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November08,2007"Istanbul"
our fall break began on Thursday night, Oct.25th when the five of us flew to Istanbul to begin our journey. we stayed at Side Pension located by Sultanahmet Square where the Blue Mosque sits right across from Hagia Sophia. the location was perfect and pension was definitely the best by far compared to our later hotels. from the roof terrace of the pension, we had a great view of the Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, and even the Bosphorus. we spent four days in Istanbul, and were lucky to experience Republic Day in Turkey, October 29th. while the festivities for Republic Day weren't as convivial as we thought it would be, there were Turkish flags draped all over the city, including many with Ataturk's face on them. Istanbul is also much cleaner than Athens, so it was nice to be in a pretty, clean city. even the stray cats look less mangy and clean!
during our four days, we basically hit all the major spots around Sultanahmet Square, and even had the chance to cruise through the Bosphorus. i wish we had more time in Istanbul because there is so much to see. i fell in love with the city instantly when i saw the water and beautiful historical landscape.
the first place we went to on Friday was the magnificent Topkapi, the famous palace of the Ottoman sultans. for 20 lira, we got to see all of the palace, including the beautiful harem. and just so you all know, the harem wasn't the sultan's personal brothel, it's actually his personal, most private section of his palace where his female family members (which did include many wives and concubines who as a result of their role, were elevated to a higher social status) and their female servants could have the most privacy. the harem of Topkapi was very ornate and beautiful, with a lot of gold organic motifs and colorful tiled walls. even the drainage was ornate and fancy! (see below left) natural lighting was a bit lacking in some rooms, but overall, the colors of the walls radiated with the sunlight peaking in from the windows.
the other parts of the palace were also very ornate and beautiful, but not comparable to the harem itself. the interior of every building was decorated with colorful tiles covered in organic motifs. there were many chandeliers, stained glass windows, and the most intricate designs in the corners of the walls and the pendentives supporting the dome rooftops. perhaps the most interesting thing is that the columns often differed greatly from one another in material and even style, suggesting that they may have been stolen from Hellenistic sites since the capitals were often of the Ionic Order. the palace also had a great view of the Bosphorus from its gardens and even some of its courtyards. while most of the building was built with a specifically Ottoman flair, some later buildings were sort of Rococo: extremely ornate and over the top with too much gold and use of colors. nevertheless, the architecture was still very impressive and the artwork was breathtakingly beautiful.
the next day, we went to see the famous underground Basilica Cistern now called Yerebatan Sarnici (or Sarayi) by the Turks. my camera unfortunately couldn't handle the lighting situation inside the cistern, but as you can see, it's a magnificent complex, consisting of 336 marble columns all 9 meters high. it was built by Justinian I, who actually expanded it after Constantine had already built and worked on it during his reign. most of the columns were stolen from other Hellenistic sites, hence why not all the columns matched in the cistern. the most famous part of the cistern is the back where two columns each used a stone (bronze?) head of Medusa as a column base. one of the heads is turned sideways, and while scholars debate over why that happened, my travel buddies and i believe that the Byzantine slaves were sick of hauling marble columns and the head of Medusa is so big and heavy that they probably didn't want to carry it and flip it. but perhaps her head is turned sideways for one column and upside down for the other because since the columns were not made for the cistern, the heads could've simply been used to add the necessary length to support the columns.
the Blue Mosque is another magnificent structure at Sultanahmet Square, built by Sultan Ahmed I in the early 1600s. supposedly Ahmed was inspired by the interior magnificence of Hagia Sophia and wanted to emulate her architectural innovations like the pendentives and dome, but he also wanted to surpass Hagia Sophia in its exterior appearance. thus, he commissioned the Blue Mosque with funds from the treasury, which angered some of the people because traditionally, great monuments were funded by gains from conquest and war. but he didn't have any war booty because he was not a military victor. in any case, the mosque is distinguished by its blue tiled domes and its six minarets. if you don't know anything about mosques, all i can tell you from my knowledge of Islam from sixth grade (and the fact that i had to build a model mosque with styrofoam boards and paint) is that the ideal Ottoman mosque would have four minarets because it was part of the architectural harmony that has already be created by the equal area of the musalla (prayer hall) and courtyard. six is really uncommon, and kind of unnecessary. anyhow, the interior was indeed, very beautiful with amazing Islamic organic motifs spiraling through the domes and walls. 
but the structure that was personally the most meaningful for me was Hagia Sophia. the one standing today, and the most famous of the previous two structures, was built during Justinian I's reign, between 532 and 537. the first structure was built by Constantine the Great, but was destroyed during riots about the games at the Hippodrome or something equally silly. what's remarkable about Hagia Sophia are its pendentives! the first structure to ever use pendentives to support its dome so that the interior side of the dome would fall gracefully over the rectangular structure. before pendentives, they were using squinches, which weren't as nice looking but at least they did the job. i remember first reading about the great Hagia Sophia when i was in middle school, briefly learning about Byzantine history and coming across a picture of the exterior of Hagia Sophia. at first i didn't think it was that great, particularly because the minarets looked out of place and the exterior didn't look very impressive. however, when i flipped the page, there were breathtaking pictures of the gorgeous interior of Hagia Sophia that intrigued me more than any other architectural masterpiece. and learning about Hagia Sophia from Ms. Mishel at Lowell in AP Art History only deepened my fascination, and i became determined to visit Istanbul at some point in my life. well lucky me, i've done it and only at the age of twenty. talk about unexpected blessings!
we also took a little cruise around the Bosphorus, taking the TurYol boat to enjoy the scenery for about 1.5 hours. we didn't want to pay more for an all day cruise that stopped at various sites along the water on both the European and Asian side, and 1.5 hours to catch a glimpse of the sites is plenty. there were some imperial palaces built in Rococo and European styles along the water, including the Dolmabahçe Palace and the Çırağan Palace, both of which i know little about besides the fact that both are European in style, not Ottoman, and were used after the Ottoman Sultans stopped using Topkapi. we also saw the Rumelihisari, also called the Rumeli Fortress, which was built before the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453. unfortunately we didn't have time to explore the fortress, but it was still an amazing sight. the Bosphorus was beautiful, and reminded me of the Bay in many ways because of its narrow width and the fact that you could see the other side clearly. in fact, we were able to walk across the Galata Bridge on the last day to Beyoglu, because the strait is just that small. of course, the waters of the San Francisco Bay is nowhere near as pristine as the Bosphorus. it was also nice to see the plethora of fishermen by the Bosphorus, and fish sandwiches grilled fresh. again, that resembled Fisherman's Wharf and reminded me of home. i guess you can see why i feel in love with Istanbul 
the Istanbul Archaeology Museum was amazing, but unfortunately we only had a couple of hours to walk through it before it closed. the museum consists of three buildings, each its own separate little museum, and absolutely too big to cover in one day. there were so much Near Eastern art, an entire floor of artifacts from Troy, and sarcophagi from the famous Necropolis at Sidon. there was also a lot of Cypriot art, Greco-Roman art, and tons more that i regrettably could not even walk through. but it was wonderful to see so much Near Eastern art because i had never seen much of it before in museums, especially Hittite art. the most amazing thing was that the museum houses the most number of tiles from the Babylonian gates of Ishtar. i couldn't believe that they had the actual parts of the gate, because i thought that most of the pieces went to the reconstruction at the Pergamon Museum in Berlin. 
the sarcophagi from the Sidon Necropolis were amazing. rather, the exhibit was beautifully displayed under dim lighting with red carpeting to give the room an intimate feel. the famous Alexander Sarcophagus was perhaps the most astounding piece that i have ever seen. it is incredibly well-preserved, such that remnants of the paint on the sculptural reliefs are still visible, especially the bright red and yellow colors. it was very impressive to see, and i'm so glad that i was able to see it despite the limited amount of time we had in the museum. next time i go back to Istanbul (and i guarantee you i will), i will spend several days walking through the museum because there are truly that many things to see.part two coming soon. i still need to talk about Ephesus and Pergamon, and Rhodes.