Istanbul: Blue Mosque A Must Visit

Blue Mosque : A not to be missed Attraction

'There are 83000 mosques in Turkey.Turkey can be another planet.Welcome all.'Our guide ‘Turguy’ from Travel Shop Turkey took us to bylines of Turkey where every corner is history.In fact, every place that I went to was grand and stories that come of it were etched in stone.

Adorned interiors @ Blue Mosque Istanbul Turkey

Group tour also has certain advantage to it.You see more in less time and it's sometimes good.We enjoyed the trip,the guides were well informed and friendly. Now as we boarded the bus and got ourselves introduced to Indians who were on board, the journey began.

Turkey:Hippodrome Square

Hippodrome Square

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 Our first stop was Hippodrome Square .Between Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia are remnants of Turkey’s past in the form of ancient Obelisks.The Hippodrome of Contantinopole(Sultanahmet) was the sporting and social center of Byzantine Empire. This used to be a place for chariot racing and 1,00,000 spectators are said to have watched the races during the Roman era.

The hippodrome had a building from where royal families would watch the races from their balcony.There were also monuments constructed dated as back as 10th century AD with 300 stones in bronze plates.In 1200’s first crusaders came and removed all bronze plates and melt it to make weapons.

Serpentine

 As we walked along , there were remnants of serpentine palace from Greek time from 5th century BC.Greek and Persians had war twice. The first time Persians won,the second time Greeks attacked on Persians and collected all the weapons and swords and melted them and these monuments were built in honor of their victory.

 The first column was constructed in bronze with Apollo temple in delphi in Greece because when they attacked the army they took the help of the Oracle.Oracle was the prophet of Apollo temple during Greek time.There are also visible 31 column names of Greek city written on the column.

They say Turkey has more history of Greece than Greece itself has.

Egyptian Column

 There is an Egyptian column from 15th century BC made of 3500 granite stones.When they brought the column from Egypt - they transported it by ship.And on the way they left 6 metres of the column - it took them 31 days to erect the column.So the basement is white marble.The column contains 3500 years old description in the form of eagle,bird etc like totems. Then,in the middle of the 6 th century AD,during byzantine time they had a riot between two powerful groups.And at the end of the riot they couldn’t decide who won and they fought amongst themselves.

They attacked Grand palace and Hagia sophia and they collected a lot and 50,000 people were killed here.

Blue Mosque:Sultan Ahmed Mosque

If you thought Blue Mosque may have exteriors as Blue, you are wrong!

Best way to see the architecture of Blue Mosque is to approach it from the Hippodrome.Blue mosque is one of the mosque by Ottoman Empire.They started the construction in 1609 AD and it took about 7.5 years to complete this mosque.The capacity of the Durban is 10000 that means 10000 people can pray in the court at the same time.During the month of Ramdan the capacity is almost full.

The rules to abide by.. @ Istanbul, Turkey

Why is Blue Mosque called Blue?It's because of the blue tiles present in the interior of Mosque.There are 24000 handmade ceramic tiles in mosque of size (20*20) 

In Islam,before praying,you have to have a clean body.Washing your feet,arms,ears and neck.Both ladies and men can pray in the mosque.The upper galleries were for ladies.But many of the ladies pray at home because they look out for their kids.Men go out. Men and women do not pray at same place,Another obligation is to have a clean mind.To have to pray you have to have a clean body and soul.They pray 5 times a day.

She ties my scarf in a way that it doesn't get down my head!

So you need to cover your head,carry your shoes in a plastic bag from the counter and can enter inside.The entry is free but there are long queues. Turguy helped us be ahead in the queue.

Mosque traditionally have one,two or four minerats. There are 6 minerates in this mosque.And why 6 is because our guide told that the architect of the mosque made mistake as he overheard Gold Minerats as six minerats because the word Gold in Turkish is Altin and 6 in turkish is Alti.He was then sent to Mecca for the construction of 7 minerats.

On the back of the Mosque is the marketplace and the income that they get from there is used for reconstruction and restoration of the mosque.

During the Ottomen Empire some of the tiles got damaged because of the earthquake and hence some were replaced with Ceramic tiles as the knowledge of the Turkish Tiles couldn't be transferred.

The main Building has 4 pillars.Behind the pillar is sultan lodge,In Ottoman time,the Sultan can’t pray because of the security.So they created special place for him. As every mosque,we see a lot of Arabic Calligraphy on the walls.On the right side was written 'Allah' and on the left 'Mohammed'.

On the chandeliers, ostrich eggs are found that where meant to avoid cobwebs inside the mosque by repelling spiders.