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Published: November 29th 2009
Next up was an overnight bus from Bucharest to Istanbul to meet Katherine and Justin. There were some fairly dodgy deals going on in the bus with passengers and the stewards exchanging inch-thick bundles of 50 euro notes. The Romanian man sitting next to me didn´t speak any English, but was up for a chat. He knew about 50 words in Spanish, Italian and French and seemed intent on sharing them all with me, as well as telling me the distance between Bucharest and every major city in Europe. Riveting stuff! He also kept feeding me apples and wouldn't let me drink the water the steward was handing out, I had to drink his. Suspicious in hindsight! Anyway, it made for an interesting trip and allowed me to knock off another country - Bulgaria.
We got into Istanbul at about 3am, which was a bit of a bummer because I had no accommodation and wasn't meeting K and J until mid-afternoon. Fortunately I'd met a (slightly weird) German geographer on the bus and we wandered the extremely quiet city together. It was pretty cool seeing the mosques etc. all lit up at night with no one around. Just before sunrise
Platter
The inspiration for Michael Jackson Rememberance Daywe ran into a stall-owner named Halid and sat down and had a chat with him. Over the course of an hour, which included four cups of excessively sweet tea, we managed to have a very amusing conversation - I don't think he understood a word we were saying and we definitely didn't know what he was on about. The only thing we really understood was when he pulled a gun out of his pocket and demonstrated what he'd do if someone tried to rob his shop.
Anyway, the Howell family reunion went off without a hitch and plenty of Howell silliness ensued. Take for example 'Michael Jackson Rememberance Day'. Inspired by a shop which was selling plates with Michael Jackson beautifully 'calligraphied´ (apparently this is not a real word, Liam and Conor are cracking the shits at me about it) on it, we decided I should go out dressed as the late MJ for a day in his honour. Fortunately for some reason I possessed every article necessary to look like him, minus the white glove. MJ's reincarnation was made complete by sightings of Prince and Blanket. Speaking of weird...
Highlights of Istanbul:
- Visiting
the Hagia Sofia and Blue Mosque. Two extremely impressive mosques which are amazingly and intricately decorated.
- The Basilica cistern: an underground water storage system built by the Romans. Very Impressive!
- Wandering through the Grand Bazaar. Very touristy, but a great atmosphere.
- The food! Beautiful fish, kebaps, crepes, ayran (a salted yoghurt drink), tea, etc.
- A ferry ride along the Bosphorus - a great trip and a good way to see how big and sprawling Istanbul is. We stopped on the Asian side and had lunch.
- Visiting Topkapi Palace. Another very impressive palace and a further example of extreme wealth. Highlights were seeing a 86-carat diamond (which was apparently found in a rubbish tip and traded for three spoons) and the arm of Prophet John and its case. Not sure why they felt the need to preserve his arm.
- Visiting the Spice Market, a much less touristy market and a great place to visit. Continuing my run of weirdoes, I was accosted by a man who wanted to know where I was from and when I told him, said to me, 'You are Australian BBQ. Oi Oi Oi. I love small people, nice people, I
am small people!'
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Liam
non-member comment
might need that year at uni ya dickhead
No results found for calligraphied: Did you mean calligrapher? Dictionary: # calligraphic # calligraphist # calligraph # calligraphy # Caligraphic # calligraphy's Bless you.