Reno – Seattle – Istanbul.

The first leg of our travels has gone (relatively) smoothly… we left Reno Tuesday afternoon & navigated the SeaTac airport to first find our International terminal (never flown Intl out of Seattle) & then shared a burger at one of the few food places available until our flight was called & we mentally prepared for the 12 hour flight in front of us.

Good news from the start – there was an empty seat in-between theBean & I, although because of where our row was located, we had the rigid metal dividers between us instead of the usual “lift-up” arms, thereby relegating us to the actual territory of our seats. No matter – it was a blessing & a joy to be able to let-down & occupy the extra space. I was able to catch a couple hours of sleep spaced out in 30-45 minute chunks throughout the ‘night’, & the 12 hour flight eventually came to an end as we slowly descended into a city & place that I’ve only read about in history books & seen in movies, & that I never thought I’d actually BE in.

Istanbul is massive – 15 million residents. Architecture that spans every known kingdom & nation that occupied it in its long & storied history (Byzantium or Byzantion to Constantinople to Istanbul). Big pockets of modernity. The whole gamut of people groups, nations, tribes, & tongues. East meets West, literally.

Our bags came – booyah! Navigated the largest baggage carousel system I’ve ever seen in person out to the place where we could order our ride. The research I did last week on transit in Istanbul came in handy as we found our way to the appropriate space to order up a ride-share using a version of Turkish-style Uber. Our driver arrived in about 5 minutes & we were off.

The driver had 4(!) phones mounted on his dash – one for this app, three for him to alternatively talk, text, & browse IG. True story. He weaved expertly through the chaos of rush-hour Istanbul traffic for about 45 minutes until we arrived at our hotel unscathed, no thanks to the tour bus driver that came an inch from clipping the motorcycle driver in front of us as bus driver guy obliviously swerved into our lane, cutting us off, earning him an earful, complete with hand gestures & expressions of extreme disgust from a collection of drivers.

After getting checked in & showered & cleaned up from a long travel day, we walked to a small cafe across the street for a lateish (for us) dinner. Beef sausage & cheese omelettes on an open air patio (it’s hot!) Surrounded by the sights, sounds of traffic & conversation, & smells (big city & cigarettes everywhere) – its a beautiful place. We made our way back to the hotel to wind down with a Hallmark show (thank you VPN.)

Slept most of the night, with a couple hours of wakefulness in the middle of the night. We both went back to sleep around 4:30 & didn’t wake up til 9:20 or so, in time to make it to their (massive) dining room for the complementary breakfast. Eggs, omelette stations, breakfast foods, yogurts, real fruits (best watermelon & plum ever) a collection of coffee & tea stations, & people. From everywhere. Every tribe, tongue, & nation. In a room of approx. 200 people, I clocked 1(!) other American couple. I proudly wore my Pete’s Meat BBQ shirt to breakfast, thankful that it had a cow on it instead of a pig… because pigs are frowned upon in this part of the world.

After breakfast, we went back to our room & read, slept a bit more, & now we’re planning on some foot-travels to a local store to pick up some necessities we didn’t bring with us. The plan is to head back to the airport tonight around 9 pm our time, as our flight heads out at 12:45 a.m. landing in our destination city 8 a.m. ish Friday 7/25.

Thank you for your prayers – we aim to stay in touch using the blog etc. as much as we are able. Looking forward to connecting with our (old & new) friends in Central Asia; we’ve got a few days in the city, staying with a local pastor, until we head out Monday, 7/28 for the 1st Discipleship/Leadership Training (DLT) conference.