Back in the saddle!

January 18: Today we saw the BEST neighborhood of our trip! Well, based on my criteria, it was absolutely fabulous. Up the Golden Horn, the old Jewish neighborhood of Balat stretches from the main road along the Bosphorus inland about a quarter of a mile. Now a lower-middle class neighborhood, the cobbled streets are lined with colorful Ottoman-style homes with the classic overhanging upper floors. Side by side these homes stand apartment buildings from the turn of the 20th century with lovely, little tiles covering the exterior. Balat has what must be later in the day a bustling main street. At 9:45 am on a Sunday morning, it’s fairly quiet. People begin to open their stores; vendors with their carts start their stroll up and down the main drag. Parent and child walk down the street in search of fuel for their stove. A head-covered woman walks home with her grocery bags. Four young guys leave the local mosque. There’s a lot going on despite the minimal commercial activity taking place.

Although it’s Sunday, Jonah and I were on our own today so Jeremy could get back to work. He and his colleagues are in the final throws of their book project (hallelujah!), which they’ll send to the publisher in the next couple of days (fingers crossed). It’s cold outside, but the day is glorious. Truly beautiful. Blue skies, warm sun, and windy. The view from our window is breathtaking. I don’t know how many times I’ve sat here looking outside and just pinching myself. Our windows are like a tourist attraction. Perhaps I could start a little side business. Alas, no, the dollar has gotten stronger vis-à-vis the Turkish Lira, so we’re all good right now. On rainy days, it’s these windows that keep me sane.

My last blog entry feels like ages ago. My exploration of Istanbul was put on hold temporarily as I made my way through the flu, a cold, and a fierce sinus headache all wrapped up into one. Jeremy had to take a sabbatical from his sabbatical to take care of Jonah, while I nursed myself back to health. I hear the Turkish flu is particularly nasty, so I’m happy that I’m the only one who managed to get it in our family. Jonah and Jeremy were spared. Being sick gave me a chance to catch up on my sleep and kick my two cup a day coffee need (dare I say addiction…). I am, in fact, enjoying a tasty cup of Gloria Jean’s vanilla toffee coffee now (yuck to you real coffee drinkers, I’m sure), but I refuse to return to the daily intake of two cups. I think I feel better when I’m off the sauce.

The flu destroyed the brain cells responsible for my recall of our day-to-day activities prior to my illness, so this is going to be a bit all over the place. The rain has been intermittent over the past two weeks, though, thankfully, it’s not really put the kibosh on any of our adventures. The days on which it has been particularly wet and icky have been our Gymboree days, in part because I’ve moved the last two Thursday classes to Friday to have a good indoor option on the rainy Fridays. We’ve gone to two art classes now, and let me just say that boys really are different than girls. Jonah is one of two boys in the class, and it is the two boys who want to do other things, play with the blocks, sit on the window ledge, do whatever it is that the group is not doing, while the girls happily go along with the painting, drawing, or Play-doh activity.

Jonah’s first art class had all of one student in the class—Jonah. The other kids were either sick, home because of the rain (totally bizarre), or out of town. The art teacher doesn’t speak English, so they have another Gymboree staff member sit with us to translate for Jonah. It’s a bit nuts. We typically start with Play-doh, which Jonah had not previously seen. He thinks that’s pretty interesting now, although he seems to be more interested in naming the implements you can use to make shapes in the Play-doh. Then on to markers or crayons, which Jonah likes for a few minutes…until he sees something more interesting out of the corner of his eye across the room and gets up to grab it. Last week it was a stuffed cow that he just would not put down. Jonah put the cow on the window ledge, and he sat with the cow, patting its head, then kissing it, calling it “sheep”. He put it on the floor, laid his head on it, and said, “Pillow!”

When the teacher brings out the paints, Jonah is much more interested in those, particularly in wielding his paintbrush so that he gets paint all over his clothes (refusing to wear an apron, of course). I’d say this medium gets the most attention from him. There’s a snack and story (for which we have our trusted interpreter), but the books have been at a lower level than he’s interested in at this point. They tend to be books with one picture and a word associated with the picture. Snoozer, says Jonah, bring me something a bit more complex. The other activity that captures Jonah’s attention for a fair bit of time is the “sandbox” filled with pasta shells, shovels, buckets, and other beach toys. The other week he was quite grabby with the other kids, wanting all of the shovels to himself. When I explain to him that he needs to share and let so-and-so have a turn, he’s usually pretty good about it. But I always need to stop him from scooting on in and grabbing the shovel or some such thing from little Mehmet (or whoever). He certainly isn’t shy about letting his desires be known by other kids. Adults, he’s less sure of these days. There are too many unknown people acting like they know him, and I think it’s starting to make him skeptical of all adults.

Jonah seems to enjoy the play class at Gymboree, although he was less interested in doing the group activities the last two weeks than he was the first time we were there. Our little guy is definitely on his own program—in class or out of class. There is no doubt about that. Today while we were off on our little adventure, we headed down to the waterfront to play at a playground after our neighborhood tour. Then we strolled along the water to look at the boats and make our way to the next playground about a quarter of a mile back toward the ferry pier. Well, trying to get Jonah to move along is like trying to ask the pharmacist here whether they have Sudafed. What you get is a blank stare. I know Jonah is standing there thinking something brilliant, I’m sure, but how about thinking and walking in the direction we’re trying to head?? No go. He’ll go when he’s good and ready. Makes it difficult to just go on a little stroll with Jonah because he wants to stop, pick up this leaf or that teeny, tiny rock, then go back and throw the leaf in the puddle he found twenty feet earlier, then stop and look at the steering wheel on the boat, then try to get himself up on the bench, then decide, no, I think I’ll try that bench instead…and so on. When you have all the time in the world, it’s fun to watch what he does. When you don’t, it can be one of the most frustrating experiences you think you’ve ever had—that, or, maybe you really did need that cup of coffee in the morning!

But back to the class… Jonah is currently obsessed with Gymbo (I guess that’s how you spell his name…it’s the mascot for Gymboree). During class, Jonah just wants to get the big Gymbo doll that is twice his size and hug him, squeeze his nose, and then sit on him. This week a little girl was hogging Gymbo, slow dancing with him for about fifteen minutes (it was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen). Jonah’s patience were put to some test as he had to wait for her to finish with Gymbo, the little girl’s mother being oblivious to the concept of “your child gets a turn, my child gets a turn”. Jonah did amazingly well in this regard. The other thing Jonah likes about Gymboree is the rocking horse. He goes from a slide to the rocking horse, through a tunnel back to the horse, over a bridge back to the horse, and so on. He loves throwing and kicking the balls too. Oh, and the thing he loves more than anything is bubble time. He goes crazy for the bubbles. One kid threw a ball in his face during bubble time, and Jonah just giggled and ran after more bubbles. Nothing can ruin bubble time.

The other moms in the classes seem nice, although very few speak English. One mom I talked to has a son named Eli. When I asked her if this was a common Turkish name, she said it wasn’t, that they’re Jewish, and he was named for his grandfather. A Jew! There are only 26,000 Jews in Turkey, and I found one. Amazing. (Apparently, it’s the second largest Jewish population in a Muslim country, the first being Iran.) Shortly after we got to Istanbul, there were anti-Israel demonstrations in the old town. The Turks and Jews historically have had a good relationship, but apparently there were many anti-semitic epithets being shouted during the demonstrations. I asked the Jewish woman in my class about that, and she said they haven’t heard these types of things being said in more than seventy years. They’re quite concerned. This was quite clear from our attempt to get into the largest synagogue in Istanbul, Neve Shalom Synagogue, located in the New District in Galata. We searched high and low for the synagogue and should have known we just needed to find the building with a huge police bus parked in front of it. A couple of armed police officers stood watch outside the synagogue, presumably because of the recent demonstrations. We buzzed the door to speak to someone, but we were turned away because we didn’t have an appointment. Bummer.

Since I last wrote, we’ve seen most of the major tourist spots in the old town and taken a few fabulous walking tours. We spent one morning in the old town at the Hagia Sophia, Blue Mosque, and underground cistern. Built by the Byzantines in 537 CE, the Hagia Sophia served for 900 years as the seat of the Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople (the “eastern Vatican”). Words cannot sufficiently describe the beauty of this place. The mosaics and marble work are stunning. The sheer size of the place is overwhelming. Its height would allow the Statue of Liberty to do jumping jacks should she decide to descend from her perch and exercise in that long gown of hers. In 1453 when the Ottomans took Constantinople (remember, it’s “Istanbul, not Constantinople, Been a long time gone, Constantinople, Why did Constantinople get the works? That’s nobody’s business but the Turks…” Jeremy and I sing this song all the time. Shout out to They Might Be Giants.), Sultan Mehmet the Conqueror converted Hagia Sophia into an imperial mosque, adding minarets. Now it’s a museum packed with tons of tourists. Jonah loved running around inside the church, walking up and down the switchback ramps to the upper galleries, and so on.

We walked across the lovely park to the Blue Mosque next. Again, this is a sight beyond words. Built in the early 17th century, the Blue Mosque has six minarets (most mosques only have one) and an interior covered from top to bottom with little tiles, mostly blue, early 17th-century İznik tiles. As with other old mosques here, there are low-hanging chandeliers designed for oil lamps with floating wicks, now converted into electrified chandeliers. Jeremy and I couldn’t figure out at first why there were so very low. But it was so the wicks could be lit. The Blue Mosque represents the beginning of the Ottoman Empire’s decline. After it was built, the treasury was depleted, leading the Empire into a period of stagnation that eventually led to its collapse.

We walked along the Hippodrome outside the walls of the mosque’s courtyard. Built in 4th century CE, the Hippodrome was Constantinople’s primary venue for chariot races, at one time seating 100,000 spectators. Now it’s a lovely pedestrian walkway, which we strolled down to the underground cistern. The cistern dates to the 6th century. The size of two football fields and big enough to hold 27 million gallons of fresh water, the cistern has 336 columns supporting its brick ceiling—the columns recycled from earlier Roman ruins in and around the city and, therefore, having different patterns and bases. When the cistern was in use, clay pipes and aqueducts carried water twelve miles to the cistern. The pipes eventually became clogged, and the cistern fell out of use. People forgot about it over the years, until some point in more recent history when someone thought it suspicious that people in old town could drop a bucket into their garden well and recover fresh water.

That day we enjoyed a delicious lunch in old town in a restaurant that displays their traditional woman chef who makes flat bread stuffed with cheese, meat, or potatoes. Jonah loved watching her cook.

Another day we took a self-guided (thanks to Rick Steves’ book) walking tour of the back streets of old town Istanbul. We started at an old Ottoman cemetery (okay, I’m still fascinated cemeteries despite earlier suggestions otherwise) with the mausoleum of Sultan Mahmut II, who ruled in the first half of the 19th century. Like other mausoleums we’ve visited here, caskets sit on display in the middle of the big domed structure with tapestries covering them. Apparently, the caskets are empty, the bodies being buried underground. Some tombstones in the cemetery that we saw seemed to reflect people’s professions. There was a tombstone carved as a ship’s sail, another as a large book.

The walking tour took us to the Grand Bazaar, which is a maze of rows in a huge building dating back to the 15th century. The Bazaar contains 4,000 stores, employs roughly 30,000 people, and has 21 gates for entry and exit and 66 “streets” inside. Jonah loved walking up the streets/aisles of the Bazaar, making friends with various shop owners. A disturbing flag we saw had a Jewish star with an equal sign leading to a swastika. On the other side was the Palestinian flag. It appears that the love between Jews and Turks is fading fast with all that has happened in Israel in recent years.

From the Bazaar we strolled along the high wall of Istanbul University, which is closed to the public. We strolled to the Mosque of Süleyman the Magnificent, a figure who has received a fair bit of airtime in my blog due to his reign over Greece. Completed in 1557, the mosque is currently undergoing renovation. Unfortunately, this meant that we couldn’t get a sense of the mosque’s beauty at all, given how little of the interior we saw. We did go in the ornately decorated mausoleums of Süleyman and his wife, Roxelana. Had to pay our respects to the guy and the many significant structural and architectural wonders he commissioned.

From this mosque, we walked through a bustling, open market to Rüstem Paşa Mosque, built and named for Süleyman’s son-in-law in the 16th century. Its exterior is covered in 16th-century İznik tiles, and almost every surface of the stunning interior is covered with floral-designed tile panels. This is a smaller mosque a bit off the path of most tourists I would imagine, but it’s a gem. Jonah loved sitting on the ground inside and tried multiple times to get into the restricted zone (reserved for worshippers).

From here, we strolled down a market street going straight into the 17th- century Spice Market. This market still has plenty of stores selling a wide range of spices, but many such vendors are now located on the streets just outside the market with more touristy stores having moved inside. We went to lunch nearby the Spice Market at a restaurant with the most spectacular view of the ferry boat pier and New District across the Golden Horn. The day was clear and beautiful, so it was a perfect spot on which to be perched for an hour or so. Inside the bathroom at the restaurant read a sign that had the following: “No toilet paper in the closet please.” Did they mean not to throw the toilet paper in the toilet? The word “closet” just threw me. Even if it had read “bowl” or something more closely associated with “toilet”, I would have been a bit less baffled.

We took another walking tour of the New District on a different day. The New District differs considerably from old town Istanbul with its shopping district full of Nike, Starbucks, MAC, and other name brand stores. We strolled along European-style İstiklal Street, the main shopping street that also has an old trolley train (of the kind in our own neighborhood) running up it. Developed after the devastating 1870 fire, the Ottomans rebuilt the area as a showpiece of the Art Nouveau style. Jonah liked walking down the street, interacting a bit with different store employees.

We stuck our head into St. Anthony’s Roman Catholic Church, which sits alongside the many clothes stores and cafes, in addition to several consulates (including the French, Dutch, Russian, and Swedish). Even back in Roman times, the New District was the place where Western-oriented minorities settled. The Franciscans built a church on the site of the existing church back in the 13th century. That church burned down, the existing church’s façade dating only to 1912. Jeremy tells me that our side of Istanbul apparently was also home to minority populations at one time.

From İstiklal Street we headed to the Neve Shalom Synagogue, which turned us away, and then over to the 14th-century, 205-foot tall Galata Tower, where we got the most amazing views of Istanbul. It being a clear day meant that we could see far into the old town and got a 360 degree sweep from the top of the tower.

We strolled through Galata, an old neighborhood that at one time had many Jewish residents. We found another old synagogue (Ashkenazi Synagogue), which you would completely miss if you weren’t searching for it. In front of it stands a small guard house and little store. You have to look up to see the Jewish star decoration in the building. I think this one may still be in use, although you wouldn’t know it by how the guard area was turned into a clothing display by a local merchant.

We strolled down to the Jewish museum, located in a former synagogue close to the Galata Bridge, and learned a bit about the relationship between Turks and Jews. Historically, it’s been a good relationship. During WWII, many Turks did quite a bit to try to save Jews from concentration camps. In Rhodes town on the day the 2,000 or so Jews were rounded up in Martyr Square for deportation, the Turkish Consul General convinced a Nazi official to allow him to issue passports to forty-two Jews to give them safe passage to Turkey rather than suffer the fate of the remaining Jews who were deported to camps. Jews also have served in high government positions in Turkey over the years. Unfortunately, the most recent demonstrations—with some 5,000 protestors burning effigies of Prime Minister Olmert and President (not for long!!) Bush and throwing eggs at the Israeli Consulate—suggest a new era may be in its infancy here.

Before I got sick, Jonah and I took a trip over to the Europe side of Istanbul to visit the Chora Church Museum. The current church dates back to 1100, an earthquake having damaged the original 4th-century building. Like most churches during the time, it was converted into a mosque under the Ottomans. Because Muslim tradition prohibits images of people or other living creatures in their places of worship, the 14th-century mosaics were whitewashed and only uncovered in the late 1940s when they were discovered and restored.

The art in the Chora Church represents the birth of the religious archetypes found today in many churches around the world. After the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches split in the 11th century, the art of western churches focused on local customs and saints. The power of the Eastern Orthodox Church remained consolidated in the Byzantine Empire, resulting in consistency in medieval Eastern Orthodox Church art as dictated by the powers that be in Constantinople. Lacking a consistent western Christian artistic tradition, many religious artists from the west adopted the Eastern Orthodox archetypes. The vision for these archetypes can be traced back to Chora Church’s original artwork. The mosaics and frescoes in the church are spectacular. Given that Jonah wanted to run around and pretend little alcoves were elevators, I didn’t have a ton of time to look around. But I had time to take in some of the beauty.

While I was sick, Jeremy also took Jonah to the other side to go to the archaeological museum and back to the Grand Bazaar. Jonah loved running around the museum, hiding behind statutes inside and outside in the sculpture garden. Most guards turned a blind eye to Jonah’s touching of the 4th-century-BCE ceramics. The trip to the Bazaar was less successful, with Jonah asking everyone who would stop to talk to him, “Mama go?” When I resumed caring for Jonah the other day, he asked me fairly frequently, “Daddy go?” It seems that he likes to have us both in tow now.

Yesterday we spent the morning with our friend Konrad's friend Chris and Chris's son Hudson. (Chris's wife was out of town.) Chris works for an organization that does social marketing for condoms. He moved to Istanbul with his family to create a presence in Turkey. The rate of unplanned pregnancies and abortions in Turkey is unbelievably high. Chris and his family live on the Europe side of Istanbul, so we took a ferry over there for him to show us around. Rather than taking the ferry to Eminonu (our typical destination if we want to go anywhere near the old town), we took a different ferry boat to a pier farther up the Golden Horn. Chris has a car so picked us up and showed us around the little neighborhoods and villages along the Bosphorus. We stopped in one suburb, I guess you'd call it, named Ortakoy, an artsy area with lots of cafes, shops, and a beautiful mosque, Buyuk Mecidiye Camii (Grand Imperial Mosque of Sultan Abdulmecid). The mosque is by the water right by the second bridge of Istanbul, the one we crossed on our drive from the airport to our apartment our first day here. We took a scenic drive along the Bosphorus to get to the area around where Chris works, which has a fabulous brunch place. Brunch in Istanbul is very popular, and this place we went to had the same vibe as a dim sum restaurant does around brunch time on the weekend. Tons of people everywhere, families enjoying their food, more wait staff than you can count, and delicious food. From the restaurant we drove to another neighborhood that has a fabulous outdoor market during the weekend. Jonah loved being outside in what turned out to be nice weather. He was a tad crazy at the market, trying to grab all of the walnuts in the big basket at one vendor's stall. We took a 1:45 pm ferry home, so Jonah had a bit later of a nap that day.

Speaking of naps, Jonah seems to have a harder time napping when he gets close to twelve hours of sleep at night. He didn't nap two or three days in a row because he was sleeping from about 7 pm to almost 7 am at night. I think we're back on track though with a bit later of a bedtime and, therefore, and thankfully, an afternoon nap.

On a couple of rainy days where we didn’t find ourselves at Gymboree, Jonah and I kept ourselves busy in our neighborhood. One day we took a trolley trip around our neighborhood. The old trolley does a loop around and through the shopping district, making one of its stops right in front of our apartment. It takes about twenty minutes to do the entire loop, and it’s a great way to see our neighborhood and the immediate surrounding area. Jonah loved sitting in the seat on his own, as he does on buses and the ferry.

We also spent a couple of days at the big shopping mall around here. The mall is as nice or nicer than any modern mall you’ll find in the states. Stores like Diesel, Guess, Claire’s, Starbucks (of course), Marks & Spencer (large British department store), and many others fill the three floors. There’s an indoor video arcade with a play area for younger kids where they can ride little stationary cars, trains, motorcycles, and helicopters that bounce around. I finally broke down and bought some tokens, since Jonah realized that the cars and such actually can move around. He gets on them now and says, “Go, go!”

We spend our afternoons after Jonah wakes up from his nap either just downstairs on the pathway along the waterfront and in the playground in the park below or at another, bigger playground with sand about a ten minute walk from our place. Jonah mostly likes the swings and seesaw these days, less so the slides. He likes watching other people, so we end up standing around quite a bit. On rainy afternoons, we play and read books inside. We weren’t able to buy Jonah a little scoot, scoot car here because we were afraid it would scratch the apartment’s nice wood floors. Instead, we bought him a fire truck to push around, open the trunk, move the ladder up and down, etc. Soon I’ll make some homemade Play-doh.

We continue making our way through each day despite the language barrier, resorting to any communication device available. Jeremy had to take the vacuum cleaner to the local repair shop up the street, where he discovered that none of the four employees spoke English. Seeing a computer on the table, he quickly Googled the Turkish-English dictionary. Jeremy and one of the guys used the online dictionary to talk about the problem with the vacuum. We also use maps as tools. To get to our Gymboree class, I have a map of the area in which Gymboree is located with a famous pastry store as a landmark nearby. I point to the pastry store, move my finger up the street and over, and poke at the spot where Gymboree is located. And on our ride home I just say the name of our neighborhood and then use hand direction signals to get us from the center of the neighborhood to our apartment building. So far so good.

The people continue to impress us with their friendliness and generosity. The guy who found my old cell phone called Jeremy for several days trying to tell Jeremy (in Turkish, of course) that he’d found Jeremy’s friend’s phone. Finally, the guy found someone who knew English to text a message to Jeremy asking for our address. Amazing. And Jonah has now officially been kissed, picked up, and hugged in his lifetime by more strangers than people he knows. This is an incredibly affectionate society. Men walk arm and arm with each other. Kisses hello, kisses good bye.

Jonah, of course, continues to absorb everything and anything. As he’s in his crib talking before taking a nap or playing with his toys in the living room, we hear him repeating things that we say to him. “Hey, that hurts!” as he hits his donkey. “Gentle!” Other great lines of his include:

“I love you, Donkey,” as he rolls around the floor hugging his donkey.

“Turn off stove!” as he eagerly awaits his pasta.

“How are you, Bear Bear? How sleep?” after he got a hold of the teddy bear who doesn’t sleep in his crib with him.

“Open door, dada!”

“Take this, peez (please),” handing Jeremy the monkey or whatever other stuffed animals he can’t carry himself to his bedroom.

“Turn light on.”

“Kitty cat, eat it, peez” as he throws a piece of potato from his plate onto the floor.

“Bob Builder book go? Get it, mommy.”

“This empty.”

“Nipple!” lifting his shirt and pointing to his nipple in the taxi, much to my embarrassment (until I realized that the driver had no idea what Jonah had said). I quickly started a new topic anyway.

“Two eyes kitty cat. Mouth,” as he points to the parts on the stuffed cat’s face.

“Take it back,” as he holds his sippy cup in the air after he’s had enough water to drink in the stroller.

“Oh, shoot!” as he tries to get on the side table on which his animals are currently sitting. He moves the animals, gets on the table, and says, “Drive, drive, bye, bye!”

“Take it off, mommy,” as he reaches for my watch.

“Mommy, daddy, mommy, daddy, mommy, daddy,” as he swings his head from left to right looking at us sitting at the dinner table together.

“I miss you. Bye!” This was a pretend exchange he had on Jeremy’s cell phone.

“Uh, oh! Dark ahead!” as he starts to walk down the hall toward his bedroom without the benefit of any light.

“Rudolph clean plaster,” referring to a character in one of his books and Jonah’s desire to have the plaster on the floor by the window swept up.

“Hi more,” a commonly used phrase by Jonah when he wants someone who has greeted and interacted with him to come back.

One morning, Jonah and I played a “kiss Jonah” game. I had each animal give Jonah a kiss. Jonah held up the bear and said, “Do that one!” Then, “Donkey too!” A few minutes later, “Do that too,” referring to the bear. I asked, “Which one?” “That one,” pointing to the bear.

While walking outside around sunset, Jonah saw his shadow and said, “Two Jonahs!” Now he always talks about his shadow, wanting to see it, and wanting to eat it as well. Go figure on his desire to eat it… During that same stroll, Jonah came running up behind Jeremy and me and put out both his hands into the air to grab our hands and walk with us. Talk about melting the heart.

Jonah now refers to himself as both “Jonah” and “you”.

He loves to pay the taxi driver, handing him the money and saying, “Thank you!”

And my favorite back and forth so far took place the other day when we heard a kid singing in the park below our window:
Jeremy: “Do you hear singing?”
Jonah: “Imam singing!”

Finally, it is true that Starbucks is indeed identical no matter what country you go to. Same signs, same drinks, same high prices, same cups, same, same, same. Considering how new everything is to us on a daily basis, it’s nice to walk in and have a feeling of familiarity every once in a while. And you just can’t beat that caramel macchiato.

Picture descriptions: Old Jewish neighborhood of Balat; same; same, note the tile on the building; Jonah and his friends perched on the window ledge (Jonah's favorite seat in the house); Jonah's other favorite seat, looking out at the Bosphorus; sunset view from our apartment; Jonah enjoys Gymboree; another sunset view from our apartment; Neve Shalom Synagogue under heavy security; Hagia Sophia; Blue Mosque; underground cistern; old Ottoman cemetery; Grand Bazaar; Rüstem Paşa Mosque; Spice Market; fabulous view from our lunch in old town; İstiklal Street in the New District; St. Anthony’s Roman Catholic Church in New District; Chora Church; Jonah and daddy looking at the map and guidebook to figure out their plan for the day; Jonah and Jeremy with Chris and Hudson at outdoor market on European side; our street (our building in at far end of the street, Jonah and Jeremy in the shadow of the tree); Jonah enjoys a car at the mall; Jonah enjoys a playground about 10 minutes from our place; view from our window of the old town right after sunrise; another sunset over old town; Jonah enjoys the motorcycle at the shopping mall; Jonah wonders where the keys are to his new car.