Generous Hospitality - 11/1/2009

We landed about 12:35pm Istanbul time and it took quite some time for us to arrive at the gate. We offloaded pretty quickly and headed towards passport control. Foreigners have to buy a visa “sticker” which costs $20 before you can go through the passport control. So I headed to the visa area and saw a kind of long line, and decided to go to the bathroom first. A few minutes later the line had more than doubled, as another flight had also just arrived. I got in line and waited. I think there were a fair number of people from non-queuing countries, because up until it was no longer possible, people just kept walking up to the middle of the line and joining in front of everyone else (by this time, the line had grown really long).

I finally paid the tourist tax and got my sticker and headed to the passport control line for foreigners. At the entrance to the line there was a man and a woman sitting in front of a monitor. The woman had a surgical mask on, something I had seen several people wearing during my travels. I looked at the monitor though, and realized that it was a thermal imaging scanner. I guess they were checking for people infected with the flu. Make me wonder what they would do with you if you did have the flu.

After passport control, I took my bags through customs, which was just some guy sitting and playing with his phone. I was almost home free. I passed the doors into the public arrow and there were many people holding up signs. There was one that was very difficult to read because it was written in pencil, but the man holding it seemed to recognize me and he looked a lot like the pictures I had seen of Mustafa’s father-in-law, Haldun. I greeted him and held up his finger to indicate I should wait. He called a friend who appeared a few minutes later and greeted me in English. They asked me where I was staying and I showed them on a map where the hotel was, but told him that I would just take the light rail by my self. There was no way that this was going to happen, as my translator indicated. Haldun was going to take me to my hotel and then by me dinner. I couldn’t refuse this hospitality so we set off together with our two bags to ride the Light Rail (Hafif). We needed to make a connection with a tram at about the half way point. On the first leg of the trip, we sat across from a man who knew more English, so I chatted with him about my trip and where he was from. His parents had moved to Turkey when he was only 2 years old from Aden and actually spoke Arabic, in addition to Turkish and English.

We made the connection at the tram station in Zeytinburnu, and slowly made our way to Sultenahmet. We got off at the stop and began asking directions to the hotel. During the walk, we walked between the Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque. Haldun kept asking each block or so, and we eventually arrived at the place. We went in to check in and the receptionist helped translate a bit to indicate that I would only be staying the night, but that I would not need help getting to my next destination. After unloading my bags, we headed out to a little restaurant on the street where the tram let us off. The food was really good and included kafta with some kind of spicy sauce as well as a salad and yogurt drink. We tried to talk a little through one of the waiters who knew a bit of English, but it was really challenging. At one point, the waiter asked if I wanted more, and I tried to say no thanks, but he brought 3 more pieces as well as a dessert. All of the food was really great and I was stuffed by the time we left.

We headed up the street to find a mobile phone store so I could get a Turkish SIM card for my phone. We got the card, which Haldun very generously paid for and then headed to the Grand Bazaar. Along the way, we passed by a candy store and Haldun bought some as a gift for me and some more for Mustafa. The bazaar was closed and I was getting tired, so we headed back to the hotel. I tried my best to thank him profusely for all he had done and gave him a small gift.

I then headed up to my room to Skype with Shanna. The kids seemed to be doing pretty well, but Shanna was clearly not quite feeling well still. It was 5:30 pm Istanbul time at that point, but only 10:30 am in North Carolina. After the long trip it was really hard to believe the time difference. I am really pooped and going to go to bed early so I can go explore a bit before meeting up with Jeff.

Here is the view out my window onto the Bosphorous.

Dinner at midnight - 10/31/2009

After sitting for a long time, I began to wonder if they were going to be serving the dinner part of the menu after all, since it had gotten so late. They had already been down the aisle with the drink carts (which included complimentary alcoholic beverages!) and it had been a long time. I was feeling hungry and didn’t think dinner was coming, so I munched on some nuts and waited. About 11:30pm as I was dozing off, they started serving the dinner. I ordered the pasta with minced lamb and it was really delicious. All of the food was really good for airplane food. They even had real metal cutlery.

After finishing dinner, I started to feel sleepy again and dozed off. For the next few hours I was sort of in and out of sleep. It seemed like things were really rough the whole time when we were flying over Greenland. I think the bumpiness sort of lulled me to sleep though. By the middle of the flight my behind and legs were really starting to get sore. I put my pillow behind my lower back and that really seemed to help.

Without about an hour and a half left till Istanbul, they served us breakfast. This was really delicious, especially the grilled chicken sausage. I think I like Turkish Airline food :) The remainder of the flight in to Istanbul was fairly uneventful. I read through some of a book I had not yet finished for most of the time. The only interesting thing was on our approach to the runway, it seemed to be really windy. We were coming in over the water, almost opposite the direction we had approached the city and I could see whitecaps on the waves below us. I was sitting on one of the seats near the wings and I noticed what looked like the flaps were going in and out rapidly. I don’t think the flaps are supposed to do that, so maybe they were something else. Just a few seconds before we landed, there was a big dip, like a roller coaster. It was kind of fun and scary and thankfully we didn’t crash.

My airplane seat runs Linux - 10/31/2009

My flight finally started boarding at 8:10 pm. I was on the plane and seated by 8:35 pm. The plane is a 777-300. It is really nice on the inside. We passed through the business class section where instead of seats there are these funny looking pod things set at 45 degree angles to the main aisleway. It looks like they convert into narrow beds. They look very futuristic. According to the diagram I looked at online, there are actual full size beds in the first class cabin. I found my way to my seat, 38C. Shortly after sitting down a middle aged Turkish couple came behind me. They looked at their seats by the window and asked if I would move to the window. I told them I preferred to sit on the aisle, but then I said if they didn’t mind me getting up for the bathroom, I would take the window. I think they misunderstood me, because they said OK and took the seat by the window anyway.

After sitting down, I think I experienced the longest taxi wait ever. We were moving slowly for what seemed like an hour. I passed some of the time playing with the fancy movie screen thing embedded in the seat in front of me. I browsed through all the movies. There weren’t many that were particularly new, and there were several foreign films that I had never heard of. I then investigated the other options, including some TV and some games. I tried my hand at some Freecell but got bored pretty quick. I then tried this Berlitz language game  that uses flash cards. I set it to Turkish mode and started playing. I got 10/10 on the first game (tren=train, otel=hotel). Not bad, I am thinking, and then it freezes up completely. None of the buttons are working. I tried to no avail to find some kind of reset button. Great, I think, I guess God doesn’t want me to play games and watch movies for my 9 hour flight :) So I open my Bible and start reading where I left off. By the time we actually took off, I was feeling really sleepy and just shut my eyes.

After we got to altitude, they turned up the lights and I started to wake up from my near doze. Then the screen in front of me starts acting funny, like when you hit reset on your PC. Sure enough, it looks like the system was rebooting itself. And, to top it off, it was a Linux boot screen, apparently some embedded RedHat distribution (RedBoot). There was even an X11 startup screen. (Yes, I am quite the nerd!) So now I am set again with my entertainment, but I think I am going to have to skip the Berlitz language program.

While I was writing this, they handed out menus, some headphones, and some eye cover things. That is really nice considering I was trying to find those last night at Target without success. Here is the menu for the flight:

First Service:

• Mozarella Peyniri (grilled eggplants / mozarella)
• Taze Mevsim Salatasi (garden fresh seasonal salad)

A choice of:

• Tavuk Fileto & Sote Ispanak (chicken breast & sauteed leaf spinach) or
• Kiymali Firin Makarna (baked maccheroni with minced lamb)

Breakfast:

• Muslili Yogurt (yoghurt with muesli)
• Beyaz Peynir, Gouda Peyniri & Siyah Zeytin (feta cheese, gouda cheese & black olive)
• Cirpilmis Yumurta (Scrambled eggs)
• Izgara Tavuk Sosis / Kizarmis Patates (grilled chicken sausage / fried potato)
• Taze Ekmek Cesitleri (ovenfresh bread selection)
• Tereyag / Recel (butter / jam)

Delayed! - 10/31/2009

I went down to the Turkish Airlines ticket desk at about 12:45 pm. Along the way I rode the elevator down with a woman who looked asian. I assumed that she was Korean because when I arrived earlier there was a Korean Air flight leaving and a lot of asian looking people wandering about. When I got to the ticket desk, I found that the asian woman was standing there, and she was on the same flight to Istanbul. She asked if I had heard the bad news about the flight being delayed 3 hours and I chatted with her a little bit about the situation and found out that she was heading home to Kyrgyzstan, a former soviet republic, known apparently for the practice of bride snatching. She was just making her connection through Istanbul and was distressed to find that she was likely to miss her next flight home. I don't think she was being bride snatched. :)

When I reached the counter the attendant said that they would start checking in at 1:30pm and waived me to the counters around the corner. I walked over with several others who were waiting for the flight. The area was still set up for the Korea Air staff, so I waited and watched with the growing mass of coach passengers as they reconfigured the area for Turkish Airlines. As I was waiting I watched a woman come to the remaining Korea Air staff member with a little brown dog in a small mesh carrier. I passed the remaining minutes listening to some heated discussion, I think relating to the dogs vaccination papers. It was very engrossing :) Fortunately for me the entrance to the line was constructed right where I was standing, so I was the first one they called to check in. A few minutes later I was carrying my bags to the security area and then quickly passed through the security checkpoint.

I walked down one of the jetways to see where I would be spending the next 6.5 hours. There were only a few people walking around and the restaurants (what little there were) were all empty. I passed on the doner sandwich figuring that I would have plenty of opportunity to eat good Turkish food after my arrival. I finally settled on the meatball hero and a bottled water. So much for low carb eating :)  After finishing the mostly satisfying meal, I tried calling Mom again. She answered and we talked for another 45 minutes or so and she caught me up on all the goings on in her life. I then called Shanna again to let her know my flight was delayed. After that I called Dad and talked to him for a while.

After catching up with Dad, I called AT&T to find out why I couldn’t login to the wifi hotspot. Turns out that they don’t have the contract here at JFK so I have to shell out 8 bucks for “Boingo”. After all that talking my phone battery is nearly dead (and I packed the charger in my checked luggage!), so I figured it was worth it to pay it, just so I could stay in touch while I am waiting. So far the service seems to be OK, though it recommends that I install some kind of extra software which I just ain’t gonna do! :) I Skyped with Shanna & the kids for a few minutes since they were planning to go out in the evening and there may not be another good opportunity. I pointed the computer camera out the window so he could see the planes and he asked if he could go on the airplane. I don’t think he understands yet that I am going away.

Not a lot happening here in the terminal. What sounds a lot like the fire alarm keeps sounding but nobody moves, so I guess it is not a fire alarm. Wonder where you are supposed to go in a terminal if there is a fire? Also, there is a little bird that keeps hopping around under the chairs. Seems pretty friendly.

I almost forgot to mention it, I am flying on Halloween, and many of the airline employees are dressed up for it. At least I think those are costumes? :P

Leaving Home - 10/31/2009

Up at 5 am this morning. Showered, put on some coffee, and ate a frozen omelette for breakfast. I walked the dogs in a light rain and by the time I got back it was time for my friend Mustafa to come and pick me up for the airport. I am carrying a bag for him which his father-in-law will pickup at the airport in Istanbul. We chatted a bit on the way over and found out that Turkish Airlines is the best and will be feeding us lots of food! He also tells me how H1N1 is getting really serious in Turkey, and that Ankara has closed its schools. After reducing his bag a little bit to make it fit under the weight limit, I check in and I’m ready to go. I say goodbye to Mustafa and head through security.

 There are only a few people in the security lines, so I quickly pass through into the departure area. I am flying American to JFK, so I will be departing out of the new Terminal 2 at RDU International. It is big and shiny and a major improvement over the old Terminal C. After a stop at the bathroom, I order a large coffee and sit down to check some last minute email and set my vacation auto-responder. After just a few minutes they start boarding. I take my seat in the front of the small commuter jet where Jose the flight attendant relieves me of my backpack. By this time, it is just getting light outside and the day is revealed to by dreary and overcast. At takeoff, the visibility is poor and I can’t even see to the end of the runway. After a few minutes we are above the clouds and the sun is shining brightly out of the east.

The trip to JFK International is short and I spend most of the time reading my bible. I have recently been felt encouraged to read through my Bible without jumping around, so I started with the first few chapters of Genesis. It has been a while (years?) since I have read through Genesis and my reading of it today has a sort of strange quality to it. The creation story reads more like the Silmarillion or The Magician’s Nephew than the straight factual report that it seemed to be before. I think it is sometimes good to take a break from the familiar parts of the Bible.

I arrived at JFK a little bit early with my bladder about to burst after my large coffee and a Diet Coke. After visiting the bathroom again I headed down to the baggage claim to get our bags. I’m not sure which terminal I am in nor where Turkish Airlines is located. I get some cash for the visa fee in Turkey and head to the AirTrain hoping that there will be a directory with the airlines listed on it. My hopes are met with success and I determine that I need to get from Terminal 8 to Terminal 1. After a grand tour of all the terminals, I finally arrive. The small Turkish Airlines ticket desk is right near the door where I enter, sandwiched between a large number of Korean Air counters. There isn’t anyone at the desk, but one of the Korean Air staff is nice enough to let me know that they will be in around 1pm. It is 10am now, so I head across to the upper level food court and stake out a good place to sit and wait for the next 3 hours. I can’t get onto the wireless internet so I abandon the tables with a nearby power supply and get a diet coke from McDonalds. I find a seat near a family with some several young boys. It sounds like they are speaking some dialect of Arabic.

I didn’t tell any of my family that I was going to be visiting Turkey. I was mostly concerned that my mother and grandmother would only be worrying about me. I did want to talk to them, though, before leaving, so I first called my Mom, who didn’t answer, and then my grandmother. I talked with her for 45 minutes or so, trying (despite the loud PA in the background) not to let on that I was at the airport. It was nice talking to her as it had been a while since we’d spoken on the phone. Sorry for not telling you guys!