Baltics24: Day 16 – Istanbul

I’ll write the second half of day 15 after this, but figure I should get today down while it’s fresh, a few extra hours won’t hurt my memory. I’m also distracted keeping one eye on the absolute shitfest that is England vs Slovakia, it’s currently half time in extra time and JFC it seems that England have finally managed to turn up and remember what that funny white framed net thing at the other end of the pitch is for. It’s been painful to follow.

Istanbul (not Constantinople — I promised that would get rehashed often once I got here), or Byzantium if you’re really really damn old. Probably one of the world’s most strategically placed cities, spreading across the Bosphorus Strait at the gateway to the Black Sea, one side in Europe, the other in Asia. Throughout history, if you want to march an army from Europe to Asia (or vice versa) you basically either go through Istanbul, or take a very long way around the Black Sea. If you want to take a navy into or out of the Black Sea, you have to go through Istanbul. Ditto for trade.

Pause while I lose my train of thought as I attempt to grasp the concept that England actually managed to win a game of football.

Anyway, Istanbul, strategic city, very old, Still has a whole bunch of old buildings that you might have heard of, like Topkapi Palace, Sultanahmet Mosque (otherwise known as the Blue Mosque), and the Hagia Sofia (pronounced “aya-sofiya”, obviously). These are basically the big three, and they are big, possibly the only thing bigger is the crowd trying to get in on a warm Sunday in June. They are all close together, forming a tourist hub along with the former Hippodrome (sadly there aren’t any hippos, or chariots, anymore, just some columns).

Back in the good old days, the Hippodrome was the centre of much in Constantinople. It was the place to be, party, and as such various rulers made the place look pretty with items from all over the region, and new works of art. A three-headed serpent column from Delphi, tick (am surprised Greece doesn’t appear to be asking for this back). An obelisk from the Temple of Karnak, tick. A new obelisk, tick. Some fancy horse statues, tick. Sadly, few of the places that were party central a thousand years ago are the same anymore, the Hippodrome no exception. In the early thirteenth century some crusaders figured they’d make up for a lack of pay by taking anything not nailed down. A couple of hundred years after they dragged all the shiny things back to Venice, the Ottomans came along, and one of the sultans, feeling inadequate and wanting to prove they had balls, knocked one of the serpent heads off. At some point the other two heads fell or were knocked off. The Hippodrome became a wide open square, and the only racing there now are kids trying to get away from their parents, and locals wanting to shake some coin out of the tourists.

While we’re mentioning folks feeling inadequate, the Sultanahmet/Blue Mosque is very big, with six tall minarets surrounding its domes. The story is that Sultan Ahmed wanted to get closer to god, or leave his mark on Constantinople, so he had this very large mosque built, one big enough to rival the nearby Hagia Sofia. Use all the tiles. Make lots of them blue. Give it as many if not more minarets than the great mosque in Mecca. Sadly, it seems that Ahmed died before it could be completed, as his son had to pay the last bills for its construction. It’s still a working mosque, so when we arrived it was closed for prayers. While I figure if it was a church, I could fake being a worshipper (all you need to do is sit quietly and close your eyes, right?) the whole Muslim prayer stuff is way more involved, with all the washing and kneeling and stuff. So we first ducked away from a local who was obviously trying to line up some way to get some coin from us, but at least had a sense of humour (“I don’t even have a rug business”) then headed to the Basilica Cistern.

The Basilica Cistern is how Byzantium/Constantinople got its water, with Romans setting up all manner of construction to dump water into this 80 million litre space, supported by columns that included recycled material from old roman statues. “What have they ever done for us?” you might ask, well after supporting the city for over a thousand years, they left this wonderful cistern that charges $40 to visit. Inside is very picturesque, with the addition of some modern sculptures to explore the relationship with water, and an impressive lighting setup that changes, and each change makes the place seem quite different. The Medusa corner is wonderful — two column bases are recycled Medusa heads, so they’ve added a creepy sculpture that throws a wonderful silhouette. The Cistern is also good to visit when it’s hot and sunny if you want to get out of the heat. The giftshop/bookshop at the end also has some interesting, if not totally unrelated works, like Dickens, Tolkein, Kafka,

We headed out into the heat and back to the Blue Mosque, having a wander around the court yard while the midday prayers finished. Then we filed in, respectfully dressed because we don’t suck as much as some on the cultural insensitivity scale, slipped off our shoes when we entered, and checked it all out. It’s a very impressive space, the interior decorations are exquisite, there’s something about Islamic art that I really enjoy, probably the balance of patterns and mathematics to it all. I won’t say I was impressed to see that there’s a separate prayer space at the back for women, while men get to pray in the main section in front of the shiny stuff (I’ve just googled and read an article justifying having women pray separately as being in their interests, and the reason they pray at the back of any mixed congregations is to avoid distracting men by having bottoms, and I’m not really buying it, but then show me an organised religion that really does treat women equally). Suffice to say Blue Mosque is quite impressive, worth checking out, and also free to enter. Just don’t dress like an idiot.

I’ll probably throw more thoughts around later, but so far Istanbul does seem a chunk more progressive than some non-secular places, they aren’t forcing hijabs on women, who seem to be wearing generally what they want, and I’m yet to encounter any overt hassling of women, unlike what I remember of Morocco. Still, it’s definitely a man’s man’s man’s world in Istanbul.

After the Blue Mosque we trammed up the hill and found lunch at a place called Lekker. I don’t know if that means anything in Turkish (it does mean delicious in German). We did the cold mixed meze, and it was … okay. I guess we’re spoilt for Turkish/Lebanese food in Australia, there are a number of exceptionally good, reasonably cheap places. In this mix some elements just didn’t have huge amazing flavour: the hummus was bland; there was some sort of vegetables in sour cream that didn’t have much going on, the bread didn’t seem the freshest, and the most spicy sample didn’t really deliver much behind the heat. The tzatziki was very good, and there was an eggplant dish that was pretty incredible.

Speaking of food, I have to relate my breakfast experience: the hotel breakfast features a number of cold dishes, with things like mushrooms, potato balls rolled in spices, olives, cheeses, dips, vegetables, all manner of things. One shallow dish contained a reddish paste, and i didn’t seen any label. Being me, so wanting to try everything, a threw a portion of that on my plate. When it came time for tasting, I’m pretty sure it was just tomato paste. So there I am, basically putting tomato paste on all my food, as if I’m one of those folks who must have tomato sauce on every meal. I can’t even say I learned a lesson, as the next buffet I’m gonna do exactly the same with anything I don’t know.

After lunch we strolled down the hill to the waterfront, where any number of boat tours on the Bosphorus can be arranged. However, as crafty travel blogs will tell you (as well as less-crafty ones written by fools who’ve just put tomato paste on everything) if you want to do it cheaply, and maybe skip having a guide explain a few sights, you can just take one of the many ferries, and see the river, all the ships, and possibly even end up in Asia. I’m still a bit weirded out by that whole geographical angle, but I’m not the one who defines the borders of continents. If it means I can take a ferry and end up in an entirely different continent, count me in. The ferries in Istanbul are cheap and popular, it’s a huge city and lots of people live on the Asian side, making these an important part of the link between the two halves. Not to mention all the pesky continent-hopping tourists. Our ferry over was named Dr. Prof Alaeddin Yavasca (we don’t know who they are either). We took a quick wander, grabbed a Turkish coffee at a corner shop that had lots of impressive cakes but inattentive service so I didn’t end up getting one. Then headed back to Europe. Our whole Bosphorus tour cost less than 100 Turkish Lira (hereafter TL or TRY) so under $5.

For dinner we wandered away from the big end of town a little, and found a downstairs place with a number of interesting things in their bain maries (which seems to be a regular thing here). L went for the eggplant, and I got some very tasty lamb meatballs and mashed potato. Then we hiked uptown to Hafiz Mustafa 1864, an Istanbul dessert institution, where I had a slab of what can best be described as baklava ice cream sandwich, full of pistachio goodness and syrup with a thick layer of vanilla icecream. Very tasty indeed. Crunchy, sweet, I think carrot was also involved in it, maybe the pistachio filling. While I’m unlikely to have this every night I’m here, it was very good indeed. Their dessert range is such that they even have some gf items, so L was happy.

Tomorrow we’re off to check out more old things, and also some markets, so I’ll save my descriptions of shops full of baklava and Turkish delight until then. There is definitely more good food to be found here, and I’m up to the challenge.