Turkey(Part 3)

We arrived at Istanbul after 2 hours and fifteen minutes, during which EgyptAir served the worst smelling lunch in history, it was so horrendously stinky I was about to throw up, add to this that my stomach was already agitated during the flight, don't know why.
After we claimed our baggage, we found the hotel's driver and his Volks Wagen van waiting for us, very accommodating. The roads there are very clean and I swear there isn't a bump in the road, people drive really fast there and they have a limit of 140 km/hour. Driving there is great, very similar to a cleaner Egypt, since they still criss-cross and swerve during driving. I've heard many European and American tourists complain about driving cause there aren't so many rules there as in their countries, and all I can think about is "Are you kidding me? This is fantastic"
They really obey the pedestrian crossing right, so much that people practically throw themselves in front of the cars when the pedestrian light is green and ironically the cars actually STOP.
As for the inner streets(not highways), they're really tight and they're mostly up-hill and down-hill kind of streets, but the people there drive really smooth, I couldn't believe how small the streets were and I thought the van won't be able to pass through, but apparently I was proved wrong.

(An Inner Street)

The hotel: http://adaistanbul.com

We arrived at the hotel 20 minutes later, to be welcomed by the hotel owners Dr. Dogan and his wife Mrs. Hava; really nice people, they'd go out of their way to keep you happy. They have 20 rooms and they're really crowded during the early summer. By the time we rested and prayed and stuff it was lunch time and Dad wanted to eat fish. So, Dr. Dogan recommended a restaurant, which sent a car to come pick us up(I wanted to walk, seeing that we've been cooped up in a plane, but the restaurant insisted). It was really nice, we went to the fish market, where there are lots of restaurants beside each other, all selling seafood(Duh!!).(fish market)

In Turkey, they're really proud of their language, so most of them don't speak English, but they will try to make you understand. In the restaurant the waiter, who speaks little English, decided that we don't understand, so he brought all the dishes they serve onto a big tray, so that we would pick and choose.

(restaurant in fish market)

Cats in Istanbul are very common, in fact shop-owners(especially carpet ) keep stray cats to get rid of rats, and they usually feed them cat food(nice!!)

(cat in the street) (cat in mosque)

Since Istanbul is a touristic city, they're really afraid of bombings and stuff, so you won't find garbage baskets in the streets, the people put their garbage bag on the pavement (at the end of the day) and then a big truck comes pick the garbage up early morning( they never miss a day), add to this the fact that everywhere you go there are cleaning-people who actually do their job, so the whole city is really clean.