Istanbul Day 1 - 12th October 2007

Since there are loads of pictures to be uploaded and stories to be updated, I would write the blog by stages. So it will be 7 entries perhaps for our trip to Istanbul. Hope all the readers won't mind with it.

So we actually start our day 1 at 1.30 a.m (and it is already Raya in Khartoum) when hubby and I had to wake up and get ready to the airports. Mandi sunat raya at very early in the morning okayyy. The kids of course are sound asleep at that time. We leave the house at 2.30 a.m. Alhamdulillah eventhough we had to do all by ourself, everything turned out well. By 3.30 a.m we are already in the lounge waiting to be boarded. The Turksih Airline is suppose to take off at 5.00 a.m but it had been delayed for 1 hour. So before we actually boarded we met with 2 other Malaysian families who are travelling to Cairo.

Since it is our first time travelling during Raya we called Mummy and Mama wishing them Hari Raya (Malaysia celebrated Raya the next day). We settled everything and take off at around 6.00 a.m. The picture below shows how Ehsan is very excited and so much energy that he can't stop talking eventhough I didnt understand it.

Taken before take off at 5.55 a.m

15 minutes later

The journey of 3458km took about 3 hours and 40 minutes to the destination. Ehsan slept for an hour but Erica was so much of energy that she just continued playing. Me and hubby just couldn't sleep feeling excited about the trip. So we just sit and watch Erica playing. We had our makanan raya in the plane which was omellete with bread and some turkey slice and cheese and also cherry cake. It was not bad for us yang memang dah lapar ni.

So finally we 'touched' the land of Istanbul at about 9.40 a.m. After all the clearance with the immigration, luggage and exchanged some money to Turkish Lira, we finally met with our driver at 10.15 a.m. The weather was so nice, the scenary along the road was beautiful. Hubby told me it is just like a typical European country.

Ehsan is all ready buckle himself before landing

Us all, at the arival hall of Attartuk International Airport.

We arrived at our hotel around 11.30 a.m. It is just a small hotel but it is nice and the place is very startegic since all the places that we are going to visit was just nearby and there are also lots of restaurant along the road. The only shocking thing was that the 2 rooms was a crooked L-shape. I had difficulty even to put our bags inside! Despite this we managed to fit the 4 of us in there.

Our small hotel, the Star Holiday Hotel, besides the Can Restaurant

The room Erica & hubby slept

The room me & Ehsan slept

We took a rest for a while before heading to our first place. But before that me and hubby decided that we buy some lunch so that we can have it at the park later. The plan was to visit Hagia Sophia but since the queue was so long we just headed to Topkapi Palace. We passed thru the Bab Humayun and faced the 1st courtyard. Over here we can see the park area, dwellings of palace servants, ruins of palace hospital and palace bakery at the right side. On the left side appear St. Irene and the old Ottoman treasury and far behind is Istanbul Archeological Museum.

St. Irene Church for the 1st time was constructed over the remains of Afrodite Temple. The building was used as an arsenal by the Ottomans between 15th-18th centuries. Today, it is used for classical music concerts due to its excellent acoustics. We have nothing further to be shown or tell as it can only be visited upon permission.

St. Irene Church

We passed thru the park at the 1st courtyard and discovered that the queue was much the same as Hagia Sophia. So we decided to have our lunch at the park while thinking of the next plan. We decided that if we couldn't enter the palace we just go back to hotel and come later tomorrow. But I feel it was a waste of time to come again.

After we had our kebab, we just pushed our luck, and went to the queue hoping that they are only lining up for information but we are wrong. Later I told hubby that I would rather spend 10 Euro rather than lining up to get a LYR 10/each ticket for entrance fee. Then we met with this nice tour guide and asked about it. I guess it was our 'innocent' faces that made him symphatise with us. He was so kind that he just sold his tickets for LYR 10 for us. It was a blessing in disguise that we can enter the palace without having to queue. God bless him!

The palace's original name used to be Saray Cedide-i Amire, however because of the huge cannons in front of the doors, the public gave the name 'Topkapi'. The palace surrounded with walls, around 5 km, has a total area of 700,000 m2 which is twice the area of Vatican and half of Monaco in size. It was protected by 28 towers. We pass through the Bab-us-Selam, the second main door of the palace and begin our visit at 2.20 p.m. When we pass the door, we faced a huge garden, full of very old cypress trees. The section to the right side of the entrance displays the Sultan's chariots and the complete right wing of the second courtyard was the 'palace divan or kitchen'.

There were 3 sections in the kitchen complex, for the sultan, other personnel and the desserts. Each of the 10 rooms were used to cook for various persons and groups like the queen mother, concubines, crown prince and black eunuchs (they guarded the 'gundik'/concubines). Today, the kitchen complex display the collection of porcelain, huge cauldrons and other kitchen utensils.

Some of the utensils collection. (Top: periuk boleh muat 10 orang, Below: mangkuk tingkat)

After the kitchen, we headed to The Akagalar Gate. It is the 3rd largest door and for 400 years the most important ceremonies were made in front of this door such as enthroning ceremonies of the new sultans and celebration of new conquests. But since the place itself inside had so many staircases and Ehsan was fast asleep since the moment we arrived I ended up waiting for hubby to snap pictures at the main gate.

Hubby & kids infront of Gate of White Eunuchs (Akagalar Kapisi)

Ehsan was fast asleep from the moment we arrived the palace till we finished the tour.

Later we headed to the 3rd section of the weapons section. At this point of time I start to feel tired and made a pitt stop to give Erica milk. Hubby went inside to take pictures inside. It took us 2 hours for the tour on our own without any distruption from our sleeping beauty Ehsan. We then decided to go back to the hotel to have a rest before going out again later in the night.

Pitt stop to give Erica milk. Ehsan is still sleeping...

Hubby & kids in front of the entrance of the weapons section

In front of Bab Humayun after the tour.

Later that nite after taking our nap for couple hours we had an early dinner that we bought on the way back from Topkapi. What we had for dinner was another kebab, chestnuts and bread (a.k.a simit in Turkish).

Chicken Kebab

Roasted Chestnut

After our rest, we then went to Sirkeci Train Station, in Eminonu, by tram, to watch the Dervish Dancing performance. The performance started at 7.30 p.m. thinking that we want to sit in a front row we left the room at 7.00 p.m but we were 'late' and the place was already fully occupied. So we only managed to seat at the back row. It wasn't a nice view but it was better us with small kids to sneak out quietly.

The performances by the dervishes.

The performance first started out with their Sufi music, which was to them a form of zikir. But by that time, Ehsan found out that the room has a nice echo - and started to talk loudly, with 'approving' glances from everyone else! So hubby had to quickly bring him out. In the end hubby only managed the last last parts of the actual dervish - luckily we have our vid cam.

Since all of us were so tired on our 1st day, we decided to leave the performance earlier. We took the tram back to the hotel at Sultanahmet at 8.30 p.m. It was a great start for our 1st day and we were looking foward for the next few days of our stay.