Vol 51 Day 4 Istanbul

After breakfast with a still less than perky Ferhan, I made my way to Taksim Square to buy a ticket for the night bus to Selcuk which is in the south, on the Aegean Sea. That done it occurred to me that I really ought to try to see some of the more popular tourists sites in Istanbul. So I returned to the Sultanahmet area, this time keeping my internal compass in line. My idea was to visit the Aya Sofya, Topkapi Palace and the Basilica Cistern. These three, along with the Blue Mosque, which I had already visited, are the 4 must-see sites in Istanbul.

I started with the Aya Sofya, which, according to my guide book, is Istanbul's most famous monument. Emperor Justinian had it built as part of his effort to restore the greatness of the Roman Empire. It was completed in 537 and reigned as the greatest church in Christendom until the conquest of Constantinople(Istanbul) in 1453, which ended the Byzantine Empire and began the Ottoman Empire. Mehmet the Conqueror had it converted into a mosque and so it remained until 1935, when it was proclaimed a museum.

Aya Sofya, (Hagia Sophia in Greek, Sancta Sophia in Latin or the Church of the Devine Wisdom in English), was built on the site of a previous Aya Sofya, built in the 415 and destroyed by fire in 532.

This photo is of the porticus of the original church discovered during excavations in the 1930's. 12 lambs = 12 apostles.
Pieces from the original church are lined up cross the street.

Imagine how many feet have passed through these doors over the last 1500 years to wear the marble like that!

In this mosaic Emporer Justinian, on the left, is seen presenting the Aya Sofya to Jesus.

On entering his creation for the first time almost 1500 years ago, Justinian exclaimed "Glory to God that I have been judged worthy of such a work. Oh Sololmon! I have outdone you!" Understandable when I entered the building. It's not much from the outside, but inside it is simply breathtaking. Lovely. Perhaps you don't know this about me but my life has a soundtrack. I always have a song playing in my head. The entire time I was inside the Aya Sofya, Mozart's Ave Verum Corpus, sung by the Vienna Boy's Choir was stuck in my head. Which made it that much more lovely.

The big medallions were added in the 19th century and are inscribed with Arabic letters giving the name of god (Allah), Mohammed, and early califs Ali and Abu Bakr.



The scaffolding is part of ongoing restoration partially funded by Unesco. Though it does detract from the splendor I quickly was able to ignore it.


This tile work was in a little aisle off on it's own. There really isn't much tilework to speak of in the church so it seemed odd to find it there.

To get upstairs I had to go up a ramp which was at the end of this hallway:

It goes up and around and around, like a staircase without the stairs.
The pavers are worn super smooth but it's also lumpy. Excellent combo for those stupid wedge sandals of mine.

The lighting is much better upstairs in the gallery.

The ceilings throughout the church/mosque are covered in frescoes (paintings rendered in wet plaster that become part of the plaster).





Massive marble doors.

The mosaics are best viewed from upstairs. Most of them were covered in plaster and since the 1930's work has been ongoing to get them uncovered as best they can. This one is Judgment Day with Jesus, the Virgin Mary and St John the Baptist.


Jesus with Empress Zoe and Constantine IX, her 3d husband. Empress Zoe had this portrait changed with each husband.


Detail of a larger mosaic showing the virgin and child.

Another virgin and child, this one on the dome.

One of the angels in the dome.



After I left the Aya Sofya I decided it was time to wander over to the Topkapi Palace. On my way there I met a nice carpet seller named Mahmet and his uncles. I met Mahmet when I was trying to buy a gozemel, a sort of made-to-order pancake stuffed with either potato or cheese, from a street vendor. I was trying to ask for both potato and cheese when Mahmet came to the rescue and translated for me. He invited me to sit nearby to eat it, across from the carpet shop where he and his uncles worked. We hung out for about an hour, chatting about the carper business, traveling and stupid tourists. I never went into their shop and they never pushed me to. We were just chatting. The gozemel was delicious and they fed me tea, fetched from the shop by one of the workers.

Then I headed over to the palace. I went into the outer grounds and looked around a bit. There were about a million tourists there. I have to say, I am not a big fan of tourists which seems a bit silly because when I'm traveling I am one. But I just don't like hanging out where the tourists are and Topkapi was crawling with them. So even though it is reputed to be one of the most incredible palaces in Europe, I just couldn't do it. I left.

I meanderd back to the main street and started the longish walk towards the Grand Bazaar with the thought that I could get an idea of the kinds of things sold there. I had no plan to buy much until my final days in Turkey as I did not want to have to carry stuff around with me for the rest of the trip. Well who should walk up to me but Mahmet! He asked how it was possible that I was finished with Topkapi Palace so quickly. I confessed my aversion to tourists and my plan to visit the Grand Bazaar instead. He informed me that it is not open on Sundays. Crap. So much for that idea. Come, he said, let's have tea. So I followed him around for the next three hours as we had tea in 3 different cafes.


One of them was a rooftop terrace and had incredible views of the area. When it was time for me to head back to Ferhan's to collect my bag and catch my night bus, Mahmet declared that I was exactly the kind of woman that he would like to marry and that I shouldn't go.

Poor Mahmet. I had to break his heart. The thing that is really funny about this is that I forgot to tell you that on my first day when I met Salim, the persuasive rug dealer, he declared that I was exactly the kind of woman that he would like to marry. So that was 2 marriage proposals from 2 rug sellers. 2 gorgeous rug sellers. Nice ego boost.
I'm afraid this is as close to the Basilica Cistern as I got. I guess I'm not a very good tourist. I would much rather while away 3 hours with a local talking about his daily life than to go to a bunch of tourist sites.

I made it back to Ferhan's in time to take him to dinner but once again, he declined. Stupid cold. We ordered in, said our goodbyes and I was off to the night bus, destination Selcuk, in the south. 12 hours and 2 cafeteria stops later, I arrived. In one of the rest stop bathrooms I found this machine beside the tampon machine.

Drat, I didn't have the right change!