One of my favorite parts of traveling to Istanbul was meeting people from all over. On the plane on the way to Istanbul via Paris, I met a couple from Guatemala who were traveling home from visiting their kids who live in Spain. They are both doctors and we talked about life, the States, Istanbul, Spain, Guatemala, and faith in God and how that affects one's life.On the flight from Paris to Istanbul, I attempted to talk to the Turkish woman next to me, but most of our "conversation" consisted of her looking at me as if I was crazy and smiling nicely. She did say "Istanbul is very nice" as soon as we got within view and asked if I'd ever been there before. She seemed sweet and I was amazed and her bravery to travel alone when it seemed that she spoke neither English nor French (as we were traveling from Paris). But she got along fine.
My next new friend was a dear college aged girl, who offered me to hold her arm, as I was too short to reach the pole on the bus above my head and the bus wasn't the smoothest ride. As I continued to almost fall over, she then said, "Hold tighter" so I did and we talked for awhile since she spoke nearly flawless english, as do many turks.
I believe that it was that night that we went to a restaurant where there was a woman making the tortilla-like bread that went with our meal. As we walked in Leanne, our friend and fabulous tour guide explained what the woman was doing. I can't remember what she said, but she blinked at us (with both eyes, a long blink), which in turkish culture mean "I like you" (or a bit more than a smile. We went and sat down and then talked to her a bit before we left, blinking at ehre and telling here that the food was really good. As we were leaving the woman making the tortillas told the owner, "I love them!" Another amazingly kind turk. Everytime we passed the building we waved and blinked at her and she did the same and blew us kisses.
The next day as we went to see the big sites of Istanbul, including the Aya Sophia Mosque, I found two kind old men who would pose for me to take their picture everytime I ran into them. Very fun, particularly since I love taking people pictures.
The following day as we went on a boat ride up the Bosphorus sea up to the Black Sea and then back to Istanbul, we stopped in a town known for freshly made yogurt. Instead of ice cream shops there were yogurt shops with deliciously plain yogurt. As I went to the bathroom I met another dear, dear old woman waiting in line with me. She smiled at me, patted my face and said "choke gazelle," or you are beautiful. She said some other kind words, although I'm not exactly sure what she said. As she entered and left the stale before I entered, she came out and kissed me on both cheeks before leaving and said to have a good day. She definitely endeared me to the turkish people.
Next were some saleswomen where I bought a jacket. The told me I had beautiful eyes, which definitely made my day.
On Easter we went to an International Church in downtown Istanbul. There we met people from all over - including Iran, Iraq, England, Scotland, South Africa, Nigeria, Uganda, Romania, Turkey (of course) and the US. It was fun to be with such diverse group of people.
After church and lunch, we visited Starbucks to journal and relax. There another girl, see the picture above, named Esin came up to me, asked if I spoke English and asked if I could help her with her English homework. I said yes and she asked me several questions about myself as she trembled from having to speak English. Basically her assignment was to talk to a native speaker.
The last day we were in Istanbul we stopped into an amazingly large Christian and English Bookstore. There we met a college aged girl who shared here story of how she had come to know Jesus, after having grown up in a Muslim family. And we met two older women. All three asked us about ourselves and told us the names of everyone in their family that hasn't yet made Jesus their Lord. They asked us to pray for them, taught us some turkish phrases, and told us that they would pray for us to find husbands. They were very dear. They also asked us to pray for Turkey and pray that Jesus would come soon. It was great to be with them.
On the plane back, I talked to a woman from San Francisco who had gone to Turkey for her spring break, as she is a 5th grade teacher. And then after a 5 hour layover in Paris full of suduko puzzles and lots of people watching, I sat next to a German man going to Madrid on a business trip. We talked about some of the fun cultural diffences between France & Spain with Germany & the US, particularly as it relates to business and working together.
All and all, despite some digestive issues that resulted from the trip, I wouldn't change a thing about our trip and a highlight was both meeting neat people who showed me much sweetness and then seeing how God is at work in people's lives in Istanbul and how he's even using Spaniards there to tell people about the love and freedom found in Christ alone. :)
