Istanbul

Istanbul day 1 Got to the airport to check in with Turkish Airlines. We had to weigh our carry on bags. Uh oh. I knew I was screwed. Normally they just look at them or have you fit them in the little metal box. The limit was 8kg, I had 12. I spent a good amount of time taking stuff out. It didn't make any sense though. Because what I took out - clothes and a bunch of my stuff that I put in a grocery bag- I was still carrying on. Airlines have just gotten so ridiculous. I finally got it down to 8.5kg which was fine. Just annoying. The flight was actually nice though. They served us meals! I haven't been on a real flight since I left for Spain. I love airplane food. Always exciting. They had this amazing almond cake that I loved. Anyways, we landed, took a bus to Taksim Square, in the modern part of Istanbul. Found our way to the hotel. It was really close to the square we were in- just down two streets. Two of the steepest streets I've ever been down. Which was fine going down but going up would be an issue. Anyways, we found our hostel which was above a Dominos. The people there were really nice and they had four adorable cats. The place was a little disorganized but it was fine. We left our stuff there and went out to explore the city. There was a reallly long street off of the square with a ton of food places and stores. There was a lot of great shopping, unfortunately I couldn't fit anything else in my carry on. Probably a good thing but so sad. Everyone we encountered was very nice and friendly. I went into Starbucks to buy a drink and thought I could pay in euro so they ended up giving it to me for free. Then we went into a bakery and a guy gave us free pastries. They were amazzzzing!!! I've never had baklava but oh my goddd I needa find it in America. Soo good. It was pistachio baklava. Then we kept walking and some guy had a metal pole that he was working ice ceam with. I was just kind of watching and he told me it was elastic ice cream and asked if I wanted to try. Of course I did. He did all these weird tricks with it when he served it to me. Gave me a scoop, on a cone, and even dipped it in chocolate! It was amazing. Tasted like marshmallow mixed with ice cream and it was kind of stretchy. Apparently it's a specialty in Turkey.  I loved it. We were on a hunt for falafel, a hunt we thought would be very easy. Falafel is always sold at places called "Istanbul" in Europe. Seriously. And they didn't have it anywhere! Only kebabs. Disappointing. We didn't do much else. Returned to the hostel and went to our room. One of the two other kids staying in there was from Canada and he'd already been in Istanbul for 10 days. He told us where we should go and pointed them out on our map. He was a little odd - he talked so proper it made me uncomfortable. Whatever, he showed us where the historic part of Istanbul was.  Istanbul day 2 So the next morning woke up with the sun beating right down on me, dying of heat exhaustion. It was sooo hot on the sixth floor! We went up to the roof and ate breakfast. Then we headed to the historic part. It was over the river. We got off a few tram stops early to walk a bit and see the city. We walked through a gorgeous park. There were huge green hill and trees and pretty flowers everywhere. (Apparently flowers and cats- also everywhere- have some sort of religious significance). There were a few groups of school kids,  maybe 5th grade, and when we walked by they were all like "Hello! What is your name?". They were so cute. They asked where we were from and told us there names. You could tell thy were repeating exactly what they'd learned in class, but they spoke pretty clearly. I love little English students. They think it's so cool that we're from America. We went to the Hagia Sofia. It was gorgeous inside. So nice seeing a mosque as opposed to a cathedral. Seen far too many cathedrals. This was much cooler. The decorations were just so artistic and interesting. I noticed some guy following Kirsten and me around and taking our picture. Then we left and walked towards the blue mosque. After a few minutes I heard someone yelling "Photo! Photo please!". It was the guy that had been following us around. He asked me to take a picture of him, so I did. Then he asked for one of us. Umm excuse me? Why do you want a picture of me you weirdo. But I didn't know what to say so now some weird Turkish dude has a picture of me and Kirsten on his phone. We went to the Blue Mosque, but didn't go in. We got some elastic ice cream then headed for the Topaki Palace. We almost didn't go in, but they lied to us and told us they had a student price. While we were waiting in line some girl further up from us asked if we were from America and which states. She was from Pennsylvania. She's in Turkey teaching.  She asked if we wanted to walk around together and said she'd wait for us. So we walked around with her. Her name is Marianne - she was awesome. She goes to Penn State and is an elementary ed major. She did most of we student teaching in America, but at her school they can do part of it abroad, so that's why she was in Turkey for two months. So cool! I wish I could do that at my school!  She was really sweet and asked what we wanted to do and told us she'd bring us around. So lucky that we met her!  The palace was pretty lame. It was huge and you'd wait in line to enter one room, which would have maybe ten windows with a little piece of jewelry. There were a few cool rooms and a nice view. Glad we went though. Then Marianne brought us to the Grand Bazaar. We stopped and got food on the way. We bought a round seseame bread thing from one of the million guys selling it on the street. At te restaurant I got veggies with mashed potatoes baked on top, and some really good buckwheat rice with spices. The Grand Bazaar was interesting. It's the oldest - and maybe biggest- underground bazaar in the world.  There are 52 different tunnels with a bunch of little markets. The people there of course try to sell you stuff, but most of them were pretty funny. One told me his face hurt because I was so beautiful. They're lines were so corny but they made us laugh. We just looked around then sat in a cafe there and had Turkish tea. It was strong, but I liked it. We also got baklava and something else similar. It was delicious. Marianne insisting on paying for us - she was seriously so nice. Then we walked around and took a ferry to the Asia side of Istanbul. Marianne lives over there. It was about 25 minutes away. We went and sat on some rocks by the Myanmar? Or Bosphorus sea? Either way it was gorgeous. We huh out and talked for an hour and a half, watching the sun set over the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sofia across the sea. It's so cool meeting people who have so much in common. We talked about being teachers- I'm getting so old! Hanin out with my friends talking about our students and how time consuming lesson planning is. And we talked about traveling and stuff. So nice. Marianne put us on a bus to go back to Taksim Square. I had looked up falafel, and supposedly the best place in Istanbul was called Falafel House and right near the square. Took us a few minutes and we found it! We watched the guy make fresh falafel. So cool. Falafel is ground up chick peas with spices and it's fried. Then he put it in a wrap with garlic hummus, a yogurt sauce, tomato and lettuce. It was amazing. We were so happy. Then right across the street there was a place with baklava and Turkish delight. We'd never tried Turkish delight and told the kid that, so he gave us a few kinds to try. I wasn't a huge fan of it but it was good. I got some baklava though - amazing. New obsession. I absolutely loved Istanbul. Nice people, great desserts, great shopping. I wanna go back. So lucky we met Marianne, hopefully we'll meet up in the US. We kinda joked about taking a road trip but we all really want to and if not Kirsten and I probably will this summer.