Istanbul under the Shadow of the Ash Plume
It seemed absurd at first, but over the past few days we grew more used to the bizarre reality that our scheduled arrival to Europe has coincided with the greatest disruption in the history of aviation. When I first related the news to a half-asleep Norika on our first night in Istanbul, she must have thought it a dream: “of course an Icelandic volcano has cast a gigantic cloud of ash over the entire continent…” zzz.
To make matters more challenging, we heard back from my relatives in Northern Italy and they won’t be in Lucca during our planned stay there — good thing we have sorely slacked on the reservations department. We suppose that’s just the jolt of spontaneity our trip needed. Naturally, we have devised a series of alternative plans in case we can’t fly to Holland tomorrow afternoon; we may fly to Barcelona instead, or better yet (if we can’t fly at all), find a boat that would take us to Romania and travel across Eastern Europe, completely scratching the Netherlands and France off our itinerary. Who knows.
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These concerns have definitely not stopped us from enjoying the present moment. Istanbul is a marvelous city and one of our favorite stops thus far. It is beautiful, chaotic, somewhat walkable and it oozes history. It also happens to be about 50 degrees cooler than the last few places we’ve been in, but having eaten baklava almost everyday, how can we complain?
Like many other fabled great cities (i.e. Rio de Janeiro), Istanbul is defined by its geography. It sits partly in Europe and partly in Asia, relying on seven bridges as well as ports and boats to connect the two sides. There is nothing plain about this place — unless you are right by the water, most of the time you will be either walking up or down steep road; in effect, this not only represents a valuable work out opportunity for overweight tourists, but also generates beautiful views of neatly stacked multicolored buildings at a distance.
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Our guesthouse room may have left something to be desired, but our breakfasts on the terrace are delicious and feature a stunning view of the Blue Mosque.
The mosque’s architecture was heavily based on the building it sits opposite to: the Hagia Sophia (except that was built nearly a 1000 years before… in 537 A.D.!!!)
Although we don’t plan on going to too many museums during our Europe leg, Istanbul was a necessary exception, if anything because its two most famous museums (Hagia Sophia and the Topkapi Palace) don’t carry much artwork — instead, the buildings themselves often ARE the artwork. The Blue Mosque (which charges nothing for admission, as it is actually a functioning mosque, blaring prayers from its impressive six towers five times a day) and the Hagia Sophia are so massive in size and design that our camera had a hard time figuring out what to focus on: there were simply too many arches, windows, domes.
Blue Mosque:
Hagia Sophia:
In contrast, the Topkapi Palace was not a single large construction, but rather a series of courtyards with scattered buildings throughout. It was more museum-y as it featured expositions of Ottoman objects (weapons, jewels, thrones, etc.); the most jaw-dropping relics contained obscene amounts of emerald and ivory; the strangest included the supposed staff of the prophet Moses, samples of Mohammed’s beard and other antiques of questionable authenticity. Most viewing rooms did not allow photographs.
We also let curiosity take us into the creepy underground world of the Basilica Cistern, also built in the 500s. There is not much to say about it: it’s just a dark, wet, and fascinating place to be.
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Eventually, we decided to experience the intense realm of Turkish commerce. The notorious Grand Bazaar is indeed overwhelmingly grand, possibly the world’s first shopping maze. Our first time there was nearly traumatic; out of at least 20 entrances, we happened to walk in through the one full of jewelry hagglers angrily yelling on their cell phones, something we thought only happened at stock market exchanges. After a while we made it to more friendly grounds and got lost wandering through the isles and narrow roads around the covered section.
The Egyptian Bazaar (also known as the Spice Bazaar) was cooler. First of all, it was smaller and thus a more manageable market to explore. The colorful shops offered more edible items than the ones at the Grand Bazaar: spices, teas, sweets, and dried goods were mostly inside, while the outdoor shops sold everything from cheese and fish (one of the shops had a whole blue marlin laying on its stand) to kitchen ware. We followed the plan we devised a long time ago and stocked up on almonds, hazelnuts, and apricots (a total of 3 pounds of goods!) so that the Old World won’t lead us to starvation with its prohibitive food costs.
Finally, we discovered crazy shops under the Galata Bridge selling leggings and fake soccer jerseys for roughly $3 a piece. As he ripped open plastic packages and tossed shirts into large disorganized mountains of shirts, the man at the soccer jersey shop yelled a lot of things that would probably remain unintelligible even if we understood Turkish.
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On Sunday, we embarked on a short boat tour of the Bosphorus; it was cool and windy, but worth it for the nice views of the greater Istanbul, including the Ortakoy Mosque and the awesome Fortress of Europe.
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Monday is theoretically our last full day here, so we wanted to get a little more adventurous and explore a less touristy part of Istanbul. We crossed the Galata Bridge and walked away from the Golden Horn in search of a particular Turkish bath that (despite being unable to find much information on it online) we hoped would have a more local flavor than the hamams around the Sultahnamet area: the Buyuk Hamam, which was built in friggin’ 1533. Of course, we were also hoping that the full treatment would be considerably cheaper than the 40+ euros that the places nearby were charging. I am happy to say in advance that we were successful on both accounts.
Because the hamam’s male and female sections are completely separate (only the most touristy ones aren’t so), we each set out on our own culturally shocking adventure.
To be continued…
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