Sultanahmet in a Kilt
(Apologies for some larger pictures today, I hope this isn't causing loading problems for anyone. If it is, let me know! Today's locations can also be found using Google Earth, Follow the Misadventures like never before!)
It was a day to shine, the visitors had seen the big mosques and palaces Friday, but today was the visit to the archeology museum, my favorites spot in all of Sultanahmet. (1, 2, 3) Today was going to be different, every time I have wanted to go to Sultanahmet I have simply walked to the corner, called a taxi and paid between 8 and 10 lira to go to the front of Tokapi palace. Today I was taking an incredibly round-about way, scouted out on Google Earth, to completely avoid any tourist predators. Today I was also wearing a kilt.
First I walked through the seaside Beshiktash market, things have changed in the spring, and many stores have moved a bit out onto the sidewalks, even though it was still midmorning when I passed through the market, the sun was coming on strong and it promised to be a warm day. Several streets wind through the market, branching and turning in a very organic way. I wonder why cars even try driving through, the traffic crawls bumper to bumper, down narrow, one way brick streets. Everyone on foot moves faster than the cars.
A rusting foot bridge draped with "Welcome to Istanbul" banners crosses over the busy street running along the Bosphorus, as I crossed over the top I caught the first hint of salt in the air. To me the sea here is not very salty, in places like California, or even Cyprus I could smell the ocean salts very strongly, maybe it is the pollution in Istanbul that keeps it from my notice. Across the footbridge and down past the Naval Museum is the Beshiktash ferry terminal. Ferries in Istanbul are always packed, so many people use them to commute because they are quicker and more reliable than buses, when getting from the Europe side to the Anatolia side is concerned.
This is the ferry I rode to Kadıköy, only two levels, unlike the second one from Kadıköy to Eminönü. But all ferries have refreshment bars where tea and toast can be ordered as well as soft drinks and chocolate candy.
Looking up and down the Bosphorus you will always see freighters like this one, it's a non-stop display of global commerce, reading the boats you see names written in Cyrillic, Chinese, even Arabic and Persian!
After the second ferry I was in Eminönü, crowded port and anyone who even remotely looked like a tourist was already being sucked up the streets into the sprawl of tourist shops that lie around the gems of Istanbul. This is where I crossed my fingers and hoped I wasn't just walking into more, down the busy road that runs next to the water things were looking good. The only other folks I saw seemed to be the gentle folk out enjoying a stroll next to the ocean on a Saturday afternoon.
As I neared the entrance to the palace grounds I crossed the street, now on the land side instead of seaside, and right over the wall I could see I was next to the train yard for the system of trams the run around the Southern blob of Istanbul West. Spring is in full tilt and beautiful vibrant greens were all over the place, shoots of grass coming up through the gravel and moss on all the rocks. What Istanbul's public transportation lacks in boggling complexity and flat screen televisions it more than makes up for with pleasant serenity and a deep sense of civility.
Then it was across the bridge into the palace gardens, I did what I had thought impossible! I was inside the Palace grounds and no one had tried to sell me a plastic bowl or called me "brother" all morning! And it was spring, the gardens were in full bloom. At that hour the pace of visitors had yet not picked up and for the most part I was getting waves and hoots from workers engaged in maintenance on sprinkler systems and washing down the inner walls. (Kilt, remember) The gardens are filled with all colors of flowers, tulips and others I don't know the name of, traffic noise seems not to penetrate the gardens and as I walked along, all I heard were the songs of birds in the overhead branches.
The ladies had arrived and we turned our sites on the museum. The Istanbul Archeology Museum is actually two museums behind one gate, the smaller one is of truly ancient artifacts, including Sumerian tablets and statues of Egyptian gods. It has reliefs from the gates of Babylon and a pair of tweezers over 2500 years old. Though it is smaller than the classical museum, I find this museum more thought provoking. It contains artifacts that are on the dawn of remembered civilization, where people were first being driven to write their thoughts and pass this on to future generations.
The courtyard between the two museums is just stunning, it's filled with statues and sarcophaguses and pillars, like these pieces weren't good enough for the museum so they are left around outside to wet your appetite for what lies behind the doors. The larger museum was apparently designed by a German Architect and it screams, "Brandenburg Gate." Father down the courtyard is a mosque with the façade done in beautiful blue and white tiles. I have a great love of showing things to people and talking at length about them. Having pieces of history, beautiful and perfect, preserved in carved marble gives a sense of majesty and mystique to the ancient world. For instance, seeing what kind of world Alexander the Great conquered gives his life a whole new meaning. It simply can not be compared to conquests of today in impact, both for conquered and conquerer.
This statue of Cornelia Antonia is the most beautiful piece of sculpted marble I have ever seen. The sculptor uses the natural lines in the marble to give the impression of fabric folds underneath her shawl. It really looks as though she was sculpted nude and then dressed in layers. I will skip blasting you with more photos of the museum pieces as they wouldn't have changed much from those in previous posts. (1, 2, 3)
Tonight many conversations over Turkish dinner tables probably began with, "You'll never guess what I saw some guy wearing today." Inside the museum and everywhere I went people reacted enthusiastically to the kilt, with lots of pointing and, "Scott! Scott!". The fun had a few memorable highlights; inside the museum in one of the lower levels that displayed artifacts from surrounding regions, we found ourselves sharing the hall with two young girls who had apparently been separated from the large school-group that had been rampaging through the halls. The girls burst into fits of giggling seeing my kilt and began to film me discreetly as they could with their digital cameras. As we left the museum a group of Italians came up and asked if it was true that nothing is worn under a kilt. The Italian man was so excited and his family thought it was just hysterical that I was wearing a kilt in an Istanbul museum. And then outside the museum some students boldly asked me to pose for some photos!
We dropped by a nearby cafe called the Green Corner for lunch, prices were reasonable and we were right next to Hagia Sophia, little can beat that, kuzu shish and ayran for me! The ladies and I parted ways with the visitors and returned the way I came. Afternoon sun on the top deck, we were happy kids. This was just how Saturdays should go.
It was a day to shine, the visitors had seen the big mosques and palaces Friday, but today was the visit to the archeology museum, my favorites spot in all of Sultanahmet. (1, 2, 3) Today was going to be different, every time I have wanted to go to Sultanahmet I have simply walked to the corner, called a taxi and paid between 8 and 10 lira to go to the front of Tokapi palace. Today I was taking an incredibly round-about way, scouted out on Google Earth, to completely avoid any tourist predators. Today I was also wearing a kilt.
First I walked through the seaside Beshiktash market, things have changed in the spring, and many stores have moved a bit out onto the sidewalks, even though it was still midmorning when I passed through the market, the sun was coming on strong and it promised to be a warm day. Several streets wind through the market, branching and turning in a very organic way. I wonder why cars even try driving through, the traffic crawls bumper to bumper, down narrow, one way brick streets. Everyone on foot moves faster than the cars.
A rusting foot bridge draped with "Welcome to Istanbul" banners crosses over the busy street running along the Bosphorus, as I crossed over the top I caught the first hint of salt in the air. To me the sea here is not very salty, in places like California, or even Cyprus I could smell the ocean salts very strongly, maybe it is the pollution in Istanbul that keeps it from my notice. Across the footbridge and down past the Naval Museum is the Beshiktash ferry terminal. Ferries in Istanbul are always packed, so many people use them to commute because they are quicker and more reliable than buses, when getting from the Europe side to the Anatolia side is concerned.
This is the ferry I rode to Kadıköy, only two levels, unlike the second one from Kadıköy to Eminönü. But all ferries have refreshment bars where tea and toast can be ordered as well as soft drinks and chocolate candy.
Looking up and down the Bosphorus you will always see freighters like this one, it's a non-stop display of global commerce, reading the boats you see names written in Cyrillic, Chinese, even Arabic and Persian!
After the second ferry I was in Eminönü, crowded port and anyone who even remotely looked like a tourist was already being sucked up the streets into the sprawl of tourist shops that lie around the gems of Istanbul. This is where I crossed my fingers and hoped I wasn't just walking into more, down the busy road that runs next to the water things were looking good. The only other folks I saw seemed to be the gentle folk out enjoying a stroll next to the ocean on a Saturday afternoon.
As I neared the entrance to the palace grounds I crossed the street, now on the land side instead of seaside, and right over the wall I could see I was next to the train yard for the system of trams the run around the Southern blob of Istanbul West. Spring is in full tilt and beautiful vibrant greens were all over the place, shoots of grass coming up through the gravel and moss on all the rocks. What Istanbul's public transportation lacks in boggling complexity and flat screen televisions it more than makes up for with pleasant serenity and a deep sense of civility.
Then it was across the bridge into the palace gardens, I did what I had thought impossible! I was inside the Palace grounds and no one had tried to sell me a plastic bowl or called me "brother" all morning! And it was spring, the gardens were in full bloom. At that hour the pace of visitors had yet not picked up and for the most part I was getting waves and hoots from workers engaged in maintenance on sprinkler systems and washing down the inner walls. (Kilt, remember) The gardens are filled with all colors of flowers, tulips and others I don't know the name of, traffic noise seems not to penetrate the gardens and as I walked along, all I heard were the songs of birds in the overhead branches.
The ladies had arrived and we turned our sites on the museum. The Istanbul Archeology Museum is actually two museums behind one gate, the smaller one is of truly ancient artifacts, including Sumerian tablets and statues of Egyptian gods. It has reliefs from the gates of Babylon and a pair of tweezers over 2500 years old. Though it is smaller than the classical museum, I find this museum more thought provoking. It contains artifacts that are on the dawn of remembered civilization, where people were first being driven to write their thoughts and pass this on to future generations.
The courtyard between the two museums is just stunning, it's filled with statues and sarcophaguses and pillars, like these pieces weren't good enough for the museum so they are left around outside to wet your appetite for what lies behind the doors. The larger museum was apparently designed by a German Architect and it screams, "Brandenburg Gate." Father down the courtyard is a mosque with the façade done in beautiful blue and white tiles. I have a great love of showing things to people and talking at length about them. Having pieces of history, beautiful and perfect, preserved in carved marble gives a sense of majesty and mystique to the ancient world. For instance, seeing what kind of world Alexander the Great conquered gives his life a whole new meaning. It simply can not be compared to conquests of today in impact, both for conquered and conquerer.
This statue of Cornelia Antonia is the most beautiful piece of sculpted marble I have ever seen. The sculptor uses the natural lines in the marble to give the impression of fabric folds underneath her shawl. It really looks as though she was sculpted nude and then dressed in layers. I will skip blasting you with more photos of the museum pieces as they wouldn't have changed much from those in previous posts. (1, 2, 3)
Tonight many conversations over Turkish dinner tables probably began with, "You'll never guess what I saw some guy wearing today." Inside the museum and everywhere I went people reacted enthusiastically to the kilt, with lots of pointing and, "Scott! Scott!". The fun had a few memorable highlights; inside the museum in one of the lower levels that displayed artifacts from surrounding regions, we found ourselves sharing the hall with two young girls who had apparently been separated from the large school-group that had been rampaging through the halls. The girls burst into fits of giggling seeing my kilt and began to film me discreetly as they could with their digital cameras. As we left the museum a group of Italians came up and asked if it was true that nothing is worn under a kilt. The Italian man was so excited and his family thought it was just hysterical that I was wearing a kilt in an Istanbul museum. And then outside the museum some students boldly asked me to pose for some photos!
We dropped by a nearby cafe called the Green Corner for lunch, prices were reasonable and we were right next to Hagia Sophia, little can beat that, kuzu shish and ayran for me! The ladies and I parted ways with the visitors and returned the way I came. Afternoon sun on the top deck, we were happy kids. This was just how Saturdays should go.
posted by Alex Gray at 23:22
1 Comments:
The location in Sultanahmet was great...walking distance to the markets, the Blue mosque and plenty of restaurants with roof-top dining.
Hagia Sophia is great !!
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