Day Two. Istanbul.

I had a pretty good sleep last night and woke to a beautiful day. I am literally staying on top of the hotel haha. The view from my room is incredible. I ate brekkie at the hotel is morning and then watched some tv in my room with the blinds open. The only two English channels I can get are CNN and BBC. They're both replaying and replaying the Boston Marathon Bombing suspects that have been shot and the Texas explosions. At 12pm, I checked out and checked back in to a new room for the tour. I met an Australian guy in the lobby as I was changing rooms and later met 3 girls as well. I'm now sharing a room with two other girls. One of them is here since her bags are on her bed, but I haven't met her yet. The other bed is still empty.

The rooftop view

Preparing to leave

Around town

Hotel street

I realised that I didn't have any Turkish lira on me. When I was at Toulouse airport, I had asked a staff member but they said there wasn't one in the section of airport I was in. Then when I got to Istanbul, I was more intent on getting a visa to stay in the country that I forgot to exchange money there as well. Once I'd out my stuff in my new room, I went to the lobby to see if they could help me out. The guy pointed to across the road (the road wasn't really a road. It was one of those market road things where cars can't actually go down, about 10m wide). I walked across and got some cash out and on my way back grabbed some food from a street seller who was walking with his cart past me. The bread was so YUM!

Lunchtime

When I went down at 2pm to check in with Topdeck, there was a group of 4 girls and a guy sitting in the foyer. They welcomed me haha and were from NZ. As we were the first to check in and wanted to explore, we hung out for the rest of the day, going to the Grand Bazaar that afternoon. That was so crazy! Over 4000 stall, it's super easy to get lost as soon as you enter. But it's more organised than I thought. It's like a Middle eastern version of paddys markets in Sydney on a much grander scale. There are certain sections too; bag section, jewellery section, clothing section, etc. So when I say it's easy to get lost, it is and it isn't. They have gate numbers up on all entrances and if you know which section you came into first, you need only to find that type of product and you're halfway there. I bought a fez! Haha for a hate party. The great thing about the markets here too is that they barter! Such a great thing. Our fezs were originally 50 lira, but we got them down to 10, which is equivalent of about $5AUS.
We then grabbed some lunch and headed back to the hotel. I feel super safe here. The men are like normal European men. They will all say things too you and are a bit in your face, but they don't touch you and most just want you to buy their stuff. They're actually pretty polite. I was even proposed to by a guy who wanted me to eat in his restaurant!

In the Grand Bazaar

Glass hanging lamps

Outside the Bazaar

Breadman

Outer wall of the Bazaar

So many scarves

One of the Grand Bazaar Entrances

View from the top

We had our briefing at 7pm and met the rest of the group. We're the smallest group of the 3. There's 40 in the other 2 groups, and 25 in ours. It makes it super easier to know everyone, we pretty much already do, and we all get along really well. There's only one other group of 3 guys travelling together on our trip. The rest of us are travelling alone. Apart from the groups, all of the singles are living in Europe this year. There's another girl living in Nice. The rest are living in London, and have been for a little while now. I met one of my room mates, AJ, who's super nice.
After the briefing, we went for dinner/drinks are a Turkish restaurant. We were sitting on the floor with heaps of cushions, it was in the main restaurant strip, though a bit like France, there are restaurants everywhere. I shared a tandoori kebab with the girl living on Nice. The kebabs are not like normal kebabs here. They either come in a roll type thing, or come presented like a normal stirfry with slices of pita bread underneath. Ours was the second option. It was really yummy. The meat came cooked in clay pots and to get the meat out, you had to break them, so we hit the tops with sticks lol. It was heaps good getting to know everyone, they all seem lovely. All other top deck 8 dayers were at the same bar too and I met a few of them. Our group is about half boys/half girls. I headed home with some other girls at about 11:30pm. Once in bed, our other roommate Kathleen, came in about 12:30pm after arriving late last night. We chatted for a while when she got changed and then headed back to bed!

Dinner

AJ ready to hit dinner open

Liz and I

Hagia Sophia

The Blue Mosque

Aj and Nikki