Many moons ago, when Constantine finally recognized Christianity as a religion and put a stop to Christian persecutions, he wanted to relocate the capitol of the Roman Empire, in order for Christianity to properly flourish. He found the rundown, yet centrally located city of Byzantium, renamed it Constantinople, and then built the Haggia Sophia, a grand church in his new capitol. When muslim was becoming a popular culture and religion in the east, it too took over Constantinople, building many mosques and taking a few churches (most notably, Haggia Sophia) and transformed them into mosques. The name of the city too was switched to Istanbul, as we call it today.
Now that you have a brief history lesson as to the importance of the city of Istanbul, you can imagine why it is the perfect location for an Architecture student, studying in Rome, to at one point visit Istanbul. Without further ado, here is my abridged week in Istanbul, in my signature bullet point form...
Arrival Day:
-Bus to airport at 11
-slept entire flight
-landed 5pm (-1 hr time difference) in Asia!
-Bus ride to hotel, stuck in much traffic, learned key Turkish phrases
-Dinner on top floor of our hotel: amazing views of Haggia Sophia and the Blue mosque
-the food was interesting yet good. our desert jiggled.
-“my sister accidently bought bread and butter pickles once and it ruined 4th of july” -CFT
-class night walk. We get bakleva. love.
-watched Turkish drama with JoJo
Day 1:
-5:30 am prayer call. to them, this is a peaceful, holy part of their day. to us, its just plain strange
-Haggia Sophia. I walked in and was awestruck. It is massive and amazing.
-Spice market. “hello spice girls!”
-Emily wanted bakleva after lunch, we searched spice market, couldnt find one she wanted, meanwhile we ate a free sample of turkish delight at every stand. estimated 1/2 kilo consumed... without paying
-Emily gets pooped on outside Mosque Yeni Cami. the headdress is causing her peripherals to not see the poo on her arm
-apple tea = yummmm
-more bakleva
-froze
-Turkish bath: not as awkward as i thought. very warm and refreshing actually
-Nargila bar on the top floor of a building that contains rug stores.
-Tim couldnt get the elevator door open when we reached the bottom and it shot back up “sorry were closed” and we were sent back down, laughing hysterically
Day 2:
-Blue Mosque
-Little Haggia Sophia
-Grand Bazaar time!
-Made friend at ceramic store
-Returned to spice market where Emily, Brigid, Corin and i continued to eat as many free samples of turkish delights as possible
-Turkish delight salesmen tells me he wishes his daughter had my eyes
Day 3:
-Mosques Mosques and more Mosuqes
-and more freezing
-looks like a protest down that street, perhaps we need to reschedule walking that way....
-lunch at awkward hotel
-Istanbul Archeological Museum = AWESOME!
-Carpet shopped, met “Uncle Ismet”
-found out about protest “right wing funeral, many people go to make sure he is in the ground. i hate him too” -Ismet
-Kelly is raking up the rugs
-Nargila bar with Eric, we collectively designed a mosque while there that was a 17 sided figure.
-Met an awesome Turkish rock star. Saleh Sabr. I know that because he found us on facebook. I dont know how.
Day 4:
-Toured hans (places connected to the bazaar)
-Saw creepy mannequins and ugly wedding dresses. CFT wanted me to try one on. no.
-rando turkish man speaks turkish to eric, fast. we decide to blindly follow
-leads us through dark stairwell and to the roof of the han. bests views ever.
-Back to shop in the bazaar with Em and Joj
-spend about an hour looking at plates in this back corner ceramic store, while jojo is on the other side looking at tiles.
-continue around bazaar. 2-3 hours later, we pass near that area, the guy recognizes us and invites us to come back to his dark alley bazaar shop for tea. hey, when in ... istanbul
Day 5:
-omg. the sky can be blue in Istanbul? say it aint so!
-Palace. not mosque. what?!
-uncle Ismet gets us turkish pizza. i dont want to know whats on it, i just know i love it.
-Spice market shopping
-Then back to bazaar. Emily and CFT buy teaspoons from awkward tea stand. its more awkward than i am making it sound
-go into carpet store, this carpet man is NOT Ismet and squeaks a lot
-Dinner in Asia, ferry ride necessary.
-thyme tea, or as we preferred calling it, “pee tea”
-little boy grabs steve, oh god, our first interaction with attempt of pick pocketing.
-strange guys at ferry terminal act strange near me
-we all decide to run home from the ferry. not our brightest of ideas
we left for Rome first thing the next morning, and thus, the beginning of my spring break. which will be covered in another blog post.
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