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Turkey

Ramadan in Turkey

Come Ramzan (Ramadan) and it’s a festive mood around us. There are many countries where it is a time of great celebration, something like carnival atmosphere, with trees, mosques and homes in towns are decorated with lights.

The followers of Islam in India, Malaysia, Turkey and other parts of the world fast during the daylight hours of the month long festival of Eid-ul-Fitr or Ramadan maintaining their self-resistance towards their needs and urges. Come evening, they break their fast with mouth watering dishes in this holy month with much gusto.

Today on this occasion I take you to Turkey through pictures.

Ramadan in Turkey

Famous mouth watering Baklava, impossible to resist.

World Heritage Day

Today is World Heritage Day. There are 30 World Heritage sites in India, and 981 in the whole world. Can anybody visit them in one life? Yes, I know of a person who visits only Heritage sites and he’s been doing it for last 6 years! Slowly, one by one.
While I am not fortunate enough to be like him, I am contended with my own pace. When I look at the pictures of the sites I’ve visited, I feel quite happy.

Today I share pictures of few of the Heritage sites visited by me. I have many more but then this post will be very long. 🙂

Rice terraces Batad @lemonicks.com

Rice terraces of Batad, Philippines

Looking back at Year 2013

Another year has passed and it’s time to look back and take stock of my journeys, not only in terms of travel but the journeys which opened a new horizon in front of me and helped me see the world with diverse perceptions.
As I always say, I count my memories, not the places and I am happy that my travel memories are far more and better than the destinations.

marina bay sands Singapore @lemonicks.com

Marina Bay sands, Singapore

For this recap

A love song of Ottoman period

Üsküdara Gideriken (When Going to Üsküdar) – A love song of Ottoman period

This is a Turkish folk song about the love between a man & a woman from Ottoman era. Our guide in Istanbul Yeliz Bolsoy was describing this story and told that it has a song too. When requested, Yeliz was kind enough to sing it for me. The bonus was that she translated the song in English !

The story goes like this.
Most of the rich women in Ottoman period had male secretaries and

Feasting on Ramadan Delicacies

I returned yesterday after soaking myself in the local culture & feasting on local culinary delights of Ramadan of a few countries. It was that time of the year again. The followers of Islam in India, Malaysia, Turkey and other parts of the world fast during the daylight hours of the month long festival of Eid-ul-Fitr or Ramadan maintaining their self-resistance towards their needs and urges. Come evening, they break their fast with mouth watering dishes in this holy month with much gusto.
This year I followed the Ramadan food trail from Istanbul to Kuala Lumpur to Singapore. Each city had its own variation of certain culture and eateries that specialize in certain types of cuisines.

ramadan delicacy lemonicks.com

In Turkey I roamed

Holidaying in Turkey during festivals

Holidaying in Turkey during festivals

Off late I have been reading a lot about Turkey and enjoying Turkey during festivals is high on my list. Did you know Turkey is one of the very few countries in the world which span across 2 continents, Europe and Asia ? Turkey is vast and its expanse boasts of awesome landscapes and natural wonders surrounded by different seas. It is as great a destination for relaxing beaches on its Mediterranean and Aegean coasts as for some of the world’s most magnificent ancient monuments, not to mention about the mouth watering national cuisine and the numerous festivals making Turkey holidays firm favourite with visitors of all ages.

Also, Istanbul, the capital city, has been nominated as European capital of culture for the year 2010.

Among the many annual festivals it boasts of, I am more interested in Camel Wrestling Festival in Selçuk. It is similar to Spanish bullfights, the Italians cockfights or