Still in Istanbul..

Well, we finally saw Topkapi Palace, the Hagia Sophia, Sultanhamet (the Blue Mosque), and the Grand and Spice Bazaars. It is pretty amazing. Coming from Williamsburg, we've had history infused into life since the beginning, but it is nothing compared to what stands here. These buildings are older than our nation, sometimes twice as old as our nation....it's impossible not to feel some sort of awe. Add to that the fact that most of them are also incredibly beautiful with tiny, intricate details on every part and it becomes amazing.

The weather was finally cooler today- with lots of wind, still VERY hot, but not as bad as the past few days. We only needed one bottle of water instead of five. Lucky for us, the city transportation is pretty effective so we can get from one side to the other quickly. Walking is really nice too because all the stalls and stores are different. And, although there are a good number of pale, blonde Turkish people walking around, Alice and I have that look of amazement sometimes and all the sellers try to get us to buy things "Oh lady, you have beautiful eyes, buy this!" They are definitely persistent.

Today we also stood in the middle of a swarm of pigeons. Although they are pretty nasty bird, it was cool to see them moving all around in the air like cloth. And the people who sold us birdseed were interesting. At first there was just an old man and immediately after we threw all the birdseed, and old woman hustled over and started bickering with the man- it got pretty intense, they were shoving each other. So, we quietly walked away.

The buildings are all pretty cool. We went to the Grand Bazaar which is really cool- it's huge and there are so many vendors. A lot of it is the same, but there still cool stuff. And, the prices are definitely inflated to take tourists' money, but having two Turkish guys around helped us walk away from that. We found the same thing in a different section of the city for 4 times less than they tried to seel it at the Bazaar, soooo....

I don't know if people here realize how lucky they are, I think they do. The whole city has easy access to the water and there are plenty of beautiful parks and places to sit and enjoy the water. Tonight we ate kumpir- a baked potato covered in all these different things, corn, peas (YUCK!), relish, olives, spices, mayonnaise, ketchup, cheese, lots of stuff- then we sat on benches next to the sea for a long time. As night fell, it got a lot cooler and the whole Anatolian side of the city was lit up across the water AND all the oldest buildings were lit up to our right on the Golden Horn. It was amazing.

I think we'll be heading to Konya and Cumra soon, so I am not sure the next time we'll post.

For now, miss you all!
Take care!