Hagia Sophia

As it turns out, my life just exploded in a flurried frenzy of deadlines, musicalities, papers, le drame hugolien, and revived thespianism, which has left my brain wiped and body tired. It's amazing - I go away for a little exotic vacation and suddenly everything is due. I don't think that's fair... But anyway, I spent the first few days after my return from Sweden working on a big fat fellowship application and had to give my first French presentation of two, in which I basically taught the class for an hour about la négritude in African francophone literature. I was actually supposed to give this presentation three weeks before, but we'd run out of class time each week so I kept having to wait. (Arg.) That made my next presentation uncomfortably close, being this Thursday. This one is for the harder of the two classes in which I really have to make sure my language abilities are up to scratch, meaning that I've been spending a lot of time in the world of French and not German. This is actually rather unfortunate, as I am paying big bucks to take an important standardized German language test on Tuesday morning that will be looked at by universities and other institutions of the sort should I return to Germany later on, which is my hope. However, I haven't really had much time to prepare for the Big French or the Big German thinghies because I've had lots of extra choir rehearsals, including an all-day one today. Then on the evenings when I don't have choir rehearsals, I'm prompting for the University Players' current show, which is lots of fun, but at least a 4-hour evening commitment and far too much English to be good for me, as several of the actors/directors this time around are native speakers. The good news is, most of the big stuff will be done with in four days and I'll be able to relax a little, if you consider writing at least six papers to be relaxing. : )

Oh my, it was not my intention to blab on about how busy I am. My intention was to share the first part of my Istanbul trip, basically being the glorious and amazing Hagia Sophia.

First off, Sarah and I flew to Istanbul via legit airports, which was a very nice relief compared to a.) not have to pay anything extra to get to an out-of-the-way airport, and b.) not have to race everyone to a good seat on the plane and then be advertised to the whole flight (Ryanair), or c.) fly out of a structure that resembles more of a tent than an airport. The flight from Hamburg to Istanbul took three hours, during which time Turkish Airlines took VERY good care of us. More specifically, they feed you lots of hot and delicious Turkish food. Always a plus. We arrived around 6pm and found the metro to take us into the city. Watching out the window, I could see mosque after mosque silhouetted against the fiery orange-pink sunset and once we'd exited the metro station and were fighting with unruly taxis to cross the street, I knew we weren't in Kansas anymore, so to speak.

It took us a while to find the hostel because we were given bad directions, but being lost in the old city was actually a cool thing because it led us to find lots of amazing places. Once on the right path, I was tickled that our hostel had to be reached by walking through the park between the Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque. They were gorgeous and reeking of exoticism in their nightly illuminations.


We eventually found our hostel and were very happy to check in. I think we were both a little nervous and stressed about being in such a different and unknown culture, but there was nothing much we could do about it except to keep our minds open. And sleep, which we did after going up to the rooftop cafe seating to look over the Bosphorus, Hagia Sophia, and Blue Mosque.

Our first day was actually supposed to be cool and rainy, so we decided to do indoor touristy things. First on our list was the Hagia Sophia. I'll copy and paste the Wikipedia beginning blurb in to give you the histories, which are still blowing my mind a couple weeks later:

Hagia Sophia (from the Greek: Ἁγία Σοφία, "Holy Wisdom"; Latin: Sancta Sophia or Sancta Sapientia) is a former Orthodox patriarchal basilica, later a mosque and now a museum in Istanbul, Turkey. From the date of its dedication in 360 until 1453, it served as the cathedral of Constantinople, except between 1204 and 1261, when it was the cathedral of the Latin empire. The building was a mosque from 29 May 1453 until 1934, when it was secularized. It was opened as a museum on 1 February 1935.^[1]

Famous in particular for its massive dome, it is considered the epitome of Byzantine architecture and is said to have "changed the history of architecture."^[2] It was the largest cathedral in the world for nearly a thousand years, until Seville Cathedral was completed in 1520. The current building was originally constructed as a church between 532 and 537 on the orders of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian and was the third Church of the Holy Wisdom to occupy the site, the previous two having both been destroyed by rioters.

...And I thought things in Europe were old, which they are, but not like here. Old, beautifully preserved, old, old, histories, old, beautiful, etc... Here are some pictures from one of the most incredible architectural structures I have ever explored.

Zebra stripes!

We could explore the upper galleries not by stairs, but by hand-made twisting and inclined stone passages.

It was really interesting to see the mix of saintly Orthodox mosaics with Islamic art from the centuries of it being a mosque. You come upon a scene like this and think, "Hmmm, something doesn't belong..."

Sarah adding a little perspective to the vast dimensions of the space.

We could see rain falling on the Blue Mosque out one of the windows.

Amazing. Incredible. Beautiful. And did I mention old? Lots more of that to come.

Somehow it got to be way past my bedtime again. I don't like it when that happens. However, I am loving the Storm of the Century hitting Hamburg right now after our week of beautiful weather and today's particularly puissante heatwave. Lightning! Thunder! Wind! Rain! And what better to enhance my enjoyment thereof than Mozart's Requiem? (DIES IRAE!!! DUNDUNDUNDUN DIES ILLA!!! ...How I must confuse my neighbors sometimes.) Thank you, oh mighty storm deities.