This morning, Chase and I had breakfast and then met up with Olcay and Burcu to head over to the television station. The station logo looked a lot like NBC but I’m not sure they are affiliated.
They have been working very hard to get the word out about the performances here. The good news is that tickets are selling GREAT! It looks like all three shows in Istanbul will be sold out. As we drove to the station, there were billboards all over town and large banners stretched across the bridges over four lanes of the main roads. Last night I watched a video commercial play on one of the large digital billboards over the Metro Entrance.
You can watch the video here: BILLBOARD COMMERCIAL – ISTANBUL
We arrived at the SHOW TV studios and then to the set of SABA. This is the most popular morning show in Turkey so it was a real honor to be a guest on the show. I shared the stage with a famous Turkish actor who had a new movie coming out on Friday and the newly crowned Miss World Model.
My 7-minute “guest appearance” turned into a 90-minute “stick around and let’s talk.” I was able to perform a few tricks and they showed a lot of footage from the show to give the audience an idea of what the large-scale illusions were like. It was a great experience and I had a fun time. During the break, I had my picture taken with several members of the studio audience. And, of course, I had my picture taken with the host, Saba, and Miss World Model.
Chase and I arrived back at the hotel around 4pm. Cindy and I decided to get something to eat and then walk to the local mall and explore. I stopped at Starbucks to get a coffee and was immediately recognized by everyone behind the counter as the “magician from Saba.” As we walked through the mall, people were stopping to look, some took pictures, many of them came up and talked. It was very cool but a little weird. We finally had to leave the mall because we were causing a bit of a stir. We decided to stop by the area grocery store to pick up a few things to take to the hotel room and the same thing happened there. We retired for the night in the quiet of our hotel.
Yesterday, Cindy and I had a chance to relax and walked through the Grand Bazaar. This market of over 4,000 vendors has been in existence since the 14th Century. Quite an amazing place! This is only the entrance…
Inside, the place is filled with merchants selling jewelry, carpets, clothing, and just about anything you can imagine. We picked up a few items, bargained with the vendors (Cindy is really, really good at that!), and had a great time relaxing in Istanbul.
And I took this picture in the morning from my hotel room. This is the skyline of Istanbul from where we are.
