Ben Tűrkiye seviyorum! (I love Turkey!)

Last weekend our group went to Istanbul! I can see now why all my Turkish friends think Ankara is so boring! The city is full of fascinating history, beautiful architecture, and wonderful people. We arrived to Istanbul at 7:30 am after a long night on the train. It was cold but the sun was shinning and we took a ferry boat from the Asian side of Istanbul to the European side. It was absolutely gorgeous. That day we were able to go to the spice market which looks like it fell out of the Disney movie Aladdin. There were huge buckets of spices, huge slabs of Turkish delight, scarves of every color, and every kind of souvenir you could imagine. It was so cool!

The next day we went to the Sultan Ahmet Camii (Blue Mosque) and the Haghia Sophia. They were both so beautiful! The Blue Mosque still has worship services that are held there but the Haghia Sophia does not. The Haghia Sophia used to be a church during the time of Constantine but was turned into a Mosque when the Ottoman Turks conquered Constantinople in 1453. In 1935 it was converted into a museum so that there would be no fighting over the space. This way all can enjoy the beauty of the mosque (around the scaffolding) for the low price of 20 YTL (New Turkish Lira) which comes out to be about $11.80. I was also able to meet up with my friend Susan from Hope College! She is studying in Greece this semester and just happend to be in Istanbul the same weekend! =) It was amazing to see her! We went to this little place down a back street that was filled with places to eat. There was live music and we had a blast! I was sad that it was cold and rainy but I still had an amazing time and I can not wait to go back this weekend when Aaron comes to visit me!