/Monday, June 04, 2007
Turkey, 16 May - 17 May'2007Day 6, Istanbul, Turkey, 8am: After spending 3 glorious days in Cuppadocia! It's back to the capital city, Istanbul-the burstling, most modern city of Turkey.
It's pretty rush for Liang-Mei and me because we have only 2 days here to shop and sightsee!
We plonked down our luggages in our hotel rooms and ran out towards Dolmabahce Palace! =)
Dolmabahce Palace was the first European-style palace in Istanbul and was built by Sultan Abdulmecid between 1842 and 1853, at a cost of five million Ottoman gold pounds, the equivalent of 35 tons of gold.
This freakin' exquisite 165 year-old palace is drop-dead gorgeous!
14 tons of gold was used only to adorn the interior ceiling of the palace! In fact, almost everything we saw there is made of either gold, silver, crystal, jade or precious stones.
Dolmabahce also has the largest collection of Bohemian and Baccarat crystal chandeliers in the world, and even the staircases are made of Baccarat crystal! (*^_^)
If you are a student, flash your ISIC(from STA) and pay only $3 to view 3 different sites! A very good deal for students, given that the normal price would set you back at $20 per pax.
A MASSIVE demostration outside the palace, due to the current political rife in the Turk parliament - The crowd is made up of infinite number of students, complete with marching band, loud singing, teachers and schoolbuses. It's a really organized protest! If only they have such student demostration in Singapore...Cool...We will all sing "Mari Kita" & rally against the GST hike. *heh*
Taken outside the main palace! Looks like there's gonna be an important function held here!
One of the many halls in the palace. The following photos are a little dark as we were not allowed to take any flash photography. But you can still admire micro-bits of its grandiose thru' my pics.
The palace has an area of 45,000 m² (11.2 acres), contains 285 rooms, 46 halls, 6 Turkish baths and 68 toilets!
No wonder the guided tour took 2 hours to complete! And it's just the main palace!
The room where the founder of modern Turkey, Kemal Ataturk, passed away in 1938.
Noticed the red plastic bags I wearing over my shoes? We had to keep them on at-all-time during the tour. It's to protect the precious flooring!
The world's largest Bohemian crystal chandelier (adorned by 750 crystal lamps and weighs 4.5 tons). It is a gift from England's Queen Victoria.
All the pretty crystal chandeliers. =)
This is the gate at a port outside the palace where the Ottoman King would recieve the Kings, Queens & important diplomats from other nations!
An ostentatious gold clock amidst many others resting inside the clock tower.
A fellow Singaporean we met at Dolmabahce Palace! All thanks to his prominent yellow T-shirt that reads
"Victoria Junior College". *heh*
It's Good to have a Male companion with us.....
Because all the unwanted attention from Turkish ah-bengs stopped when he's with us!
He's exceptionally "useful" in the evening...Since we would be roaming around Taksim Square(Istanbul's Orchard Road) all night long!
We're leaving for Athens, Greece today! Exciting day ahead!
First to the Blue mosque, then Hagia Sophia and lastly, Topkapi Palace! Need to get to the International airport by 3.30pm....
Rachel's
"Pink" Palace - Hagia Sophia! It's directly opposite the Blue mosque and it's
Pink!
The reason why the
"Blue mosque" is ........eeerrrr.......
blue.
The Ayasofya Museum, was a Christian cathedral in the Middle Ages, but was later converted into an imperial mosque in 1453 by the Ottoman Empire and into a museum in 1935.
It's a freakin'
~1500 years old! And still standing! strong! (It had been reconstructed twice)
How do you convert a church into a mosque in the quickest time possible?You paint over the Christian mosaic images with Islamic inscriptions and floral patterns!
Hence, they started a very careful, tedious process of scrapping away the outer layer of Islamic art to reveal the glorious mosiacs hidden underneath.
Many Christian iconographic mosaics are gradually being uncovered. However, in order to do so, historic Islamic art would have to be destroyed. It's pretty difficult to strike a balance. ("-_-)
It's over 1000 years old and I'm really impressed by their state of preservation!
Rachel and Benny at Topkapi Palace.
This is a ancient Ottoman Palace built in 1459 and is much older than Dolmabahce Palace(An Ottoman king decided to move from Topkapi to Dolmabahce in 1853)
This historic Ottoman palace is a vast contrast to the Ottoman's european-style Dolmabahce palace! You should see what the kings wore on in the past...so much precious stones! At least 10kg worth of jewellery and 2 kg of cloth....
Lovely shots of the Greek Islands aboard the plane.....
Greece! Here we come!
it just ain't right @ Monday, June 04, 2007
A MASSIVE demostration outside the palace, due to the current political rife in the Turk parliament - The crowd is made up of infinite number of students, complete with marching band, loud singing, teachers and schoolbuses. It's a really organized protest! If only they have such student demostration in Singapore...Cool...We will all sing "Mari Kita" & rally against the GST hike. *heh*
Taken outside the main palace! Looks like there's gonna be an important function held here!
