Mer-Hah-Bah!
Check out the size of those fishing poles – like ready to catch a giant marlon. What they do catch are fish between four and six inches long(!) and as many as ten on a string.
Everyone, it seemed, was pulling them in in great numbers, and thinking about dinner.
Next I rode the tram from (E) to (F), ending here at the Dolmabahçe Palace, most well known as the place where Ataturk spent his last days, and finally died here.
This mosque is just next to the palace. It was very pleasant and quiet in here. Notice all the windows making it a unique and serene space.
While I was here it was me and that guy up front. I only snapped this one shot because my camera was so loud it sounded like a cannon was going off. And then just as I was leaving a bus full of German tourists pulled up, so lucky me on the timing.
Then I headed out for the very long uphill slog to Taksim Square. Just floating on the air I could hear a flute soloist. Wow, maybe I could go listen?!
And I could! There was a graduation going on at this university and that cutie boy at the front door with the carnations said I could wander around for a while, just don’t take any pictures. I’m not sure why since cameras were flashing away like crazy, but I didn’t, except for this picture of a picture that was prominently placed on the wall. I wonder what is its story.
Several blocks before actually arriving at Taksim Square these police barricades began to appear and continued all the way to the Square. They were gathering them up to put away until next time I’m sure.
At (G) The Monument of Independence from 1928 with “Ataturk and the Founding Fathers of the modern Turkish Republic.”
Walking from (G) to (H) it was A-Ma-Zing. Over here in the Beyogle district is the modern commercial part of Istanbul.
The places I was visiting though were basically for leisure, both for tourists and locals…
…including every side street chock-o-block with restaurants, snack shops, stores of every description, clubs, and even the occasional sign pointing upstairs for ‘artistic tattoos’.
Right off the road of the throngs you can step into the courtyard of the Saint Antoine Church. This is looking away from the church.
It could be a refuge, but not when the whole courtyard was packed with people.
Another of what the housing looks like in this neighborhood, including a museum and a hotel. It has a most appealing feel I think but the surrounding blocks are night-club-central it seems.
Then I took the tunnel-trolly from (I) to (J), the bus from (J) to (K), walked up another long hill…
…to arrive at the Conrad Hilton, 15th floor executive lounge, for this view of the Bosporous…
…and dinner with Joy (on the right) who invited me having run across my website, and her friend Deronda. Both women are working in Istanbul now – Deronda planning to stay semi-permanently and Joy on a one year contract with IBM.
I had a totally great time with two smart and interesting, resourceful and adventursome women. Thank you Joy!
May 3
Most of the breakfast buffet at my hotel pictured here. We’ve got three kinds of cheese including feta, a type of cheddar, and a kind of string cheese. Three kinds of olives. Five kinds of spreads for your bread and three kinds of jam for your yogurt. Two kinds of meat. Corn flakes and chocolate flavored corn flakes. Always an egg dish of some preparation. And always always very delicious bread, tomatoes, and cucumbers. I’m a happy camper.
Loudspeakers are positioned thus around the minarets. It’s all about the guy who is doing the call – does he hold his mouth too close to the microphone and really go at so it sounds like a dj at a scratch challenge, or does he calmly and sincerely just sing the words.
May 4
Ahmet and Eser found me on the internet and invited me out. They gave up their whole day to drive me places it’s not so easy to visit by public transportation and ohh yeah, I had Such a time!
We crossed over the Galata Bridge from ‘my side’ to ‘the other side’ of the European finger and headed up the Bosporus.
In this town there are maybe 6-8 stands like this one all with similar egg shaped piles (they call them ‘potato’) each one more lavishly decorated than the next.
There are two bridges that cross the Bosporus. Absolutely everyone I ever heard speak of them called them The First Bridge and The Second Bridge.
I don’t know which one that is. On our drive we went to Asia on the second bridge and came back across on the first.
And this is the main room of the mosque. This one, like the other one near here (the one that also had a lot of windows) both have these massive crystal chandeliers whereas the older ones have the individual light bulbs spread throughout the space hanging from the domes by long long strings.
Must be about the style and era of the building.
This is the high school building connected with Bogazici Universitesi where Ahmet teaches and where their daughter is going to be married on June 19th. If that date looks familiar to you it should because it’s my Birthday.
It’s a gorgeous location for a wedding and everyone is very happy about it all.
Loving those Judas trees that brighten every corner of Istanbul. It’s like cherry blossom season – utterly magnificent and then gone.
Why are all these ladies gathered? To climb down a steep staircase just two or three at a time and…
…enter this room where you toss the strings of tinsel you’ve just bought and wish for a good match for your daughter. You can wish for youself too, but we were wishing for our daughters!
Then when your wish comes true you’re supposed to come back and say thank you. Sounds fair.
The Black Sea! The inset shows where the tour boats stop and where you can climb to that fortification at the top.
Having crossed at the second bridge we are now In Asia.
This was originally a channel dug for the use of the ladies of the court who would, of a summers day, row up and back, dressed to the nines with all their minions in tow.
A much smaller fortification built earlier than the Fortress of Europe and not to a very useful end or so I heard from Ahmet.
We ended the afternoon with a cup of coffee at A&E’s home. We can note that all cats do not live on the street as several of them live here.
That’s Ahmet’s book he’s holding. I got to look through the book with a personal naration by the author himself. It’s very cool and available on Amazon: Dreams and Perception (Dusler ve Gorusler) by Ahmet Cafer Celebiler.
The view from their patio is so vast – I couldn’t figure out any other way to show it. That’s the Blue Mosque on the farthest right and I’m not sure of the landmark on the farthest left.
And THEN Ahmet invited me to join them for an evening dinner and cruise on the Bosporus. Yes! It was a business thing, put on by folks in the insurance business for whom Ahmet does some work.
I haven’t attended a good business party in Forever and this one was Good.
First we had all that, then they brought more, and then there was the whole fish course just the way I like it, then dessert and coffee. And an open bar all night long.
They also had a Turkish folk band and a belly dancer to entertain the guests. Everyone was smiling.
I cannot even believe At All that I got to be here, doing this, on my last night in Istanbul.
Allahaismarladik Istanbul, tesekkur ederim!
