Let me just start this off by saying that Kawika is a total champ. I mean I got lucky when it comes to babies!! (I think God knew that he was about to put us through some serious challenges but because he so intimately understands my shortcomings, he blessed me with a peaceful, happy baby.) Anyways, the first leg of our journey was a 10 hour flight and this kid hardly made a peep. The flight attendants loved his smiles and couldn't believe how relaxed and happy he was. On the complete opposite scale of peace, was the little girl sitting next to me. She is probably 2 years old and has the most amazing lung capacity I have ever witnessed. She screamed for 8 of the 10 hours of our flight. I mean she screamed. It was awful. Her poor mother couldn't do a thing to shut her up. I really felt for her.
The next leg of our journey was a 5 hour flight and although we didn't get the bulkhead seats we did get rows to ourselves so that was a pretty painless flight as well. As a side note, I carried on like 20 outfits for K ( just in case he had some blowouts) and literally he wore one outfit throughout the entire thing. But believe me, if I hadn't packed them and lugged them around, he would have been shooting out poop like crazy. Just sayin.
So when we landed, we had to clear customs but of course they wouldn't let us in without first purchasing some visas. That was a complete pain because we cleverly had exchanged our US dollars for Turkish Lira only to find out that at the TURKISH visa counter, they only accept US $ or Euro. So that was cool.
When we finally got to baggage claim (in Europe its called “baggage reclaim”) we looked all over for someone who might be looking for us. The team that Jordan plays for has an English speaking manager named “Ege” who was supposed to pick us up. We couldn't find anyone so we preceded to REclaim our bags. When we went to rent a little cart we found out that we needed coins. After begging people for change for a 5, getting turned down at every single cashier in the airport, having just about everyone tell us they don’t speak English, I tried for the vending machine. As I waited in line for my turn, some kind old man realized what I was trying to do and pointed me to a giant sign labeled “coins” where a lovely man gave me the change I had been searching for. Apparently more people in the world had the same problem as we did and the airport had indeed noticed the trend and provided a highly convenient means for resolving the problem. WE LEARNED THAT THE HARD WAY.
Well we decided to push on despite being completely confused, exhausted, and lost. As we exited to what we thought was the street, we noticed a crowd of people waiting for their loved ones in the reception area. I have never been in an airport where the baggage claim was blocked off to the public so that’s why I was confused and thought that Ege forgot about us. Anywho, that’s when I noticed two kind faces (one being Ege) who recognized us and came running over to greet us. By the way, they had a camera in their hands and were filming us the entire time and let me just say that after being in the air for 15 hours and traveling literally across the world, nobody looks good. So if anyone sees the footage, don't judge.
I don't remember much about the drive to our home other than that I couldn't stop thinking about which day it was and if it was Sunday, where was our church located and how early did we need to wake up to be on time. Eventually though we got to our new home. It’s located in a HUGE building with a pretty grand foyer and fully equipped with security, cameras, and lots of locks. It’s supposed to make me (a scared little American girl) feel safe but it really just makes me wonder why we need this level of security…?
Our place is cute.
As you can see in the photos, its a fully (IKEA) furnished 2 bed/ 1 bath apartment. And as we had guessed, the team didn't have our car, SIM cards, or internet ready for us. But in all fairness, we had been warned about this so our expectations weren't set too high. We were just grateful that Ege was thoughtful enough to purchase us some groceries and we had some water to drink! He is a very sweet man.
No comments:
Post a Comment