Cistern. The Underground Kind.

We were releases from the meetings and headed to Sultanahmet to see the cistern that has been preserved from before the time of Constantine.....as in the guy that Constantinople was named for----before the city was called Istanbul but after it was called Byzantium?

Now a tourist attraction and a cool respite from the heat of the day (although, it really was pleasant today by the time we got outside). The previous times I have visited the cistern, I was told a story. It referred to the stone that holds one of the support columns that has the head of Medusa placed on her side and another with her head upside down. The story I was told on both previous visits was that she was not right side up because of superstition; namely, that to look upon Medusa with her snake-y snake hair would turn you to stone. The architects/laborers were protecting us by rotating the head so that you could look on her REFLECTION in the water.

Today, that story was contradicted by Orhan, our tour guide. It was placed on the side or top (upside down) because it provided a better base for support to the column. The base of the column would have under water as would the top decorative part when the cistern was full. So, then the question: "Why flipping bother with the decoration at all?" They didn't, they were just recycling old pieces of marble from pagan Roman and/or Greek temples---they didn't care about the decoration at all. And that made sense.

Me from twenty years ago likes the drama story of not turning to stone; the 2012 version of me is a little minuscule bit sad by that bubble bursting but at the same time, it makes more sense.

Regardless, it still feels like an eerie, magical, refreshing space to hang out for 15 minutes.