Istanbul (not Constantinople)

Toto, we’re not in Rome anymore.

The minute I arrived in Istanbul, I could tell I was in for a city experience unlike anything I had encountered abroad. As I rode the bus from the airport to Taksim Square to meet up with my friends, the kooks, Gina and Emma, minarets and mosques popped up everywhere…smooshed into small neighborhoods, crammed between industrial buildings, and perched on top of hills among dense construction.  The bus (barely) made its way through the tight streets of the city and dropped us off in the middle of a large square packed with people.  I made my way down Istiklal, a large pedestrian street, trekking along behind a friendly soccer riot, taking in the unusual and exotic smells of unfamiliar (mostly unidentifiable) food from the shops and vendors along the way.

After finding each other along the crowded street—you haven’t really seen a crowded street until you’re in a city of over 13 million people (…NYC is 8)—we dropped my bags at the hostel and set out to meet up with Neil Korostoff, one of the Penn State landscape architecture teachers who was finishing up a year of research abroad in Istanbul.  Standing on the bridge that spans the Golden Horn, the bay of Istanbul, Professor Korostoff opened up a huge map of the city and pointed out the must-see’s, must-do’s, and, most importantly, the must-eat’s for our week in Istanbul.  He handed us a stack of guide books and maps and took us for our first ferry ride across the Bosphorus Strait to the section of Istanbul that is technically in Asia.  We explored the street markets that were selling mountains of spices, piles of fruit, and freaky, warty fish, while Prof. Korostoff gave us the lowdown on how to use public transportation, basic Turkish phrases, and Istanbul history.

Walking around Istanbul is a sensory overload. We woke up each morning to music playing from the neighboring instrument shops that surrounded our hostel, and five times a day the call to prayer resonates across the city from all the mosques, echoing through the streets, reminding you that you’re in Istanbul, incase you forgot. Gina and Emma, like me, are total ‘foodies’, so eating easily became a central focus of our trip. Our hostel served a traditional Turkish breakfast every morning: strawberries, feta, tomatoes, cucumbers, olives, bread, honey, and a hard-boiled egg. Between sites and activities we tasted anything that looked unusual or smelled interesting, so, like, everything we saw: kebabs, falafel, honey-saturated fried donuts, a buffet of food and a bucket of bread, mysterious, spicy burritos, pistachio coffee. We devoured fish sandwiches from the carts along the river (twice), ate our weight in baklava, and succeeded in our search for the legendary ‘wet hamburgers’.

On our first full day, we walked through the city to the historical center to see the Hagia Sophia, originally built in 360 as Constantine’s first Christian church in the West, and the famous Sultan Ahmed Mosque, also known as the Blue Mosque, a massive mosque covered in elaborate patterns and mosaics.  I was completely blow away by the immense size of both buildings, and the proportions were so unlike any space I had ever experienced. We grabbed kebabs for lunch, strolled through the Grand Bazaar, and visited the Basilica Cistern, an underground water storage basin that was once used to supply water to the surrounding palaces and pools.  We hopped a tram to the Suleymaniye Mosque at the top of one of the city hills where we got a great view over the city and harbor and devoured a bag of sour green plums that we bought from a fruit stand.

We spent a half of a day exploring the Topkapi Palace, a massive palace and garden complex which was once home to the Sultan and his 4000 attendants and royalty, and visited the Harem, the private suite of the Sultan where he carried out both his business and personal life.  The rooms were covered, floor to ceiling, in elaborate painted tiles and adorned with ornate lanterns and furniture.

In Istanbul, people live on the streets around the clock—playing music, eating and drinking, talking to neighbors—and at night the city comes alive. We ended almost every day under the Gallatta Tower (with a few beers and a box of baklava) where the open square was covered with people sitting on the ground, singing along to their friends’ guitars, cheering on street performers, and just hanging out with each other.

Although we managed to visit most of the main tourist sites and experience some of the local hang outs and restaurants, I know there is sooo much left to discover. I’m already itching to go back…who’s coming with me? 

Sunset over the Bosphorus from the ferry

Inside the Hagia Sophia

Inside the Sultan Ahmed Mosque

Basilica Cistern

Suleymaniye Mosque

The decorated ceiling of the New Mosque

View of the city and harbor from the Suleymaniye Mosque

Topkapi Palace Building

Decorated dome inside the Topkapi Palace

View of the Gallatta Tower from the water

Fresh squeezed orange juice and pineapple slices

Fish sandwich cart by the water

The nightly Gallatta Tower hang-out

Topkapi Palace and a full moon