Istanbul

Finally made it to Istanbul. Third time’s the charm! We met everyone in our group – 30 of us in total. Pretty much everyone is either an Aussie or Kiwi living in London, with the exception of one Canadian living in London and 3 British people.

Istanbul is considered “a country within a country” as it has a population of 15.5million, and takes around three hours to drive from west to east, across two continents.

We went on a walking tour of the major sights of Istanbul. Very disappointed that we couldn’t go to the Grand Bazaar as it is closed on Sundays. Turkey switched from the Muslim to the Christian calendar in the 1920’s or thereabouts – so they follow a Monday to Friday work week – unlike Dubai.

First stop was Hagia Sophia, you probably heard/saw it on the news recently? You can read the history here. But in a nutshell, it was a Catholic Church, then converted into a Mosque under Ottoman rule, in 1935 established as a museum under the new Turkish Republic and in July this year, converted back to a Mosque. Apparently the Catholics/Christians (everywhere other than Turkey) are not amused 🙂 Anyway, amazing building with heaps of history.

One of the challenges when building the church was how to construct the large dome on top of a square building, they resolved the issue with the help of two mathematicians (I think) and the answer is, quarter and semi arches before the final dome … get it? Got it? Good! It took a mere five and a half years to complete with 10,000 people working day and night.

Next stop was the “Blue Mosque” (so named by tourists because of the blue tiles inside – to the locals it is Sultan Ahmet Mosque). We’ll have to take their word for it because not only is practically the entire exterior covered in scaffolding but the interior is too – couldn’t see anything really and hence no photos – I’ve googled it to see what it actually looks like, and you can see it here. Even more disappointed now … would have been amazing to see it in the flesh. We did, however, see the carpet. Which to the untrained (uneducated) eye, just looks like a nice ornate carpet but our guide (Aykut) explained how the design indicates the rows for people to stand for prayer, where to put their feet, their elbows, hands and head (on the tulip). Tulips, by the way, originated in Turkey and landed up in the Netherlands when a gift of bulbs were given to the Dutch Ambassador (or someone) ~500 years ago (if you don’t believe me, you can enlighten yourself here).

FYI – Fun Fact: The word turquoise dates to the 17th century and is derived from the French turquois meaning “Turkish” because the mineral was first brought to Europe through Turkey.

Next stop was the Hippodrome of Constantinople – venue of chariot races and bloody battles, complete with an Egyptian Obelisk!! It was originally erected at the Temple of Karnak in Luxor and Theodosius the Great cut it into three pieces and brought it to Constantinople in about 390. Only the top piece remains and it’s in amazing condition given it is nearly 3,500 years old.

Last stop was Topkapi Palace, residence and administrative headquarters of the Ottoman sultans and now home to many of the stray cats and dogs of Istanbul as well as the Spoonmaker’s diamond and the Topkapi Dagger (sorry no pics, as we weren’t allowed to take pics inside). The diamond is an 86 carat pear-shaped diamond – 5th largest in the world, but not very good clarity though (IMHO) – a tad cloudy 🙂 You’ll have to google the dagger yourself because I’ve waffled for too long and it’s getting late!

Took a cruise down the Bosphorous Strait before dinner. Istanbul is the only city in the world to straddle two continents. Asia on one side, Europe on the other.

En route to dinner (for Turkish Pizza’s) we walked through the spice bazaar.

One of the first things that Aykut told us was that we would see lots of stray dogs and cats around Turkey, but not to worry, as the Turkish take care of them; government vaccinates them (and I think desexes them) and tags their ears to show they’ve been “done” and the locals provide food and water. Here are just some of the felines and hounds of Istanbul: