Aya Sofia and The Blue Mosque, Istanbul

Before going to Istanbul I really didn't know much about the city, but I knew I had to see the Aya Sofia (Hagia Sofia). I think I remember it from my history class from high school as being known as the most beautiful building in the world or something like that. After visiting, I would say that it probably isn't the most beatuiful building in the world, but it is certainly worth checking out.

For those who don't know much about the Aya Sofia, it was the largest Cathedral in the world for about 1,000 years. The current structure was completed in 537 and served as the Greek Patriarchal Cathedral of Constantinople until the Ottomans took over the city in 1453 and converted it to a mosque. It is considered to be the epitome of Byzantine architecture and  served as a model for many later churches and mosques.

The main dome is massive and stands at an impressive 55.6 meters (182 ft). It's interesting to read the history of the church, various parts have been destroyed over the years, but they just kept rebuilding and improving the structure every time to make the building stronger and stronger.

Today the Aya Sofia is now a museum so that Muslims and Christians alike can appreciate the history and beauty of the building. They have tried to keep a healthy balance of uncovering the Christian mosaics and frescos while preserving the Islamic art which covered much of the Christian images.

If you look out the front door of the Aya Sofia, you can't miss the Blue Mosque which was built directly in front of the Aya Sofia. The Blue Mosque (Sultanahmet) was built in 1609 by the Sultan Ahmet I. You can see that the architecture style was, in part, modeled after the Aya Sofia.

Unlike the Aya Sofia which has been convereted into a museum, the Blue Mosque is still a functioning mosque and therefore visitors must show a little respect when entering. Women should wear a head scarf, cover their legs and arms. Everyone must take of their shoes before entering.

As I first learned while in Spain this summer, Islamic art is just stunning. While you will never see icons as you would in Catholic or Orthodox churches, the repeated patterns and the Arabic writing used to make designs is quite stunning.

Many people argue that the Blue Mosque is even more beautiful than the Aya Sofia. For me, you can't compare them, they are like apples and oranges. But, they are both worth seeing while in Istanbul.

Admission into the Aya Sofia is 20 Lira, which was about $12.00 USD when I was there. Audio guides are available and there are many licensed guides milling about the entrance who also offer tours in many languages. It would have been nice to have a guide, but I just did it on my own and was happy enough. As the Blue Mosque is a functioning mosque, you should be wary not to enter during prayer times. Those times change every day, but are around sun rise, mid morning, noon, mid afternoon and evening. There is no charge to enter, but you must stay within one area for viewing if you are entering as a tourist, not a worshiper.

Toledo

I first visited Toledo as a senior in High School and was absolutely breath taken by it's beauty. Despite the fact that Toledo was on the last leg of our trip this time and that we had a bit of a transportation nightmare arriving and getting out which added a lot of stress, I still believe that Toledo is one of the most beautiful places on earth. The beautiful back streets and the river that surrounds it, it's no wonder the whole old city is a UNESCO world heritage site.

As it was a Sunday, and we were going broke paying the exorbitant fees to enter the cathedral in every city we'd been to, we decided to go to mass to take in the cathedral, rather than waiting for opening hours, much as we did in Westminster Abbey in London. After a bit of research, it seemed like a rather brilliant idea because the cathedral hosts a celebration of the Mozarabic Rite of the Catholic Church. I'd never heard of this Rite of the church before and was quite excited to see it here. We showed up, read that the mass time for the Mozarabic mass was at 9:45, which was just about the time we arrived, and thought we were in store for something really spectacular. Unfortunately, the cathedral has many side chapels and no one explained that the Mozarabic mass was not held in the main part of the church but in a specific side chapel devoted just to this rite. We sat through the most boring Catholic Church mass of my life in the main hall where there was no choir, no singing and not even a procession at the beginning and end. The only upside to all this was the fact that the mass was also one of the quickest of my life, seeing that all the good stuff was taken out.  After the mass we wondered around a little before getting out and found the Mozarabic mass finishing up in the side chapel.

One cool thing about the cathedral is that every bishop that is buried here can choose where in the cathedral he would like to be buried, and then his hat is hung over his tomb... basically until it disintegrates from old age.  So, all through the church, you can see hats like this hanging around in odd places.

 Toledo is a great place for shopping. The two most famous items to buy here are their swords and their Damascene, a handicraft which inlays gold or silver onto iron.

There's so much more to Toledo, we didn't even have time to brush the surface, but one more nice thing we found time to do was to walk down to the river. Above is the night scene and below is the day scene. Both beautiful and worth the walk. 

If I were to plan this trip again, I would definitely give more time to Toledo. And plan better because there are no trains or buses that go directly from Cordoba to Toledo. Toledo needs two nights minimum and transportation needs to be well planned in advanced. We went for the high speed direct train from Madrid to Toledo for 10 Euro. You get there in just 1/2 an hour.

Cordoba

I think if I were to have taken this trip again, I would have done it backwards, starting in Cordoba and ending in Granada. Granada and Sevilla had so many incredible things to offer that it started to make other beautiful things seem less impressive. It could also have had something to do with the fact that we were getting a little worn out from our vacation at this point. 

Cordoba's main attraction is the "Mezquita" or the mosque. More specifically, it's a cathedral that was once the grandest mosque in Al-Andaluz. Unfortunately, as a cathedral, it just feels very awkward with the grand Moorish architecture mixed in with Catholic images. This place would have been very impressive to us if we hadn't seen any other Arabic architecture in Spain, but after wonders like the Alhambra and the Alcazar of Sevilla, this was a bit of a disappointment I hate to say. 

Cordoba also had a bit of Jewish history to discover. We found the (very hard to find) synagogue that remained hidden for many years and was discovered in the 19th century.  Remember that once the Catholics took over Spain, the Spanish Jews were forced to either get out, convert or face the consequences. Before that, though, there was a vibrant Jewish community of Sefardic Jews in Spain who even brought back the Hebrew language which had more or less died out by then. The House of Sefarad which is next to the synagogue gives a great history of Jews in Spain.

The famous image of Cordoba is of the Puente Romano (Roman Bridge) which connects the old city with the other side of the river. It's the view that always comes up on a google image search. While of course it's been updated since Roman times, it's still incredible to think that a bridge that old has still stuck around.

So, of course, Cordoba is a must see of Spain. Just don't do it after you've been to Granada and Sevilla. And especially don't do it when you're travel weary.

Cathedral of Sevilla

We visited a lot of churches and cathedrals in Spain, but my favorite was the Cathedral in Sevilla. Though it was once a mosque, you'd never know it unless someone told you. It doesn't resemble a mosque at all except for one tower, that I'll get to later. 

I didn't find that any of the churches in Spain had any impressive stained glass windows, but this one stained glass window in the church ( the only noticeable one in the whole place ) cast off some lovely colors on the ground below. 

 

Every altar that I saw got increasingly more impressive up until this one which is pretty near impossible to beat I think.

I love taking photos of the ceilings in these churches.... they are just marvelous...

Can you guess who's mausoleum could be so impressive? Well, it's none other than Christopher Columbus himself in here. The Guadalquivir river comes up into Sevilla and this is where all the riches of the new world were first brought. It's a fitting place for his grave.

The best part about this cathedral was the tower which you can climb with your admission to the cathedral. Here you can actually see the Arabic influence in the shape of the windows if you look closely. 

They allow you to climb right up to the top of the bell tower and you can get some amazing areal views of the city. 

We needed some friends living here with their roof top pools to cool down. 

The Catholic Side of Granada, Spain

Though Granada is well known around the world for the Alhambra, there are also quite a number of sights of religious importance as well.

First is the Cathedral of Granada, home to the graves of Ferdinand and Isabelle, the ones who pushed the Moores out of Granada, thier last stronghold, and the same Ferdinand and Isabelle who commisioned the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria to sail across the Atlantic. You can even see them for yourself in the photo below. The caskets aren't so impressive, but the mausoleum above is fantastic, but between the security guards hovering and the fact that they were quite taller than myself, I couldn't get a good photo to show you here.

The graves of Ferdinand and Isabelle can be found in the Capilla Real (the royal chapel) which has  a separate entrance (and separate entry fee), but the cathedral itself has much to offer as well. I liked the small museum that holds the treasures of the cathedral. There you can see robes like this one below that are incredibly, intricately embroidered. I don't want to think how many hours it must have taken someone to embroider the things on display here.

After lunch on our so called religious day, we found ourselves at two different monasteries; Monasterio de San Jerónimo  and the Cartuja. Both were quite austere for the most part, as you would expect monasteries to be... until you walk into the chapels when you're overwhelmed with sights as impressive as any cathedral, just on smaller scales. Don't you agree?

I couldn't leave out a bone from one of the hundreds of relics I saw on this trip, could I?

My Neighborhood 2#: A walk to work

About a month ago now, before I came back to the states, I decided to walk to work (because I've become a lazy slug and stopped walking many many months ago even though it's only about 20 minutes) and take some photos of what I see every day on my way to work. For those of you at home, it might give you some idea of what my life here is like, if you're curious. This goes more or less in order from my house to my work.


Here's a gas station. I took this photo about a month ago. The price of gas/ liter is 1638 won/liter. That's $1.42 per liter, or $5.37 per gallon... though I'm not sure which grade of gas that's for. I think my boyfriend generally pays about 100,000 won for every time he fills his tank of his little Kia.
Right across the street from my old building is a whole neighborhood (and I mean a WHOLE neighborhood) which has been set to be demolished, obviously making way for some ginormous apartment complex. I bet at least 1000 people must have been kicked out of this neighborhood... no, probably a lot more. Kind of sad. It's really creepy to walk through too. You would expect that many empty, gutted houses would be full of squatters, but... they really don't seem to be... it's just eerily quiet back there...
Near Sangwangsimni Station there are lots of machine shops... I don't know what they could possibly be doing, but they tend to make a lot of noise doing it... not to mention using their blow torches and hack saws (or whatever the thing that makes lots of sparks when you play with metal is) in the middle of the sidewalk. It seems dangerous to me, but what do I know?

Here's the Gynecologist I went to, right by Sangwangsimni. His English wasn't great, but he has been practicing for 30 years and seems to know what he's doing, even if he is a little rough...

Here's my old dance studio where I used to go back in the day. It was a lot of fun and good exercise, but I'm happy with my Korean class now. I can't really be taking two classes.... that's a little intense... though I am hoping to find a salsa class when I get back....

If you're not familiar with Korea, you might be happy (or unhappy to know) you can get all your favorite American food here, like McDonalds and Pizza Hut. McDonalds is mostly the same as home with some new additions like the bulgogi Burger and the Shanghai spicy chicken sandwiches (I generally avoid these places, but they are good... ).

On the other hand, you might find Pizza Hut to be quite different. Korean pizza is just a little strange... sweet potato filled crust, seafood and corn for toppings, but (save for the seafood) I have really grown to like Korean pizza. Though, not the price of Pizza Hut (try PizzaSchool instead... much more affordable).

Here is the Enter-6 Mall at Wangsimni Station. Wangsimni Station is going through some gentrification. It's the intersection of three subway lines, eventually it will be home to 4 lines, aka, a major hub. Therefore they are going through a process of modernization. Here at Enter-6, which opened about a month after I arrived last year, there is an E-Mart (there is always an E-Mart), "Renaissance Themed Mall", golf range (see the big half dome... its supposed to be huge), water park (yup, you heard me)/ jimjilbang, CGV cinema, not to mention all the big name Korean restaurants like VIPS, Marisco (is that really a big name?) and some others.


Here is the park across the street to my school. No grass really to speak of, but there is so much foot traffic through here, it would probably be decimated anyway. Down here we take our preschoolers out to play for gym.

In the upper part of the park all the old men gather to play their board games. On any day there might be 10 to 50 old men out here playing. Women don't seem to be invited. Soju usually is a normal part of the day for these men, so I try not to come too close (I took this photo with my zoom). Sometimes I get creeped out a little here because there are a lot of homeless men (really homeless) that live in this park... the number seems to have increased since I arrived and I dont know if that's an indicator of the economy or what. The homeless men here tend to be drunk/drinking whenever I pass. The lack of laws regarding public drunkenness in this country is probably my biggest complaint, I like almost every other aspect of living in Korea that I can think of...



Here you can see Lemon Plaza where I used to work. My school is SLP, and upstairs from us is Olympiad. They stole a lot of our older kids when they first opened, but since they don't have a preschool they weren't competition for us there. Those poor folks who work up there work until 10 or 11pm. I couldn't do that... not anymore at least...


Here is the new Lotte Super. It used to be called Lemon Mart (because this is called Lemon Plaza) but a few weeks ago it magically changed. It's really nice to have a supermarket in the building where you work, because you can just stop by on the way home from work. God I love this kind of life...

All the lovely places downstairs from my hagwon. First on your left is Paris Baguette. This is a coffee shop/pastry shop. Personally I hate almost everything here, except their chocolate chip muffins and their baguettes (since they are the only place I can get a baguette conveniently). Next is the 약국 or Pharmacy. The folks here are very nice, I like going here for my pharmaceutical needs. Next is the best Korean food restaurant on the face of the Earth. It kind of looks like a Kimbap Chonguk, but the food is 1000x better. I ate here every day at least once a day while I was an afternoon teacher (sometimes twice... shhhh).

Here's the Ear/Nose/Throat doctor I used to go to. I stopped going when I realized that she diagnosed everyone with tonsillitis... even in Korean when we brought translators. And it didn't matter what you went in for, you walked out with a prescription for 5 different drugs, one always being an antibiotic... for a cold... a cold people. Colds are from viruses, antibiotics are for bacteria. I'm not a doctor and I can tell you that. Haven't you ever heard of Antibiotic Resistances? How 'bout MRSA, does that ring a bell for you???

Anyway, long story short, I gave up going here and treated all my colds the old fationed way... doing nothing and waiting for it to pass. Now that I'm home I got a neti pot and it's been working wonders... definatly coming back with me to Korea.

Here is the church inside the same building as my old hagwon. Coming from a Catholic family, it seems really strange to have a "church" inside of another building, because my idea of "church" is some big stone building with a steeple and stained glass windows, but I guess there are plenty of small protestant churches in the US too that meet in the basement of other buildings.

I hope I don't come off too negative about my neighborhood. Yea, it's not Apgujeong or Gangnam, but I'm happy I lived here and I'm looking for apartments around here for when I return. It's a little less classy than other areas of Seoul, but it feels like real Korea to me, not some ultra-modern tinsel town. I think in 10 years, this is going to be a very different place though... we'll see.