Turkey Turkey Turkey!

I can’t believe that we only have two more ports, and in four weeks I’ll be back in Boulder! It’s crazy how so very fast this is going! On Tuesday morning, we arrived in Istanbul, Turkey! This was probably one of the ports I was most excited for. I can remember learning about the Hagia Sophia my first year in Art History, and I hoped that I would someday get to visit it! Well on Tuesday I got to do just that! I managed to get on an SAS tour of Byzantine Art at the last minute, and I’m so glad that I did because it was probably the best tour I’ve done so far. We headed to the Golden Horn (or Old Town) stopped quickly at the City Walls built during the Roman Constantinople. Then we headed to the Kariye Museum, formerly the Chora Church, which means “Church of the Holy Savior Outside the Walls” because it used to be in the “countryside.” Pretty nifty name I think ha ha. This church has some very impressive mosaics, made from various stones and gold leaf. We next went to a mosque affectionately called Little Sophia, and here it began to rain… like hurricane rain. When we arrived, we couldn’t go inside righty away because they had just begun a prayer time, so we ate lunch under some tents outside by the fountain and drank Turkish tea. I have to admit that I was a little nervous to go into the mosque, having never been to one I wasn’t sure how the process would go. However, I found it to be very comfortable. We had to remove our shoes at the door and cover our heads with scarves, it wasn’t required to cover our heads because we were visitors but our guide said it shows respect… anyways, the carpet was very soft and the interior was absolutely beautiful! After a while we headed outside, and one of the professors suggested that we take a small detour to another mosque before heading to the next scheduled stop. The second mosque, I can’t remember it’s name, was even more impressive; and after the visit, our guide took us to an old building across the street which provided an excellent view of that mosque and it’s unique graveyard, and the Bosphorus. We then walked to the hippodrome by the Blue Mosque and looked at the Obelisk of Theodosius, and the Serpentine Column. Our next stop was the Basilican Cistern, which was AWESOME. I don’t know how I can explain this place in a way that will make it sound as cool as it truly is. You walk down some very steep stairs to this 16th century cistern made from brick with marble columns. There is probably a foot or so of water on the ground, and some even drips from the ceiling. We walked on these sort of bridge things around the cistern in almost total darkness. They use the space for art exhibitions, so there were some not so impressive modern art pieces scattered around in the water, which were kind of distracting, but oh well! In one of the corners there are sculptures of the face of Medusa on the bottom of two columns, which are huge… and honestly, kind of random to me! I mean the cistern was used to hold water, some 100,000 tons of water storage, and so they put these fantastic sculptures there? Hmmm… our guide didn’t really explain why they were there, he just pointed them out. Anyways, we next went to the Hagia Sophia that has been turned into a museum of sorts, basically it’s not a mosque or a church, it’s just sort of there. It has the largest dome in Istanbul and these huge medallions with Arabic writing that sit just below the dome. It was absolutely amazing to finally be there! Next we went to a mosaic museum and on the way we walked past the Blue Mosque again… at this time there was another call to prayer, and the feeling of being near that huge mosque with the prayer call and criers playing over the loud speakers was very surreal. I have no idea what they were saying but I suddenly felt like I was in an entirely different world, and we truly were. After the stop at the museum, we went to a building that had several fancy shops in it to wait for the bus. The sales people were very nice to let us stay in there with the wonderful AC and even offered us some apple tea (I found the Turkish people to be extremely hospitable). We got back to the ship around 6:30 and were exhausted, so we ate dinner on the ship and went out to Taksim Square, the more “hip” part of the city, and drank some more tea.

On Wednesday, I joined my friend Kari for another SAS tour that went to four palaces and the Asian side of Istanbul. Among them was the Dolmabahce Palace which was the second residence of the sultans until 1923… this thing is huge! It sits right on the Bosphorus and is elaborately decorated inside and out. There are probably 20+ crystal chandeliers that couldn’t even fit in my bedroom by themselves… it was absolutely nuts! The other palaces were similar in over the top decorations. Seriously over the top, I think I could buy a house with one of the doorknobs! I must say that the strangest thing I’ve experienced so far happened at the last palace, the Kucuksu Palace I believe. So we were warned about these crazy toilets called “squatters” but I had yet to see one. Basically it’s just a hole in the ground, but not like a dirt hole… oh no, there is porcelain and tile all around them, ridged places for your feet so you don’t fall, and a handy bar to hold on to. Imagine the rest for yourselves… I did not enjoy this. The Asian side of Istanbul is surprisingly different from the European side in that it is much more residential and just calmer overall. I think I could see myself living there! Ha ha I know it’s pretty far from CO, but it was awesome!

On Thursday Kari and I slept in and then headed to the Grand Bazaar for pretty much the entire day! The Grand Bazaar is absolutely insane. It is the biggest covered market in the world, with 4,000 shops and probably a million salesmen that all want to help you spend your money, and that are not too shy to tell you that you should be spending your money at their shop. It’s crazy, absolutely crazy. Soon after walking in, Kari and I were pulled into a scarf shop, given some apple tea, and had several scarves picked out for each of us. We probably stayed there for 30 or more minutes just looking at scarves, we were out of control. After that shop we wandered around for a few hours, ducking in and out of various shops. We tried not to stop anywhere for too long or you get pulled inside, and if they catch you looking at something for a second they attack you trying to sell everything to you. Craziness. Kari really wanted to buy a carpet so we spent a long time in a few carpet shops. The first one was really nice, they took us to their upstairs showroom and gave us some more tea and threw down 30+ carpets for Kari to choose. She found one that she like of liked but in the end didn’t buy it. We went into another one and basically the same thing happened… more and more tea! Kari had also found a huge blue-ish, turquoise-ish plate that she loved, but it was pretty expensive and the guy wouldn’t lower the price so she didn’t get that either. But not to worry, we spent our money in other ways haha!

Lindsey, Kari, and I went to the Topkapi Palace on Friday morning, which was the first palace to the sultans, and is now a museum filled with the sultan’s jewels and relics of the prophets. It was pretty crowded there so we got in and out pretty quickly. Lindsey had spent the past two days outside of Istanbul and hadn’t seen the Bazaar yet, so we headed in that direction. We first stopped at the Spice Bazaar, which I like much better than the Grand Bazaar. It is much less crowded and the salesmen are not as aggressive. Almost every shop sells huge mounds of spices, tea, Turkish delight, and other goodies… and the whole places smells amazing! We got to try different types of Turkish delight and bought some highly recommended Turkish coffee. We then headed to the Grand Bazaar and Lindsey got her first taste of bargaining and the aggressive salesmen. That day was probably the worst for us as we were hassled by many different salesmen. One wanted to take a picture with me and then tried to kiss me, but I ran away! And then Kari got that plate she had wanted the day before for less than half price and an unexpected kiss… ugh!! She sanitized her face right after, no worries! Ha ha… other than that it was a pretty good day at the Bazaar. We got back to the ship around 5:45 just in time for me to head off to a Suri Dervish ceremony. These “Whirling Dervishes” as they are commonly known, do a ritualistic dance accompanied by traditional music. They wear these long white skirts, white jackets, and tall, thimble-looking hats and spin around for minutes at a time. Through this dance, they are opening a connection with God, and it is a ritual tradition that goes back to the 13th century. This was absolutely amazing. These five men came out and spun around each other so effortlessly for quite some time, and the music was beautiful. We got to sit in the front row so I could feel the breeze made by their skirts, and one of them was going so fast I’m surprised that he didn’t fall right over! It was an amazing final night in Istanbul!

Our last day was spent at the Blue Mosque, which is quite possibly the most impressive in the city. Like the Topkapi Palace, it was extremely crowded with tourists from all over the world so we didn’t spend too much time there. This mosque is so pretty I can’t even describe it. The interior is covered with blue, white, and gold tiles, and has low hanging, simple chandeliers. Ugh I can’t describe it very well… Google magic! The whole time in Istanbul, we had planned to go to a Turkish bath, so after the mosque we went to the Cemberlitas Hamami, a bathhouse built in 1584. I won’t go into full detail about it on here, but it was incredibly relaxing, and an amazing experience. We spent three full hours there and dreaded the idea of going back out into the nasty heat and humidity after we had been scrubbed, bathed, and massaged. Oh it was amazing and the perfect ending to our time spent in Istanbul!

We’re on our way to Egypt now!!! If you know me at all you’ll know that I the most excited about this port… I will get to see the pyramids on Wednesday! THE PYRAMIDS! Ahhhh! Oh and I get to ride a camel which is pretty exciting too! Ha ha

Here are some hilarious “Special Questions/Comments of the Day” from Turkey…
“Why do I need a Turkish Visa when I already have a credit card?”
“I’ve been to the European and Asian sides of Turkey, I wish we were going to Africa too.”

LOVE LOVE LOVE