Part 9: Istanbul Part I September 21-22

For our second four day weekend (thank you, Bulgarian Ministry!), I went with two of my friends to Istanbul Turkey.  Istanbul is only about an hour and 20 minute plane ride from Sofia, so we left Wednesday evening after school and were at our hotel by 9:00 pm.  We stayed in Sultanhamet, the area where all the sights, such as the Blue Mosque and the Hagia Sofia, are located.  We went out to grab some dinner, took some pictures of the aforementioned areas all lit up, and then went back to our hotel to sleep. 

The next day, we were planning on going to the Blue Mosque first, but apparently, so was everyone else, so we walked across the street to the Hagia Sofia.  The current building (there were two structures before it) of the Hagia Sofia was built by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian in 537 AD and was the largest cathedral in the world for nearly 1,000 years.  After the Ottomans conquered Turkey in 1453, it was turned into a mosque.  Minarets were added and most of the religious relics and paintings inside were plastered over.  In 1931, the mosque was closed and in 1935, the Republic of Turkey reopened the Hagia Sophia as a museum.  It has been undergoing various restorations for many years and some of the original mosaics of Jesus and his Disciples and Byzantine Emperors have been uncovered and are really impressive.  Each little tile is maybe a centimeter square and there must have been thousands of them originally. 

The Hagia Sophia is massive.  It has a gigantic dome that was designed to look unsupported.  Also, there was probably over 400 people inside when we went, but it didn’t even feel crowded.  From the second floor, you can look down on the main hall and the people milling around look like ants.  The second floor has windows all around where you can get great pictures of the Blue Mosque and other nice views of Istanbul.  The Hagia Sofia also has mausoleums of several Ottoman Sultans.  These buildings were really interesting (I also found it interesting that they were open to tourists, seems weird…).  The buildings had domes decorated with tile and the sultans and their family members (one had something like 40 people buried in it) are inside coffins that have pointed tops and are covered in green carpet.  The sultan and any sons that had died had turbans on the tops of their coffins.  It was interesting, and a little morbid.
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Blue Mosque

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Mausoleum

After the Hagia Sophia we got some lunch before heading to the Basilica Cisterns.  The Cisterns were built in the 6^th century by Justinian I.  They are the largest water cisterns of the several hundred underneath Istanbul.  This cistern provided water to the Great Palace of Constantinople and to Topkapi Palace (where the sultans lived) up to modern times.  The cistern is supported by over 336 marble columns that were actually recycled from other Roman structures, so they don’t all match.  Two columns have Medusa heads at the bottom.  Supposedly the heads ward off evil spirits.  The cistern at one time could hold 100,000 tons of water, but now there are only a few feet in the bottom. 

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Hagia Sofia

After stopping for some pictures in front of the Hagia Sofia, we at last headed over to the Blue Mosque.  The line was significantly shorter so we got plastic bags for our shoes, covered up our shoulders, and headed inside.  It was extremely impressive.  It is the largest mosque in Istanbul and was completed in 1616 by Sultan Ahmed I.  Its formal name is the Sultan Ahmed Mosque.  It was designed by the greatest Turkish architect, Sinan, and incorporates both traditional Islamic features and Byzantine features, since it has to compete with the Hagia Sofia across the street. 

The inside is tiled with over 20,000 Iznik tiles.  It is incredible to see.  The mosque also has a huge dome, but it is clearly supported by four giant columns (which are apparently referred to as “elephant feet”) that dominant parts of the floor.  While I feel like most things I saw in Istanbul were impressive, the Blue Mosque takes the prize for most impressive decoration.

To be continued….