Istanbul

After a pretty ordinary week at work, where many students did not attend because of the  local school holidays, we made it to the end of term.  It was fine if you had a full class, or a small class, but it was very slow if you had just one student turn up.  I had a few free classes but Eric still has never had even one session off in the whole semester: he points out that he is the only staff member to have never had even one session off. Build abridge I say!
After 'end of semester drinks' we headed to the airport and caught the flight to Istanbul. 10 hrs sitting next to a very self-important Turkish man made me a little apprehensive, and then the 'she who is on home turf has priority' in the queues at immigration compounded my apprehension .............. but we were met by a very enthusiastic operator at the baggage belt and then whisked away in a Mercedes (Ron would have loved it) to the Hotel Daphne in Sultanamat, the Old Quarter, arriving about 8am.  

Note the terrace on the rooftop for coffee and beers.

Across the cobblestone corner.

Day 1
A few hours sleep would  have been to our advantage but it is not to be, the room is unavailable until after 1 pm. So we hit the streets and found the immediate area charming. The streets are cobbled and narrow while the old buildings have so much character in every state of repair, or is that disrepair. We find ourselves at the southern end of the Hippodrome within minutes of our doorstep. This was the heart of the cultural and political action for so many centuries, no matter who was ruling at the time.   

My first impression is that very few local women are wearing the burkha, opting instead for conservative western dress and that the local men are very friendly.  My second impression is that every Turkish man who speaks to us is a tout for the family business, be it fabulous local ceramics or textiles.
This afternoon we have learnt to say:
hello - Merhaba
thank you - teşekkür ederim, which sounds like tea, sugar a dream 
enough already! - yeter miktar! 

We have also learnt all about carpets, kilim and Kurdish tapestries even if we didn't really want to at this early stage of our trip. We have also been treated to hot apple tea, turkish coffee and a full lunch of kofta lamb and chick peas with rice followed by baklava all in the interests of selling us a carpet. We started off completely disinterested but eventually walked home with a Kurdish tapestry. Were we suckers? Who knows, what is important to us is that we are happy with what we purchased (and the price) and now we have another line of defense for the touts; "We have one already" but I need to translate.  Eventually our room was available and we were able to sleep. 

Day 2
We started off at Earl and Ken's Coffee Shop, just around the corner. We met Earl yesterday, being drawn to his front window by the beautiful ceramics and then lured in by the coffee aroma. Since we are going to be visiting many of the important historical sights with a guide on Wednesday he helped us plan our day which had us take the tram over The Golden Horn and to the end of the line at Kabatas. From here we took the funicular railway to Taksim Square, the symbolic heart of modern Istanbul. Then we walked all the way down Istiklal Caddesi once known as Grand Rue de Pera. It is an impressively wide mall with a gentle downhill gradient in this direction. A quaint tramway runs through the middle and it's lined with Foreign Consulates and all the shops you can find anywhere I guess (Benneton, Mango and good old Body Shop etc). More interesting were the laneways and arcades off to both sides. We had lunch at a little place where Grandma sat in the front window hand making ravioli and the benchtops inside were covered in jars of preserves. Have I mentioned how fabulous the food is here?

Istiklal Caddesi

At the end of the wide, Istiklal Caddesi you continue down Galipede Caddesi, the name should give it away. It is very steep and my feet begin to ache as my toes are jammed into the front of my new walking shoes. We took a break and climbed the Galata Tower for impressive views over the Bosphorus to the Asian side of Turkey and also of the Galata bridge that takes us back to the old city which we call home. 

Walking across this you pass hundreds of keen fishermen catching anchovies. At the halfway point we took the stairs down to the lower level  which is lined with bars and restaurants. We had earnt a cold glass of Efes larger by this stage. We had planned to visit the Spice Markets and Grand Bazaar on the way home but we have walked enough already and my feet need bandaides. Fortunately we still have plenty of time to explore this old city. 
Day 3
This morning we were met by Uhr, a local guide, who took us on a personal walking tour of the Old Quarter.  From the hippodrome we entered the Blue Mosque; this is when you are very happy to have a guide as he sidestepped the 4000 cruise ship visitors that all seemed to be lined up at the entrance. The Blue Mosque gets its name from the 10s of thousands of blue mosaics and tiles that line its interior. The Sultan of the day (early 1600s) built it to rival the magnitude of the Ayasofya church (1000 yrs earlier) when the area was Christian. The Blue Mosque was built with six minarets which equals the number of those at the most important mosque in Mecca. Some thought this was a little ostentatious but so be it. The stained glass windows are brilliant in the summer sunshine.  

Next we visited the Topkapi Palace Museum and moved quickly through the outer grounds and courtyard to avoid the cruise crowds. There are a number of displays in the third courtyard including imperial treasury, robes, armoury etc. We found the most interesting of the displays was the sacred holy relics room which showcased Moses' staff, David's sword and Mohammed's teeth (of all things). Makes you appreciate how much Christians and Muslim's share in the belief of the prophets.  What astounded us was that the Ottoman Empire was so powerful in its day that they claimed these prizes. Finally we visited the harem, which you expect will be full of stories about slave consorts but in fact was where the imperial family lived (as well as the slave consorts and black eunuchs).  

After lunch we wandered through the Palace Market on our way to Ayasofya  Museum.  This was a church built built by the Roman Emperor Justinian in 537 and dwarfed all other buildings in the city. This was the most important church in Christendom for over a thousand years, until the fall of Constantinople. It was converted into a mosque in 1453, as significant to Muslims as it had been to Christians. Ataturk converted it to a museum in 1934. 

Uhr recommended we see a display of carpets but instead we asked to visit the Basilica Cistern. Oh what a lovely cool place to be on this hot afternoon! In the days of the Byzantines they built an aquaduct from a reservoir near the Black Sea to bring water into the city and stored it in an underground cistern. The ceiling is supported by more than 300 columns, many of which appear to be recycled even then from other ruins, two of these are supported by blocks carved into Medusa heads. In its day it held 80,000 cubic mts of water but over the centuries became obsolete and forgotten until it was rediscovered and restored. 

To finish the tour we viewed a ceramics display and finally he left us at the Grand Bazaar. We were way passed shopping by this stage in the day. In the evening we had tickets to a Whirling Dervish Performance. I was really looking forward to this, not sure what it was all about but expecting lots of energy and flamboyance, similar to Belly Dancing and the Chooky Dancers. What we discovered was that this is a ceremony performed by a particular Order of the Sufi.  Rather than energizing it was mesmerizing ii its repetitive whirling of men in skirts and long johns.  Eric fell asleep but I tried harder and managed to stay awake (just).

Day 3

This morning we joined a Day Tour which started at the spice markets which were a frenzy of action. The array of rich colours and aromas were an experience in themselves let alone the tastes we were offered.

We then took a 2 hr cruise of the Bosphorus. You all know how comfortable I feel on boats! I was stealing myself for the worst but it was all fine, perhaps I have outgrown the sea-sickness thing. We cruised up toward the Black Sea, passing summer palaces and the hotels frequented by the rich and famous, amongst them the private island owned by Galatasaray, the soccer team Harry Kewell played for.

Galatasaray Is

At the end of the cruise we visited a leather outlet where they use laser technology to sheer the skin to 0.8mm thick. It is so soft, but still not a useful piece of clothing in Singapore!  Then we visited another Christian/Mosque/Museum and finally crossed back to the Asian side to see the view of the Bosphorus in the late afternoon from the highest viewing point. The traffic in Istanbul is horrendous. It seems we have spent as long sitting in traffic jams today as we have visiting the sites.  The drivers are patient but it seems everyone is a law unto himself, so it is a free for all at every intersection where the one with the most bluff gets to proceed first.  This not only applies just to the drivers but also the pedestrians who take extraordinary risks walking behind reversing vehicles and squeezing between moving vehicles.  Our drivers have all been incredibly skilled at judging the gap to edge between ancient stone walls and illegally parked cars. Thank goodness Eric wasn’t driving, his blood pressure would be through the roof.

One of the most interesting things we went passed today was the Hotel Palace Pera which was purpose built to accommodate the passengers of the Orient Express when they completed their journey, having travelled across Europe from Paris and arriving here on the edge of the Orient.  It was the first and only building to be powered by electricity, other than the Ottoman Palaces. It was also the only address in the city to provide hot running water for its guests and was home to the first electric elevator in Istanbul.  We had already discovered the station located in Sultanamat  but this hotel is on the other side of the Golden Horn and apparently passengers were carried all the way here in sedan chair which must have been quite an effort with all the luggage in tow.  The rooms are each named after famous guests like Agatha Christie, Ernest Hemmingway, King Edward VIII etc.