Turkey Day 7: Istanbul and Traveling

For our last day, we flew back to Istanbul and explored a few places on the Asian side of Istanbul, including Camilica Hill which boasts a fabulous view of the city. And lots of tulips. :)

We visited Beylerbeyi Palace, which was a summer residence of the Sultan built in the 1860s.

The guys were obsessed with taking panoramic photos of themselves. They'd start in one place, then as the person was rotating the camera, they'd run around to the other side so they could be in the picture twice. I am quite confident that they spent over an hour total taking these kinds of pictures in various places in Turkey.

The palace is right next to the Bosphorus Bridge, which was built in 1973.

We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, so you get a very thorough picture presentation of the outside.

After lunch we visited Maiden's Tower, which was built in 1110 by Byzantine Emperor (the eastern half of the Roman empire, which predominantly spoke Greek) Alexius Comnenus. There's a lot of history and legend surrounding this tower. The most famous one asserts that an emperor had a beloved daughter that was prophesied to die by a venomous snake on her 18th birthday. The emperor built this tower to protect his daughter, and he was the only one who visited her. On her 18th birthday he brought her a basket of fruit to celebrate her birthday and her outliving the prophecy. When she reached in to get some fruit, a snake, which had been hiding among the fruit, bit the princess and she died; thus, fulfilling the prophecy and prompting the name Maiden's Tower.

The next day we got up, packed our things, and flew home. The airport was a mess. A hot, stressful mess. We got there a few hours early, but the lines for everything were insanely long. In Turkey you have to go through a security check just to get into the building. Once we made it through that line, we had to wait in line to get checked in. They had self-serve kiosks but the kiosk wouldn't read my passport and it wouldn't work for a few others, so there were a handful of us that got held up in the line where only two workers were checking in a line of about 30 people. Of course. Once we finally made it through that line, we had to enter a line for immigration or customs or something, which fortunately fed right into the second security check. By this time, our flight was boarding so Luke and I were running through the halls to get to the very last gate in a very long terminal. When we got there, we waited in another lane and got our passports checked five more times in a distance of twenty feet. Not an exaggeration. I have no idea what they were checking so many times or how they imagined I would have been able to forge a passport in the five feet since they last checked it, but two hours later, we made it to the plane. We had to stop and wait eight different times between the front door of the airport and our seats on the plane. When we finally made it, Luke and I were delighted to find that we had an empty seat between us. We earned that seat, dang it.

The flight home was one of the longest I've sat through. Twelve hours is a long flight any time, but it was in the middle of the day so I wasn't tired. And it was unbearably hot on the plane again (tons of luxuries on Turkish Airlines, but crappy AC. Ridiculous). And it was Sunday so I felt like I had to do things that helped me feel closer to the Spirit. And it was Conference weekend so I kept reading Facebook updates about Conference while I was stuck on a plane and couldn't watch or listen to it. I was grateful to those who shared quotes, though, because it helped me feel connected.

On our little TVs there was an option to see the view out the front of the plane. This was it. I can't say being a pilot sounds very glamorous or exciting. Maybe on a clear day. There was also a little map that showed where our plane was. It was a sad time to watch us fly over Indiana to get to Houston. Too bad parachutes weren't an option.

We finally made it to Houston and had to wait in more long lines in customs and immigration. We hurried to catch our next flight back to Indianapolis only to find that it was delayed. I was grateful, because it gave me a chance to get some food before boarding the next flight. I guess they had overbooked the plane so they were asking for volunteers to take a flight the next day in exchange for a flight credit PLUS a hotel room and food vouchers. This has long been my dream, so I quickly volunteered and got my voucher, but I had to wait until the plane boarded to see if they really needed my seat. Unfortunately, our flight kept getting delayed until it was finally cancelled because they didn't have enough pilots to man all the flights (some sort of strike or something). So I had to stay an extra day and I didn't even get a flight credit. Lame-o. I did get my own fancy hotel room to sleep in that night, though. If only I'd been able to enjoy it for more than five hours. I woke up the next day showered, full, and rested and our flight was a quick one with free drinks and snacks, thanks to the pilot who felt that we deserved it (the entire flight was full of people who had their previous flights cancelled). Our assistant principal was kind enough to arrange for us all to have the day off, so I was able to come home, unpack, and relax before going to school the next day.

I am so grateful for the opportunity I had to go to Turkey at such an incredible price. I'm grateful to have gone with two Turkish men who were absolutely generous, kind, and thoughtful. They translated for us, explained things to us, and answered a million questions. I'm grateful to have gone with good friends from work. Though there were definitely times when we bugged each other, everyone was very easygoing and we all had a great time. My lasting impression of Turkey is one of a kind, generous people who care deeply not just about their friends and family but about all people. It was a refreshing and lovely experience.