Turkey Day #2

On the second day we started out by going to the hippodrome and other sites in Istanbul.  There were several monuments we went to.  This is the day that I saw workers all over the city to help clean.  The shop keepers were also out washing the floors outside of the store.  It was like the store keepers had such pride in their job.

One interesting thing about Istanbul and I think Turkey in general is that they have cats and dogs.  The city pays for them to get fixed and given their shots, and then they let them live in the city, and the people of that city will buy food and leave it out for them.  They are literally the cats and dogs of Istanbul, and they are all very healthy and happy looking.  It is kind of odd, but also really cool.  

We went to the Blue Mosque, which was exquisite.  It was built by a sultan like 400 years ago I think.  It was build by a sultan when he was like 19.  He wanted to have the most exquisite mosque in the entire world, to trump everyone, so he decided to make a mosque that had 6 minarets (the tower looking things).  The one problem with this is that there was only one mosque that had 6 minarets, and it was in Mecca, and he couldn’t trump that one, so he had his architect go to the one in Mecca, build another minaret for it (so it had seven) and then had him come back and build the blue mosque, with 6 minarets.

Next we went to a cistern that had been part of Constantinople.  It it shocking how huge it is.  Also, it was never meant to be seen by people so they took a bunch of mismatched Roman pillars to create the room.  Two of the pillars were too short so there are these two blocks of Medusa heads used to make the two pillars tall enough, and one of them is upside down.  The Romans just kind of took what they had and made this cistern out of it.  

We also went to Topakaki Palance, which would have been in use from about 1750-1800 I think.  It was a huge elaborate palace.  Kind of reminded me of the Gilded Age Houses like the Breakers in Newport, RI.  

The Grand Baazar was amazing.  Basically they told us to go have fun and at ten to 5, to asks storekeepers how to get to gate 1 and we were meeting there.  The place has 21 gates and you really do get lost in a sea of shops.  The shops sell everything imaginable and you could shop and explore for hours there.  It was very culturally enriching experience.  There were little black ribbon posters for Soma Turkey all around the shops, as the country was in mourning for the mine disaster that occurred a couple days before.  They actually cancelled a bunch of the Independence Day celebrations around the country because of the disaster.  There also were some demonstrations in some of the public squares, but we never saw anything. 

Next we walked down to the Bosphorous strait and went on a river cruise.  They said it was going to be the most romantic thing we ever did alone.  I agree with him.  It was super beautiful, and the weather was perfect.  It made me want to jump in, but then I saw all the jelly fish, and the temptation was gone.

One funny thing about turkey, they have some cognates of things, but in Turkish they are written phonetically.  One of the best ones was their taxis.  They all have “Taksi” written on the top of them.

Then we went and saw the whirling dervishes.  This was a very interesting experience because the premise of the whirling dervishes is that they spin in place until they are almost out of control, and this lack of control leads them closer to God.  It was interesting to watch, but after a long day the spinning made me feel kind of dizzy to watch.  

It was an exhausting day, but I loved every minute of it.

Turkey Day #1

Day 1 started out early as we got up at 4:00 AM to go catch a plane.  Apparently getting through the security at the Ben Gurion airport is pretty crazy sometimes so getting through 72 people is quite a feat.  I am not exactly an airport security conossuier but I think I counted 5 security checkpoints before we got into the airport.  I think there are like 2 in Salt Lake International.  So check “Go through the toughest airport security in the world” off the bucket list.  Then we rode a Pegasus to Troy.  Haha, it sounds so funny when you say it like that.  The airline company we took was called Pegasus, and we are going to Troy, so it works.

It was on the bus ride from the airport I learned a couple things about Istanbul.  #1 . . . . Istanbul is absolutely amazingly the most beautiful city I have ever seen.  I really am shocked that more people do not put this on their list of places to travel because I think it should be up there with Paris and London and Rome.  It has the amazing historical ruins from both the Greeks and the Romans; it has the gorgeous palaces with treasury museums including solid emerald boxes and  a 72 carat diamond; it has the adorable shops and quaint streets and restaurants; and the romantic river cruises and the beaches to play on.  It is also incredible clean.  I noticed this the first day and was stunned that in a city of 14 million, the public areas are soooo clean.  Not a piece of trash to be seen.  But the next morning I saw the dozens of public workers that keep this place clean, and I was amazed at how they upkeep their city so well.  #2 . . . The Turkish flag is so beautiful.  It was actually Turkish Independence Day the day after we got there so there were flags EVERYWHERE.  And the Turkish flag with its red and white stands out on all the buildings.  Here are some of the pictures of flags I took.  #3 . . . . The reason everybody doesn’t visit Turkey (this is what my professor said) is that since the country is 98% muslim people get nervous.  Which is dumb because I have lived with Muslims surrounding me for a month now and they are amazing people.  And their religion is amazing, and you can feel the spirit in their holy places, and their religious culture is one of acceptance and access to God for all.  Also, because at some places (aka one in all of the places I went to in Turkey) there are men with machine guns.  Which freaks some people out, which is understandable.  But really, Istanbul is sooooo worth seeing one man with a machine gun.  Also, if you go to Istanbul you are in Asia in one section of the city, and Europe in the other.  So you can visit both continents in one visit.

 The Bosporus Strait---so georgeous.

 These are all pictures from the bus . . . 

Ok, the first place we went to in the city was the Hagia Sophia (in English the translation is roughly Church of Holy Wisdom).  It is an amazing church that was built by Constnatine but was turned into a Mosque by crusaders, and now it is a mix of both because they turned it into a museum.  One girl from our group went back later that night and opened her mission call in the church (her name is Teresa and she is going to Argentina).  We were laughing because I bet God thinks it is kind of funny that all these kids of his are opening up their mission calls in these super historic places.  I think she was the first that will ever open up a mission call there, and probably the last.  Dr. Seely (who actually taught Peter Jarman in the JC in 1990) said that he thought I will probably be the first person to ever open up my mission call in the Pool of Bethesda. Anyway, the other funny story from the Hagia Sophia is that I accidentally walked onto this one section of the marble floor with special marble circles on it that was chained off.  It is called the coronation spheres and it is where the Emperors of the Holy Roman Empire were crowned.  So we joke that I am now the current Holy Roman Empress because I stepped on the coronation circle.

The ceiling of the church.  It was a Christian church, but when it was a mosque they plastered it over.  Now that it is a museum they have removed some of the plaster and have uncovered some of these frescos.

 This is the gate that only the royal emperors were allowed to walk through.

It is cool to see the relics of the Christian next to bug Muslim circles.  This church is a great example of the religions of Turkey---first Christianity and now Muslim.

I can touch!!

  Outside the church.

There is a post that you stick your thumb in and circle your hand around and make a wish, and an angel that is stuck in the church will occasionally “cry” and you get a drop of water on your hand.  This means your wish will come true.

Then we went to the Istanbul Archeological Museum.  The things here were really cool, really old, and I will tell you about the highlights in the pictures.

This is a picture of a engraving that stood on the outside of the temple mount.  It says something like “don’t cross into this holy place or you will die”.  But the amazing thing about this is that it is in room 28.  Aka the room that has artifacts that celebrate the Palestine aka a room that they don’t let anyone into.  But for our tour, Dr. Seely (who has been dying to get into this room for years) convinced them to let our group up there.  So I saw something that the general public doesn’t have access to.  It was really neat.

This is me with some cool Roman structure.  There are Greek and Roman ruins all throughout the museum.

This is a replica of what the gates of Babylon would look like.

A sarcophagus that was dedicated to Alexander the Great.  It was huge.

This was a picture of the museum door with a Turkish flag.  I love how bright and simple their flag is.

This is Istanbul at night.  Sooooo beautiful.  We took the metro bus down to the river to walk around and then took it back. The return trip on the Metrobus was nuts!  I don’t think I have never been so squished in my entire life.  We were packed into the metro car like sardines, but tighter.  We could say I got a very intimate feel for the Turks because I was pressed up against several of them for a full 20 minutes that felt like 20 hours.  It was quite the adventure.

The Normal Jeru Life

It has been a couple days since my last post, so I am just going to go through and give the highlights of my week and the big news.

#1.  My mission call got assigned!! It should be coming in the mail in the next 2 weeks or so.

#2. I am going to Turkey for a week in a couple of days.  And I am super exited.  They gave us a run down orientation of what we will be doing when we are there and we are just going from 8 AM to 10 PM for a week.  Also, I get to see the whirling dervishes.  That might be my favorite part.  I mean how many people have actually seen what people where the phrase of speech comes from?  I also will be living next door to the pope for a couple days when I get back from Turkey.  I will explain later when it actually happens.  I feel like going to Jerusalem study abroad really prepares you to play the game two truths and a lie.  You have some very lie sounding truths by the end of it.  Haha, maybe that is the real reason everyone should go on the Jerusalem study abroad if they have the chance---to set yourself up for a life of good interesting facts about yourself.

#3.  As of a couple of hours ago, I finished my four page paper on exegesis and eisegesis!!!!  This is the real reason I have been slacking on the blogging.

These are some pictures from this week . . . . . 

We went to a Lakiya, a Beduoin weaving center that teaches self reliance to the women of the community.  It was so cool to see how they naturally make all these beautiful rugs through take home projects the women do.

 This is the shop for the rugs and pillowcases. 

We went on a field trip to the Negev (the middle of the Judean wilderness---where nomads like Abraham would have lived.) 

More of the amazing vistas I seem to see everywhere I go.  I wish my camera could take panoramic pictures.

 Me and Jessica Smith (she was in my Elm's ward) in the Holy of Holies that is part of the only Israelite temple ever discovered in Tel Dan.

 We went on a under the center tour and we got to write our names and "leave our mark" on the center.

A huge group of us went to West Jerusalem and played soccer and ultimate frisbee.  It was so fun!  Except I rolled/sprained my ankle so I was limping around for a couple days.

 So we also had a day at the mall and before you judge me . . . . I really needed more maxi skirts because the modesty standards here plus the heat here make having the right clothes kind of hard.  But I have them now!

Israel Museum, Dome of the Rock, and the Pool of Besthesda

So today was our second free day, and we started our day by going into West Jerusalem to go to the Israel museum.  Everything there is super super old so by the time we got to the end, it was like "Oh, thats from 900 AD?  Moving on!".  It really does amaze me the intricate stuff that was made by people thousands of years ago.  Really, it is amazing what they are able to do with such unsophisticated tools.  These are some of the pictures from the museum.

Outside the museum.

 Islam door to a temple from a couple hundred years ago.

 Ancient bronze statue from the period of the Romans.  It is of Herod I think.

Jewelry from the Caananites (it is really elaborate, but you can't tell from far away).

 Some really cool rainbow mural we found.  

 A group of students eating lunch outside the museum.

 Us at the Dome of the Rock.  We went there for a little bit, but we went just as it was closing so we didn't get to see much.  

Then, on the way back some of us went and found the pool of Bethesda.  This is the pool where many invalids would come because once a year it was said that angels would come and rustle the water and the first person to get in the water will be healed.  There was a man that was paralyzed and had come to the pool every year for 39 years, trying to be healed.  When Jesus comes he tells him that he tries to get healed he has nobody to lower him into the water, and while he is making his way, someone always gets to the water first.  This man has great intentions, but just always falls a little bit short of the mark.  Then Jesus tells him to "Stand up, take your mat and walk."  I think this is a beautiful analogy to the atonement because I feel like I am trying to be better and do all I can, but I will always fall short of the mark of perfection.  But the miracle is that when we come to Jesus and say "I tried to reach out and complete my goals for myself today, to follow the commandments and be the person I know I have the potential to be, but I fell a little short."  and then Jesus makes up the difference. I have decided that this is the place where I am going to open up my mission call.   Which hopefully should be coming in the next two weeks!!!