Wonderland, Travel

August 29, 2001 --- Istanbul Airport

"Sorry, sir, I am afraid I cannot let you get on this flight without a transit visa."
"What do you mean?! Two weeks ago, I flew from New York through London to Istanbul without a transit visa!"
"I am afraid that they made a mistake."
"A mistake? No one told me that I need a transit visa just to change plane in London!"
"I am sorry sir, but I am afraid you have to get a transit visa first. Please go to the ticket office and they will reissue you a ticket."
"!@)(*#)$*)(#)(#$$#"

So here I was, at 8:30 AM in the morning of August 29 2001, standing in front of British Airway's check-in counter, talking with a BA agent. It was the last day of my two-week long trip in Turkey and I was suppose to board on a 8:45 AM flight back to New York and eventually I would be back in Madison, Wisconsin, before the start of the fall semester.

It is very hard to ask for perfection in this imperfect world. However, if there were such a thing as perfection, my trip in Turkey was as close to that as it could possibly be -- except the fact that at this very moment British Airway, along with the British Government, seemed to be in the process of messing up my near perfect vacation. Somehow, at that instance I made up my mind that I would not let them messing up my trip and I would leave Istanbul on the date as I had originally planned.

August 14, 2001 --- New York

It was almost four o'clock in the afternoon of August 14, 2001 and I was about to leave New York at 7 PM that day, en-routing to Istanbul for a two-week trip. My friend Gavin took me to a camera shop in downtown Manhattan so I can buy a replacement camera for my trip. One week before, I broke my EOS-5 and had it fixed and then broke it again less than 5 minutes after I got it back from the camera shop. I must confess that breaking things is one skill which I am really good at. Many of my friends would give personal testimonies to back me up on this. Since the shop couldn't fix it before I leave for Turkey, the only choice I had left is buying another one and that left a seven hundred dollars hole in my pocket before I even started the trip. On the bright side, I had a good excuse to get a new gadget and with it I was better prepared for the trip now. With my fancy new camera, I better take some good pictures, and lots of them.

August 15, 2001 --- London Heathrow Airport

I am not a well traveled person, but I have to say that I don't like London's Heathrow Airport, the same way I don't like Beijing's old airport. For the number of passengers it handles on a daily basis, the design of the airport is simply awful. The international arrival terminal is rather small with narrow corridors. But that was not the worst part. This is a connection terminal and in order to get to your connection flight, you need to get on the right bus and go to one of the four terminals located miles away. On top of that, there are not electronic information boards or monitors telling people which terminal to go to. Instead, you have the luxury of looking up the information on a single 2x4 board located on the wall of a narrow corridor while hundreds, if not thousands, of people try to go through the same corridor, lookup the same board and decide where to go. If you are lucky, there might be a poor airport employee, standing in the middle of the crowd, asking people where they are going and then direct them to the right bus terminal.

My flight from New York arrived at Heathrow in the early hour of August 15. Somehow, three or four other international flights managed to arrive precisely at the same minutes at the same terminal. Now imagine this: five Boeing 747 jumbo jets, arriving at the same time, unload hoards of people into this dinky little terminal that is serviced by buses and the people had no idea which bus to take and which terminal they should go. It was chaotic. Since I had two hours before my connecting flight to Istanbul, I was not as worried as some of my fellow passengers are. Furthermore I understood why the British use the word queue to refer to waiting in a line -- because the line could be very long!

August 15, 2001 -- Turkey, here I come!

A lot of people, including my parents, asked me why I decided to visit Turkey. Even more people still ask me the same question after I came back from the trip. I don't think I can ever come up with a good reason for my decision except the fact that I love traveling and I need a break from school and I am adventurous (to a certain degree :) However, after the trip, I can come up with many good reasons why everyone, if possible, should go and visit Turkey.

As my flight approached Istanbul, I can see the coast line of the city as well as the urban development going on all over the city. As I found out later on, the population of Istanbul is between 12 and 15 million and that makes it one of the top ten cities in the world (the entire Turkey, on the other hand, only has around 65 million people.) In addition, it is probably one of the few cities in the world that spans over two continents.

After I went through the custom, I was greeted by my officemate Tevfik and his father Mustafa. Tevfik and I study at the same university and he came back a week ago to spend some time with family before heading back to school. Although Tevfik is taller than his father, his father seems to be much stronger build than Tevfik. When I commented this to Tevfik, he confirmed my observation -- his father used to be the wrestling champion of Turkey!

August 15, 2001 -- First Turkish Meal

You might wonder why I devoted a section just for food. Well, I love food, especially ethnic food. I can claim, without any hesitation, that my stomach is a certified international stomach. And, as my friend Gavin often put it: I am always on a "see-food diet".

I had my first Turkish meal with Tevfik's family and it was an eye-opening experience. While Tevfik took me to meet his friend, his mother, a courteous, warm-hearted lady in her fifties, cook the entire family a sumptuous meal. And she does this everyday! Later on, as I found out more about Turkish culture, it appears to me that in most family, women do most of the family chores while men are responsible for supporting the family. This is not an uncommon thing in many part of the world. China, not until recently, had a similar familiar structure. More on this later, but let me now focus on the subject of food again.

By the time we got back from the short excursion, the dinner was all ready, sitting quietly on the table, waiting to be devoured by my hungry stomach. The dinner consists of bread, a staple of every Turkish meal; ayran, a drink whose main ingredients are yogurt and milk and may require an adventurous mind to get used to it, but it becomes one of my favorites immediately -- to everyone's surprise; a chicken dish and a lamb dish; Dolmas -- stuffed grape leaves; salad, and soup. It was a treat. Although I haven't learnt any Turkish yet, I immediately understood what I was supposed to do and I fulfilled my duty faithfully and laboriously -- from that meal on, I was always the last person who would leave the table, regardless of which meal. And this apparently made a good impression on the mother and every meal I am getting more food on my plate. Everyone was happy.

August 16 - 19, 2001 -- Exploring Istanbul

It would take me probably another paragraph to describe my first Turish breakfast, so I shall skip it here. However, the Turkish tidbits I wrote have a short summary about Turkish food.