Snow

I am watching snow fall silently upon the streets of Istanbul. The Silence of Snow… Thanks for giving that meaning, Pamuk. My typing is the only thing that can be heard apart from the occasional Turkish murmuring. You see, the snow and heavy rain has cut the power in this little café. The refrigerator, the kahve grinder, the oven – it’s all off. Powerless. Silent. These snowflakes are the biggest I’ve ever seen. They fall hard and fast, but their impact is totally unseen among the much more present rain.

The dance of this storm is quite like listening to a symphony. It will increase in speed and size; snowing hard and quick. Then, suddenly, it will slow to almost a strolling pace. Just a slight reminder of the bitter cold above.

The Bosporus is totally indistinguishable from the clouds and fog. And Asia is completely invisible. It is over there. On the other side of that bridge in the distance, that now looks like it ends midway over the water. Only a few miles from the other continent, and yet it feels as far away as if I were back in North America.

Without making a sound, the snow has separated continents, tamed the busyness of the city, and muzzled the bustling noises of 18 million as they stand and watch.

How can one not love the snow?

Incense and Rose

We timidly entered the foyer. Our whispers, despite our best efforts, still reverberated off the cold and gray marble. Should we go in? The priest is singing Vespers. How improper would it be to go in now? I don’t know…

Then, we were startled by a loud thud as the door behind us closed. We looked at the shorter, dark-haired man heading our way. “Tamam? Acık?” We asked with our teeny knowledge of Turkish. “Evet. Evet” He replied and threw open the huge church doors.

The sound of vocal harmony flooded our ears as the grandeur of the sanctuary was revealed.  Gold. Marble. Limestone. Silver. Massive columns and portraits. All twelve apostles numbered among uncountable Saints. The song, totally in Greek, meant nothing to us, except it was gorgeous. The divinity of the words was impossible to miss, despite not knowing more than 10 Greek words.

But all of those senses paled in comparison to the most unmistakable marker that you are now in the presence of the Almighty: Incense filled every corner as we sat, and prayed, in the Aya Trinada Greek Orthodox Church.

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Our pace noticeable slowed as we stepped through the large, foreboding gates garnished with gilded Arabic calligraphy. Ok, do I take my shoes off now? Or should I wait. It’s Friday, should I go in yet, or will I be shooed out during prayer? I don’t know…

Then, suddenly. Keaton opened the canvas flap into the mosque. He immediately found the face he was looking for. “Hello! Merhada, Ibrahim!” The aged, mustached groundkeeper smiled wider than seemed possible. “Hudson! Hudson!” Ibrahim greeted Keaton in the traditional Turkish way, but did it as if he was seeing his grandson again. Throwing open his arms, he did the same to Peter and I.

We were given a tour of the impressive Tophane mosque. The intricate painted tiles shone in the dim lights. Medallions with massive Arabic words proudly presented the names of those holy forerunners. The only sound were the occasional mumble of prayer and Ibrahim’s proud voice explaining, in some twisted Turkish-German-English the incredible history of the building. We were then left at the back sitting in awe of the domes, arches, and friezes left by Mimar Sidan.

But all of those sensed paled in comparison to the most unmistakable marker that you are now in the presence of the Almighty: Ibrahim returned with a bottle of rose water and filled our cupped hands as we sat, and prayed in the Ali Paşa Mosque.

Some Turkish Delight...

Istanbul. What a… strange… city. It is gorgeous. It is a lot of fun. It has some wonderful places to explore and offers great treasures. But it is still rather bizarre. The thing about Istanbul is that there is just no other place like it in the entire world. It really, truly feels like the meeting point between east and west. As our time in the city wore down, it seemed to accelerate. The last few days absolutely flew by. However, they left their memory mark. I don’t think I have ever seen a sunset like the one I saw from the roof of our hotel.  It was kind of eerie to be at the same level as the calling balconies on the minarets. It does give a stunning view, though. As we left the city for the inner country, two of our professors and their daughters left us to go home early. Their third daughter has been battling a case in the U.S. immigration court, and they had to come back to settle the ordeal once and for all. The night before they left, I bought them all (the three professors and Kristin) a round of drinks. We ended up sitting and talking for about an hour. Naturally, we talked about parts of the trip, and people on the trip. It’s too much fun to get a professor’s opinion of students, let alone the opinion of professors who have been living with their students for three months. That interaction made me miss last year a bit. The whole RA position lets you in on so many different people’s views on the situation, and there’s something unique about an authority figure’s opinion. You just gotta love that.

Anyway, we left the city for the country. Landed in Cappadocia. Apparently, it’s pronounced cap-ah-doe-key-ah, we’ve been saying it wrong this whole time, and no one told us. It’s basically the Turkish version of Utah. Obviously, this entails some very cool things. Like churches built into the sides of mountains. Think Petra, but on a caveman scale. They also have things called “underground” cities. It’s a huge underground network of caves and tunnels. They were built by early Christians escaping persecution. We explored one of these cities for probably an hour. I was like a little kid. I was jumping off the trial, into random corners and unlit caves. At one point I had my head dangling out of a hole scaring people coming through a tunnel, at another I was talking through a small hole to a girl as the voice of God.

Basically, I had a real good time in Cappadocia.

We took off after two days in the desert and headed for the beach. We literally ended our semester with a vacation. We were beachside in a five-star resort on the Aegean coast. The town is called Kusadasi, and it’s Turkey’s Cancun.

We were there off-season, which is a real good thing. You could just feel how the streets would flood with drunken university students during high time. The only bad part of being there in the late fall was a closed hot tub. Course, the sauna, spa, and Turkish Bath made up for that ;) Like I said, it was a vacation. We spent four days poolside, spa side, and threw in just a hint of touring. I mean, seeing Ephesus was no big deal right? Sheesh… It’s going to be strange to read about these places in textbooks, and, well, the Bible, now. I mean, we stood on Mars Hill where Paul spoke to the Gentiles, and we sat in the Ephesian theater where he addressed the city.

That’ll bring the Bible to life, eh?

So, that was Turkey. One of my favorite stops on the trip. And once Turkey was over, we headed to…

Wait…

We headed home. Or rather, I headed home.

It’s over.