The view of the dome through the chandelier.
Jill’s and my journey continues.
You would think that one blog post about the Hagia Sofia would be enough.
However, it isn’t even close to enough.
I’ve got hundreds of pictures that I could post but I’ve decided to limit them.
I’ve cut it down to about 40 or so and they barely even touch the surface of the amazing Church/Mosque/Museum that is the Hagia Sofia.
The dome. Notice how it is not perfectly circular.
Jill and I continued our tour around the Hagia Sofia.
We were both in awe and could barely talk.
I know, this doesn’t happen that often.
Enjoy the moment.
A mosaic of Mary and Jesus.
This might take awhile.
So, I’m going to keep it short and sweet and let the pictures speak for themselves.
The Hagia Sofia is mind blowing.
There is no other way to describe it.
From the outside is it monumental and awe inspiring.
From the inside it compares to anything I’ve seen in my travels around this Earth.
I’m planning about four days of posts on the Hagia Sofia because there are so many pictures and a video or two.
For starters, the history of this museum is amazing.
It was build in 537 and was an orthodox church until 1453.
It was then a mosque from 1453 until 1931.
In 1935 it became a museum.
It was the focal point of the Eastern Orthodox Church for nearly 1,000 years.
The amazing dome has collapsed at least once and had to be rebuilt.
The other domes have also collapsed.
It has been ransacked and almost totally destroyed through the years but somehow survived.
It had many Christian mosaics on the walls that were then covered by the Muslims who took control of Istanbul.
Luckily, they didn’t destroy the mosaics, but instead, were plastered over and, therefore, saved to be renovated and shown as they are today.
It was a joy, and a wonder, to stand underneath the dome of the Hagia Sophia and just take in the history, the art work, and the power.
The best way to explain it is to click the wikipedia link and then look at my pictures.
Cheers!
After stopping by the Blue Mosque, Jill and I decided to grab some lunch.
We walked around a bit of Istanbul and found a few restaurants that looked nice.
One, in particular, had a rooftop area that allowed us to look out over the Bosphorus.
We decided that would be the perfect way to spend our first lunch in Istanbul.
We climbed up the 4 flights of very steep stairs and found the place almost empty.
There were two other Canadian couples sitting there, but that was it.
We talked with them for a bit and found out that one was a psychiatrist and ran his own department back in Toronto. Small world.
They were on a cruise and only in town for a day.
Jill and I thought of how we had a week and were grateful that we had so much time.
The view from the rooftop terrace.
There is so much to see and do in Istanbul that a day, or even 3 days, wouldn’t be nearly enough for us.
Honestly, we could spend a month in Istanbul alone, if we had the time, and still feel like we haven’t seen everything.
They were nice enough to take a few pictures of us and we enjoyed meeting them.
When they left, we had the whole rooftop terrace to ourselves and it was incredibly peaceful and serene. And the food was fantastic.
Just watching the clouds, the Bosphorus and the ships go by as we enjoyed our meal and our time together.
In case you were wondering, the mosques have speakers attached to them so that is how the sound is projected for the followers to hear and know to come to pray.
Happy!
Jill and I wanted to see the Blue Mosque, since it was free, and we knew the other sites we wanted to see would cost money.
The reason this matters is that we could buy a discount pass to see all the other sites but it is limited in regards to time (3 days total) and we didn’t want to start at this point since the lines were pretty long.
We figured out that we’d see them, starting tomorrow morning, when there were less people and shorter lines.
Also, July and August in this part of the world is incredibly hot so there aren’t as many tourists, which is nice, and the sites are usually less crowded.
The negative is that some places are closed and others may have shorter viewing hours.
We didn’t notice this on this trip but it has happened to us in other places.
It is a chance we take to get away from the crowds and lines.
To us, it is worth the trade-off.
So, we walked up to the Blue Mosque and prepared to get in line.
I had shorts on so I had to pull them down to below my knees (it is respect in the Muslim culture to have your knees covered if you are a man).
Jill, on the other hand, has to put on a head scarf and also put on something covering her up down to her feet.
This makes it incredibly hot and uncomfortable.
To be honest, I’m not sure how women do it.
I’ve been told that some don’t wear anything underneath their robes but most seemed to be wearing leggings, at the very least, and I could not imagine the heat and dehydration that would accompany such clothes.
When we arrived, we realized it was in the middle of one of the prayer sessions and, as we aren’t Muslim, we wouldn’t be allowed inside.
We decided to just take some pictures from the outside, grab some lunch, and then see what else we wanted to do.
It was a bit anti-climatic to not be able to go inside but since Jill and I have been there before, it wasn’t a big let down.
We knew we’d be seeing it in a day or so and wouldn’t have to rush.
Isn’t that what a vacation is all about?
The view from the Galata Tower.
Jill’s and my true vacation, and about 100 future blog posts, starts now.
We woke up, had a nice breakfast in the little cafe right around the corner from Andac’s apartment, and headed out to see the Galata Tower, or, Galata Kulesi if you want to see the Turkish name for it. It used to be called Galatea, which is Gaelic, because the Welsh people originally settled there, built it, and named it.
Jill had been here before, since she’s now been to Turkey 4 different times to my 1, and she thought it would be a good starting point for our adventures.
We walked in and paid for our tickets.
I think it was about 9 USD or something like that.
It was worth 100x that for the view alone.
We went in the elevator and headed up.
The elevator was empty so we took a few pictures and I loved how the elevator buttons were set into a replica of the tower.
When we reached the top, we walked up a flight of stairs, and then out onto the tower ledge.
It was truly amazing.
There were only a few other people there so we had it almost to ourselves.
The Galata Tower was originally built in 1348 and is about 200 feet tall. The walls are about 9 feet thick. Just stop and think of that. It is almost 700 years old. But that is nothing compared to what we will see later on during our vacation. It is truly mind blowing to think of the history and what has happened in this part of the world.
It was used to make sure the city wasn’t attacked and also for a few crazy inventors to jump off of with either a glider on their back or strapped to a rocket. I imagine Wyl E. Coyote would have approved of this idea. Supposedly, both inventors survived and proved their products were reliable. Have to be impressed with their salesmanship if not their sense of sanity.
It was a truly wonderful way to start the day and see so much of Istanbul in one simple tower.
We stayed up there for an hour or so and just breathed in the fresh air, watched the seagulls, and remembered what it felt like to be alive, free, and have the world at our feet.
After 7 months in China, we had forgotten a lot about ourselves.
We had become somewhat unhealthy, both physically and mentally, and both seemed to be coming alive again.
Just the feeling of the people, the culture, the architecture, the country, and the ease of everything was settling back in and it felt like we were home.
Jill had lived in Turkey for 3 months, at one time, and I’d visited for 3 weeks, and it seemed like everything was just right the second we arrived.
That feeling would continue for the next month and only become more evident and more true.
Angkor Wat is rather amazing, even in 1:25 scale.
Off to Angkor Wat.
This is truly a magnificent replication of the temple.
This is also some place that is on our bucket list that we want to see and we want to see this before we return to the USA.
Strangely enough, writing this blog post on Asia has shown me how little of Asia we have seen, even though we’ve been here for over a year.
We’ve been to Malaysia and Singapore, twice, Mongolia, Shanghai and Beijing but we haven’t really seen much of Asia.
Between work, visa and life popping up, it has made it difficult to hop over to these other places even though they are quite close.
In regards to the visa: My visa is a business visa so I’m free to do anything I want. Up until recently, Jill had a 1 year tourist visa. This visa required her to leave the country every 90 days. As you can guess, this became quite expensive and made it difficult to set up plans to visit the countries we wanted to go to because we weren’t able to save up the money needed to truly do the trips we wanted.
We’ve seen a lot but want to see a lot more.
We both consider ourselves incredibly lucky to have seen what we have seen and been where we have been but just realize there is so much more to see and do!
We also stopped by Ishtar’s Gate on the way to the Grand Palace of Thailand.
It was quite gorgeous and there was a family playing around in front of it.
I did my best to capture them as many families seemed to truly enjoy this park and probably learned a lot about the outside world.
Our hope is that the information is checked, and questioned, by the families that visit and they find out that there is some good points, and some bad points, and that they decide to explore the world themselves and not just take the park as truth.
I guess it would sort of like an American citizen going to Disneyland and expecting the rest of the world to look like that.
I have high hopes for this park, as it looks like they are building more parts of it, and hopefully they are renovating what they have already built, as it was definitely a fun, and worthwhile, trip and I’d suggest anyone give it a try and spend some time here when they visit Beijing!
The not-so-great wall of China.
The Great Wall of China…well, not so great, since it was pretty small.
By the way, there is a myth that you can see the great wall from space.
This is actually not true.
It is only 30 feet wide, at its widest point, so you can’t see it from space.
In fact, one of my favorite video bloggers, CPG GREY, has a wonderful video explaining why this is not true.
I have to admit, I’ve become addicted to his videos and Jill and I immediately watch a new one when it comes out.
They are always packed full of humor, and facts, and entertaining while be educating.
I’d suggest subscribing to his YouTube page and sharing the joy.
We then walked over to the Taj Mahal, which is another sight we want to see at some point in our lives.
However, we don’t plan on going to India until we are a few years removed from China as we’ve heard that it is even more chaotic than China and we will need some serious downtime and calmness before we venture into India as we want to be grounded and really be present and mindful in such a magical and life changing place.
The Taj Mahal. Also, one of my favorite musicians.
My aunt and uncle, and my cousins, have all spent many years in India, and have told us about the wonders and the incredibly powerful experiences they have had there and we look forward to seeing them in the near future.
Again, the world has so many places to visit and so little time.
We are fully trying to make time and take advantage of our ability to live without an office and without a country.
The amazing Shwedagon Pagoda of Burma/Myanmar.
We start with the beautiful Shwedagon Pagoda of Myanmar/Burma. We were taken back by its size and definitely want to see it in real life before we leave Asia for the USA.
We have heard a lot of wonderful stories about Myanmar/Burma and have yet to hear of someone that went that didn’t love it beyond belief.
Next was Borobudur and it was quite well done and very detailed.
This is also a temple that we’d like to see before we leave.
Sadly, there is only so much time in life, so we need to start traveling more as soon as possible.
In fact, if things go well, we plan to retire in the next 5 years and survive on Jill’s website SF Tourism Tips and other businesses that we are starting at this point. If you want to subscribe to her site, and get information about San Francisco, click the here: SF Tourism Tips, and please do!
We don’t want to be tied to a desk, an office, a city, or even a country because we know there is so much more to see and so little time to see it.
We also love being able to meet new people, see new sights, and constantly be surprised by different cultures.
So, if I can ask a favor, please go to the Facebook SF Tourism Tips and like that page.
The Borobudur of Indonesia.
Also, please share it with others and use it whenever you travel to San Francisco or have friends that are traveling to San Francisco.
To give you an idea of how we plan to live our lives, here is a picture of us, on the ferry from Athens to Mykonos, working on building our business and enjoying the view from our “office” for the day.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful to do this every day?
That is our plan and we’d be happy to help you figure out how to do it also!
The Sydney Opera House.
Off we went to the magical island of Australia…and Easter Island after that.
I’ve been to Australia and absolutely loved it. Jill has never been to Australia so this was her “first time” visiting it and seeing the sights.
Sadly, the Sydney Opera House was pretty dirty but it still looked darn cool as the design is supposed to resemble the sails on a ship as it sails through the ocean.
I can’t quite figure out why the Sydney Harbor Bridge is blue, since it is actually grey, but I guess they have the designers of the World Park have their reasons.
Jill, Gulzar and I really liked how close the Dome of the Rock and Australia were located in the World Park since they are probably about as far apart as any two places on the Earth, but literally and figuratively.
However, when you have limited space, you make displays fit into where you can and they have done a good job of that at the World Park. It is a rather large space and we became so worn out we didn’t even get to see everything they had in one day and may return again at a future date.
The Moai on the Easter Island island were only about 5 feet tall but were fun to imagine being full sized and awe inspiring.
We then moved on to the Asian part of the World Park.
