Well, blogging been a bit light this week, as I have been in Istanbul for the last four days of the week, and have spent this weekend making up a demo for an organisation in the Middle East, so keeping busy.
Some views from Istanbul, which is the most populous city in Europe (yes, yes, half or more of it is over the Bosporus, and doesn't count, but so what.) Istanbul is an interesting city, not least because of the contrast between its very rich history, and its no less interesting present.
Here is the Spaceship in its day job guise. With Colleagues.
Had an interesting meeting, so it was no waste of time to go there. Because of how the plane times fell, I have the opportunity to go and do a bit of sightseeing on the last night.
First, and most obviously I went down to the old town. (Take a taxi in Istanbul, it's the cheapest and best thrill ride you can get. They have a really, really free take on how to join and leave a queue of traffic. It's not aggressive, but it involves rather a lot of fine judgement.)
Here is the Hagia Sophia, which I could not go into, because it was too late, but it is also beautiful from the outside.
I did however brave the very talented flow of carpet salesmen outside the Blue Mosque to go in. (I am not joking, the only thing that seemed to throw them in their pitch was when I said I came from Scotland, as "my friend, I am so sorry for the weather there," does not flog many floor coverings.)
Here is a picture of a Blue Dome. Fascinating building, and still an active mosque, so it is very tolerant of the (?) congregation (?) to allow so many visitors.
Then I went to the bazaar, which really does have an awful lot of stuff in it, none of which I bought. (I did love the motorcycle section though, just because it seems such an improbable thing to haggle over.)
Then I emerged into the evening light next to the Bosporus, and the channel is as advertised, one of the world's busiest shipping lanes, linking the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Here is a small sample of local shipping. (Ferries in this case.)
Finally I saw one of my favourites of the trip, which was the small parade of boats that serve fish kebabs to locals and tourist alike, at about 2 Euros, a very good deal. Here is one:
The thing that amazed me is that they are cooking with hot plates on these boats, and because of the wash from the large boats that run up and down the channel the whole time, the deck can pitch up to about twenty degrees, while these chaps are cooking and serving hot fish. This calls for a steady pair of legs and a flagrant disregard for the more conservative norms of work and safety in the traditional West. Look at this as an example, and this is not as bad as it got. Imagine running a chip shop in a North Sea gale. Well done indeed.
Right, that's an update, it's been an interesting few days. Next week holds Slovenia. Imagine Berkshire County Council set adrift as an accident of war, and you pretty much have an idea of what it is like.
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