The Grand Bazaar!

The next sight we saw on Friday was the Grand Bazaar. It is the largest covered bazaar in the world, and cycles through about 400,000 people EVERY DAY. Nothing, and I mean nothing, can prepare you for the beautiful colors, persistent shop owners, and haggling that goes on within the walls. I would not be surprised if people had spent days lost in it before, it is a huge maze of shops that are all different, but look similar enough that you can't remember where you've been. I was on a mission to get an over-the-shoulder bag, so I didn't take too many pictures the first day, but here is the gate that we entered:

And here is a photo of the inside of the bazaar:

It was really beautiful. In my mind, it was a bunch of disordered tables with more heckling shop owners than customers. I was very wrong. There were scarves, leather, rugs, ceramics and jewelry galore, but the shops each had rooms and were fairly organized. Everything was laid out beautifully, luring innocent shoppers for a closer look. The shop owners were certainly persistent. One looked at our group of about 4 girls and pointed to us individually and said "You have eyes like the pacific ocean, and yours are like the the atlantic!" and so on. Everyone wants to sell you something at an incredibly inflated price. One former exchange student told us not to pay more than half the offering price of anything there.

I did end up buying a bag, and although the shop keeper asked for 55TL, I got it for 35TL (about $20). I thought it was a good price for my first bargaining experience! The bag was certainly not worth that, as it's already falling apart, but I needed one, and it was a great experience. I can't wait to go back, I really want one of the glass lanterns and some of the evil eye jewelry that is found all over the city. It was overwhelming, but didn't scare this Mainer away!