Any reservations we had about Istanbul evaporated
after several revealing days of taking in the city’s sights. They were
beautiful and exotic and we enjoyed each one.
First up on our agenda was a casual luncheon cruise
on the Bosporus for a magnificent view of the city from sea level and an
afternoon heading up to and back from the Black Sea. The day was sweltering as we were
transported to our little excursion boat in a so-called “air-conditioned” van
that would have been cooler had we rolled down all the windows. As we’d already
learned back at the Princess Diana, Turkish AC has no resemblance to the icicle-producing
jets of cold air we’re used to. It merely circulates the hot air with the goal
of making you think you’re cooler as the sweat continues to trickle. Simply
put, Turkish air conditioning is what is commonly known as a fan.
Our boat ride underway, the Bosporus breeze
lowered the temperatures and we enjoyed a tasty paper-plated lunch of kebabs
and rice and were kept company by dozens
of graceful dolphins that played in our wake. The broad, critical waterway slices
transcontinental Istanbul, which straddles both Europe and Asia, in two. One-third
of the population lives on the larger, eastern, Asian side but the western piece
is home to the bulk of the population and is the city’s cultural heart. After
an hour and a half of cruising north past sumptuous palaces followed by wooden
mansions and the Selimiye Barracks (where Florence Nightingale worked during the
Crimean War),
we disembarked in the harbor of a nondescript little fishing village, climbed up
the steep hill behind it and gazed out over the vast, storied Black Sea. And all at once it hit
me: we had landed on the eastern shore of the Bosporus and were now in Asia!
Our gap year has taken us not only to Europe but to Africa and Asia as well.
The following day, not having done adequate
Istanbul homework to venture forth effectively on our own, we joined a small
tour group to take in the city’s highlights. We found ourselves under the
guidance of Tahir, a delightful young man from the area, and part of a remarkable
cultural stew: a French-speaking woman from Quebec who ran a relief organization
in Nairobi, Kenya and lived there with her 16-year-old daughter; her husband,
originally from Saskatchewan, who headed up a refugee agency in Khartoum, Sudan;
a woman from Bangalore, India in town for a regional meeting of the World
Economic Forum; and, a young Filipino couple who worked in Dubai. We were an impromptu
set of international visitors ready for a few days in Istanbul.
Sightseers know the Sultan Ahmed Mosque, built in
the early 1600s, as the Blue Mosque, so named for its exquisite interior blue
tiles. With its six minarets and perfect cascade of domes, it is a magnificent
piece of architecture. We passed by the ablution fountains outside the courtyard,
I draped the requisite scarf over my head and we then slipped off our shoes before
stepping barefoot onto the plush Turkish carpet along with the scores of other
visitors. Despite the crowds, the cavernous chamber was hushed and the delicate
morning light that streamed through the pastel stained glass windows added to
the tranquility of the space. Every available surface was embellished with
hand-painted blue, green and red tiles in graceful, flowery patterns. No human
or animal images were in evidence since Islam forbids prayer in front of such
since to do so would be a bit too close to idol worship. I’ve found the mosques
we’ve visited generally more peaceful and conducive to contemplation than the many
churches we’ve seen. They are lofty, light-filled places of prayer with no distracting
statues of Saint Sebastian punctured by arrows, frescoes of bleeding, beheaded
martyrs or dark paintings of souls condemned to the fires of eternal damnation.
Our next stop was the neighboring Topkapi Palace, sprawling
residence of Ottoman sultans, their mothers, sisters, wives and
concubines
in the harem and the bejeweled, golden-hilted dagger made famous by the 1964 caper
film (Topkapi) starring Peter Ustinov
and Melina Mercouri. Much of the palace’s enclosed space is dedicated to the
presentation of priceless treasures and Islamic artifacts sitting on sumptuous
velvet cushions behind thick vitrines. Just as in Croatia, where myriad macabre
Catholic relics were displayed -- shards of saints’ bones and clips of their nails
housed in hollow gold coffers in the shape of arms and feet -- so the sacred
relics of Islam’s holy messengers were presented. Treasures such as a hair of
Mohammed’s beard, a tooth, his sword and his cloak were similarly preserved in gilded
and argentine receptacles. And I wondered in Istanbul as I had in Croatia about
the authenticity of all these religious artifacts: who vouches for the
provenance of such things? The sultan robes on display were close replicas of the
priests’ vestments we’d also seen in Croatia: royal regalia of gilded thread
and the finest embroidery. Was it any wonder that citizens and kings (like
those of France in centuries past) became so wary of the “bedecked like
royalty” clergy? In Croatia, each room of the convent treasury was vigilantly guarded
by a genial, habited nun who we were told would have no problem physically
pouncing on us should we attempt to take pictures or touch anything
inappropriately. In the Topkapi Palace, armed guards from the Turkish military
replaced the smiling sisters but I’m not sure with whom I’d rather tangle.
What is it that compels people to buy funny hats and
ridiculous shirts on vacation and to actually wear them as if they were attractive?
Perhaps its make them feel like locals but in reality they stick out like sore
thumbs. Over the course of our travels we’ve
seen so many tourists, especially bands of merry men off cruise ships, in silly
looking sailor caps and black-and-white striped sailor shirts or cheap straw
panamas with coordinating ribbons. They wear their new attire enthusiastically for
the length of the holiday, but I’m certain that once home, it is relegated to
the already existing piles of discarded accouterments from previous excursions.
I imagined their lucky children and grandchildren as they picked through the heaps
of discarded bonnets and chemises with delight as they prepared for Halloween and
other dress-up occasions.
As we wandered the Topkapi Palace, I spied a troupe
of several dozen weathered older women draped in black and wearing navy and
white baseball caps atop their headscarves. Well, that’s a unique look, I
thought, and while happy to see that the women were out and about, wondered,
given their hats, if they could possibly be off one of the massive cruise ships
docked in the Bosporus. Tahir told me when I asked that they were actually peasant
women from rural Turkey enjoying their first trip to see the top cultural and
religious sights of Istanbul, paid for by a charitable foundation. Wow, I
thought, their particular baseball caps are not silly at all and I was certain
that once back on their farms, the women would continue to wear them proudly.
Around the corner from the palace, monumental Hagia
Sofia (Holy Wisdom) rises at the end of what was the ancient Roman hippodrome.
In the reverse of what took place in Cordoba where the victorious Catholic
monarchs mutilated the mosque by dropping a basilica into the middle of the
Islamic mezquita, the triumphant Ottoman Empire defaced the cathedral by
turning it into a mosque. In both cases, the buildings should have been left
alone, but alas, such is not the behavior of conquerors. In 360 Hagia Sofia was
dedicated as the Greek Orthodox Cathedral of Constantinople, for a short time
in the 13th century was a Roman Catholic Cathedral, was first
transformed into a mosque in 1453 and finally was secularized as a museum in
1935. The echoing
interior is a massive example of Byzantine architecture and was the largest
cathedral in the world for nearly a thousand years until Sevilla’s cathedral
was built.
Lying beneath Istanbul are hundreds of dark
cisterns that stored water for the emperors from the city’s days as
Constantinople. En route to the Grand Bazaar, we left the 90-degree
temperatures of the streets to descend to the refreshingly cool depths of the
grandest of them all: the Basilica Cistern, so called because it lay beneath a
grand Byzantine public square (the original meaning of the word). Sometimes
called the Sunken Palace because that’s exactly what it appears to be, the
cistern covers almost two and a half subterranean acres and includes a procession
of 336 marble columns. The symmetry and grandeur of the deep, cavernous structure,
illuminated by atmospheric lighting, are really quite extraordinary. We walked
along the raised wooden platforms, watched the slowly moving, ghostly carp
silently guarding the waters and felt and heard the drip-drip-drip of moisture
from the vaulted ceiling. In addition to being a welcome relief from the aboveground
heat, visiting the cistern was an eerie, entirely unexpected and fascinating stop
on our guided itinerary.
There are more than 3,000 shops in Istanbul’s celebrated Grand Bazaar.
While merchants are indeed anxious to make a sale, shoppers are not subjected
to undue pressure à la Morocco. A retailer may ask you once if you’d like to
see some beautiful belts or shawls or carpets but then smile and let you go on
your way when you shake your head and say, “No thanks.” The covered marketplace
was considerably more modern than I expected and while many of the stalls were
tiny niches overflowing with merchandise, others were bright, roomy showrooms
with plenty of space for displaying their wares.
Our
stay in Istanbul ended with another van-with-two-drivers transfer to the
airport. One of our chauffeurs was a young man who, when we told him we were
American, enthusiastically shared that he’d always wanted to go to the US – out
west to Texas and to Dallas, specifically. He was a big fan of the late ‘70s television
show and wanted to see the ranches and the horses and wear cowboy boots and a cowboy
hat like JR Ewing. We wished him well in his quest to reach Dallas as he dropped
us at the terminal and then headed for our hour-long flight to Cappadocia –
Turkey’s particular version of the American West.
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