In January I went to Istanbul for about a week. An amazing and ancient city. Some parts are very conservative while others, like Taksim, where we were staying with the illustrious Nese, are chocked full of five floor buildings with a club or bar on each level. The city is built on seven hills and you are constantly walking up or down steep inclines. This also means that almost every top floor of a building has a spectacular and uninterrupted view, usually in more than one direction. It's a bit of a cliche but the city really does feel like East meets West in terms of culture. Unfortunately it rained pretty much every day me and Casey were there - hence the dark and mysterious pics... I have a tonne of pics so this will be a long one.
I did manage to get one sunset out of the whole trip while riding a ferry up the Bosphorous. I was coming from visiting a castle where I managed to get chased by stray dogs when I got too close to them fighting over some kind of horse skull. It turned out for the best because this Australian fellow was laughing at the whole thing and we played back-gammon and drank tea the whole way back.
I should have paid attention to the sign.
Wasn't going near this one.
Turkish food is amazing. The pastries and baklavas there were the best I've had. Too much good food to get in to - and combined with a super hospitable atmosphere everywhere it was really nice. Every restaurant baked its own bread and served Salep - which is basically really thin yoghurt with a bit of salt in it. Super refreshing to drink.
These guys had a boat based restaurant going which was impressive...
... given that the straits were really dire that night.
Markets come out at night.
Istanbul is a bit like Havana in that there are not that many street lamps on at night. So it kind of feels like you are a character in "Double Indemnity".
Sultanahmet. One of the biggest mosques in the city (there are hundreds). Apparently there was a big stink when it was constructed because it had too many minarettes and was coming a bit too close to Mecca in grandiosity.
Inside Sultanahmet.
The Hagia Sofia was also really impressive. It no longer functions as a church or mosque and is now a museum.
This is Sulimanye mosque. The whole city is marked by hundreds of buildings by the architect Mimar Sinan and this is one of his best. It's amazing how many of the buildings in Istanbul are his work or derived from him.
There is a cemetery attached to Sulimanye. Interesting to note how important cultural reference is for NOT getting the heeby jeebies in a cemetery. No Christian imagery or western style tomb stones = no ghosts right?
Heating coals for smoking nargile.
Backgammon and chess are really popular. Seriously, all ages.
Deniz, Nese, Casey and me smoking and drinking coffee. Coffee there is really tasty but hard to finish because it is the consistency of mud.
Pump ya brakes and drive slow homie! 3,300,000 Lire cab ride... That's how we roll.
Back in the 4th century Constantine 1 had some massive cisterns built to service the city.
Night life is a bit under-represented in this post given how many bars and clubs we went to. I guess I was too busy learning how to dance in 9/8 Turkish style to take photo's. It involves a lot of out stretched arms, eye contact and aggressive hip thrusting. My new dance moves have gone over really well back in the A'dam. Clubs really varied widely - from gay bars with table dancing trannies and lots of bad euro-trance to salsa music. One club was playing all thugged out hip-hop which is rare for there (thankfully) and was populated by a whole bunch of 7 foot tall guys (and girls) from the southern states. Apparently they were playing basketball there. Strange to ask some guy where he is from and have him answer "Yeah, A'm frum Jawgia, you know - Hot-Lanta" while in Istanbul. By far the best night out was with the band in this picture. Traditional music. Everyone in the place in cluding the band was dancing. Awesome.
The Sultan's seal.
At the grand bazaar. Best sweater ever?
At the airport.
Taking off from Turkey.The clocks changed here today - in the losing an hour sense of course. I think it would be better if every time they changed we just gained an hour. Eventually day and night would just reverse. I wonder how many consecutive posts I can do with some kind of reference to menacing animals.
