Yalova was lucky enough to get two more visitors this weekend! Rebecca and Devin, two Fulbrighters from C(h)anakkale, came to see our humble abode and sweet seaside city on Friday night and then the 5 of us headed into the big city across the water on Saturday morning.
I experienced many "Istanbul miracles" during the 36-ish hours I was there this weekend. The first being that we all woke up early enough to pack, have everyone (5 people!) take a shower, eat breakfast, walk to the ferry and buy tickets for the 9:30 ride. Wow. It set the stage.
After arriving in Istanbul, the boys headed off to the US consulate to take the FSOT exam--the first step in the long process that is joining US state department staff. We girls headed off to find lodging, and found a hostel called "Bahaus" (Should be "Bauhaus"???) that was about 5 minutes away from the Blue Mosque. This was Rebecca's first time to Istanbul, though she'd dreamt of it for 5 years, so we did big, famous things...and for some reason people kept asking us if we were German. Above: the Blue Mosque. It's dizzying tilework (23,000+ revered Iznik tiles), calligraphy, and arabesques are best appreciated when the place is not so packed.
After leaving the Blue Mosque, we emerged back out into a beautiful fall day. As we walked to lunch, we had this gorgeous view of the Aya Sofya. (Don't know what Princess Jasmine's dad was doing in Istanbul, though.)
We had a delicious and way-too-big lunch just off the main street in Sultanahmet. Afterwards, we stumbled off, bellies bursting towards the Grand Bazaar. It's an easy walk from the Hippodrome, and within 10-15 minutes we'd arrived in the depths. The shot above is from the oldest part of the bazaar--built in the 15th century. This section is famous for its gold and jewelry. I passed on that, but did splurge for a Iznik tea cup and big blue evil eye for my bedroom. I'm really excited for them!
After getting a bit overwhelmed by the Grand Bazaar, we said, "Hey! Why don't we try to go get more overwhelmed by touristic shopping?" So, bellies still too-full we headed off toward the Egyptian Spice Bazaar. We made it, accidentally going through the same packed corridor of modern Turkish bazaar, and actually bought spices. Margot, who has made several great Indian dishes recently, bought some paprika, garam marsala and bay leaves. I ate some free samples of Turkish delight. I wasn't hungry but I couldn't help it!
After the Spice Bazaar, we headed up to Nishantashi--an upscale, uber-Western shopping area uphill from Dolmabache Palace. There we did a little window shopping and decided we'd found a place to come to if we ever felt overwhelmed by a disconnect from America, or something... It basically felt like we were in Pioneer Place. There was a Gap, Banana Republic, a fake Apple Store (RIP Steve Jobs), a Starbucks, little makeup counters, a Turkish equivalent to Sears, maybe, plus the nicest public bathroom I've seen for a LONG time. --Maybe ever. We were all impressed.
All our girlie shopping time couldn't last forever, so soon the boys called to say they were done with their tests. We said, "tammam,"and went to meet them in Taksim. It was Devin's birthday, so to celebrate, we all went out for Kunefe. Kunefe is a cheese-filled, honey-soaked, giant piece of shredded wheat, heated up. It was really good. After our dessert, we wandered around a bit down Istiklal street. It was really fun to be part of such a big group of happy, relaxed Americans. We spoke English so fast. Too soon, though, the boys and Margot (still sick) :-( had to leave to catch their ferry. So we had some nice Swiss friends take this shot of us and Devin got a last-minute Turkish sloppy joe, "paket."
Unsurprisingly, Rebecca and I weren't that hungry. We avoided heading to a restaurant by doing more window shopping and heading to "360" to get this view:
The big white steeple that you see is the tower of Istanbul's Catholic Church, the next line of bright lights, moving up from the bottom, are the floating restaurants and boats docked along the Golden Horn. Then above that, orange-ish from the left are Topkapi Palace, Aya Sofya and the Blue Mosque. "360" gets its name because you can see all of Istanbul's skyline from it's bars, patios and dance floor. This was my favorite view, though.
Soon it was approaching our dinner reservation time, so Rebecca and I headed for our Meyhane of choice. Refik turned out to be a great find. Here's we're cheers-ing with our first of several glasses of raki. We had a fantastic 3 hour dinner with fun conversation, a little Turkish, international visitors at our table (we had a little table tacked on next to ours at the 9:30 rush), and wonderful mezzes. It was absolutely perfect. Yum yum yum! Oh! Plus, our waiter gave us free baklava. How nice!
This morning when we woke up it was really raining. Luckily we'd done most of our big adventuring yesterday, so our main goal for today was to see Aya Sofya and get home at a reasonable hour. We did both and it was fantastic!
The last time I was in Aya Sofya, there was this hideous scaffolding in the middle of the nave. Now it's gone and I was so impressed by the building. New lamps have been installed and great work was done on the ceiling. Thanks UNESCO!
Here's the iconic shot of Aya Sofya. At the top, of course, is a seated Madonna with baby Jesus on her lap. The mosaic-work in these figures is apparently among the best examples of Byzantine artistry. To the right of them (from our perspective), is a giant medallion with God's name written in Arabic calligraphy and below that, a huge, beautiful marble minbar (pulpit). The mihrab (niche indicating the direction of Mecca) is hard to see here, but it's behind the further-away lantern set. Also visible in this picture is the wall-paper-like use of colored marble, the plastered-over and then painted mosaics, and the intricate carvings on the capitals of the columns and the separators of the marble.
Here is a view of the completed dome. It's is beautiful, I think. In the right hand corner, you can see the uncovered face of a seraph, it's covered (Islamic) equivalent is opposite it.
Here's a view of the whole space. It's hard to capture the enormity of this, but try to bear in mind that when I took this, I was about 4 stories (40-50 feet) off the ground, and this is all inside. And I think those medallions with God, Muhammed and the first 4 caliphs' names on them, are at least 15' in diameter. And that yellow apse across the way is definitely not the highest part of the building. It's amazing.
Here's something for all you Scandinavians out there: 9th century Viking graffiti! The Aya Sofya was completed in 360 AD. It's been standing ever since. Wow.
Here we are--happy tourists, loving the Hagia Sofia!
Unfortunately, Rebecca and I soon ran out of explanations in our guide book about the wonders around us. We decided to trek out to try and find the Hurrem Hamam (a Turkish bath built by Suleyman the Magnificent for his beautiful and clever wife, Hurrem). Along the way, we saw these Americans. Really? Why is she wearing that when it was pouring-down rain this morning? And why is he wearing that silly, 5 TL tourist junk hat? I think they're for 7 year-olds! lol
Well, we never found the hammam, but we didn't mind and it was getting to be time to get lunch and get on the road. We headed back toward our hostel and stopped at the little red awning on the corner of this street because we couldn't find the giant red building with 5 different signs saying: Sofa Cafe!!!, the place we'd been looking to eat at. We loved our lunch, though, and thought it was hilarious when, walking away, we realized how close we'd been all along.
I walked Rebecca to the lightrail stop and then headed off to my own train station, and then ferry. I arrived back home to Yalova by 5, so happy with my weekend.
Hope you all had great ones, too! Much love,
-Annika
ah! istanbul! wish i could be there...
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