To market, to market

One of the things we loved about Istanbul was the numerous markets. We miss our Ballard Farmers' Market and haven't been able to find anything similar in Japan yet.

In Istanbul, we visited the Grand Bazaar, the spice market, and some local markets.

Sausage and olives...Ryan was drooling...


Here's Ian trying some cheese that a vendor gave him. It was similar to string cheese.


Honey


Mmm....watermelon

Here's the spice market.



We bought quite a few spices. So far we've just used the cinnamon, but we're excited to start using the rest.



Ian tried on a fez at one of the local shops. Yep, they even have sizes for kids.

Hagia Sofia

Our favorite site in Istanbul was definitely Hagia Sofia. (pronounced aya sofia) This was the largest church in the world for nearly 1,ooo years. It was originally built as an Orthodox cathedral and was converted to a mosque in the 1400s. Now it has been turned into a museum. It's pretty incredible. We read that the statue of liberty can fit inside the cathedral under the dome (minus the torch). It's great - the building is so incredibly huge that you're not bothered by the 100s of other people who are also there.

Here it is from the outside:


This is Ian in front of the Emperor's door. This gives you a little perspective on how huge it is!


Inside they've been able to recover a lot of the original mosaics. When the church was converted to a mosque, they covered all of the mosaics. (in mosques they never show pictures of humans) These mosaics are made by tiny squares - it's pretty incredible. What I like best about them, though, is that not only do they depict Jesus and Mary, but often times someone else is there as well. I guess if you're the one commissioning the church you can request whatever you want. In this mosaic the emperor and his wife are giving Jesus gifts.

Istanbul's Basilica Cistern

One of our favorite sites that we saw in Istanbul was the Basilica Cistern. According to our guidebook, it's filled with 336 marble columns that were taken from various Greek ruins. It was built in the time of Emperor Constantine and rebuilt somewhere around 530AD. You can see the cistern in the 1963 James Bond film From Russia With Love. From what I've read, James is rowing with one of his lovely ladies in the cistern. (the water height was much higher at that time)

It's incredibly dark inside, but Ryan still managed to capture some great photos.


Towards the end of the cistern there are a couple columns that have a medusa head on the bottom. She's resting sideways, though. I'd be sideways, too, if I had to support that column for that many years.

Father’s Day: The Gift of Smoking

Japan uses coins up to the equivalent of a $10 bill: 500 yen (roughly equal to $5), 100 yen, 50 yen, 10 yen, 5 yen and the “yenny,” which is our name for the 1 yen coin that is roughly equal to a penny and oddly floats on water. I have been looking for a coin purse to prevent depositing my high value coins in the couch and the car. Not just any coin purse, but a manly coin purse. A coin purse that makes other men say, “That purse makes him look manly.”

I looked throughout Japan and Istanbul for an appropriately manly coin purse. It turns out that it is hard to find a manly purse (maybe not so surprisingly).

Today, I opened my Father’s day gift to find this…

A coin purse so manly it even has a dragon embroidered on it! Perfect, and then I looked a little closer and realized Kari unknowingly gave me a “Mobile Ashtray!”

It’s hard to find a purse manlier than a purse that can double as an ashtray.

Ugly is beautiful

Ian did incredibly well on our trip. He's such a people watcher and so curious that he typically does really well with traveling and new environments. It helped to have the love and entertainment of friends and locals, of course. However, he did have one breakdown at a restaurant on our 2nd day in Istanbul. He was really tired, still dealing with jet lag, and overall not excited about sitting in a high chair.

As he started to fuss, the wait staff brought out this doll:

Yes, it's incredibly creepy. The one redeeming factor, though, is that this doll makes a squeaking noise when you press it. And, even better yet, this is one of the few toys that Ian has been able to press and actually make the noise himself. Hallelujah! This entertained him for a good 10-15 minutes while we wolfed down our food.

Blue Mosque

Our hotel was a 5 minute walk from a lot of the historic sites in old town. So, on our second day in Istanbul we walked over to the Blue Mosque. This was built in 1603-1617 by Sultan Ahmet I. It was named the blue mosque because of the blue tiles on the interior. Here are some pics:

These spigots are located along the base of the exterior of the mosque. Muslims (mostly men) come here to wash their heads, hands, and feet before entering the mosque for prayer.

Here are a few pictures of the interior. There is blue tile inside, but the name of the mosque is still a little deceiving.

Ian loves Turkey...and Turkey loves Ian

On our flight to Turkey, 2 Turkish women took an interest in Ian while we were waiting to board. It was great - they even offered to take Ian back to their seats for a while during the flight. Here's a pic of Ian with his new friends:

We thought we were just lucky on the flight, but it turns out that those women were not out of the ordinary. People in Turkey LOVE Ian. Yes, Ian gets admirers in Japan, but it's nothing like Turkey. Turks love all babies in general. Men, women, young, old...they all love babies. They just can't resist reaching over to pinch, kiss, and squeeze babies to pieces.

A couple shopkeepers gave Ian a wrapped chocolate bar to play with. (which Ryan and I ended up eating later)

On a boat ride these teenagers came over and wanted to pick up Ian. He actually wasn't as excited about them as they were in him. We're hoping that feeling continues in his teen years...

In addition to all of the Turkish love, Ian also had Rani and Erika's attention as well. Does life get any better than this?