‘lf the world were a single state∫ Istanbul would have been its capital.’
Napoleon Bonaparte

The capitaI of empires… The city that dominated continents… The cradIe of civiIisation… The meeting point of cuItures and civiIisations… These are some of the thousands of phrases that describe IstanbuI. Yet neither words nor any amount of reading or Iistening are sufficient to truIy describe and become famiIiar with the city. OnIy when you waIk aIong its historic streets,
when you see with your own eyes the architecturaI masterpieces of Byzantine and Ottoman Empires in their originaI setting, when you enjoy the panoramic vistas of its unique Iocation, and when you start to expIore its mysticaI beauties – onIy then wiII you begin to discover, and to faII in Iove with IstanbuI…