Just returned on an overnight train from 3 days in Istanbul. Ate way too much, very little sleep, but absolutely wonderful experiences! Cuma (Friday) we visited the Jewish Museum, Galata Tower (360 degree view of the city), the Egyptian Spice Market, the Greek Orthdadox Patriarchate, and took a boat down the Bosphorus. Cumartesi (Saturday) tours included the Hippodrome, Sultanahmet (Blue Mosque), Aya Sofya, Topkapi Sarayi (Topkapi Palace), and Binbirdirek Cistern. Pazar (Sunday) we saw a Shadow Puppet play at Istanbul Modern and a Whirling Dervish sema.

I just wanted to share some of the things that struck my interest along the way:

I saw hundreds of fishermen (I mean fishermen not fisherpeople because I did not see a single woman) lined up on one of the bridges across the Golden Horn, casting their lines into the Halic.

Hostels are a wonderful way to travel.

Soggy shoes and lots of walking is not a very good combination. Don't worry, I warmed up.

Sitting in an audience of children, in hysterics over a Shadow Puppet play dating back to the 13th century, is a must.

A long quote from a pamphlet on Sema, the universal movement (the pamphet is the from the Whirling Dervishes sema):

Contemporary science definantly confirms that the fundamental condition of our existence is to revolve. There is no object, no being which does not revolve and the shared similarity among beings is the revolution of the electrons and protons in the atoms, which constiture the structure of the smallest particle to the stars far in the sky. As a consequence of this similarity, everything revolves and the man [sic] carries on his life. his very existence by means of the revolition in the atoms, structural elements in his body, by the circulation of his blood, by his coming from the Earth and return to it, by his revolving with the Earth itself...Sema is the turning of humanbeing towards truth, soaring by sence and love, quitting the egoism and existing with God and as a perfect man returning to slavery with a brandnew soul servitude to all creatures...

I'll post some pics from the weekend next time.