Something completely different: the Sakirin Mosque

A couple of weekends ago we took the ferry across to Uskudar on the Asian side and got happily lost in the winding streets and neighbourhoods there.  I took my first ride in a dolmus (pronounced DOLE-mish) here in Istanbul - sort of like the South African combi, it is a cross between a taxi and a city bus which travels set routes of shorter distances in and around the city. Their name comes from the word dolma meaning "stuffed" which you might recognize from Mediterranean cuisine - and just like the grape leaves are stuffed with rice, the vans are stuffed with people!

We made our way to the Sakirin Mosque, heralded as the most modern mosque in Turkey. It is indeed quite a departure from the traditional mosques we usually see on this trip. I found the courtyard and outside very serene and beautiful.

The inside has a lot going on... The interior has bright reds, yellows, and a circular turquoise pulpit. It has a chandelier. It has glass panels that line 3 walls of the interior stylized like pages of the Qur'an. It has a dome with spiraled Arabic verses that pinwheel to the top. It has metal, and gold foil, and glass and crystal water drops... There's a lot.

I'm glad we went and saw it, and it is interesting to see the modern re-invention of an ancient prototype. I'll leave the architectural analysis to the experts, of course, but you can compare and contrast this with other mosques in Turkey hundreds and hundreds of years old, which I don't feel are lacking anything for their age.... For example:

But I guess there's a lot going on there too :-)

Signing off the blog for the next little while since we are taking a trip to Cappadocia and the coast (similar to last year) this week. I hope all your snow will have melted by then! :-)  If you are curious what Cappadocia is like there are some pictures from last year here and here, plus the post about our hot air balloon ride. Görüsürüz! (see you later!)