Turkish Delight

Here’s a good, short article with some tips for anyone else out there looking to start a blog. It’s nothing advanced, but I certainly found it helpful.

Aya Sophia as seen from the roof of Hotel Angel’s Home

For a more complete history of the Church of Holy Wisdom (the meaning of Aya Sophia), please see the corresponding Wikipedia article. Words and photos, however, can only begin to describe the experience of walking into the church itself. There is a small entry fee, as it is now a museum; it comes to about $6 USD or 10 YTL (Turkish Lire[at the exchange rates when we were in country). The entrance of the building itself faces west with the apse facing East as is customary for many Christian churches. To enter, one walks along the north side of the building past a font of absolution built by the Ottomans along with very old graves.

The font stands in the foreground with the central dome and minaret rising in back.

As one enters through the side, first a very simple, unadorned gallery is entered which runs the length of the exterior of the church. Upon leaving this gallery, however, a second one is entered, which is highly decorated, mainly with polychrome marble (multi-colored). Also, the ceilings all have beautiful Byzantine designs which are mostly intact.

What comes next, however, is really breathtaking. Unfortunately, pictures do not properly convey the immensity of the interior or its grandeur. At least mine don’t. Still more unfortunate, at the time we visited, a hugh scaffolding had been constructed in the very middle of the space which broke it up to some extent and occupied a quarter of the central dome. Despite this, the interplay between the Byantine architecture and decoration, the dark marble used, the Christian symbolism, and the later Mulsim symbolism acts to accomplish what every holy place attempts: to enter a seperate space outside of and very much segregated from the temporal world.

A somewhat blurry shot of what is encountered upon first walking in to the interior.

The most decent shot I managed of the Central Dome and a Sophia Seraphim

A side note: One unfortunate thing about attempting amateur, or worse, photography here is the inability to use a flash, and my personal lack of a tripod. In order to take a decent photo, I had to set my camera to a slow shutter speed and attempt to take as steady a picture as I could. Often, I would take 3-4 shots of the exact same space to attempt to get just 1 good photo. Sometimes I succeeded, mostly not. If you plan on doing any sort of decent photography here, I would highly reccomend bringing a tripod; I wish I had.

To try and convey at least some part of the magnitude of the space, I took a photo from the upper gallery looking past the scaffolding towards the apse. Try to count the flights of stairs. I dare you. Cause I’m certainly not about to do it. Then remember that the top visible part of the scaffolding has certainly not even reached the base of the central dome; nor can one see the bottom of the scaffolding. Now, look at how tiny the people are.

As one makes one’s way around the scaffolding, towards the apse, the galleries on either side on the higher story and on the ground level create an impression of infinite space.

Finally, the apse is reached. It really does take some time; between the omnipresent detail of the decoration and the magnitude of the structure itself, visitors have a tendency to stand and gawk, looking up and all around, jaws agape. I know I did. Once you get past that, you do actually have a relatively considerable distance to cross from the entrance to the apse itself. Upon reaching the apse, however, gorgeous stain glass windows, a mosaic of the Virgin, and an Islamic pulpit are displayed.

After taking in Aya Sophia from the ground floor, it is possible to take a series of ramps up to the second floor gallery which has some fantastic mosaics along with excellent views out into the main space. This gallery wraps around the front and both sides, extending almost all the way to the apse. On the way to the ramp, a visitor will encounter two very interesting things. First, a large egg shaped piece of marble. Frankly, I don’t know what this is; if anyone has any idea, I’d love to know. Secondly, a huge square column encased in brass. In the middle of the brass is a hole, in which the thumb is placed. As the legend goes, by one’s thumb in the hole and making a full circle with the hand, one will receive holy wisdom and good luck.

Now, various shots of the upper galleries:

The front, second story gallery spanning the two side galleries

One of the side galleries; note the polychrome marble on the pillars on either side.

Me, from across the corner of the second story gallery; I love the dark marble columns

Somehow, the huge signs of Arabic calligraphy don’t break up Sophia at all but add to it

It is a damn shame Turkey is so seismically active…

The mosaics on the second floor gallery are also quite stunning, although most seem to have been added some time after the original construction by late Byzantine emperors. In these mosaics they depict themselves offering gifts to Christ. The mosaic of the Virgin, Christ, and the Baptist, however, I believe to be original.

Finally, as a parting shot:

Aya Sophia

My last night in Istanbul (we only spent 4 nights out of 6 there), I took some time to shoot Aya(Hagia) Sophia and Sultanahmet Mosque (Blue Mosque). Luckily, they are both exquisitely lighted by night, so all that needs to be done is find a good solid base to rest the camera upon to prevent a blurry image.

Interestingly, Aya Sophia and Sultan Ahmet Mosque are no more than 200 yards across from each other. Sultan Ahmet was built directly across and facing Aya Sophia to, in the words of Turkish man I met, “Intimidate [Aya Sophia].” Today, a beautiful park lies between the two landmarks, with a fountain in the middle which serves as a reflecting pond at night. It also seems to be a preferred place for Turks, both straight and gay, to make out at night; it is certainly a romantic enough spot, particularly since to the south is the Marmarra Sea and the part of Istanbul which lies across the Bosphorous in Asia. I was unable to get a good shot of the coast at night, despite my hotel’s amazing location and rooftop terrace; at the bottom I’ve provided a shot of the coast by day from the Hotel’s roof.
Sultan Ahamet Mosque

Curiously enough though, when the Ottomans took Constantinople in 1453, Sultan Faith Mehmed, their leader, ran ahead of his troops to bar them from entering and looting Aya Sophia. Despite this, the interior of Aya Sophia is in some disrepair, as will be seen in my next post, focusing on the interior of Aya Sophia.Finally, just as a little bonus, here’s a shot I took of the near end of the Hippordrome which lies to the north of Sultan Ahmet Mosque.

This is the view from the hotel we stayed in at Istanbul. Hotel Angel’s home was a beautiful place with a commanding view of the surrounding area and many very nice touches as far as accomodations go. Fortunatley, at the time of year we went, it was also very cheap. Only $45 a night.

Not sure if there’s really a point to this or not, but I like the idea of these licenses, so I thought I’d use one.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License.
2006 Patrick Redmon

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If anyone would like to see my photos, they can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/patrickredmon/

I’m in the process of getting them all uploaded and organized, so they may not be complete for another day or two; these’ll be the photos that make up the better part of this blog (certainly better than my writing [or maybe not; let me know which is the case]), so you can get a sneak peak, albeit without context, of what I’ll be posting on in the coming weeks.

I’m just starting to get settled in after returning from Turkey on Thursday, so please bear with me as a I get things rolling on this blog. I loved the country and the people were wonderful, so I’m hoping that with my pile of photos and notes I can spark interest among Americans for traveling to Turkey. Also, I’d be happy to post any quality articles/photos that anyone who has traveled there has authored; I was only in the country for seven days split amongst three locations; given that I could have spent almost a week in each location and still not have been satisifed, any contributions would be greatly appreciated. Also, it is never a bad thing to look at the same object from different perspectives, and I’d love to hear the unique voices and experiences of anyone who has traveled or lived in Turkey.

All that being said, it’s going to take some time for me to organize my thoughts and my photos, and then begin putting it all down on paper (metaphorically, not literally speaking). However, I do have a skeleton of a structure for the blog sketched out in my head, so here’s a basic idea of what I’m planning to do:

First Posts: Specific locations and cultural artwork, i.e. the Blue Mosque, or Turkish Rugs. I hope for these posts to be educational and informative while displaying the beauty of Turkey. The source info for these will be my notes and photos, along with some outside research to help give readers a more comprehensive picture of each topic.

Next: Advice posts, i.e. best time of year to travel or how to haggle. These posts will based on my experiences while in country and my evaluation of decisions and choices I made leading up to and during the trip. I’ll also be using some of my photos and notes for these as well.

Finally: If I have still have the energy, and, god forbid, people are actually reading this and I’m getting good feedback, I’d like to keep the blog going with posts from outside contributors while also commenting on issues relating to tourism in Turkey and the interaction between the US and Turkey on the world stage.

One last note: I love feedback; if you’re reading this and enjoying it, tell me. If you’re reading this and it’s shit, tell me. Whatever your reaction, please, tell me. I’m not really interested in hearing, “Your site sucks!”, unless you tell me why it sucks; even better, construct a semi-solid argument for why it sucks and I’d be especially appreciative. So, thanks in advance for any feedback.