Weekend wanderings..

Well, its been awhile since I got to post, yet again.  Some things have happened, some good, some bad.  Overall I'm still thrilled to be here.  Sometime in the middle of this week I got sick, sorta.  Well my throat hurts and I cough some.  Alyssa and I made a friend at the pide place by south campus, we went to celebrate Devrim's birthday with pide and a cake from the pastane... mm, what else happened during the week.. not much other than class I guess.  We have midterm exams and a long weekend this coming week! Scary..

The weekend was pretty exciting though.  Alyssa and I were mad that we didn't get to go to Edirne with the school trip because we didn't pay our fees before it filled up.  We didn't know that signing up wasn't enough to actually secure a place on the list, so we missed it.  We decided to fill our Saturday with other things.. but really we started on Friday.  One of Alyssa's friends from here (the one who got married last weekend) recommended her favorite restaurant.  It was kinda far away, but we had a night to kill, so we went.  We had to take several modes of transportation to get there, but thats the beauty of the akbil!  You can use it to pay for all of the different buses and ferries and trains, and you get discounts for transfers if you have it.  The restaurant was really nice though, sorta expensive for here, but for restaurant that nice, nowhere near what it would be back in the states... so anyway, here's some pictures...

It's called Develi and its pretty on the outside :D

I ate the Urfa kebap... because the translation said "urfa kebab," which didn't explain a whole lot.. sooo I was curious.  I still don't really know what it means.  To me, it just means delicious.

This was our dessert, Alyssa ordered it because the translation said something about "tiny nosdles" and again, we were curious about what that meant. The thing on the right is my türk kahvesi (turkish coffee) and there is turkish delight on the metal thing... yummm. 

So, the next day, which was the Edirne trip, we decided to go to a hamam.  We just left when we felt like it and went into the touristy regions of Istanbul.  First we wandered around and looked for a pleasant and cheap place to get çay.  I mean, you dont look for çay here, its literally everywhere.  You do look for a place you want to actually want to go to in order to drink it.  Besides some places really rip you off..  In our wanderings we stumbled across A. the hotel I stayed at my first night here! B. some huge museum and what we later discovered was the Ayasofya and the Sultanahmet mosque.  We actually visited Ayasofya before anything else important that day.  Well not before buying some cheap earrings I guess. Pictures ensue!

This is just the entryway.. nothin' big, compared to the rest anyway.

Beautifullllllll!
Insane amounts of  restoration!  Actually, I was kinda glad about this, it gives you an idea of how huge this place actually is.  Even when you're in there, its kinda hard to tell.. I think its too overwhelming or so.

Well,  I like angels... lots

A view from the second story.  I have practically a million more pictures from here..

After that, we went over to the Blue Mosque, which was also just plain incredible....

The big ceiling dome.

The windows are incredibly beautiful and there are sooo many of them.  Love the lights as well.  Anyway, we were only allowed into the edges of this one, which is good, thats the way it probably should be.  I wouldn't want tourists bothering me while I was there praying either.

They really knew what they were doing with this artwork.  All the domes and arches and everything about it.  Gorgeous.

Ok, I really, really love the lights... which are no longer candles, but electric lights.

And just look at the size of that pillar!  wow.  This building was amazing all around.  So, that was cool, we left and looked at a few gift shops/stands around it.  Afterwards we sat in a little park area because there was a band about to play.

We listened to a few songs and then made our way to the hamam.. The hamam was an experience all in itself, mildly uncomfortable, but overall I think perhaps I liked it.  I don't think I'll go into detail however..  

Today, I went back to Taksim to find a Catholic mass, and I did.  Actually, it was in English and only an hour.  I took more pictures of the inside before walking back outside and seeing the sign that said its um.. not allowed. So I felt bad.  I'm also sad that the only turkish mass there is on Tuesday during my classes...