thoughts from the bosphorous – istanbul wrapup • 05.15.10
lillis (like my old friend chance) is a big fan of having a person you know in pics of places so you can see how big they were. that’s lillis. she’s tall. haghia sophia is really big and impressive, what with the domes supporting themselves and all.
the cistern was beautiful. chuck would have to tell me if it’s better looking than the one in north africa, but it was pretty darned impressive. i want to say it was a something like 100K square feet in surface area, meaning it could hold a crap-ton of water. it was built by justinian around the same time as “the sophia” and was forgotten about until some locals were found to be pulling up water (and sometimes fish) from holes in their basements. wild place istanbul….just too much history.
these are from inside the blue mosque….women praying in the womens section at the back of the mosque.
we got to spend an evening seeing the dervishes. i can’t imagine what it’s like during their annual celebration with 100 or more people participating in a grand hall, but the show was really really impressive. the music and ceremony are eerie. the whole sufi mysticism thing is fascinating anyway, as it seems islam’s answer to hippy spiritualism seen in the US.
it was so peaceful at night. we sat here (rather quietly) in a spot in between 2 of the 3 or 4 greatest sights in all istanbul and just watched the fountain and the blue mosque at night.
lillis enjoyed so many of the people she met on the trip, but her one constant companion (other than me) was bread. she fell in love with this loaf the moment she laid eyes (and hands) on it. this was at Bab-i Hayat – a FABULOUS restaurant just outside the spice bazaar….one of the best meals of our trip. plus our waiter had a crush on lillis.
men wash their feet (one of the ablutions) before heading into the mosque.
cool barber guy…not only did i get a haircut, a straight razor (or as my aussie friend called it – a suicide) shave and a shoulder massage, but he also used a lighter to singe my ears. i gotta say, getting a straight razor shave (well a decent one – which would be different from the guy who sliced of 3 layers of skin along with my beard in the sahara) is awesome. you feel powerful. not only is someone shaving me (like a freaking emporer or something) but also, i do not fear long sharp objects…..sorta like de niro in the untouchables. speaking of which we bought some spices and teas from the mini-turkish-robert deniro in the spice bazaar. he even let me taste iranian caviar. i kept wondering….had i broken the embargo? regardless, it was better than the russian stuff.
we ate dinner on our 3rd night at Mikla restaurant in the Marmara hotel in upscale Beyoglu. it was described to be “simply the best restaurant in all of istanbul.” so, we gave it a try. it was fabulously expensive, but it was indeed fabulous. the views were phenomenal as well…especially my view, since my view had lillis in it. here is a pic of her, and the mirror above her which allowed me to see the city as well. at one part of the restaurant, the windows (12 feet high??) were slid back to create a 40 foot long windowless area with a large outdoor patio with a wonderful view and even better breeze. amazing place.
from the rooftop of one of our hotels we got a pic of ourselves in front of the blue mosque. we ate all of our breakfasts on rooftops with views such as this, except, you know, with daylight and all. if you look closely, you can see pink adornments in lillis’ ears. those are earplugs. she had already put them in to go to bed, but i insisted she check out the view of the seagulls circling the blue mosque. she has a hard time getting them in so she was NOT taking them out. this made the walk up to (and the time on) the rooftop a view into what life for us will be like in 40 years when we can’t hear anything the other one was saying. it will be frustrating. i can’t wait.
here we are in front of the bosphorous on our last day.
here’s a young girl and her grandmother on the train
on our last night in istanbul, we had a restaurant bring dinner to our hotel, and we sat up on the rooftop by ourselves eating and soaking up the views (and breezes) one last time before heading back. the blue mosque was in rare form as the last glimpses of light escaped behind it .
we then caught a cab towards our hotel (the marriot courtyard by the airport). it was very simple except our driver didn’t recognize the address, couldn’t understand the word courtyard, and every time we said something he would either repeat marriot or airport…..neither of which were places we wanted to go. lillis decided we should just look out for the hotel and hope it was tall. luckily it was and with some sophisticated pointing and grunting we were able to navigate to it. a wonderful night in a giant bed in a large room with a modern bathroom and a view over the city in a chic new hotel was a great way to finish off the trip. rested and ready we pack and prepare for the flight back to america. homeward bound!
