Istanbul - 6.8 thru 6.10.07

(first - here's a link to my pictures until I'm able to post a few on the blog)
http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=vd2ejfo.3ebmbvyc&x=0&h=1&y=2rifqy

Friday Night -
So Rafael and I went to Reina and enjoyed a great dinner on the patio off of the Basphora River. The scene - probably about 60% wealthy locals (fairly young) and business people. Interesting people-watching for sure. The girls were gorgeous and the guys, well...not so much, but I'm sure they had plenty of money to keep the girls entertained. Somehow dinner lasted from 8:30 to midnight...typical slow service, but we also ordered a few courses and obviously dessert! The restaurant was actually 6 different restaurants all connected with bars in each of them and a main bar on the ground level in the middle. Rafael hung out for a bit at the bar after dinner to check out the scene as the restaurant(s) turn into a club/lounge at night. Still good people watching, but the music wasn't really "dance-able" (even though I did like it) and after a 3 1/2 hour dinner with my co-worker, I didn't really have much else to talk about at the time.
I was up for checking out some other "hot spots" in the area - Ortakoy, but Rafael was tired so we headed back to the hotel to get some rest for Saturday.

Saturday - 6.9.07
Today we couldn’t get up at 8am as planned, but Rafael finally got up at 9 and woke me up at 9:30 to get ready. We knew we had a full day ahead of us so it wasn’t a big deal that we slept in a little…I knew that I’d need all the energy I could get. We grabbed some breakfast in the hotel since it came with the room but came to realize that it was pretty gross. Not even good fruit or croissants. There were canned peaches and runny eggs, sausages and some weird cheese. I had some fruit and a bowl of cereal that was half-way decent. So anyways, after breakfast we headed out to explore the city according to Izzet’s itinerary that he prepared for us.

1st stop – the Blue Mosque (Sultanahmet Camii).
This was still a working mosque and is referred to as “Blue” because of the Blue tiles and Blue granite used. It looks huge and is very beautiful from the outside but extremely simple on the inside. Since the mosque was still in use, we had to take off our shoes and cover our legs and head before entering. It was a fairly quick visit as there wasn’t much to see.

2nd stop – Aya Sophia
…this mosque-turned-museum across the street was actually built twice since the original had burned down. From the outside it’s also beautiful but doesn’t look quite as large as the Blue Mosque. From the inside it appears MUCH bigger than it’s friend across the way. We spent a good hour here as there was way more to see. This mosque was more elaborate and was actually originally a church from the Byzantine Era. You could see some remnants of Christian mosaics on the walls. The Sultan who took over this “church” and turned it into a mosque also simplified the inside. The walls were painted into much simpler shapes and designs. A photographer had apparently spent many years taking photographs in the area and his pictures of the mosque were displayed. Truly beautiful stuff. You couldn’t even tell that they were just photographs because of the clarity of the pictures. They looked almost like paintings.

3rd stop – Topkapi Palace (Topkapi Sarayi)We walked through an amazingly huge and beautiful garden before even reaching the palace itself. On our way into the palace, Rafael and I got stopped by some guy and his wife (I'm assuming) who asked us if we were American. As usual, Rafael replies that he's Mexican (it's true - not a US Citizen) but I called him out on wearing a FL Gators polo - booo Gators! So basically this guy asked us if we were on vacation here etc. and if we were planning to buy any Turkish Rugs...obviously we said no and turns out that they were there buying some rugs for importing into the States to sell. Sooo random! The palace had hundreds of rooms and was extremely spread out. Most of the rooms were closed but areas such as the Audience Room (where the Sultan met with advisors), the kitchens, and treasury rooms were open for us to view. Several rooms mainly held items on display such as blue and white porcelain bowls and plates, brass silverware, teapots, and decorative items, prayer rugs and Turkish carpets and my favorite – the jewelry. Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take pictures in the Treasury room, which held the jewelry and jewel-studded thrones, armoire, and various other items. The bling was out of control! The least piece was this enormous diamond – 86 carats I think that was surrounded by hundreds of other smaller diamonds. Can you imagine that this piece of jewelry was originally a RING! I don’t know who’s finger that thing would fit on, but eventually it was made into a brooch for the Sultan’s turban. After all our walking around – my stomach started talking to me…so obviously all I could think of was food. We headed out to an area nearby called Yerebatan Sarnici, which was actually on our itinerary for lunch. Izzet planned this pretty well.

We went to the Yerebatan Sarnici to grab lunch at this place called the Mosaic Cafe. It was really good but pretty pricey. We had some shrimp appetizer which was spiced with Turkish spices (yummm) and a lamb kabob...also pretty good. Anyways, I got some rest and off we go to the Grand Bazaar for shopping!

The Grand Bazaar was something else for sure...apparently it's the largest indoor marketplace in Europe and I wouldn't be surprised! Well, first - on our way to the Grand Bazaar we passed by a Sweets Shop and what do I see? Baklava!! my fave :-) They were also selling Turkish Delights so I picked up a box of each. So back on track to the Bazaar. This place was hall after hall of anything and everything you could possibly be looking for. I'm pretty sure it was geared more towards tourists as most stores were jewelry, silver, random bags (Frada, etc.), souvenir shirts, hookahs, tea sets, and the list goes on and on!! So we just walked around to see what all was there and we end up getting lost! After going through this aisle and that aisle we eventually found our way to a door leading to the outside. Unfortunately the door didn't lead to the way we came in from, but it led to this street of vendors that was completely packed with people!! We could hardly move and had no idea where we were going but we eventually found our way out to a main street and caught a cab back to our hotel.

By this time it's about 4:30ish and we were too tired to do anything else during the day and the weather was gorgeous so I hit up the pool for some reading and relaxation. Our dinner reservations for that night weren't until 10 because we figured that we could just go directly out afterwards...After the pool, it was nap time and then we got ready for our big night out.
Well it turned out to be pretty chill like the night before and not-so-big...turns out it's not as exciting to go out when you've been working with the same person for 2 months straight (and that person pretty much being the ONLY one). We went to the 360 Restaurant near our hotel and got a little lost along the way. It was walking distance, but the hotel was at the top of an Apartment Building that we couldn't find. The restaurant was on Istiklal St - another ridiculously crowded area, but this time ranging from teenagers and up. The street was blocked off so cars/cabs couldn't drive on it and was lined on both sides with stores like Diesel, United Colors of Benetton, Nike, Swatch, and sprinkled with random restaurants. This dinner was actually better than Reina's and cheaper too. I'd definitely recommend it!
There was a band playing some great Turkish music but again - not really dance-able so we walked the street to see what else was going on. Some good stuff but again nothing that really peaked our interest to stay out any later than 1am. Also surprisingly enough, the street was still ridiculously crowded that late at night...and back we went to the hotel for Sunday's excursion back to the Dolmabahce Palace.

Sunday - 6.10.07
Again, couldn't get up as early as I wanted but we were up by 9:30ish. Decided that we wanted something besides the nasty hotel breakfast so we walked to the nearby McD's for something. Apparently neither McD's nor Burger King sell breakfast food in Romania...must be an American thing. Next to the Burger King was a cute little Patisserie called Ozsut. We decided that surely they would have some type of breakfast food. Well Romanian breakfast is different from ours (boiled egg and vegetables), so Rafael decided on a cheesecake and lemon smoothie and I had a chocolate eclair and tea. Healthy breakfast right? oh well...so off we go to our palace. We walked there since it was close enough and I needed to burn some cals after that sugary breakfast. The palace had beautiful gardens and was gorgeous on the inside. They made us put this plastic booties over our shoes and we could only walk on specified carpet as the palace was hundreds of years old. The most amazing and distinct part of this palace was the numerous extravagant and beautiful chandeliers!! Truly exquisite. I believe there were over 300 rooms here and also a "Harem's" wing where the Sultan's women, wife and mother stayed. We also saw a pretty famous ballroom that has a 4.5 ton chandelier! It's apparently rented out to the government when high ranking officials (presidents, etc.) come visit and events are held.
So after about 2 hrs, we were finally done w/the palace and had to head back to the hotel to get our bags and peace out to the airport. This taxi driver wasn't as crazy as the first one, but took a long route so i almost fell asleep on the way....

So now I'm in Romania and back to work as usual. It's a little bit more stressful than my work in Amsterdam but it's all good...can't be a slacker for too long!
I'm out!! (pics to be uploaded soon)