Woke up this morning to a somewhat cool morning in Istanbul. It was cloudy enough to expect rain, yet since we didn’t bring an umbrella, we were hoping it wouldn’t, plus just touring around the city while raining makes the tour somewhat unpleasant.
We started off our tour with a trip into the heart of downtown Istanbul. After being dropped off by our tour bus, our guide led us on a short walk through the cobblestone streets to a nearby local mosque. Now considering the extensive research I’ve done on the roots of Islam, a system (not just a religion) which has so much history rooted in anti-western values, I wasn’t too fond of actually visiting the mosque’s in Istanbul.
This was our first ever visit inside a Muslim house of worship. We were told to take our shoes off, a Muslim custom, and the inside was rather boring compared to the many churches, chapels and basilicas we had seen up to this point. We didn’t waste much time in there because Janine has a complex of going barefoot anywhere other than inside our home so we headed out. As everyone else was heading out, the Muslim mosque keeper started yelling at all of us because some of us were putting our shoes on while we were still standing on the carpet out on the front steps of the mosque. It caused quite a scene and made many people feel awkward and uncomfortable, especially when the old muslim man started shouting at our tour guide and getting into it with her. Made the whole experience feel very welcoming!
After this, our next experience was a visit to an even bigger mosque! Yippee! This time it was the faous Blue Mosque, the largest mosque in Istanbul. By this time it was raining pretty hard and we had to make several stops to get out of the rain. I even bought an umbrella for 4 Euro from a local scraggler who was trying to sell umbrellas to the tourists.
Once we got the blue Mosque, it was HUGE. I can’t say amazing because I wasn’t impressed just knowing what I know about Islam. We had to take our shoes off again, and Janine didn’t even want to go inside because of this. We were forced to go in because there was only one exit point and it wasn’t where we currently were at so we had to go with the group into the Mosque. We took our shoes off, stepped foot inside this massive place, and omg, it STANK like smelly socks and dirty feet. Funny, because the whole point in taking off the shoes is to keep the mosque “clean” according to Islamic custom, yet by making thousands of people take opff their shoes, it created a terrible stench that was hard to bear.
Janine’s sensitive gag-reflexes were even tested at some point. I took a few pictures of the inside just because, but it wasn’t out of admiration for the place. It was in fact HUGE.
I even got an interesting picture of this little cordoned off area where all the muslim women were corralled. They looked miserable. I remember one woman giving me a dirty look because I pointed my camera and took a picture of them.
This compared to going to St. Peters Basilica doesn’t even match up in terms of a welcoming, holy place, and I’m not even catholic. This place can be summed up as a big historical building that propagated the terrible values of Islamic culture, nothing more in my opinion. Don’t get me wrong, muslims are decent people, and I have no problem with the people, only the ideology of Islam. The people are the biggest victims unfortunately. I have met many good Muslims who simply don’t understand what their religion really entails.
After the Blue Mosque visit we were taken to the largest marketplace in Istanbul called the “Grand Bazaar”. This place is massive, and you could get lost VERY easily if you’re not careful simply because every little street looks the same and sells practically the same stuff. I’d say 90% of the shops are selling either jewelry or carpets. We found a couple little stores that were actually selling some kind of substantial souvenirs, but we weren’t there very long.
After a short bus ride back to port, we were back on the bus.
Overall, with the rain and everything, we weren’t too impressed with Istanbul. We were hoping our visit to another part of Turkey tomorrow (Ephesus) would be much better.
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Yeah, those mosques are always pretty from the outside and pretty lame on the inside. I once visited the largest mosque in LA, and they made all of us women put scarves over our heads (did they make Janine do this?) and we had to take off our shoes. And we walked in and it was just a large room, carpeted with nothing really else going on. Sorry you guys couldn’t of seen something else in Istanbul. At least it made for a great story!