Sultanahmet

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, my experience at the Blue Mosque on Saturday night deserves its own post, so here it is.

Alhamdulillah, all is well. I started work on Monday, after about six weeks off. Still have to get used to it. I haven't yet moved into an apartment, because for some reason, in Istanbul it is rather difficult to get short term rentals, at least in the area I am targeting (in the tourist areas, it is much easier). I think it was much easier to find short term rentals in Damascus when we were there - to be fair, at that time, I guess demand was much lower in Damascus than it ever was here.

Anyways, back to last Saturday.

I kind of ended up at the Blue Mosque by accident. I wanted to do some exploring on the weekend and use the public transportation system. I also wanted to pray taraweeh in the Sultanahmet area, where all of the old mosques are (like the Blue Mosque, the Suleymaniye Mosque, the Hagia Sophia, and others), because I figured I would not get a chance during the week. Initially, I thought I would take the Metro down to Taksim and then take a bus or ferry or something over the Golden Horn to Sultanahmet area (I could even walk, like Omer and I did earlier this year). However, once I saw a bus near my hotel with "Topkopi" on it, I knew that it would be going near these places, so I asked the bus driver to drop me off at Sultanahmet. I thought he would just drop me off in the general area, but he dropped me off and directed me to go straight to the Blue Mosque, or Sultan Ahmet mosque, so that is where I ended up, rather than one of the other ones.

I was dropped off maybe half a mile from the mosque, so I walked down a street full of shops and restaurants. It wasn't too long before Maghrib, so quite a few people were already sitting at the cafes, waiting (of course, many were not waiting). I saw some dates and other useful things being sold in this area, even those ceramic Turkish plates my Mom always mentions, so I will have to do some shopping here at some point.

Once I got to the actual Blue Mosque area, I was quite impressed. There is a large park surrounding the Mosque complex, and it was full of people. There were thousands of families picnicing, spreading newspapers on the ground. Some even brought plastic chairs and tables and stools. It was quite crowded. I don't think the area was completely full, but it had as many people as it could handle comfortably. Certainly, several walkways were overcrowded. A bunch of what I imagine are only temporary stalls wound there way around the park area as well. They were mostly iftar cafe/restaurants, but several were selling sweets, tourist items, or other things. The surrounding road areas were also mostly blocked up with parked cars. I really should take a picture of this next weekend, in sha Allah. I don't know if this scene replays itself everynight in Ramadan or only on weekends, or if it is only at this masjid or at other large masjids, but it is worth seeing.

As I did not really want to sit down and eat - there was not much room, and I didn't see the point in sitting by myself anyways - I made my way carefully over to the masjid, so I could pray and then come back out and eat. I didn't want to lose track of how I walked in, because I wanted to go back to the same road and take same bus back (alas, this didn't happen anyways, but what can you do?). I had bought a bottle of cold water for YTL 0.75 (I think) to break my fast with, so I took it in with me. As I entered the masjid complex itself, I saw that the crowd extended even to the open area around the building.

Alas, when Maghrib rolled around, less than two full lines prayed with us. I was a bit disheartened by that. I mean the whole complex is full of THOUSANDS of Muslims waiting to break iftar - they are in the MASJID COMPLEX - but maybe twenty or thirty made the effort to pray Maghrib with the jamat.

Oddly, when they made the adhan, I could only hear the Blue Masjid adhan. In Damascus, you hear numerous adhans on even a normal day. Heck, I think the Omayyad masjid itself has four adhans or something. When in Rome, I guess, or Byzantium, as it were.

After Maghrib, I went out the same way, to the northeast corner of the masjid/complex where I came from and looked for something to eat. To the left of the gate, there were huge crowds, so I went to a Doner Kebab place and got a YTL 5 Doner sandwich. I ate it while walking to another masjid-like building I saw nearby. I walked until the crowd dissipated. I made a circuit of this other building. I couldn't tell what it was, but it was as abandoned as the Blue Mosque was full.

On the way back to the Blue Mosque for taraweeh, I decided to try some of the Tamer Hindi (YTL 3.5) I had spotted earlier. It was okay. There were countless other goodies that people in stalls and people on the ground and people in booths were all selling. In sha Allah, I would like to try the chocolate covered hazelnuts sometime. Also, it looked like some booths were making a type of candy/lollipop/popsicle out of toffee or taffy or something. It looked interesting enough to try some time, in sha Allah. There were all sorts of other things that could only be Ramadan specials, as the whole scene was one big Ramadan special. And I only saw about a quarter of the spectacle, the northeast corner.

I had nothing else going on, so I made my way back to the first row to read Qur'an and wait for taraweeh. Alhamdulillah, this time, the masjid filled up behind me. I don't know that everyone came to pray - I daresay those who were lounging outside outnumbered those inside two to one (the men, that is). However, it was still neat to see, considering the disappointment of Maghrib. I will say this though, 99% of those there stayed through 20 and witr. I wanted to scoot before witr, but it was so packed, I just prayed with everyone. Of course, the fact that the Imam read one ayah per rakat made things a bit easier. We were done within an hour or so.

Alhamdulillah, the Imam had a nice, Sudais-like voice. At first, I thought he was reading consecutive verses, as he read from the second to last page of Imran. Then, it seemed he was only reading verses that were duas. Then he switched over to verses that addressed the Muslims. Then, I think he just started saying whatever popped into his head. Once he got to Rahman though, he had to say at least two verses - it would have been wierd to just say "Fa bi ayyi aa'laai rabbikuma tukadhdhiban" and then bow down!. Unlike in Saudi, or the Unity Center, and like the Syrians and IAGD, the Turks do say something after every four, or even after every two. They recite salawat on the Prophet. After four, "allahumma salli 'ala sayyidina Muhammadin an nabi al ummiyi wa 'ala aalihi wa sahbihi wa sallim." I still like how they do it in Damascus best (at least in Murabit for sure that I can remember) - "ya hannan, ya mannan, ya dhal judi wal ihsan, thabbit qulubana 'alal iman, narju 'afwaka wal ghufran, wa ja'alna min 'utaqai shahri Ramadan."

It took a while to get out, and then much longer to get back, but on the whole, I was quite pleased with how that evening went down, alhamdulillah.