Always losing her daughter

Something I haven’t mentioned about Istanbul is the cats. There are a lot of them. You can’t really look anywhere that is devoid of cat. In groups, individually, asleep on posts, staring up at trees, sauntering along the street. It’s all cats. There is the occasional dog but, basically, it’s just cats. Feral cats.

Estimates of the cat population vary but there could be up to a million of them. Residents of the city love them. For one thing, there are very few rodents in Istanbul. Though, we did come across a couple of rats today.

We were in the very long queue at the Blue Mosque when we were approached by a couple of women who wanted to push in because, one said, she had lost her daughter who was somewhere ahead of us. We had been in the queue for a while at this point and had almost reached the entrance.

John stood his ground and said he was sorry, but they would have to queue like everyone else. We saw the women in the mosque a little later and they were happily wandering around without a third person. It was clearly a way to avoid the sizeable queue. Sarah was very tempted to go over and ask them if they’d found the daughter yet.

To say the place was a bit crowded would be an understatement. Mind you, it’s big enough to hold thousands of worshippers when the tourists are not there. A few of the tourists are there to take selfies, some even have portable telescopic tripods which they happily set up in order to take the perfect shot without anyone else being in it.

These selfie-takers will tell you to move so they can achieve the impossible. I would suggest standing your ground and speaking gibberish as if you don’t understand them. Then go back to looking at the magnificence before you.

And the building is magnificent. It was built between 1609 and 1617 and is decorated, inside, with thousands of little coloured tiles. It also has a few massive columns that are holding the roof up. The architect, Sedefkar Mehmed Agha, was a pupil of the great Sinan and the place is almost a homage to his master.

It was built on the orders of the sultan, which is why there are so many mosques in Istanbul. Most sultans would have a mosque built during their reign to either thank their god for their victories or appease him for their defeats in battle. The Blue Mosque was built because Ahmed I didn’t win the Long Turkish War between the Ottomans and the Habsburg monarchy, which ended in the Treaty of Sitvatorok. It wasn’t a win for either side. Well, apart from the common people who were pointlessly dying on the battlefield.

The fact that Ahmed I had the mosque built to say sorry for losing is interesting when you consider that both the Ottomans and the Habsburgs were worshipping the same god. At least according to the people that told John about Islam and Christianity.

He had approached them as they stood eagerly waiting, like desperate little wallflowers at a High School dance. They were more than glad to discuss their fantasy world with him and Lindy. Personally, I preferred the fantasy world on display at the Museum of Archaeology, which we visited after the mosque.

It made me wonder why humans went to all the trouble of inventing a bunch of incredible gods who allowed just about everything you could ever want, only to dump them for one who was vengeful and a right bastard at times. I’m sure someone has written something about this weird choice and I could go on…but I can hear my wife suggesting I move on rather than keep ranting from my soap box.

[Gary theatrically clears his throat and moves on]

The Museum of Archaeology was built on the orders of the Ottoman Sultan Abdülaziz after his world tour during which he visited museums in Paris, London and Vienna. He figured that Turkey was missing out and he couldn’t have that. So, by 1869, the place opened its doors. Behind them were a lot of objects and we saw a load of them today.

I rather liked the Great Wall of Heads (my name for it) and, especially, the head of Agrippina the Elder (above) from the 1st half of the 1st century of the Common Era.

She was the mother of both Nero and Caligula and a pretty formidable woman. Unlike Ottoman women, she was powerful, politically aware and was allowed to show her face in public. She was considered both smart and dangerous. Even the head above looks fiercely determined. Okay, her boys were a tad deranged, but that doesn’t mean she was.

I was sitting having a weird pretzel thing later, while waiting for the others and saw quite a few burka clad women, tending their children. Thinking back to Agrippina, I know which mother I’d prefer.

Anyway, back at the museum, I rather enjoyed the story of Troy, told in mocked up newspaper reports both in Turkish and English. It highlighted how adventurous, and fun, the Greek gods were. Their exploits were stories handed down for centuries by people like Homer who, incidentally, was probably blind. How amazing is that? The author of the Illiad may have been blind. Presumably, he dictated to a handy scribe who remains unknown.

Speaking of early Greeks, the museum contains an awful lot of Greek works which is unsurprising given Turkish/Greek history however, I do wonder they still have them. With all the ruckus over the Parthenon Marbles in the Museum of London, you’d think Athens would like a few other bits returned as well.

As I looked at various marble statues and marble reliefs, I wondered about the makers. I love the David and Michaelangelo was clearly a genius however, as I looked at the work of the Greek artists, I realised they achieved remarkable results with far more primitive tools than he had.

The delicacy, the realism, the impossible ability to make stone look almost translucent, it’s all there. On one piece, a bracelet, tight on an upper arm, looked very real to me.

But it wasn’t just statues (though there were a lot) there were also some interesting cuneiform clay and terracotta tablets, including one that even had a terracotta envelope. It was a contract related to gold investment.

The objects above date back to the 19th century BCE. I think that’s pretty amazing if you consider that god only created the earth around 20,000 years ago.

Inevitably, we all wandered apart in the museum, crossing paths occasionally. I spotted John, Sarah and Anthea watching a film about How to be an Archaeologist, at one point. As I passed John, I quietly asked if it wasn’t a bit of a busman’s holiday.

Having filled our brains with ancient wonders, we headed back to the Basilica Cistern, where the others joined the massive queue. My legs had had enough with queueing and my brain was full of sites for the day, so I sat and ate the aforementioned weird pretzel thing, bought from this handy street vendor.

The ones on the top shelf are spread with cream cheese. Obviously, I had one of those.

A short while later, I met up with the others at a very handy bar, where we may have indulged in a few drinks before heading back to the accommodation.

It was decided that for dinner tonight, we’d return to the Women’s Bazaar for a real Turkish dinner. We were not disappointed.

It was a feast of food where we had no idea what we were eating. Well, we knew it wasn’t cat. The cats are very much loved in Istanbul. Killing and eating them would be akin to consuming a minor deity.

The place was full; the atmosphere delightful. We finally wandered home with big smiles on our faces and lots of food in our tummies.