Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque

"Well now it looks huge!" Kendon says, "why does it look bigger when you're further away?"

I'm too distracted by the smell of roasted corn to think about scale factors right now. Roasted corn is my favorite monsoon snack but it's way too hot to eat right now. Right? Right.

We are walking back towards the Hagia Sophia after visiting the museum nearby. I decide not to get the corn because it really is too hot to enjoy, and our conversation eventually returns to the complexities of repatriating artifacts, especially in places that are politically or geologically unstable. I share that what happened to Khaled al Asaad still rattles me, and that it reshaped how I made sense of the preservation and restoration of historic artifacts. 

We talk about this as we read about the cycles of destruction and rebuilding and destruction and rebuilding of this very building.

The Hagia Sophia was an Eastern Orthodox Church, then a Roman Catholic Church, then an Eastern Orthodox Church again, then a Mosque, then a museum, then a Mosque again. In many of these eras, it was looted, artifacts were destroyed, and an earthquake destroyed the roof and made some of the arches lopsided. 

Inside, it very much feels like a duomo. Many of the mosaics are different, and the aisles have been repurposed to be walkways to observe the nave, now the prayer room. The dome has words from the Quran where the portrait of Jesus used to be. But you can tell where the pews were. The frescoes of Mary and the disciples on one of the domes are covered with a white cloth. The building feels like it was retrofitted to reflect the changing community that surrounds it.  And I'm grateful that some of the art was preserved, even if its covered up.

  

The Blue Mosque, on the other hand, has very clearly been a (very beautiful) Mosque the whole time. Depictions of flowers and reeds cover the mosque's interior almost entirely. Detailed patterns in baby blue, mustard yellow, and burnt sienna cover the walls, columns, and arches. The stained glass shows the same in vibrant steel blue, kelly green, and amber. 

If you're wondering, sometimes huge objects like mountains and buildings can look bigger when you're further away because of the relative distance between your eyes and the things around it. Let's say you're 1000 feet away from a big building and 20 feet away from a roasted corn cart. If you walk 20 feet further, you're 40ft away from the cart and 1020ft away from the building. The distance between you and the cart has doubled, making it look smaller, but you're only slightly farther away from the building so it probably looks the same. Because the cart looks smaller while building doesn't, it can make the building look bigger in comparison.

Istanbul: First Impressions

"Is it possible..." THUD "...potholes..." THUD "...tarmac... airport?" I type into my phone as my plane prepares to take off. 

Generally not, but sometimes. 

Cool.

I was warned that this airport would disappoint me. Perhaps even infuriate me. But Frankfurt's airport has confused me.

Our second security screening took over an hour to process about a hundred people. The only place to fill a water bottle on both floors I had access to was out of order. I couldn't take the risk of looking on the third or fourth floor because I would miss my flight if I had to go through security again. The yoga rooms I was excited to stretch in after 10 hours on a plane are on the third and fourth floor. I walked several laps of the first and second floor instead.

The first (and only?) time I remember being at this airport is when I was moving to the US. I remember telling my dad this was the best airport ever because I saw a Toblerone for the first time. Triangle chocolate distracted me from there being only one water fountain.

No matter, we take off soon enough and a short three hours later, I see a familiar kind of  sunshine that jolts me back to my childhood. Istanbul is bright. 

A taxi in to Istanbul from the airport takes 60 minutes, and the Havaina bus to Aksaray will get you there in 68 minutes with better views. The transit system is pretty easy to figure out, with the added bonus of prices being transparent.

As we gently putter across the Turkish countryside, I see familiar evergreen trees dotting the rolling hills, and layers of red and purple silt where it's dry enough. 20 minutes later, there are clusters of tall, silver buildings. Condos, rooftop lounges, office buildings, with an occasional dome peeking through. All under the very bright sun. I can't wait to explore.

Aksaray Station in Istanbul 

A Familiar Staircase

If there was a way to capture this smell in a perfume, I would.

I'm carrying a suitcase and bags of leftover food up to Kendon's apartment in Köln, and I'm breathing deeply. I'm not out of breath, but I'd lie and say I was if anyone saw me.

I'm savoring a very specific smell of damp stone and cigarette residue that I've smelled in staircases in 3 continents so far. It reminds me of hostels in Europe and apartments in San Francisco and Hyderabad and Brooklyn and Florence and the Bronx and emerging from subways and stepping into basilicas or museums or theaters or cafes or bookstores or record stores or, or...

It smells like a feeling that's ever-present yet nostalgic at the same time. Like I'm on an adventure with people I love, who are and will be the constant while the backdrops of cafes and paintings and languages and histories fluctuate.

This smell reminds me how much I love my friends.

I imagine the market for this smell is slim... and I might have to learn how to make it myself. Köln is probably a good place to start, right?