Thread: Where am I right now

Your a lucky man Bob ...... if you have time be sure to check out the Blue Mosque (Boukoleon Palace) and the Basilica Cistern - plenty of other wonderful sites within easy walking distance of these two.

No photos, it didn't happen.

Yes, what Sir Stinkalot said, and the Hagia Sophia* (worlds largest free standing dome for 1000 years) there as well. Have a walk around inside the Hagia and have a look at how the floor and walls have buckled under the weight of the dome. It really is an interesting structure. The Basilica cistern re-used a whole lot of older columns and such. I recommend a quick visit there too. All those places are across the water to the south of you. Also if you get to the grand bazaar, the tool arcade (which isn't anything special) is outside the main bazaar but in the outer wall of the bazaar itself on the western side (from memory, don't blame me if you get lost or I was! ).

*True story...
Hagia Sophia is famous for it's mosaics, some of which are more than 1000 years old, which were sometimes covered over while it was a mosque, but never actually destroyed.
I personally overheard a lady of a certain nationality (feel free to guess) utter the following words at the top of her voice in apparent surprise and without any hint of irony:
"These mosaics, they're made of lots of little tiles!"

Regards
SWK

Originally Posted by Cliff Rogers

No photos, it didn't happen.

I will clean the finger marks off the mobile's lens cover and see what I can do,

The next 4 days are holidays and demonstrations are planned - The hotel I'm staying is part of a set of city blocks of stores and hotels with guard houses at the entrances to the internal streets and private security guards with obvious guns on all the cross streets.

Could be a bit entertaining.

The guns bit sounds "interesting". I expect the seminar people would have some preorganised tours available for the participants?
I found Istanbul to be a fabulous place (May last year) and four days could be easily consumed, pity about the unrest at the moment.

Regards
SWK

Originally Posted by swk

The guns bit sounds "interesting". I expect the seminar people would have some preorganised tours available for the participants?
I found Istanbul to be a fabulous place (May last year) and four days could be easily consumed, pity about the unrest at the moment.
Regards
SWK

Just walked the main night time drag/mall (Istikla Csl) starting at Taksim Square and had dinner in a small restaurant on a rooftop terrace 7 stories above ground level while watching the sunset over the roof tops
In Taksim square about 250 police with automatic weapons were moving in while we walked past. On the way back we noticed a couple of coffee carts were doing a roaring trade with the cops.
Not a sign of trouble anywhere.

Soooo - you did read these links before going - right?

Turkey | Travel advice | Smartraveller: The Australian Government's travel advisory and consular assistance service

NZ government travel advisory - Turkey

UK CENSORED: Nuclear Genie Is Already Out of the Bottle | Ed Ward, MD's Blog: US Tyranny & Treason

Not a real safe place to be for Westerners at the moment Bob.

Egypt's a mess...as is Syria...

Did you at least pay up your life insurance before you went?

Duck and weave - roll, duck and weave - when you hear the bullets whizzing past OK?.

Your a braver man than I Gungadin.

I always found smart traveller to be over hyped. Just had a quick look at it now and it shows similar danger levels to Turkey in India (really, all of it?), Indonesia (no going to Bali then), the UAE (no transitting from Australia to Europe by that advice) and Thailand, to name a few.

The world is a place with unrest and indeed there are places I wouldn't go, but at the end of the day normal people have to live in those places too. (I know a lady from Bahgdad who says Adelaide is very nice because you don't hear any shooting). Without accepting the very slightly higher risk than our lucky country affords us we don't get to experience the very real and very worthwhile attractions of those other places.

I've been to Thailand during the red shirt/yellow shirt thing. Never saw any overt acts that made me feel unsafe, but there was a strong undercurrent of internal politics that I felt, but that wasn't directed at westerners, nor even locals who didn't care.
I've been to Iran. The people there are hugely friendly, at least those I met (the government of course, is nuts). The European family we stayed with eventually left a few months before they meant to due to the unrest in 2009. Having said that, leaving Tehran myself we had to go through the "normal" checks with armed security guys and I actually felt like they were more reasonable human beings than the numpty screeners we get in Australia and other western countries. (I assume because they were looking for _real_ terrorists and don't care to waste their time with nail clippers and the like).
Also missed a bomb scare in Koblenz by about an hour (I got off the train and went to find a hotel, then went for a walk in the old town. I could hear a ruckus but thought it was a rock concert being set up. Didn't know what had happened till it was all over and I went back to the railway station late night cafe near midnight. I saw "Bomb gefunden" on the TV news showing outside shots of the very railway station I was in!). Next day.

Things that cause trouble are generally limited in size and you have to have extreme bad luck to be involved in them and even worse luck if you can't get away from them. I don't think BobL is in any real danger but he now has the opportunity to see some things (good and not so good) not experienced in Australia.

In short, we could choose to forego some remarkable experiences because we prefer the safety of the familiar, but we still might get knocked over by a bus tomorrow.

Regards
SWK

Originally Posted by swk

I always found smart traveller to be over hyped. Just had a quick look at it now and it shows similar danger levels to Turkey in India (really, all of it?), Indonesia (no going to Bali then), the UAE (no transitting from Australia to Europe by that advice) and Thailand, to name a few.

I think you have summarized it pretty well. The Govt has to cover it's backside otherwise it might get taken to court so all their advice is very conservative.

I was there in June just as the demonstrations were starting. We left for the airport from Taksim Square the second night that the water cannon were rolling through.

Can't say I felt threatened at any point. We were staying in an apartment just below the Galata tower and everybody was friendly and helpful. Lots of little workshops around in basements and at street level. This fellow mainly repaired old furniture and was happy to show me around although we were limited to 3 words of communication. (Hello, thankyou and goodbye)

Nice friendly people, great food and magnificent vistas. At least Ramadan has finished now although I'd be interested to know if as a tourist it was much noticeable in Istanbul.

P1040161.jpgP1040163.jpgP1040164.jpg

Originally Posted by Fuzzie

Nice friendly people, great food and magnificent vistas. At least Ramadan has finished now although I'd be interested to know if as a tourist it was much noticeable in Istanbul.

Yep very friendly people. Ramadan not noticeable at all in tourist haunts in the city centre but very evident in out of town places. Out of town or in outer suburb restaurants the evening meal at restaurants did not start until after sunset. And in some places until 15 minutes after sunset.

Originally Posted by BobL

Yep very friendly people. Ramadan not noticeable at all in tourist haunts in the city centre but very evident in out of town places. Out of town or in outer suburb restaurants the evening meal at restaurants did not start until after sunset. And in some places until 15 minutes after sunset.

When we were there last year we didn't really go to any eating places till about sunset, so basically not much difference by the sound of it.

When the partner and I were in Iran we went into the restaurant attached to the hotel we were staying in. As we had been out doing the sight seeing stuff we didn't sit down till nearly 9 in the empty restaurant. I was a bit worried we were going to get told to sling our hook for being so late, but put our order in anyway. They unlocked the fridge for our drinks, me thinking it had just been closed up and also thinking what patient staff at the place to forebear with us furriners. After our meals came out and we had started on them a couple more patrons turned up. Then a few more. Then a few more until the place was nearly full at 11. We weren't late, we were the early birds!
Turns out they have a siesta in the middle of the day where everyone has a snooze for a couple of hours, start the second half of their working day at about 5 and then they go out after that. Later we walked through the park along the river and there were families with young kids out having family picnics, playing games and such like _at midnight_ !

Regards
SWK

Make the most of it Bob. Iw ould go back to Istanbul, and turkey in general, at the drop of a hat.

Great people, fabulous food and wonderful sights. The Topakapi Palace (spelling) on the European side
is more than worth the visit.

I don't know about others but wherever we went and people found we were Australian then we were treated as brothers.
There was always a great interest in Australia from people we met.

Busy day at the conference yesterday. I chaired a meeting of about 20 people the whole day so I was pretty shagged out at the end.
AFterwards about 3/4 of the people from the meeting decided to go out for dinner in the busy downtown area through a packed mall about 2km SW of Taksim square.The restaurant was 9 floors up and had 360 degree view of the city - elegant and high quality Turkish food, and with Belgian beer!


I managed to take this 9 photo panorama of sunset over the roof tops and the Bosphorous straits in the background.