I'm back, alive, and sharing now with you my travel journal as written on busses, on planes, in hotel rooms, and in the more atmospheric hotel lobbies, unedited and complete with run-un sentences, spelling errors, and all the boring bits, with just a sampling of the 600+ photos I took that may make it onto Picassa, but only if I've the energy to caption them all, 'cuz otherwise what's the point? Lets us commence our adventures now. (Also as I'm vaguely fanatical about the spacing on this blog, er, and everything else in life, and I know photos will booger it up, you'll see lots of fancy stars, oh boy!)
* * *
"It's already tomorrow today."
*
*
The longest days are those that at some mysterious point while in the sky, the next begins before the first ever ended; when you find yourself already fast into the next day. This kind of travel is exhausting.
*
How many breakfasts can I possibly eat in a day? Coffee and doughnut before boarding the plane, muffin and carrots purchased one the first flight, full breakfasts served on both subsequent flights, with only the most random spattering of lunch/dinner tucked in with no regard to the general order these things are done in. Which breakfast signalled the start of a new day? I cannot say, I never can sleep while on the move.
*
Is it the food that fuels me, or the adrenaline/excitement of an escorted rush through Frankfurt airport in a deperate flight to catch a flight? Or the anxious moments spent filling out forms when your luggage didn't make it to the plane as you barely did? Or could it simply be love, of living a life travelled, of seeing the lives that exist on the other side of the world, or living out of a suitcase in (hopefully) fresh sheets each night?
*
Our first hotel is Kent, nearly across the street from a mosque and not far from the bazaar. With no luggage to deposit,we wandered the streets. Very few women to be seen, and well-dressed men everywhere. They openly stare at us, either because we are foreign, women, or possibly immodest in their eyes. The siewalks are hapharzardous, a strewn collection of cobbles and stones, steep, windy, and just as crowded. The traffic, even the parking, is without method. The stargest place I've yet been, nothing compares. I can't say I don't entirely enjoy the attentions, smiles, stares, comments of men, I'd been warned, and I'll enjoy it in the good humour it's meant.
*
A quick nap before dinner, out heads had barely hit the pillow when the call to prayer sang out from the mosque. Magical. The most exotic experience, to hear prayers echo though a city, bouncing over rooftops, through crowded streets, into every open window. I hope I never tire of it.
*
Dinner was what appeared to be authentic Turkey food! A cold salsa type mix served on grilled eggplant, a flaky pastry filled with soft cheese, breaded and fried white fish, and the best fruit salad for dessert: apples, oranges, cherries, pomegranate, grapefruit (which I ate around) amd kiwi! No stinking melons, I think I love it here!
*
The dessert was so good I forgot to even take a picture of all the good stuff that was in it :)
No comments:
Post a Comment