Mail Art #111 and exploring Istanbul

 This is my second card in Istanbul. Beside from Turkish scraps, I used the skull from a Tate Modern brochure. It fit so well.

 This surprised us as we walked DOWN the steep hill. The minarets appeared over the hill. We knew we weren't in Richmond, VA for sure.

 A bit further on DOWN the hill, we saw this ruin and the contemporary building behind it. It's so very much Istanbul, the very old, the old, and the contemporary. What an amazingly interesting city.

 After exploring a bit down below, we used a map we'd picked up (at Cuppa, the breakfast place, more on that later) to look for galleries. However, it was Monday and they were closed, as was the Istanbul Modern. As we walked UP hill towards the big commercial street (Istaklil) I saw these hanging pieces and looked in the window and there was an artist's studio. Wow, it looked like MY studio, meaning lots of materials and tools. It wasn't open. I would have loved to chat with the artist about what she did.

Notice how steep the hill. Here is the view looking back down the street. Can you tell how steep it is?

 Here we are walking UP further. There were some steps at this part, which I gladly used.

Looking back down the hill. Way off there in the distance is the area across the Golden Horn.

This walk was on Monday, our first day. We were getting the "lay" of the land and it was all UPhill and DOWNhill from what we could tell, at least in "our" neighborhood, Beyoglu.

Here are the Turkish words I knew when I arrived: merhaba-hello, lütfen-please, teşeküler-thanks