Turkey Day In Turkey
Friday, November 28th, 2008So I finally made it to Istanbul! I made it in last night after some terrible turbulence. Everyone thought we were going to die. When we finally landed everyone started applauding. Apparently this is the really rainy season. What a great time to visit (I’m being very sarcastic). Apparently it snows here too, which I never thought would happen. Hopefully it doesn’t.
Anyways… I landed last night about 10pm and headed into the airport. I was kind of holding my breath the entire time because I didn’t have a visa, which I found out a couple days ago was very necessary, but the State Dept. website said I could buy one here. With my luck though it would have been outdated and I’d spend my weekend being detained or something. Thankfully a short line and 15 Euros later, I was officially in Turkey. And not 5 minutes later I was being asked by every “information specialist” to let them take me to my hostel. One guy told me that it was going to take me 2 hours to get there by subway, so I should let him take me because he could get me there in half an hour. Couldn’t help but laugh and called him out on it, and then he finally left me alone. I screwed up on counting how many people offered me drugs on the street in Amsterdam, but I’m keeping count on people trying to “help me” in Istanbul. I haven’t even been out on the streets for more than 11 combined hours and I’m up to 28. Another guy at the airport tried helping me out by taking me to the Metro. The only problem was that there was a sign pointing right to the Metro (I could actually see the entrance), but he tried taking me the other way, even when I pointed it out to him.
After the metro and tram ride, I found myself in the SultanAhmet neighborhood. It was beautiful. I got off the tram and found myself right by Aya Sofia and the Blue mosque, both lit up in the night. I then proceeded to look for my hostel, for an hour. Couldn’t find the fucking thing. On the website I booked it on, it got over 95% on everything, so I expected it to be very popular and to stand out, instead it’s on a little back street and almost completely hidden. Plus on the way through the streets, I noticed a lot of stray dogs, most of which were destroying trash cans and eating trash. One of them almost attacked a woman walking by.
While the building is nothing to brag about, the location is great! It’s located in the Sultanahmet district, which is essentially the Constantinople of Roman and Byzantine history. It contains the Grand Bazaar, Blue Mosque, Topkapi Palace, Aya Sofia, the Hippodrome, and is right on the Bosphorus.
I had hoped to be woken up by the call to prayer in the morning, but slept right through it. When I finally did get up and going, it was pouring out. Fortunately it eased up a bit rather quickly. Since it was raining, I deceided to head to the Grand Bazaar, which is covered. I spent a couple hours wandering the seemingly endless maze of shops and headed back to the Aya Sofia and checked out the museum. It seems like everytime I go somewhere big, the major sights are always under renovation. I got into Aya Sofia and went directly to see the dome, which is now covered for renovations. Couldn’t see any of it. Plus you have this huge, ugly, scaffolding in the way…
I also decided to check out the Bosphurus, so I headed down to the shore. After being stopped and pretty much intimidated (by 4 very large Turkish guys) into a rug shop, I made my way down there. I walked along the shore for about half a mile, then tried to make my way back up. Unfortunately there was a huge wall, which I later found out belonged to Topapki Palace, and couldn’t get by. The gambler side of me said keep walking, there was about to be a street eventually. I should have listened to my careful side. Instead of eating the 1/2 mile, I ended up walking 2 more. At one point I thought I had conquered the wall (I found a place to scale it), but was greeted by train tracks and another, bigger, barb-wired fence.
Finally having found a street, I decided to try some Turkish food which included a Kebap Durum and Turkish Delights. At that point it started raining again, so I sought shelter in my hostel, watching The Office and House with Turkish subtitles waiting for the rain to disappear. It didnt.
mrnational