Istanbul

Istanbul was the last stop on my trip, and it was one of the places I was most interested to visit. I didn't know much about Turkey before going there, but I figured it would be the most different from any of the other places I had been to, which is part of why I wanted to go there.
Europe in general is a very easy place for an American to travel, even alone, because the cultures in most European countries aren't that fundamentally different from American culture, there is usually an abundance of people who speak English, and for the most part I pretty much knew what to expect in each place. Turkey was a little more out of my comfort zone, and I wanted an experience like that.

I wasn't completely out of my comfort zone though because I wasn't alone for this part of the trip. Robert, one of my sister's friends who I met in Germany, met me there and we explored the city together, and it was really nice to have someone I knew to spend time with after traveling by myself for most of the previous months. The place we stayed was right near a central touristy area of the city, so it was very convenient to walk to lots of cool places. We were there for a week and had 6 full days for sightseeing, so we had a more relaxed approach than I'd had in some other places where I didn't stay as long. It was nice to have so much time, especially on the day I started to feel a little sick again from the cold I had in Romania. It was also really nice to not have to make all of the plans like I had to do when I was alone (I let Robert do most of the research about what we were going to do haha), and I didn't have to spend my free time making plans for the next stop on my journey, because I was going home and everything was pretty much figured out. Overall it was more relaxing than most of the places I visited, more like an actual vacation, so it was a great way to end my time in Europe.

We saw a lot of really cool things, and the city is much different than anywhere else I had ever been. For one, it's the biggest city in Europe and the biggest city I've ever been to, so it felt way more crowded than I was used to, which was a little overwhelming when I first got there. As with many places I visited during the winter months, I was happy that I was there during the off-season so that there weren't as many tourists around to make things even more crowded. Also, Turkey is the only predominantly Muslim country I've been to, and it was cool to see so many mosques dotting the skyline everywhere you looked. The biggest culture shock for me of my entire trip was when we went inside mosques and I had to cover my head with a scarf or hood. I had never been put in a situation before where I so clearly had different rules for my behavior because I was a woman, and it made me really uncomfortable at first because I felt like the culture was telling me I was inferior. But after doing it a few times I sort of got used to it, and I realized that for women in Turkey it probably feels totally normal. And it got me thinking about what cultural expectations the United States has for women that are so ingrained in my mind that I don't even notice them or think about them. Maybe there are things I do without thinking about that a woman in Turkey would feel just as strange about as I did about wearing a scarf on my head.

Other than that, there weren't many other things that were drastically different from other places I had been. The only major one was the call to prayer that happens several times a day everyday to signal the times throughout the day that Muslims are expected to pray. And it was the worst place I'd been to in terms of salesmen being super pushy about wanting you to buy their wares or eat at their restaurant simply when you're walking past. I had experienced this in other places like Venice, but never to the same extent. It's quite annoying and it actually puts me off wanting to spend my money there most of the time when people do that. I also noticed, other than needing to cover my head in mosques, that there were certain other things that reinforced that the culture in Turkey is rather sexist. Women aren't allowed to pray in the main area of the mosques with the men, there are separate, smaller rooms for the women if they want to pray there. Also, it seemed like when Robert and I were walking together, most people would speak to him first and not me (in the case of salesmen, maybe assuming that he was the one who had the money since he's a man). Usually this was fine with me because I'm not much of a talker anyway and was content to let him do the talking, but it also got me wondering how my experience would have been different in Istanbul if I had been alone. I've heard a few stories about women not being treated very respectfully while traveling in Turkey, and it would have been interesting to see if I was treated differently there if I was not with a man.

And now, without further ado, here are some pictures of the awesome things we saw in Istanbul!

View from the hotel's rooftop terrace

Hagia Sofia at night

Blue Mosque at night

The weather was amazing the first two days we were there. So sunny and warm!

Inside Hagia Sofia. Unfortunately there was scaffolding on the left side that obscured some of the view, but nevertheless it was beautiful!

View from the second story of Hagia Sofia

View of the Blue Mosque from inside Hagia Sofia

Our first Turkish tea (of many after that)

A courtyard at Topkapi Palace

View of the river and the city from Topkapi Palace

Another river and city view

Galata Tower. We didn't go up to the top because the line was really long. 

Beautiful mosque near Galata Bridge (not sure which one it is)

Inside the old cistern underneath the city

The cistern was so cool, it was one of my favorite places in Istanbul

The ceiling inside the Blue Mosque. So beautiful. 

Inside the Blue Mosque

Daylight picture of the Blue Mosque

Daylight picture of Hagia Sofia

We took a boat to the Asian side of the Bosphorus River. I can technically say I've been to Asia! 

Inside the Grand Bazaar! I loved it, so much cool stuff to see!

Old aqueduct 

Acueduct

Cool cable car thing we took

Elaborate meal I had the last night, there was a flame underneath keeping it hot

By the last day, it had started snowing...the weather sure changed a lot in one week.

As you can see from the the changes in the pictures from the beginning of the week to the end, the weather changed completely during our stay there. Our first full day I was wearing a tank top and was very warm, each day we were there got a little chillier, and the day we left it was snowing. I was expecting it to be warm there, but I didn't think they even got snow in Turkey. Just goes to show how much I know haha. And apparently after we left they got even more snow. We got out just in time!

So that completes the description of all of the places I visited on my 5-month, 15-country trip around Europe! I plan to do one more post with some fun facts about my trip and a bunch of observations I made along the way, so stayed tuned for that, and thank you for sticking with me and supporting me on this incredible journey! :)