August 10-19, 2001 Robert Brown, tour leader and president of the Center for World Music, has been leading cultural tours to Indonesia since 1977, and has also been leading yearly cultural tours for the students and faculty of Semester at Sea in Istanbul since 1994.. The great and cosmopolitan city of Istanbul, lying partly in Europe and partly in Asia on the banks of the Bosphorus, is filled with monuments from its Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman Turkish past. Istanbul is considered to be one of the most enticing tourist destinations and one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Participants in the Center for World Music tour to Istanbul will join Semester at Sea for their two big final events, an evening in one of the best restaurants, where people come to enjoy the classical music called fasil, and an Ottoman banquet with music and dancing in a great hall of the wonderful mosque built by Suleyman the Magnificent in the 16th Century. When Semester at Sea departs on their ship soon after the banquet, we begin our own itinerary in fabulous Istanbul, visiting museums and monuments, listening to exciting music in many styles, tasting the delicious Turkish cuisine, shopping in the world's largest mall (the ancient Covered Bazaar), and enjoying the company of Istanbul's friendly and hospitable people. Among other things we will have a cooking class for Ottoman dishes, a special visit to a musical instruments shop and a well-stocked records store, and an afternoon with the musicians of the mehter band. This thrilling ensemble is the origin of the bass drum and cymbals and in fact, of the European military band itself. We have a chance to try some Turkish rhythms hands-on, with the mehter band's moustachioed performers. We will see the Egyptian Spice Market, Topkapi palace, the Blue Mosque, the Archaeological Museum. and the Hagia Sophia. This famous building, pictured above, dates from the Seventh Century, when it was a Byzantine cathedral with an enormous dome built by the Emperor Justinian,. Later it became a mosque, and more recently a museum. We will eat well at several different restaurants and a taverna, all featuring unique styles of music as well as delicious Turkish food. An optional visit to an historic Turkish bath (separate facilities for men and women) is a special treat for many visitors to Istanbul. Other options include a motor launch excursion down the Bosphorus to the Black Sea, or a visit to the Princes Islands, where vehicles are prohibited. Towards the end of the week a tour in Western Turkey will take the group to the old Ottoman capital of Bursa with its famous mosques and painted tiles, on to the site of ancient Troy and the battlefield of Gallipoli, then ending with a tour of Ephesus, to see the extensive Greco-Roman excavations. For those who wish to extend their stay in Turkey, there are the options of a tour to the strange landscape of Cappadocia and to other parts of Anatolia, or to Central Asia for a look at the newly independent countries of Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, whose fabled cities of Tashkent, Bukhara, and Samarkand recall the ancient Silk Road that linked them to China in the East and Rome in the West.. (Incidentally, the Center plans to organize a musical tour of the Silk Road within China at some point in the future.) For a Virtual Tour to Istanbul click here to see some of the events and places we will visit on our cultural tour to Istanbul and Beyond. [Coming soon!] |
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Modified: April 13, 2001 |
