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Published: November 14th 2007
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Another very cold day today and neither of us very well prepared. Rob bought a corn on the cob to keep him going till lunch. You could pay 0.50 extra for a grilled one which he did. This ended up being a terrible idea; not only was it more expensive but it was dry and tasteless despite the copious amount of salt on it. While eating we went back to the Blue shop where Steph had spotted a pashmina she liked the day before (not black, but purple). After a bit of haggling and a promise to promote the Blue shop with a picture on the blog, Steph managed to get what she wanted for half the price.
From the Sultanahmet we walked past the bazaar district up to the university area towards Suleymaniye camii. The area leading to the mosque was a lot more Turkish with hardly any tourists and plenty of students. It was surprising how many students had headscarves considering they aren't allowed to wear it at university. Outside the impressive mosque were loads of cafes, so we picked one and sat down. Almost immediately a waiter encouraged us to look at a variety of dishes and
pick what we fancied; its faster than fastfood as all the food is pre-cooked and kept warm and dished out there and then. Steph got a bowl of haricot beans and rice which seems to be a national dish, I got a beef stew and rice.
Suleymaniye camii is a massive complex which surrounds a beautiful mosque. We didn't really have time to walk around it all, but we did go and see the Sultan's tombs and went into the mosque. We got to the mosque just before a call to prayer, so we were ushered in and told to leave when everyone else did. Inside was pretty spectacular and not entirely different from the Blue Mosque. Just as we were leaving the mosque a call prayer began so we sat down in the courtyard of the mosque to listen. I don't think you're supposed to sit that close to the speakers to listen because it was so loud.
We walked back to the front via the university area which was interesting. It was kind of run down but bustling and the university buildings were ugly monstrosities.
We had heard about the spice or Egyptian bazaar and
not had time to visit so we walked to it. It was packed, except unlike the grand bazaar it was full of locals. There were shops and stalls just selling tea or coffee which had massive queues of Turkish people. There were stalls for tourists which sold the obligatory Turkish delight and then gimmicks like aphrodisiacs and love potions etc. The actual spice stalls were really colourful and the smells carried around the bazaar.
It was cold and wet when we set off for the football game. Steph bought a jacket from a shop in the main highstreet in Taksim. We walked down the highstreet looking for somewhere affordable to eat some warm food. We had every possible variety of salad available but we wanted warm food. Just as we standing trying to figure out where to go a strange guy came over to us and began talking. Not only did he profess his love for Steph, but he pointed us in the wrong direction for the Galatasaray game. (We didn't believe him though)
We ate at Pizza Hut which was massively disappointing but it did fill us up. We left and donned our colours for the game.
We knew that we had to catch a metro from Taksim square except when we got to the station there were no signs to anywhere we knew. We looked around for someone to ask and funnily enough the same policeman was there from when we asked how to buy the tickets. He recognised us and didn't bother wasting time trying to explain, he just walked us to the correct platform. From there we followed anyone wearing a Galatasaray shirt until suddenly the rain got heavy. We ran for cover and instantly realised that our measly waterproofs would be no match for the increasingly worsening storm. We purchased two red, yellow and black macs and headed for the stadium. Unfortunately Galatasaray have a pretty bad history of violence and so we were greeted by a stringent set of security measures which we were not expecting. Once through the turnstiles we were separated and I was patted down by male security whilst a woman went through Steph's handbag. They made us get rid of all of our change which wouldn't have been completely terrible except that in Steph's purse she had all the small change we have been collecting since we
began traveling.
The stadium itself is quite small and only holds about twenty thousand people. Galatasaray had a new stadium built for them but the fans were sick of the lack of atmosphere so they moved back to their old one. We tried to figure out which were our seats but we were told that there weren't any allocated seats and to just to go wherever. We opted for the atmospheric side and stood up on our seats like everyone else. We were there early which gave us time to learn a few of the chants before the game began. We were extremely glad of our full length macs as the rain was very heavy. Just before the game kicked off we were all told to bunch up into a tighter group by the people at the front who seemed to be charged with the primary job of getting the fans to chant etc. As the game kicked off there was a crack of lighting and a deafening roar of thunder. It was around this point that we wondered what we had let ourselves in for.
The game wasn't the best game of football we had seen and
play was severely affected by the rain. Neither team was noticeably superior which lead to a stalemate. The fans chants etc kept us amused when the football became a bit dull. Weirdly the fans seemed to dictate who stayed on the pitch. A few minutes before half time Fenerbahce substituted an increasingly unpopular player, even though they were losing and needed the extra time. The final score was 3-2 which a few fans missed because Fenerbahce's last goal was scored when most people had accepted defeat. Even though the football wasn't the best it was worth going to see for the atmosphere created by the fans.
Somehow we managed to walk all the way back to the hostel even though we were both asleep on our feet. We both collapsed onto our beds and fell fast asleep almost instantaneously.
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kate
non-member comment
footie
The football match sounds like a really interesting experience. It's not everybody that can say they've been to a Turkish match in Turkey. Love mumxxxxxxxx