I’ve heard the name Hagia Sophia before, but I didn’t understand the significance of the place until I walked inside. First, the place is massive. The photo doesn’t do the dome justice. To put it in perspective though, I took the photo from the second floor, about 50 feet about the main floor and the dome is still a few hundred feet above you. The only downside to the timing of the trip is that they are in the process of renovating and restoring so there was scaffolding everywhere. 
All the images on the walls are mosaics with some of them partially restored with paint. The level of detail in them is stunning. Again, the pictures really don’t do it justice. All the squares in the mosaics glimmer in the sunlight.
You can kind of make out the individual squares in the picture below. It was cool getting to see this in person. I remember in highschool seeing pictures of this in Art History and my Theology classes. There's a big window on the wall next to it that lets a lot of light in on it. They said the window is also why the bottom half of the mosaic it gone, it got washed away by rain over the years.
The Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque are right next each other. This is looking out the window next to the mosaic above on the second level of the sophia back at the mosque.
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