Since Turkey was so amazing, I decided to Turkey its own blog post :)
SUNDAY: I woke up and realized the BYU vs. Utah game was going on in the forum area. Went and watched about 10 minutes after half time then was grateful I had to leave to get ready for Turkey. 'Nuff said. On a better note, the flight went great, and we landed in Istanbul!!! One of the best realizations I had in Istanbul was that it was the nearest I'll be to Croatia until I get there! AHH!!! I can't wait! But Istanbul is sooo beautiful! We came to our hotel and it was called "Cartoon Hotel"! The theme was cartoons, and there was Bugs Bunny, Mickey Mouse, Snow White, and all sorts of characters! It was so much fun. Also the elevator was tiny and get this...there was no door to the box part. The door closed to the floor and then we watched the door go down and the wall move. After looking at the beautiful view, we walked through downtown Istanbul to get to our dinner, and it was sooo good!!! Family, you would be proud of me, I tried everything! And I found new favorite foods that I wouldn't have had by just the looks of it.
MONDAY: Our first stop was the Blue Mosque which is right by Hagia Sophia (the oldest church still standing; about 1000 years old). In the Blue Mosque we had to take off our shoes like in any holy place. They didn't require us to wear head scarves, but I think it's because it's more like a museum now. We then went to the Topkapi Palace which is where sultans used to live and about 4,000 wives, concubines, family, servants, and workers. It's like it's own little village. There was so many beautiful carvings, gardens, paintings, and other artifacts. The tile work was especially amazing. I don't even know how many tiles there were, but just imagine a little village covering their walls not in wallpaper but in tiles. Bam. Crazy, huh? We went down to a cistern ( an underground dam underneath the city) which was about the size of at least 3 Vernal temples, maybe 4. We then went to the Grand Baazar. Bizare! I still am marveling at how big that place was. We got lost so many times. It's a miracle my group made it back on the bus. After our long day we went on a boat ride to get to the Asian side of Istanbul (they call one side of the sea Europe and the other side Asia). It was great to feel the sea air and see Istanbul from a different perspective. When we landed, we ate dinner by the water side and I had a sardine whole! I know you're not beliveing me, so I took a pic of it and my reaction afterwards. Let's just say I wasn't smiling... I also had clam for the first time! It was stinkin good!!! Since I was on such an adventurous high, they served us an entire fish without the guts, but I then tried the eye. Definitely not trying that again. After getting back to our cartoon hotel, we hit up on the town by metro and tasted some of the best baklava ever! It was a successful night to an AMAZING, long successful day.
TUESDAY: Troy was our next stop, so we got on the bus and headed on our way. Now I can say I've been on a Trojan horse and got attacked by a frog where Hector was killed by Achilles (supposedly). Don't worry the frog will not mess with people again ;) That day we couldn't fit a lot with riding on the bus and not many sites around Troy so we went to our hotel which was right by the beach. So we went to the pool, had a bonfire and dance party on the beach! It was crazy fun! I LOVED IT!!!
WEDNESDAY: We started the day in beautiful Assos where Paul taught. It has a temple of Athena which overlooks a gorgeous view of the sea. I definitely could get used to the sea. I miss my mountains, but oceans and seas I could definitely look at for quite some time. In the little village, there were some turkeys. Yes, turkeys in Turkey! haha We then went to Pergumum (mentioned in Revelation) which has a Roman Temple, and it poured!!! Zeus was not happy with us being there or something. Everyone was soaked to the bone, but it was a lot of fun :)
THURSDAY: We headed our way to Ephesus which is an ancient city bigger than 2 BYU campus and only maybe 10% has been excavated. In the hills all around there is most likely 90% of the city underground. Wow. Ephesus was a hopping place. It's so much fun going to these ancient ruins and pretending to be like how it would have been in those days. My friend, Cali, and I walked down the lane acting like we were going to the Turkish baths and head to the theatre after some shopping. It was great. The theatre by the way made me all giddy! The acoustics were great and there were actual stones excavated for this site. It felt so good to be on a stage again! Another stage that was fun to see after Ephesus was the one in Miletus, another ancient city, but this one is where Paul said good-bye to the Turkish people. It made me really think about saying good-bye, but I'll talk about that in the overview blog. Before Miletus, we visited the Artemis temple which is one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. This temple had 127 columns about 60 feet high. Currently, there's only one column about 50 feet high. They're not exactly sure what happened, but it could be from a lot of different things (enemies, earthquakes, angry birds; last theory don't take seriously). But it was crazy seeing a field where one of the great wonders of the world should be. After this exciting ancient day, we went to a modern hotel which had hot springs! The water felt sooo good!!! A great way to relax after many hours sitting on a bus for sure.
FRIDAY: We started the day heading down a waterfallish of hot springs. If you want to see pictures of what I mean, type in Google "Pamukkale" and press on Images. Again, it was soo much fun! This day was mostly spent on the bus (about 7 hours) which is why this part is so short.
SATURDAY: Spent some of the day in Bursa, first off in the Grand Mosque, and Bursa is the end of the Silk Road, so we went to a silk market and visited some silk shops. I've decided I love silk and can never go back to cotton. It felt way too good. We then went to Nicea where Constantine held his winter palace and First and Seventh Ecumenical Councils (don't worry about the details, I'm just trying to remember for my test). We stopped by a small Hagia Sophia then made our way to the famous Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. Crazy big. This church was originally Christian then the Turks took over and changed it to a mosque and covered all the Christian symbols. Now it's a museum and undeclared of religion so both religions can be seen inside this beautiful, huge building. We then had our final dinner in Turkey went to the airport. There were no troubles in my opinion throughout the airport experience. The only problem was that we arrived home 4:30 am in the morning. We were a bit tired the next day, but all is well.
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