A Weekend in Istanbul

I planned my first vacation within the Peace Corps even before I departed about a year ago.  I knew that I wanted to travel to Istanbul with my brother, so we had decided on a date long before I knew what my Peace Corps service would be like.  From August 29 to August 31, we spent two and a half fantastic days seeing all of the sites of the former capital of the Ottoman Empire. 

A Brief History of the Ottoman Empire

As readers of this blog know, when visiting new places I often like to include a bit of history about the new sites.  Istanbul was once the capital of the Byzantine Empire, and the city was known as Constantinople (named after Constantine, the Roman Emperor who did most to spread Christianity through the Roman Empire).  However, on May 29, 1452, the Ottoman armies were able to breach the defenses of the Byzantine city and claim the city for itself, virtually wiping out the Byzantine Empire.  The seize of Constantinople marked the beginning of the Ottoman Empire as a major power in the world, but its territory surrounded the Bosporus strait long before Constantinople was captured.

According to “The Ottoman Empire” by Halil Inalcik, the Ottomans originated from a collection of Turkoman tribes in Western Anatolia.  They had adapted Islam from the Arabic people of Saudi Arabia and the Near East, and thus were opposed to the Mongol civilization from which they shared similar social structures. In 1302, Osman was the first leader (gazi) of these Turkoman tribes to wage a holy war against other non-Muslim kingdoms in Anatolia. 

In the mid-14^th Century, the Ottomans expanded their kingdom by bypassing Constantinople and conquering the peoples in the Balkans.  Even though they expanded their lands in the name of Islam, they ruled these new lands in a conciliatory fashion, acknowledging that it would be easier to subjugate these lands if they allowed the locals to continue practicing Christianity.  However, any family that did not convert to Christianity was subject to harsher rules than Muslims.  For example, Christians were taxed at a higher rate, and many Christian families were subjected to the devsirme.

The devsirme was a levy on families where boys aged between eight and twenty were enslaved and sent to Istanbul.  There they would were forced to accept Islam, and they were provided the best education and training in the Ottoman Empire.  Many ended up serving in the army as Janissaries, but the most promising slaves served as scribes, servants, and bureaucrats in the palace.  Many of these slaves eventually served as the most important officials in the Ottoman Empire.  It is likely that many young boys were taken from Macedonia, and it probably was the largest Ottoman imposition that affected the Macedonian people.

One of the most successful sultans of the Ottoman Empire was Suleiman, who continued the expansion of the Ottoman Empire.  Selim I, the sultan who ruled for only eight years before him, was able to conquer Mecca and Damascus, thus legitimizing the Ottoman Empire as an Islamic caliphate.  With these important conquests, Suleiman’s reign (1520-1566) further propelled the Ottoman Empire’s importance on the international level.  In 1521-22, Suleiman was able to conquer Belgrade and Rhodes (in the Mediterranean).  In 1531 he led his attacks against the Austrian-Hungarian Empire and entered Buda (part of Budapest).  They were able to conquer much of Hungary and defeat many of the Venetian fleets in the Mediterranean (ie. in Corfu), but the Ottoman’s advances caused enemies to press it on all sides. Persia began to stir in the East, as the Russian Empire advanced to Crimea in the Northern Black Sea.  However, at its widest expansion, the Ottoman Empire stretched from North Africa, Arabia, Cyprus, all of the Balkans to Hungary, the Caucasus region, and east to Iran.

The Ottoman Empire began to decline through the age of European colonialism.  Its Middle Eastern holdings were torn apart during WWI, when France and Great Britain divided it into many territories to claim as their own.  This led to Ataturk creating the modern, secular Turkey that most of the world knows today.

Our Time in Istanbul

Luckily, my brother and I both arranged our travel plans so that we would arrive in Istanbul around the same time.  I took an overnight bus from Skopje to Istanbul that, altogether with the border stops, took 14 hours.  The bus was very comfortable and nice- for example, they served tea at the beginning of our trip and the air conditioning worked fairly well.  I may as well mention that taking the bus from Skopje to Istanbul was much cheaper than any direct flights, though it was definitely difficult to gain sufficient sleep on the long bus ride.  However, as I arrived at the bus station in Istanbul, my adrenaline rush of visiting a new city and culture kept me motivated to pack the day with sightseeing.

As I navigated the bus station to find an ATM, and then to find something necessary to break my high denomination of Lyra, I discovered how difficult it was to travel in a country alone without knowing the language.  Never before did I need to navigate on my own while traveling abroad because either I could get by with my knowledge of the local language (Spain, Japan, even in Bulgaria with my Macedonian) or I traveled with those who spoke the language (India, Philippines).  Turkey was the first time in my life where I had to survive and travel without even knowing how to say “yes,” “sorry”, or “thank you”. 

Luckily I made very detailed notes of how to arrive to our flat without a map (I committed the map to my memory), and I was able to purchase the awkward Turkish transportation tokens (a plastic cylinder, really Turkey?) and finally arrived on the street where we would stay in our flat.  The flat that we reserved was beautiful, spacious, and had a great view of the Galata Tower.  I thought I would momentarily for my brother, only to discover that his plane was turned around 2 hours into the flight since the bathrooms were out of order on its first attempt to Istanbul.

The view from our flat

Our accommodations for the weekend

Nice breezeway upon entering our flat

Galata Tower, built by the Genoese

Since I had some time to waste before my brother would meet me at the flat, I took a quick tour or Beyoglu, the area in which we stayed.  I explored Tarablasi Boulevard, which is the main commercial stretch, comparable to Michigan Avenue in Chicago.  This led to Taksim Square, which seemed much more like a concrete parking lot than I had originally imagined.  After, I explored the port near the Galata bridge, and enjoyed a lunch of fresh-caught fish from the Bosphorous cooked in parchment paper.  After, I returned to the flat to nap and wait for my brother.

Still enjoying some fresh fish

Walking through the neighborhood

Tarablasi Blvd.

Taksim Square 

When my brother climbed up the hill to where our flat was, he randomly rang bells of apartments until he could find me.  It took him a while to find our flat, and for me to realize what he was doing, but we finally were able to make a rendezvous since last seeing each other about a year ago.  He climbed the 5 flights of stairs that led to our flat to also settle in.  Unfortunately, my brother’s bad luck in regards to traveling did not stop there.  He had an issue with his debit card, and we spent the better part of the evening trying to fix his card.  Thus, a day originally planned for seeing half of the sites of the city were foiled by my brother’s bad luck.

People who travel with me know that I often experience good luck when traveling, so my luck began to trump his toward the end of the night.  After all of the issues were resolved, we walked toward the Topkapi palace with blind hope that the park was still open.  It was, and we enjoyed a cool evening breeze in a park that was unbelievably large and beautiful.  We enjoyed a nice cup of Turkish tea while looking over the strait.  Afterwards, we found a relaxing hookah place nearby and enjoyed the rest of our first night in Istanbul.

Sunset over Istanbul 

Gulhane Park/ Topkapi Palace

Enjoying Tea in Gulhane Park

We purchased tickets for a tour group for our second morning of the trip, and through this tour we were able to see the Hippodrome, Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, and the Great Bazaar all within a few hours.  The tour guide was great, and he explained to us some interesting facts regarding the architecture and Ottoman history of the sites we visited.  He also explained why so many placed were flying the Turkish flag (Saturday, August 30, was the Turkish Independence Day).  I always imagined myself walking through the Hagia Sophia, and even though the renovation of the interior made the space seem smaller than I had imagined, I was awed to see the ceilings and wall of this church-turned-mosque-turned-museum in person.  We split from the tour group during lunch and decided to wander the Great Bazaar on our own.  The Bazaar mostly sold silk cloths, Turkish trinkets, jewelry, and silverware, so it did not particularly appeal to my brother or me.  However, we were able to discover the part of the Bazaar that sold books and artwork, and we both made some bold purchases.  Confidence was needed since mark-ups on items were steep, and we were required to haggle down the price.

Ceiling of the Hagia Sophia

In front of the Blue Mosque

Old Bazaar

Our drowsiness won over our eagerness to see more sites, so we decided to forfeit seeing the Topkapi Palace Museum for some Zs.  However, after our nap we decided to finish our sightseeing with a Bosphorus cruise.  We departed from the Kadikoy docks, and after sipping some Raki (which, confusingly for me, tastes more like Ouzo than Rakija) at a café on the Golden Horn, my brother and I jumped boats and embarked on a one-hour cruise.  The sight from the deck was gorgeous, and it was impressive to see Istanbul stretch on and on past the historic center.  My brother and I were able to enjoy the sunset on the ferry, and as we returned to Beyoglu, we settled down at a more modern restaurant before retiring our last evening in Istanbul.

Our view as we drink raki near the Golden Horn

On the Boshporus Cruise

The next day, I woke up earlier so that I could attend Catholic mass at the city cathedral.  The mass was given in English, and surprisingly much of the congregation was either Filipino or West African.  Afterwards, my brother and I collected our luggage and took the metro to Taksim Square for the shuttle to Gocken Airport, which was located on the Asian side.  Taking a shuttle through the other half of Istanbul that we had not even visited further impressed me with how large the city was (16 million people in the metro area).  From there, we collected our tickets for Athens, and I prepared for my first plane ride in about a year.

My Impressions of Istanbul

Based on my short experience of Istanbul, I have a few impressions about the city and (generally speaking) the Turkish people:

Istanbul is just as Balkan as any other Balkan city I visited.  Macedonia, Albania, Thessaloniki, and Sofia all have that same feel that can only be described as “Balkan.”  And Istanbul just seemed like a larger version of all of these other places.  In a way, that makes sense since the Ottomans probably exported this “lifestyle” to the locations I had visited before my trip to Istanbul.

Alcohol is difficult to find, and thus Istanbul is a very easy city to experience sober.  It is my general impression that meals at restaurants are not fully experienced without a beer or rakija in Macedonia, so it was nice to not feel this cultural pressure while in Istanbul. Part of what makes alcohol less prevalent in Istanbul is that alcohol cannot be served or sold within 100 meters of a mosque.

Istanbul did not really have a theme to sell to its tourists.  Some places are good at this- Rome selling its Roman Empire and Catholic centricity, Athens selling its Antiquity and its birth of democracy, Kyoto selling its medieval, zen-like atmosphere or Tokyo selling its ultra-urban and hyper-technological cityscape.  But to me (and maybe I am too Balkanized at this point), Istanbul did not have a certain theme to sell to its tourists.  Much of the sites flouted their connections with the ancient Greeks, Romans, Ottoman Empire, or modern Turkey.  But it seemed like the city did not care about showcasing its former glory from the Ottoman Empire, or its centricity to Islam during the empire’s rule, or even the modern creation of Turkey.  It may be that Turkey is still finding its identity as its people debate joining the EU and as skyscrapers continue to tower over the Bosphorus.  Many highlight Istanbul as a gateway between Asia and Europe, or as a former capital of both Christian and Islamic empires.  However, Istanbul did not seem to even highlight its unique double personality as a city.  Even though Istanbul was gorgeous (especially at night), I left very confused about what part of history or culture I was experiencing.  Or maybe that was the point.