Istanbul, part VIII - Blue Mosque

The Sea of Marmara from my hostel

Rather irrelevant to Istanbul, but seeing as I also wrote extensively about the last World Cup during 2014, I think I'll include this here anyway. I watched France v Croatia yesterday night, and whilst my initial thoughts were that an England-France match would have been fun to watch (purely because of all the insults lobbed at each other over the English Channel), I have to concur that Croatia deserved their place in the finals this year, and that the match yesterday made for spectacular viewing. It was certainly a lot better than the finals of 2014, in which the only interesting part was the penalty shootout which Lionel Messi flubbed quite badly. Yesterday was magnificent. Mario Mandzukic, apart from looking a lot like the Weasley twins, was fantastic, and has gone down in history, I believe, as the only World Cup finalist who has scored for both teams.

Mario Mandzukic's best 'I can't believe I just scored for France' face

Anyway, Blue Mosque, which was lovely, and also getting quite chilly at this stage, but that is the name of the game, so I walked around, took pictures and enjoyed the lovely architecture.

A nice view of the Marmara from my hostel

The Hagia Sofya from the Blue Mosque

Muslin contributions that changed the world

Istanbul, part VII - Theodosian Walls and Blue Mosque

I decided to go visit the Theodosian Walls, the famous and mostly intact walls of old Constantinople, on a sunny afternoon. Too sunny, as it later turned out, and I hate the heat; but you never know till you try, I suppose. The walls were initially built by Constantine the Great, and surrounded the city on all sides, protecting it against attack from both sea and land. Unfortunately they did not prove effective in its last stand of 1453; but that was a series of unfortunate events and at that point the Ottomans were determined to take the city, which itself lacked the sufficient people to man and defend.

Mosque that I passed on the way there

It really was too hot that day, and the neighbourhood was apparently a bad one, so I didn't want to loiter. I ended up doing a bit of walking around the bits of wall that I could find, and that was it.

After I got back I decided to visit the Blue Mosque, which was a) 5 mins walk from my hostel, and b) right opposite the Hagia Sophia. It should have been straightforward enough in theory, but I had the misfortune to encounter not one but two very persistent Turkish men who would just not take no for an answer.