Istanbul, Turkey (9 Aug 2009)

Istanbul is often mistaken as the capital city of Turkey where in fact it was Ankara. We did not travel to Ankara as the city is out of our route. However, Istanbul is the city which is so diverse that I am confused whether I am in Asia or Europe continent.

We took a night bus from Kusadasi all the way to Istanbul. I was quite surprised with the service of the bus as it was more like being in a plane than in a bus. Food and drinks were served by a waiter in a bus!! and it was quite luxurious. We reached Istanbul about 9am in the morning after almost a 12 hour journey. We took a metro to our hostel which was very near to the Blue Mosque and the Sultanahmet area (which is the busiest and most happening area)

view from the balcony of our hostel


Product of my boreness while waiting for our beds to be readied


the breakfast area of the hostel.. I love the concept

We waited for the hostel to clean our room as we wanted to wash up before heading out to explore Istanbul. We practically had only 1 and half day to explore as we need to catch the dreading 17 hr bus from Istanbul to Bucharest, Romania. So after washing, we head to the main bus station to get our tickets. Istanbul is quite easy to get around as the metro and tram services are very convinient and easy to navigate.

We explore Blue Mosque and Hagia Sofia, the former being one of the largest and most beautiful mosque in the world and the later being turned from a mosque into a museum. Both buildings were so beautiful that they almost look fake even I saw them with my own eyes. To get into the Blue Mosque, one needs to cover up and me being a Malaysian can even forget that I cant go in with short pants.Luckily, they provide cloth to cover up my legs and plastic bags to put in my shoes.

The famous Blue Mosque. It was called Blue due to the tiles which built on the mosque coloured blue


inside the mosque

At night we ate some kebabs for dinner and loiter around the town for sunset and night views. The next day, we decided to sleep in as we need to head to the bus station at 2pm to catch the bus to Romania.

Hagia Sofea


inside Hagia Sofea












I took this shot from one of the windows inside Hagia Sofea, after which many follow what I did


The window shot. I kind of like this one. I was a bit short to take the window view and end up had to push my camera up and see through the live view. Thank God those fellas in Canon decided to include live view mode....


Another shot from the window. Refer to above


Another view


Blue Mosque at night


Hagia at night