Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Almost opposite Kuleli on the European shore is
Arnavutköy
(Albanian Village),
which boasts a number of gabled Ottoman-era wooden houses. On the hill above it are
buildings formerly occupied by the American College for Girls. Its most famous alumni
was Halide Edib Adıvar, who wrote about the years she spent here in her 1926 work,
The
Memoir of Halide Edib
.
Arnavutköy runs straight into the glamorous suburb of
Bebek
, known for its upmarket
shopping and chic cafe-bars such as Mangerie, Lucca and Kitchenette. It also has the most
glamorous Starbucks in the city (right on the water, and with a lovely terrace). Bebek's
shops surround a small park and the Ottoman Revivalist-style
Bebek Mosque
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; to the east of these is the ferry dock, to the south is the
Egyptian consulate build-
work of Italian architect Raimondo D'Aronco. This gorgeous art nouveau mini-palace was
built for Emine Hanım, mother of the last khedive of Egypt, Abbas Hilmi II. It's the white
building with a mansard roof and an ornate wrought-iron fence.
Opposite Bebek on the Asian shore is
Kandilli
, the 'Place of Lamps', named after the
lamps that were lit here to warn ships of the particularly treacherous currents at the head-
the 19th century by Count Leon Ostorog, a Polish adviser to the Ottoman court; French
novelist Pierre Loti stayed here when he visited İstanbul in the 1890s. A bit further on,
past Kandilli, is the long, white
Kıbrıslı ('Cypriot') Mustafa Emin Paşa Yalı
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, which dates from 1760.
Next to the Kıbrıslı are the
Büyük Göksu Deresi
(Great Heavenly Stream) and
Küçük
Göksu Deresi
(Small Heavenly Stream), two brooks that descend from the Asian hills in-
to the Bosphorus. Between them is a fertile delta, grassy and shady, which the Ottoman
elite thought perfect for picnics. Foreign residents referred to it as 'The Sweet Waters of
Asia'.
TOP SIGHTS
HIDİV KASRI
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