First week of classes

I was kind of getting used to the whole no-class thing. Unfortunately all good things must come to an end. Unlike my friends at Hanover, I have been living a life of sleeping until 12 pm every day and exploring ancient monuments and experiencing cultural immersion.

Bogazici has a really, really weird system for registering for classes. For a good deal of time, it caused me a lot of stress. After talking with Chris I have learned that I'm not the only one confused about their classes. I've kind of been going to a couple classes here and there, some of them I am registered for, and some of them I am not. Like I've told most of you, all of the classes are taught in English, which is great for those of us who don't know Turkish. Some professors allow students to ask questions in Turkish, which of course can get confusing because the professor will answer in English.

For the most part all of the teachers know pretty good English, and I definitely have an advantage over a lot of the other students because I am a native speaker. I've discovered that some of the students can understand English perfectly but simply can't speak the language very well, if at all. But for the most part, I don't have a problem conversing with the Turkish students. And with the aid of my Beginning Turkish for Foreigners class I am beginning to pick up bits and pieces of conversations, and maybe add a bit of my own.

I don't have any pretty pictures for this entry, but I am flying to Antalya this weekend with Aaron. For those of you who don't know where that is, it's a southern Turkish city on the Mediterranean. It should be pretty sweet. Stay tuned around the beginning of next week for some photos.

i've been busy

It's been a while since my last update. I apologize. I've been extremely busy. Since I last updated, I've been to the real touristy part of town and seen some of the biggest sights in Istanbul. I saw the Haghia Sophia and the Blue Mosque, the Basillica Cistern, and the Hippodrome. The Haghia Sophia was the first stop for Aaaron, Hailey, and I because when we went to the blue mosque we couldn't enter because they were in the middle of prayer. The hagia sophia, despite being like 1800 years old, is amazing. It is huge. Unfortunately, over the years a lot of deterioration hs occured. It was burned down 2 or 3 times and rebuilt. When the ottomans took over, they converted the church into a mosque. It is real neat because they left all the christian mosaics of like archangel gabriel, virgin mary with the baby jesus, and some other stuff. You can also see where they pained over crosses. Unfortunately they are restoring the dome so the interior is cluttered with this huge thing that goes to the roof.
The Blue Mosque, or Sultan Ahmet Camii, was the first mosque I ever entered. I had to do the normal things, like be respectful and remove my shoes, etc. The women had to cover their legs, shoulders, and sometimes hair. It was really neat just sitting on the carpet watching people come and go, pray, and carry on their business. From the Blue Mosque, we walked over to the Hippodrome, of which only the Obelisks from the original remain. The hippodrome used to be a huge arena, rumored to be bigger than the Circus Maximus in Rome. It was constructed by Constantine and had obelisks lining the center of the track. Today the hippodrome is a park with a road that circles the obelisks.
We ended our historical tour of Sultanhamet with the Basillica Cistern. It is a large underground water chamber that was built during the reign of Justinian. Water from aqueducts flowed into this chamber, which is absolutely huge. Cisterns provided clean water for the surrounding neighborhoods. This big one was obviously for Imperial palace and the Haghia Sophia. There is a blurry picture of it below.
Other than trying not to be an obnoxious tourist, i've done some shopping, met a retarded amount of other people. I've spent a lot of time with people from germany, holland, turkey, canada, spain, england, austria, and of course the US. It is so much fun interacting with these people from all over the world. I've learned so much about them and their cultures. It is really nice making friends with Americans who are from Turkish descent and are fluent in the language. We take them out with us so we don't get ripped off as much. Turkish merchants and cab drivers are good at ripping off people who look foreign and who don't speak the language, which is one reason why i want to learn the language so badly. The other being that I really want to flirt with this cute Turkish girl who works in the cafeteria of my dorm.
I still dont have a blanket on my bed. Just one fitted sheet. I feel like a bum when I'm sleeping under my jacket. I also need to wash clothes. I found out the hard way that you can pack lite and still take enough clothes. I'm going to try to maybe travel some this weekend. I haven't decided where yet, but some options are the black sea, troy, or some other outlying towns. Hailey's family has a beach home outside of Izmir, about 6 hours south west of Istanbul on The Agean. We are going to try to go there in a couple weeks to see the ruins of Ephesus and just take it easy. Ok, sleep time.

The blue mosque:<--- part of the interior of the Haghia Sophia. This picture shows the "plupit-type-thing" that you see in Mosques, and in the background you can see the painting of Mary and the baby jesus which is above the altar. The Interior of the Blue Mosque: and another picture of the interior!

Basillica Cisternand
Hagia Sophia

first day exploring

I finally got to explore a little bit of the city today. We started off with a turkish meal in the cafe of the Superdorm for breakfast. Afterwards, we met up with a girl from Belgium and walked up to the rich part of town (according to some turkish kids, our school is in the "Beverly Hills of Istanbul") to find a money exchange office. We passed a porsche dealer, bmw, vw, and some other realy expensive looking automotive dealers. I saw a starbucks and a McDonalds Delivery motorbike. It was exciting! The 5 of us (rick, bj, rana, and sandra) walked into this really expensive mall. I took a picture of the KFC! I was really surprised at all the american stores they had there, like dockers, finish line, calvin klein, and others.
At 1 p.m we met up with a couple German students and we took a bus to Taksim Square, where we met a group of about 15 students...We traveled through the neighboring tourist / shopping area. We spent a lot of time walking through all the people and past so many shops. A lot of it was similar: jewelry, clothing, etc. A lot of stores sold the same things. After walking for about 20 minutes one of the group leaders decided to take the tunnel train (i was just following people). The train took us further downtown to the Golden Horn, which is a big river thing that connects to the Bosphorus in Istanbul (the thing that seperates Asia and Europe, duh). There were many people fishing off of the bridge, and on the bottom of the bridge there was a walkway with many restaurants. It's hard to describe...i'll just show pictures. We stopped under the bridge at a restaurant and smoked a hookah and watched the boats on the Golden Horn. Here is a picture of Saunders smoking.
After lunch, the big group split up. Bj, Saunders, Lizzy, Rana, and I walked to the Grand Bazaar...stopping for pictures at this beautiful Mosque. It took a long time to walk through the markets and streets to get the the Grand Bazaar, but it was worth it. I have never seen so many shops and vendors in one place in my entire life. If you make eye contact with any of them, they will walk up to you and invite you in the shop, using broken english. These guys would make great used car salesmen in America. They have a real good way of telling you that you would look great with a new leather jacket or some crazy stuff. You are expected to bargain with them. A lot. Their prices are inflated a lot. I talked a man down to 35 YTL from 45 TYL about ($23 dollars from $30) for a nice leather wallet. Yes, I probably still got ripped off. However, I keep telling myself that getting ripped off once or twice is part of the experience. I also bought an Evil Eye, which is supposed to ward away bad spirits. It is for good luck. To save people much frustration we took a cab home. On this trip home, there were 5 people crammed into the cab (not including the driver), and you already know how crazy their driving is...it was great. The 5 of us went to an Italian restaurant for dinner, where I had a penne meal. Afterwards, we decided to go to a bar, which turned out to be the most expensive bar in the area. The prices were ridiculous: 22-30 YTL for a mixed drink (15-18 Dollars) and 9 YTL (Lira) for the cheapest local beer, which is still about 6 dollars. Well we made a mistake and made it home after an extremely exhausting day. I plan on looking for some sheets and a blanket tomorrow. Sorry if this update is jumbled and incoherent. It's 2 am and I had an extremely LONG day (forget spell checker). peace, willis out.

willis has landed

Before today I had never been outside of the United States. Before today I had never riden in a cab. Before today I had never had to convert currency.
My trip began yesterday with a frantic epsidode of running through the house worried of things I had missed and would be leaving. I'm sure my suitcase has more crap in it than I needed to bring. I'm also sure some of that crap will not make the trip home. I left from cincinnati at 1:25 a little nervous; still full of the jitters that I get when I haven't flown in a while. The plane was very cramped, it stank a little, and the portholes were by my knees causing me to bend to an awkward position to see the scenery. Flying into Boston was amazing. It is a beautiful city on the Bay, with the typical sailboats filling the bay. I took my time crossing the airport to check in with British Airways. The plane I then boarded was the biggest passenger plane I have ever seen. The 747-400, jumbo jet. The kind with the second deck for first class (kind of like in Snakes on a Plane, however the resemblances to that movie end there, thankfully). I was cramped between a sweet 19 year old british girl and a smoking 37 year old woman from Trinidad (A Carribean island).
The six hour flight got old pretty quickly. I couldn't sleep, and the movies were pretty lame. I caught up a little on Owen Meany and chatted some. After the flight, Suzie (the smoking chick) offered to buy me my first beer at a bar in the airport. I kindly took her up on it, seeing as it would be bad manners to turn down such a generous offer. We talked a lot and it turns out she's a role player, you know..Dungeons and Dragons. Whow would have known? I almost missed my flight.
Taking off from London, I felt like a true flying veteran. My stomach didn't churn once. I felt like I had done this a million times and I was ready to get to my "final destination" (being istanbul, not the ultimate final destination). However, looking out my window, I saw London, bathed in the light of a 7 am sunrise. The city was amazing, sprawling, huge! Bigger and more beautiful than Boston. I think I slept for at good 30 minutes on this 3.5 hour flight. Luckily there was a power outlet and I played some hardcore spider solitare. Nacho Libre was the feature presentation, which I didn't have the inclination to watch. By this point it was about 2 am and the sun was shining bright...sleep was not an option.
Sooner than I expected, we were flying into Istanbul over the Aegean. After seeing London, I didn't think I could be more impressed by a city from the air. I was wrong, Istanbul is huge. It is all urban housing and mosques. After a lengthy visa/passport check, I had the relief of being flagged down by an emissary from Bogazici University, whom guided us through the metro to a cab. In hindsight, I should have been more scared in that cab. The driver made no attempt to follow any sort of driving regualations. Turn signals were non existant...There might as well not have even been lane lines. Calling it aggressive driving would be an understatement. I now understand why Istanbul has one of the highest automobile accident rates in the world. I wasn't complaining, I buckled up and enjoyed the ride.
Did I mention that the city was huge? It took us a good hour of aggressive city driving to get to our destiation. After a quick and painless check in at the superdorm, i was introduced to my mental-hospital-like dormitory room. i have a desk and a bed. It is very small...but the common room is quite large. I was taken to South Campus where I saw Bogazici's "point" (which is cooler than Hanover's). I ate some traditional Turkish food, which was nice. Contrary to what others may say, I don't think the coke tastes that much different.
In the evening i met up with a girl i had been in touch with via e-mail, Rana. She called my extension when she got in and said that she was with two boys from Hanover. Low and behold Rick Saunders and BJ. The four of us set upon an adventure to find toilet paper, bed sheets, food, and a pillow. I'm back, the adrenaline and excitement has faded from my veins and the jet lag is starting to creep back up on me. We have decided on a 9:30 AM breakfast. So, i need to hit the sack. I have two weeks before classes start and a ridiculously big city to explore. In the next update you can expect some pictures! Stay tuned, willis out.

first post

This is going to be an account of my 4 month trip to Turkey. This blog is still a work-in-progress, so bear with me. There will probably be a lot of changes before I am happy with the way things look and feel. I plan on posting as often as possible about my experiences. There will be plenty of stories, photos, etc in here. I leave for Turkey tomorrow. My itinerary:

Cincinnati - Boston 1:35 pm
Boston - London (Heathrow) 6:35 PM
London - Istanbul (Ataturk) 7:05 AM

After I catch up on sleep from jet-lag you can expect another update.