♪ ♪ [Turkish instruments play in bright rhythm] (Rudy Maxa) Every time I come to this city, I buy a rug, and I'm not going to do it again!

But I love the game.

For 2000 years, people have come to barter and bargain here in the city where East meets West, the city in the middle, Istanbul.

(woman) "Rudy Maxa's World," proudly sponsored by the leading hotels of the world.

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♪ ♪ Every quest has a beginning-- online at LHW.com.

Additional funding for "Rudy Maxa's World" provided by: Medjet.com, medical evacuation membership protection for travelers.

Take trips, not chances.

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Or "Welcome to Japan."

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♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ (Rudy) Istanbul embraces difference.

It's a cosmopolitan, colorful, tolerant mix of cultures.

The city's allure comes from its festive bazaars, many-tiled mosques and warm, outgoing people.

Noisy, frenetic, multicultural, commercial, and overwhelmingly friendly, Istanbul is like no other city in the world.

♪ ♪ Istanbul sits astride the Bosphorus, which connects the Black Sea and the Mediterranean and separates Europe from Asia.

♪ ♪ Known as "Byzantium," "Constantinople," and now "Istanbul," this city was the capital of the Roman Empire, then the center of orthodox Christianity.

In 1453, Mehmet the Conqueror, leader of the Ottoman Turks, took the city.

Today, it's the nexus of Europe and traditional Islam and a thoroughly modern, sophisticated city with some 15 million inhabitants.

For millennia, travelers have come to Istanbul to trade goods and ideas.

And for many, their first stop was here at the Grand Bazaar.

Soon after his conquest, Mehmet built the Kapali Carsi, or the Grand Bazaar.

It's enormous, with more than 4000 shops and 2 mosques, spread across 60 streets.

In Ottoman times, traders sold silk, spices and porcelain from the East, furs, honey, and silk from the Russian Steppes, and slaves from Africa and the Caucuses.

The streets are still named after the Guilds that traded here.

But the main draws now are carpets, gold, and textiles.

Maybe it's because I want to capture a piece of this beguiling city, I'm not sure, but Istanbul carpets are as alluring as the town itself.

Carpets began some 3500 years ago, woven from goat hair into tents to insulate herdsmen from the cold.

Tell me how I tell a good carpet from a bad carpet.

What am I looking for?

First of all, we must know if the carpet is a handmade or a machine made.

So I'm looking for if a carpet is handmade or machine made, what kind of fabric and where it came from, how fast the color is, will it fade in the sun quickly, anything else I'm looking for?

And then the density of the knots.

The density of the knots, that really determines the price.

Yes, for example, this one, when we put the measuring tape, we can count 8 knots here, 8 times 8, 64 knots per square centimeter.

Is that good?

Yes, it's for the floral side, for a silk rug, this is very good.

What does a carpet this size, approximately in U.S. dollars cost?

This pure silk, with this original pattern, U.S. dollars, around $40,000.

This is a serious carpet.

It is a very serious carpet.

I must tell you, every time I come to Istanbul, I buy a carpet and I have too many carpets now.

They're stuffed under my bed.

So I have orders not to buy a carpet on this visit to Istanbul.

I'm trying very hard.

Well, this time, you are in big trouble because you'll see for the first time very new carpets being made in our country, and I am sure you will want to have one of these carpets.

Spoken like a great Turkish carpet salesman.

[both laugh] The atmosphere in the Grand Bazaar is electric, with touts using their best lines to lure customers into their shops.

♪ ♪ Selling everything under the sun from tea and backgammon sets, to textiles and robes from Central Asia.

Haggling is a way of life here.

As in the old days, shop owners still donate a portion of their profits to support local mosques, schools, and soup kitchens for the poor.

Expat Kathy Hamilton leads shopping trips in Istanbul.

She's an old pro in the Bazaar.

It's not for just for tourists here.

People come, especially for the textiles, people come, they buy bolts of the fabric for wedding dresses, special party dresses.

Belly dancing outfits.

We all need those, you know!

So it's a lot of tourist things, but also, the Turks shop here.

So where are we going now?

This is a shop that has silks, shawls, pashminas.

It certainly does.

It even has more once you get to the back.

(Rudy) Kathy knows the best shops in the Bazaar and how to bargain for the lowest price.

How many scarves do you have in this store?

About 250 different kinds.

But how many total, numbers?

Over 100,000 pieces.

[chuckles] That's a lot of scarves.

Anything else that you're interested in?

Well I think this will about do it.

I think we've got about a dozen scarves here, so let's what we can do on price.

Let's see what we can get pricewise.

I'll let you handle this; let me learn from a pro, Kath.

This is the fun part.

9 times 24 comes to 225, and one of them real wool, $40, it come... 265.

[speaking Turkish] (ph) oochoose, oochoose, "Oochoose, oochoose," does that mean lower lower?

I had a feeling; I'm learning Turkish very quickly.

Okay $30, 170 is last, is a good prices, $170.00 That's about $13.00 each, no $17.00 each?

That is a very good price for these textiles and for here.

Okay, we take it, my expert says okay.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

(Rudy) From the city's earliest history, people of different cultures have rubbed shoulders here.

Today, Istanbul is Turkey's melting pot, a place where people from all over the country come in search of jobs and a modern life.

The music of Baba Zula reflects the melting pot that is Istanbul, a magic mix of reggae, dub, and tradition, the band calls "psychedeli dance music."

♪ ♪ What are you and Baba Zula trying to do with your music?

We try to combine tradition with the future.

It's a very cosmopolitan city and the cultures it brings are fabulous.

It's really deep, so it's very nice to see lots of religions and lots of races living together in harmony.

♪ ♪ (Rudy) After Mehmed conquered Constantinople, he deported much of the population and recruited people from around the Ottoman Empire to come live in his new capital.

In the 19th century, only 50 to 60% of Istanbul's population was Muslim.

Now, almost all of the city's residents are Muslim and 80% of them were born somewhere else.

♪ ♪ What misconceptions do you find Americans bring on their first visit to Turkey?

A lot of people coming, they expect it to be a very religious country, women are all covered up, or you don't see the women on the street.

Here, everybody's part of personal life.

There's women on the street, women working.

I think most Americans are surprised at the fact that this is a Muslim country that is secular and there is a divide between the two.

And somebody can be religious, but you would never know it from the way they dress or the way they act.

(Rudy) Women fare better in Turkey, and especially Istanbul, than in other Middle Eastern countries.

Polygamy was outlawed in the 1920's and in 1934, women gained the right to vote, before women in France or Switzerland.

The mass migration of rural families to Istanbul means that many young girls will grow up leading a modern life.

A recent survey found that the vast majority of female high school graduates hope for a career.

[singing a cappella] (Rudy) My visit to Istanbul coincides with the 3-day festival that marks the end of Ramadan, the month during which Muslims fast between sunrise and sunset.

During Ramadan, which Turks call Ramazan, Muslims not only fast, they also try to avoid anger, greed, lust, and gossip.

Turks call the 3 days after Ramazan, "Seker Beyrami."

The day begins with prayer, a family meal, and then a visit to the graves of ancestors.

The rest of the holiday is given over to celebration.

Many people come to the Eyup Mosque on the outskirts of Istanbul to celebrate Seker Beyrami.

For Turks, the Eyup Mosque is the fourth most sacred site after Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem because this is the site of the grave of Abu Ayyub al-Ansari, the friend and standard-bearer of the Prophet Mohammed.

He died during the Arab army siege of Constantinople in 669.

This is also where new sultans were inaugurated.

[speaking in her native language] In the afternoons, street food vendors are out all over the city.

"Seker" means sugar and the holiday is also known as the "Candy Festival."

♪ ♪ On the evening of the first day of Beyrami, everyone is out celebrating.

Competing bands wander from table to table singing traditional songs; everyone knows the words.

The joy and good will are infectious.

♪ ♪ Mehmed the Conqueror built the Topkapi Palace on the site of the original Acropolis of Byzantium.

The palace housed the sultan and his family, his concubines, hundreds of advisors, government bureaucrats and artisans.

Arabic for forbidden, the "harem" was home to the sultan's mother, wives, concubines, and children.

The concubines could not be Muslims, but were foreigners purchased as slaves or captured in war.

The only men allowed in were the sultan and eunuchs.

Perhaps the most famous resident was Roxalana, a slave from Ukraine who became Solyman the Magnificent's favorite concubine.

This 16th-century ruler, who led the golden age of the Ottoman Empire, loved Roxalana so much, he married her, the first time ever a Sultan married a concubine.

♪ ♪ The sultan was so important, almost no one was permitted to speak to him.

He listened in on official business hidden behind a screened window.

The grounds of Topkapi have fantastic views out over the Bosphorus and Golden Horn.

Istanbul's the only city that straddles two continents.

The Bosphorus separates the European side from the Asian side.

It's 17 miles long and at its narrowest point, it's only a half mile wide.

Jason and his Argonauts sailed these waters in search of the Golden Fleece.

Today, more than 50,000 ships a year sail through under an international treaty that grants all nations the right to pass through the Bosphorus unimpeded.

♪ ♪ Thanks largely to the Bosphorus, Istanbul is Turkey's commercial center.

It accounts for 45% of national production and about the same percentage of jobs.

Traffic is often snarled and air quality can suffer, but there's a buzz and energy here day and night.

♪ ♪ For centuries, citizens here have turned to the Turkish bath for some peace and quiet.

♪ ♪ It's a tradition inherited from the Byzantines, who inherited it from the Romans.

But the Turks took it to new heights with their baths called "hamman."

Islam emphasizes cleanliness, but people come to the baths also to socialize.

It's a divine feeling to be cooked and scrubbed.

♪ ♪ Reaching the divine is the goal of the whirling dervishes, a Sufi order following the teachings of a mystic poet named Rumi, who lived in the early 13th century.

It's believed that Rumi created his poems in a state of ecstasy, accompanying his verses with a whirling dance.

His quest was to reunite the soul with the divine.

"Who looks out with my eyes?

"What is the soul, I cannot stop asking," he wrote.

Finding his answer in himself, he said, "There is nothing in the universe that you are not.

"Everything you want, look for it within yourself."

The dervishes hats represent their tombstones, the white robes, the shrouds of their egos.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ The Ottoman Empire's respect for other cultures is best exemplified here at Hagia Sophia.

When his troops poured through the walls of Constantinople, Mehmed came here, fell to his knees and sprinkled dirt on his turban in a show of humility.

For 1000 years, Hagia Sophia was the greatest church in Christendom.

Built by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian in 537, Hagia Sophia was the largest dome until the completion of St. Peter's in Rome.

Mehmed immediately converted the church to a mosque and added the minarets, but he kept the name.

Originally, the entire ceiling was covered by gold mosaics, that were the envy of the world.

Earthquakes destroyed some, and the rest were plastered over by the Ottomans, because representations of humans and animals are forbidden in Islam.

The mosaics are slowly being restored.

Istanbul embraces tradition and modernity.

Young women in Istanbul have taken up the hookah, historically a male pastime.

Hookah bars, or nargileh bars, have become recently popular.

Sultans used to smoke a special mixture of opium, perfume, and crushed pearls.

Today's mixture is a little more pedestrian.

Tobacco and fruit leaves are smoked in the nargileh.

♪ ♪ It sort of tastes like honey apples-- very sweet.

It's very cool though, because it comes through the water.

[coughs] James Bond I am not!

A friend of mine told me about a carpet store that sells dowry rugs, rugs made by young women for their wedding.

Hello, I'm Rudy Maxa.

I am Sisko Osman please feel at home.

Do the carpets represent more than just something to put on the floor?

Are there stories in the carpets?

Every young girl puts her feeling inside the piece, what she feels, if she is happy.

Sometimes it gives message when she prepares her wedding gift, putting some signs or the name or the initials of the young man she would like to get married with.

So it's like weaving a dream.

It's a dream.

She puts all her feeling inside.

And what story does this carpet tell us?

She says, "I don't want to forget what I had, my view in my father's house."

Another famed Istanbul bazaar sells spices, and traditional Turkish sweets.

Some of the spices sold here are for medicinal purposes.

We have the best pistachio inside.

You want to sample the Turkish pistachio?

(Rudy) May I have a small bag of these?

[birds sing] Hidden above shops near the spice market is Istanbul's most sublime mosque, Rustem Pasa.

Built by the great Ottoman architect, Mimar Sinan, who designed more than 300 buildings, Rustem Pasa includes an electric display of Iznik tiles.

In the 16th century, the town of Iznik, south of Istanbul, produced magnificent ceramics that became all the rave with the sultans.

The Iznik art of creating ceramics with brilliant colors and intricate designs was lost.

The craftsmen took secret techniques to the grave.

But today, artisans are reviving their art.

The tulip is a common motif.

The word is derived from the Turkish word for turban, who's shape the flower resembles.

The main thing, white is very popular, the color of quartz stone.

Is this all made of quartz stone here?

All these are made with quartz stone.

For example, this again... Tulips, there's the tulips.

Yes, you can see that's the tulip flower, and here...[a slight ring] hear this?

That tells you it's quartz stone.

Just heavy, and it's a stone.

It is very heavy, so this is what we see in the mosques.

Yes.

Some 20,000 Iznik tiles light up Istanbul's soaring Blue mosque.

Built in 1609, it was meant to rival Hagia Sophia.

Here again are the turban-like tulips and a riot of other floral tiles overlapping arches, and mini domes.

Fresh pomegranate juice, sesame bread rings, from street food to kabobs to authentic Ottoman cuisine, Istanbul is a circus for the palate.

This is rice?

♪ ♪ Mr. Hamdi set up a kebob stand in a parking lot and parlayed it into one of Istanbul's favorite restaurants with delicious Bosphorus views.

To start, thin, crusty pizza, sprinkled with lamb, onion, and tomatoes, before the kebob platter arrives.

In the beginning of the 18th century, the city's elite built palaces outside of town on the Bosphorus.

The restored palace of a grand vizier and son-in-law of the sultan, is now the Ciragan Palace Hotel.

A British ambassador's wife in 1717 wrote, "Here is all the expensive magnificence "that you can suppose in a palace founded by a young man, "with the wealth of a vast empire at his command.

"Indeed the sultan himself would be delighted if he could see the Ciragan Palace today."

The Ottoman restaurant here is known citywide for its cuisine and Bosphorus views.

The "Turkish Daily News" is the English language newspaper here.

Some stories--there's a new train service for nut harvesters to prevent traffic accidents.

And there was a debate in Istanbul during Ramazan over the traditional drum beaters, who wake up people for their predawn meal.

The drums apparently were setting off car alarms.

I'm nearing the end of my trip and only one rug shop left on my list.

Abdullah deals in tribal rugs, treasures he's dug up in villages all over Turkey, and I'm keen to have a look.

You specialize in old carpets.

Yes I do.

Why?

Because they are ethnic, unsigned arts.

They are made by the village people, they are made for birth, wedding, and death.

Do we understand all the symbols on these older carpets?

The majority of them, we don't understand today, but in those days, there is this folk tale, once upon a time, the sultan was visiting a nomad tribe and they spread some carpets on the ground and the sultan asked who wove this carpet?

This old man proudly said, "My daughter, your highness."

He said, "You are a very bad father.

"Your daughter, in this carpet, I can read, "Your daughter is in love with shepherd, and you are making her marry an old rich man."

[both laugh] ♪ ♪ [man sings in Turkish] Istanbul is still the city in the middle, the place where East meets West.

Anything goes in this tolerant, diverse, warm city.

From the splendor of its mosques and palaces, to the energy, zest, and compassion of its people, Istanbul is an experience one can never forget.

♪ ♪ I swore I wouldn't do it, but there's a carpet I can't get off my mind-- I'm going shopping!

Reporting from Istanbul, I'm Rudy Maxa, "Hoscakal."

(woman) For information on the places featured in "Rudy Maxa's World," along with other savvy traveling tips, visit... To order DVDs of "Rudy Maxa's World" or the CD of world music from the series, call or visit... ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ The Leading Hotels of the World.

Quests for travel begin at LHW.com, where you'll discover a collection of nearly 450 unique hotels worldwide, Including the distinctive family of Taj hotels, resorts, and palaces.

Every quest has a beginning, online at LHW.com.

Additional funding for Rudy Maxa's World provided by Medjet.com, medical evacuation membership protection for travelers.

Take trips, not chances.

And by... Yokoso!

Or "Welcome to Japan."

And by Delta--serving hundreds of destinations worldwide.

Information to plan your next trip available at delta.com.

[orchestral fanfare]