Istanbul hos geldiniz . . . continued!

[Written late last night . . .] To pick up where I left off, we began our journey to Istanbul on Wednesday, arriving at the airport around two o’clock in the afternoon Eastern Time, and we wearily stumbled into our apartment in Istanbul 18 hours later. For the first leg of our journey, we flew business class, and though I’ve flown on airplanes more times than I care to count, this was only my second time in business class. Compared to coach, I found it incomparably luxurious, but for the first hour I was distracted from my good fortune by my hysterical son, who was screaming inconsolably. (How delightful, to be that mother—the one with the screaming baby.) When he eventually fell into an exhausted slumber, I soaked up the comforts of business class, including ample space, my own large TV screen, a delicious meal of beef ribs and white wine, complimented by ice cream with chocolate and nuts for dessert, and a fully reclining seat. After sleeping on and off for four hours, my son awoke to a moody, irritable state of mind (Who wouldn’t at one in the morning?), but we managed to avoid any prolonged screaming episodes until the end of the flight. After a brief layover in Munich, with just enough time to transfer from one plane to the next, we started on the final leg of our journey, and two hours later we touched down in Istanbul, on the opposite side of the world from where we had stood less than a day before. It seemed like it took forever to find our way to the right baggage claim, collect our bags, and connect with our ride, and meanwhile I spent a long time splitting my attention between our luggage and our baby, while my tired but competent husband tried to figure out the location of our two lost suitcases (which we did not find and which arrived at our apartment a day later), and our sponsor from the consulate who was supposed to pick us up (but who could not come find us, since in Istanbul everyone must wait at the front of the airport for their friends or relatives and no one can come as far as the baggage claim.

I was thankful for a warning I had received about Turks’ love for babies, because while my son was toddling around the baggage claim, a lovely security employee (Turkish women are generally gorgeous—imagine lots of thin, dark, well-dressed women parading around the city in stilettos) came from out of nowhere and snatched up my baby in her arms. Startled and perturbed, he burst into frightened tears, but instead of putting him down, the security employee just tried harder to make him smile. That was but the start of his newfound fame. He seems to be virtually the most popular guy in Istanbul at the moment (excluding Ataturk, of course, who is honored throughout the city by many statues and monuments). It is hard to shop at the mall because whenever I go into a store, I am bombarded by female employees who are enthralled with Teddy: pinching his cheeks, making little noises to amuse him, and urging him repeatedly to come to them. Although perceptibly appreciative of the attention, he steadfastly refuses to go to any of them and clings to me as tightly as if I am a rock in the midst of a stormy sea. Over time, I think he will become less shy and more interactive with the Turkish women (and men!) who seem so taken with him, but for now his Western space bubble is unwaveringly intact. As a mother, I can’t help but appreciate how everyone seems to think as highly of my baby as I do, but I hope the excessive attention doesn’t go to his head, since I can’t imagine he will ever be more popular than this. ;-)

Exploring our house for the first time was overwhelming. We have relocated from an 800 square foot condo with a single bathroom and a single loft bedroom to a capacious apartment with three and a half bedrooms and three and a half bathrooms. I hardly know what to do with so much space! The kitchen is filled with cupboards, the long hallways house three closets and one wardrobe, the laundry room has two cupboards and space for folding clothes, and the master bedroom has a walk-in closet half the size of our previous living room! For a type-A, obsessive and compulsive perfectionist such as myself, the availability of so much storage space is intoxicating. Yesterday I took advantage of a rare moment to myself to open each one of the kitchen cupboards and investigate the organizational possibilities, and I was soon smiling to myself in the silliest manner, while my soul experienced a complex mixture of calm and excitement at the thought of having a place for everything. I am sure any perfectionist reading this blog can relate, and as for the rest of you, you have permission to consider me crazy. J Suffice it to say, I am filled with thankfulness in my heart to God, who so graciously supported me through over a year of living in cramped quarters with an energetic, restless, intense baby, and who has now brought me to a place of space and rest. “The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places: yes, I have a good inheritance.”

This blog post is quickly getting out-of-hand, and I am either giving false hopes to those patient readers who actually enjoy a long post or scaring away those readers who prefer the short and sweet, so I will conclude my update with a brief account of today’s visit to the open-air market. Although I had high hopes for Turkish produce, I was still amazed and elated by the quality and quantity of fruits and vegetables at the market. It did my California heart good to see the vibrantly-colored peppers, delicately-translucent green and yellow grapes, and delightfully-sizeable peaches. It had been a long time since this girl, who grew up in the San Joaquin Valley, encountered such an impressive produce paradise. Imagine walking into Whole Foods but seeing larger volumes of fresher-looking produce for half the price, and there you have the Turkish farmers’ market.

If I haven’t already convinced you indirectly, I am now telling you forthrightly: You must visit Istanbul! The city is filled to the brim with interesting sights and characters, and every day brings a new adventure. Red-roofed houses stretch as far as the eye can see, interspersed with elegant minarets reaching up to the sky as straight as pencils, and the bright blue Bosporus divides the city in two with a splendor only experienced in person and not in pictures or words. Come, come to Istanbul, where every Turk will greet you with a friendly hos geldiniz (Welcome!), and where the city itself will invite you into its arms and steal a permanent place in your heart.