Istanbul

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We made it to Istanbul yesterday! We got out of the airport at around six, and arrived at our hostel at about 8pm, via public transportation, walking and some helpful, sometimes animated, directions. Apparently, getting to downtown involved a lot of swopping. Today we visted Hagia Sophia, the Basilica Cistern, the Grand Bazar, and the Turikish Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts. Hagia Sophia was a church built during reign Justinian I of the Byzantine empire, it was later converted into a mosque, and is now a museum. When it was a converted to a mosque the Christian mosaics were plastered over. This perserved them to the present day. The remnants of the mosaics are beautiful, as are the stones, and collums of this huge building. The Cistern was also a byzantine project. It was an underground water supply for old Constantinople. It recycled collums and statues as supports. We saw a couple of Medusa heads. The bazar was hectic, and made me nervous. I don't like stituations like that. The haggling makes me feel guilty, and people hound you. The Museum was nice. It contained some ancient copies of the Quran, other interesting artifacts, and many, many examples of carpets. Like last night, we spent our evening on our hostel's rooftop cafe, enjoying the view of the landmarks and the water.


No pictures for awhile, the USB port is not accesible on the computers we have access to. Sorry.

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