Dali and Me
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Istanbul,
Turkey
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Today we had two missions planned. We were going to go to the Salvador Dali exhibit at the art museum and we wanted to go and see the Castle c. The Dali exhibit was amazing. I had never seen much of his work before and the museum had devoted three floors to the great surrealist artist. We were able to see everything from sketches to masterpieces as well as some of his videos and journal entries. It was only ten lira each for us to get in. Awesome. We were with six other people and after we finished at the museum the next adventure was the castle.
This castle is really cool for several reasons. With the help of thousands of masons and workers, the fortress was completed in a record time of 4 months and 16 days, which, considering the size of the castle, is very impressive. The walls are about 14 feet thick as well. The castle was built be Sultan Memmet II after he sacked Constantinople. He built the castle at the narrowest point in the Bosphorus as a way to control ships passing through. The other cool thing about this place is it only costs one lira to visit and you can explore the whole thing. The views are supposed to be amazing and you can walk along the parapets and look out on the Bosphorus. You can imagine how excited Hannah and I were to go. We met up with a couple more of our friends so 10 of us got onto a crowded bus and headed south. We got off and walked for about twenty minutes and saw ....a closed on Wednesdays sign. Total bummer.
We decided to go to Ortakoy, a small village where my friend Peter lives. The party split up, and Hannah and I finally found some of the trinkets we were looking for. Hannah bought a headscarf and a couple evil eyes - not actually eyes or evil- and I finally got a pair of sunglasses for 10 lira. They say Okley on the side, but I would be very surprised. Peter and his girlfriend Rachel met back up with us and we went to a bar that had bean bag chairs for seats. We ordered a water pipe with apple in it and it was mild and delicious. The pipes are filled with a type of tobacco that looks like a piece of charcoal. It burned for hours. It seems like everyone here likes to smoke and play bay root as a type of evening relaxation ritual. Tomorrow we are going to check out the Blue Mosque as well as the Sultans Palace. I think we will try to go to the castle again this weekend.
