Turkish Delight

 Jumping outside the Blue Mosque

 Getting ready to go inside the Blue Mosque, had to cover your hair, take your shoes off, and I was wearing leggings so I had to wear a skirt.

 Hagia Sophia, once a Mosque but has been turned into a Museum although many mosaics are still visible on the walls

 Blue Mosque from the window of Hagia Sophia

 The view of Istanbul from Topkapi Palace

 Lunch at a cute Turkish restaurant were I had gozelmeme, a crepe thing with either cheese, meat or spinach inside

 The spice bazaar, where we ate Turkish delights and bakliva.

 The Grand Bazaar, where I bought some pretty bowls.

 Me, Steph, and Stef, on the ferry over to the Asia side of Turkey.  Only three percent of Turkey is in Europe, the rest is a part of Asia.

The view of the Black Sea from Steph's campus.

I don't even know how to begin to explain my trip to Turkey.  It was as fun and jam packed as the city itself is full of people.  I left bright and early Friday morning with fourteen hours of traveling ahead of me.  I had a short layover in Paris which was only a tease since I have yet to visit Paris, but will be soon with Krystal at Christmas.  As something always goes wrong this time it was our landing into Istanbul.  We were already behind schedule and were ready to land, I could see the cars on the streets we were so low and suddenly the plane shoots back upwards into the air. The announcement to explain to everyone what had happened  was of course in French since we were coming in from Paris, but because they speak a different dialect I didn't understand and everyone began talking when they were announcing it in English.  After clinging to my seat until we properly landed I later found out we were too close to the plane ahead of us so we had to go back up to avoid crashing.  Good start to the weekend I must say.  Once I did finally land Steph was there waiting for me. We headed back to her place which she likes to call the bomb shelter since it is in a concrete wall with barb wire on the top, similar to a bomb shelter I suppose.  As Steph does not disappoint she had the weekend filled to the max with activities which began the moment I stepped off the plane.  That night we had ended up going to a Canadian bar to see if they could compare and we ended up walking into a Canadian bar confused with Mexico.  Although it had nothing to do with Canada it was something to remember.  The following day we spent power sight seeing, energizer bunny style.  We started at the Blue Mosque, then off to Hagia Sophia, and Topkapi Palace.  We shopped a bit in the Grand Bazaar, and the Spice Bazaar, and then on our way home we walked across the Galata Bridge.  Sunday we ventured over to Asia by ferry, who would have thought I'd get to see two countries in one city. Although I was sad to leave it was probably good as I was spent for energy, I can definitely say that this trip was by far the most dynamic and eventful.  Istanbul is such an interesting city, so different from what we see on a daily basis, everything just seemed more unique and inspiring.  The Mosques, the food, the people, even the nightlife are above and beyond anything you've ever experienced but even out of all the amazing things I did and saw I have to say my favorite part of the whole trip was simply hearing the prayers being read throughout the city during prayer times.