More mosques, museums, mayhem. We’re constantly jostled in the midst of huge crowds. Surely by now we’ve seen all of Istanbul’s 15 million people. Here are the spice bazaar, a narrow street near it, and the main pedestrian street near us, called Istiklal Caddesi.
Thankfully there are open spaces where kids have room to play, like here in the courtyard of the biggest mosque. I wonder if they ever get to play on grass?
Lots of walking today in the old city. Lunch was with locals all eating white beans with a red curry sauce, so why not try some beans? Pretty good. Morning coffee and dinner, however, were at a very American-style terrace restaurant high over the Bosporus, where we watched a big cruise ship pull out for its overnight journey to where, Ephesus? Patmos? The word here for "Ephesus" is "Efes" and that's the name of the most popular beer! By the way, that's Asia across the water.
Between coffee and dinner: two lovely mosques .. watching interesting people .. budding trees, tulips and glorious wisteria .. and visiting with a charming young man from Aleppo, Syria, far too frightened to return there now. Istanbul still takes some getting used to. It’s intense and tiring .. up and down hills .. can't drink the water (but the beer is OK) .. running our washing machine was an adventure .. and we can recognize only a very few words (antik, polis, taksi, oto bus, oto park, oto garaji). But the magical sound of multiple calls to prayer makes up for it. We’re glad we’re here.
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