To say Istanbul was an experience would be a gross underestimation of how much I learned and realized while in Istanbul this last weekend. First off, it was my first non Loyola sponsored travel, meaning that 4 course meals also came with a bill (weird, I know) and that we had a lot we had to figure out ourselves.
We left the JFRC at 4:30 to catch out 6:40 am flight, needless to say, I was exhausted, but it would soon be worth it. We flew SWISSAIR, which was amazing, wine, chocolate, and lunch at 10:30, that after being up for 7 hours I couldn't say no to. We connected in Zurich, the coolest airport I have ever seen, and were in Istanbul before we knew it. Once there we got a van of some sort to our hostel.
The door to the hostel was, um, shady, but inside we found a really nice hostel (with wifi) and a really knowledgable woman who ran it who really helped us optimize our time in Turkey. We then went off to the Galata tower, just a few minutes from the hostel and took in the city we had yet to get to know from above. We could see the entire city, and the bridges that connected the Asian, and European sides of Turkey.
After that, we went out to try and find some drinks, we were greeted by what looked like an alleyway lined with bars and restaurants, eventually we went to get food, and got swindled out of some Lira, we left, annoyed, and went on eventually ending up at a Hookah bar, where we were the only non turkish people in the room..
We ended the night with the largest feeling of culture shock I have ever felt, coming to Rome had nothing on Turkey, there we stuck out like sore thumbs, there were really no commonalities of our societies, and it was very striking, it was experience I really appreciate having.
Saturday we were up bright and early to see all that Turkey had to offer, it was our only full day there, and we made the most of it. We started at the Blue Mosque, which was truly beautiful, I have seen a lot of religious buildings in my short time abroad, but so far, the Mosques have any Christian church I have ever seen beat when it comes to architecture. (Sorry super Christian family members, I still love churches too)
We went to the Haghia Sophia, and I was just in awe of it. There really are no words to describe it. We later went to the Topkapi Palace, apparently the oldest surviving palace in the world, it was huge, and amazing- with some of the best views of the bay I had seen all weekend. We ended the sightseeing at the Grand Bazzar, which was an experience like I've never had before, and I don't think I'll ever have again, so many people trying to get us to buy things, which worked on some of us, and not on others. I walked out with nothing good, except for some watch I left in the hostel on purpose because I was so embarrassed I bought it.
Sunday, although we had to leave for the Airport at 12:30pm, we still had a full agenda, at 7:30 we left and went to the Turkish baths, where we, um bathed in this place that has been open since 1481, holy hell thats a long time. It was quite the experience, it ended with me being swaddled by some awkward Turkish guy while he hummed, it was an odd experience, that I don't think I'd do again, but that I am very happy I did.
We then, after much trial and tribulation went to the Asian side of Istanbul by shuttle boat, it was a really beautiful view, and it was also awesome to be able to say that we had gone to Asia! We then went to the Airport, went through fake security, and tried to get lunch.
The ticket counter was closed so we had to wait for it to open to go through security, and we went up to the food court. It was really weird, there was a Popeye's, Burger King (there were BK's everywhere, and a Sbarro. Needless to say we didn't eat anything and hoped for something better by the gate. After we got our boarding passes, we went in to the crazy huge duty free shopping mall and looked around, ate food (which was actually good) and found out our flight was delayed. So we shopped some more, and went to our gate, where there was individual security checkpoints for each gate. The Turkish people don't really mess around with their security.
We finally made it to Rome, after our delayed connection in Zurich and were back at the JFRC by 12:30. We were greeted by a cab that couldn't make it near our front gate because of all of the snow, and a crazy amount of snow that toppled some of the trees on the campus property, it was a crazy sight to see.
Istanbul was crazy, 1 city down, and I think 14 left to go?
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