belli glass, and the spoon rings against it as you stir.
• Okey tiles being shuffled. Okey is played with 106 tiles in every kahvehane, and each round starts with the noisy shuffle.
• İstiklal nostalgic tram. A restored early-20th-century tram runs the length of İstiklal Avenue, ringing its bell at the crowds.
• Pigeons at Yeni Cami. The square in front of Yeni Cami at Eminönü is known for its huge flock, fed with seed sold on the spot.
• Coppersmiths hammering. In Bakırcılar Çarşısı, next to the Grand Bazaar, smiths still hammer copper trays and pots by hand.
• Dolmuş tout calling the route. At the Taksim dolmuş stop a tout chants the route, “Kadıköy, Kadıköy!”, until every seat is full. Dolmuş means “filled”: it leaves when it is.
• Shoe shiner. Shoe shiners carry ornate brass boxes and rap the brush against them to call customers over.
• Kokoreç chopping. Kokoreç is grilled lamb intestine, chopped with two blades on a hot griddle. You can hear the rhythm from down the street.

How the sounds are made

None of the sounds are recordings. Each one is rebuilt with the Web Audio API in your browser and tuned against field recordings. Katman started as a research instrument, the Lab, which runs 3AFC and ABX listening tests on what a sound memory keeps when the recording is gone.

Play İstanbul (needs JavaScript and sound). Other cities: New York.