Istanbul. Our first trip to a Muslim country. It is so fascinating! Here I am standing in front of the Blue Mosque. The mosque was built between 1609 and 1616 by order of the Sultan Ahmed I, after whom it is named. He is buried in the mosque's precincts. It is located in the oldest part of Istanbul, in what was before 1453 the centre of Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire.
In the picture above, this is what I am looking at! Aya Sofia or Hagia Sofia. Aya Sofia was built in the 6th Century to be the grandest church in the world. Yup, you read that right! A church! When the Ottoman Turks conquered Istanbul in 1453, Aya Sofia was converted into a mosque. The cool thing about it is that there are still mosaics of Jesus and other Christian themes through Aya Sofia! Its quite mind blowing really, to see two cultures come together in such a unique way. Aya Sofia is no longer worshiped in, so its open to tourists.
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