The morning of day 2

Not quite so early into breakfast as we did our own thing today. Our first stop was to take some pics of the restored houses that make up the hotel. Then we made our way into the first courtyard of Topkapi Palace and out at the side, for the Archaeological Museum. We first stepped into the Ancient Oriental building where we saw many ancient sculptures as well as the animal tile reliefs from Babylon. After this we went along to the historical pavilion housing the tile museum. It is partially covered with tiles in a geometric pattern with secular verses in Arabic over the entrance. Inside is an interesting exhibition of the history of ceramics in Turkey as well as several rooms which are decorated with beautiful blue tiles; some were even gilded and have been restored in part to show the sumptuousness of the pavilion in its time. Outside again, we looked for the peacock feather column from the Temple of Theodosius. It is similar to the Column of Tears in the Basilica Cistern. We decided to go and to look for PCs, but the Topkapi Museum shop was a dead loss, so after looking outside, we decided to walk up to the Madresesi which we overlook from our room. It is a craft centre, government funded, and anyone can come and take a class there in ceramics, calligraphy, lute and flute playing, silver work, painting and marbling. We were greeted by a young man who explained all about the place and showed us the various rooms for the classes. We saw the lute class, the silversmiths, the calligraphists and the painters. We also found one man on his own practising the flute - needing more practise! Finally we watched some women making pictures on marble paper. This was fascinating, and we watched from start to finish. They first built up the paint for the marble background on the surface of the water/gum mixture in the trough. When they were happy with that design, they started to make the flower design over the top of this. Blobs of green were manipulated into stems and leaves and blobs of colour were spread out and twirled around to form the flowers. When everything was finished, the artist took a piece of paper and laid it over the surface. It was then slid over the edge of the trough and the clever design all came off onto the paper, leaving the 'water' in the trough clean for the next turn. The paper was then laid flat on a mesh rack to dry.
All this was thirsty work, so we sat in the courtyard and drank apple tea with cinnamon biscuits - delicious. We couldn’t decide what to buy, so left, saying hello to 2 tiny kittens on the way out. We were still searching for PCs, so walked down to the Sultanahmet Sq. between the two mosques - but no pics of the tiles. We were now very close to the Arasta Bazaar/ craft area and the Mosaic Museum, so we walked down to the left of the Blue Mosque and into the Bazaar. At the far side we found the Mosaic Museum with its stunning many meters long pavement of mosaic, which has been preserved and covered with the museum building. This was position of the Great Palace of the Byzantine Emperors. Restoration has been painstaking and the results are spectacular. It’s a shame so much has been lost, though.