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Turkey Becomes Growingly Popular Stop For Muslim Pilgrims
30 June 2009
In addition to the waters of the Bosporus and the intrigue of street markets, the nightlife, historic buildings and landmarks at every turn, Istanbul is home to an Islamic history and Muslim-friendly accommodations that are making it an increasingly popular stopover for travelers on their way back from pilgrimages to Mecca. On a sunny weekday afternoon in the Sultanahmet district, a group of British men form a line outside the Blue Mosque. They are not at the mosque entrance alongside the groups of tourists from Japan, Spain and the US, who await the end of the afternoon prayer so that they can enter and take pictures, but are instead standing around the fountain in the mosque's courtyard, waiting for their turn to make ablutions so that they can join the prayer. The men are among a growing demographic of tourists visiting Istanbul, Muslims from Europe, the United States, Indonesia and beyond who elect to finish off their religious pilgrimages to Mecca in Saudi Arabia with a trip to Istanbul, the last center of the caliphate and the point from which the Muslim world was administrated for centuries. Turkey can be an ideal location for Muslim tourists for many reasons. Outside of the universal attractions, several factors in Turkey appeal to Muslim considerations: the ready availability of meat that is halal (prepared according to Islamic guidelines, similar to kosher), restaurants that do not serve alcoholic beverages, mosques to pray in and the call to prayer that sounds through the streets five times a day. Though increasing numbers of Muslims are traveling to Turkey following Hajj or Umrah -- the greater and lesser Muslim pilgrimages, respectively, to Mecca -- there are few packages geared toward religiously focused tourism for such travelers. As Tom Berny from the UK-based IAH Holiday travel agency puts it, “In Turkey there's a sense of Muslim history in the place, something that goes back to the root.” His firm arranges “Muslim tours” of Istanbul for travelers interested in visiting the city, often after making Hajj or Umrah. He's careful to note that they are not the same thing as religious tours, as a critical difference between them and other tour packages is that they are often put together for Muslims, with flights returning from Saudi Arabia via Turkish Airlines (THY). Instead of hanging around the airport, Muslims can spend two or three days exploring Istanbul on their way back to their home country. “Groups of Muslims staying here on stopover trips for two or three days visit the classic Istanbul sites, including Sultanahmet, Eminönü, Eyüp Sultan Cami, maybe Hirka-i Serif. They mostly stay in Istanbul,” Cenk Kunter, the general manager of Advisor Travel told Sunday's Zaman. Nevertheless, he estimates that travelers coming to Turkey through his agency for faith-related tourism constitute about 25-30 percent of all his customers, and he says the number of Muslims within this subset is rising. Muslim tourism needs attention, development While Turkish tourism and border authorities keep figures on the number of tourists traveling to Turkey from Muslim countries, there are no figures on how many are coming to the country for religiously related purposes. And while tour operators say there has been a noticeable increase in interest in religious tourism packages for Muslims, more effort is needed to help the tourism niche grow. The Ministry of Culture and Tourism and tourism marketing agencies have taken an increased interest in developing Christian and Jewish faith-based tourist packages in recent years, yet growing numbers of Muslim tourists coming to Turkey from Europe and beyond have gained comparatively little attention from tour operators. At the moment, tourist agencies' itineraries relevant to Muslims are tailored based on country of origin, not religious interest. “It's easy for people from many Muslim countries to get visas to Turkey, so that is a major contribution to their choice of Turkey as a destination,” says Fahri Aral, Advisor Travel's operations manager. “Along with this there are geographical considerations: Turkey has bodies of water and greenery that many living in countries with primarily desert terrain long for. Also, it's very nearby in terms of distance to places like Iran, where a lot of tourists come from.” Aral says that travel agencies often organize tourists into different groups by geography -- for example, Europeans in one group and Arabs in another -- for cultural and practical purposes due to the generally differing needs of each group. Europeans tend to be more interested in activities involving the sea, he says, while Arabs often enjoy greenery and barbecues and so forth. At the heart of the problem in creating religious tourism itineraries for Muslims is the distinction between the needs and desires of Muslims traveling to see religious sites in particular, with a focus on Islamic history, and groups of tourists coming to visit Istanbul who happen to be Muslims. “Traditionally, Turkish tourism agencies haven't considered groups of Muslims as religious tourism travelers. Instead, they've been considered a cultural group -- such as Iranian or Arab -- and their itineraries have been designed with a range of cultural generalizations in mind. This means that even if it's a stopover associated with the Umrah, these tourists aren't necessarily being given specialized packages,” says Ahmet Zengin, a UK-based tour operator who brings groups of Muslims to Turkey each year on private religious tours. “You have a situation where since Istanbul's major tourist sites happen to involve a lot of Muslim history, it's easy to slap together a generic itinerary and call it a post-Umrah or a post-Hajj trip. And usually, because the quality of the Istanbul sites is high -- the Topkapi Palace, for example, is host to an incredible collection of Islamic historical artifacts -- Muslim tourists are pleased with their trips. But what you'll find is that there is much more potential for longer visits and an expansion of tourism aimed at religious Muslims outside of post-pilgrimage packages,” Zengin says. Opportunities abound for Muslim tourists A good example of a tourism option with major potential for Muslim groups, Zengin says, is the conservative vacation resorts along Turkey's southwestern coast, where gender-segregated beaches and a lack of alcohol make the facilities popular among many pious Turks. “These places are really just ideal for Muslims from all over the world, and if they were more effectively marketed, say, to Muslims in the West, I think there would definitely be an interest. The awareness that, you know, Turkey offers sun, surf and sea in a beach context that's accessible to practicing Muslims as well, that message just isn't being broadcast,” Zengin says. In addition, there is a plethora of off-the-beaten-path options that might not appeal to the average tourist but may seem like hidden gems for those with a particular interest in Muslim religious sites -- Istanbul is full of tombs of renowned Muslim figures, Sufi lodges, Islamic schools and the sites of historical battles that were pivotal points in Muslim history. Bilaal Khan, one of the young British Muslims visiting as part of Zengin's tour group, explains that he is in fact traveling to Istanbul for a second time: “I'd come here back in 2005 on a post-Umrah tour, and while I really did enjoy my time here, about three days, it wasn't until I met and spoke with a Turkish coworker that I found out how much there was that I hadn't seen and that I wished I'd seen. Turkey just has this amazing richness of Muslim sites, and unfortunately they're not really made available to Muslim tourists; otherwise, I think people would definitely come here and spend a good week or two checking these places out. That's why I'm back!”
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