Topkapi

This day was taken up primarily by visiting two very different palaces of past Sultans. First the famous Topkapi Palace museum. The entrance gate was right next to our old hotel house, so we knew to get there early. As it was, we entered between hordes of tour buses. The gate is so small, and the road so bumpy, that the buses have to go very slowly, or they'd loose their side mirrors -- pedestrians had to wait for them to go through.This palace/museum is primarily a series of gardens and buildings. First we took the tour of the Harim (harem) which was the most spectacular of the buildings inside. Many of the other buildings were to display the Treasury, meaning glass cases full of jeweled swords & daggers, elegant china & pottery, golden utensils, and of course the famous, huge diamond (from the movie).

It took most of the morning to explore the entire grounds and it was very beautiful. We had late morning tea on the terrace cafe, overlooking the Bosphorus river and the Harbor -- an awesome view and very good museum food.

One thing I noticed was that, unlike most tourist areas, there weren't a lot of junkie souvenir shops in Turkey. Oh there were plenty of places to buy gifts and souvenirs, but not the tacky variety, like miniature Statues of Liberty and Eifel Towers, all made in Korea. The souvenir items, from inexpensive Blue Eyes to very expensive silk carpets, were genuine crafts from Turkey (or at least nearby), and most of the things for sale were beautifully, hand-made, like the tiny, bone boxes, or the beaded jewelry.

Certainly the carpets were hand-made, not factory made, which was explained to us, in full, by the carpet dealer that night. Actually, we had avoided being dragged in to any carpet stores (for tea and talk) until then, so we felt that it was about time we got the full treatment. We wanted a carpet but couldn't afford a large one, so we thought that a small, "prayer rug" would be affordable. We stopped to admire one in a window and, sure enough, a young man was at our side chatting us up. He seemed very unintimidating and pleasant (they usually did) and since we were planning to buy one, we followed him into his store. He took us upstairs, ordered us tea (apple tea, which we had learned to love) and began spreading carpets out in front of us.

He started with the all wool kilims, which are the cheapest, and worked up to the glorious silk carpets. We had seen enough of them before to know that the kilims were very crude looking and not our cup of tea. Of course, we fell in love with the silk ones, as he waved them before us to show us how the patterns shimmered and changed with the light; they were truly exquisite. When we finally pinned him down to the price of one of those, it was in the thousands (of dollars) and so impossible. We convinced him that we weren't millionaires and asked to see some good quality, cotton and wool prayer rugs. He showed us several, which were beautiful, and the one we felt would look best (on the new bathroom door) was of a price we could definitely afford. Now one never takes the first price offered, it would be insulting, so Munro said, "We never make a decision on an empty stomach" and we left for dinner (of pizza).

While out, we checked the price with another dealer and it was comparable, so we returned with that "I'm still not sure" look. So naturally, the price came down even more and the deal was struck. I decided to buy this, since Munro had spent his wad on the clock. So I am now the owner of a Turkish Carpet, which looks gorgeous in the upstairs hall on the door. One last thing, after we were purchasers, with a fancy certificate of origin and credit card receipt in hand, we were lead down the marble staircase to the street. Before we had climbed up and down an metal spiral stairs in the middle of the shop (on which Munro scratched his arm, rather badly). A different exit for the buyers - pretty neat.