Out of the Peace Corps! Enjoying Istanbul -- April 22, 2009

I still can't quite absorb the fact that I am out of the Peace Corps! The last three days in Bucharest were so busy with signing papers and getting final interviews that I hardly had time to think. I did have a last dinner with some friends and an impromptu birthday party. I also have a big bruise on my arm from a blood test that went a little wrong.

I uploaded a bunch of photos to the Istanbul 1 photo album, and I'm sure there will be many more images of Turkey, in case you want to travel with me vicariously. I am thoroughly enjoying Istanbul and will have a lot more to say about Turkey in the next couple of weeks. I am surprised how spoiled I was with fast broadband internet access in Romania, because here in Turkey it seems slow! Of course, everything else is more modern, and also more expensive. I will have to get used to being in the Western world again, and in countries that are far more wealthy than Romania. At least I can get online, and keep in touch on occasion. I have been staying at a nice little hotel in a great location (http://www.modernsultan.com), but will move to the hostel where I will meet my friend Lucy tomorrow. We will have one day together here in the city before we leave on our two weeks of travel together around the country.

As you can see in the pictures, most of the local women wear headscarves, and often long toe-length coats. Occasionally there is a woman fully covered except for her eyes, but not too often. I understand that these are women who are highly religious and have a strict Islamic belief. You will also see a new friend in some photos, Courtney from Washington, D.C. We spent a couple of days wandering the city together, and I really enjoyed her company. She just returned from a three-month volunteer program in Morocco followed by a two-week vacation in Spain. Now she's leaving on an 18-day overland journey to Damascus, the kind that involves camping and sharing the cooking duties. I'm looking forward to hearing all about it. I can see that a collateral result of my Peace Corps experience is meeting new people who can relate, know other PCVs, or would like to know more about my service time.

To get here, I had a very long overnight train, on a 20-plus hour trip, where we were disturbed frequently for passport checks. I got to see Bulgaria from the train windows as we passed through, but feel that I still would like to visit there someday. Of course all the signs were in cyrillic, so I couldn't understand a thing. I'm sort of relieved that I wasn't sent there by the PC, at least Romanian is a Latin-based language. Getting through the Turkish border in the middle of the night was interesting. Apparently it is the only border crossing in Europe where you actually have to get off the train, and I had to stand in three different lines through a confusing process to get a visa stamp. The first one was, believe it or not, at a liquor store where they screened our passports. Most of the travelers are Turkish or EU members, so they have a much easier time and only one queue for their entry approval. Then after crawling back into my bunk, thinking I could sleep for a while, there came another knock and yet another passport check.

Istanbul is as beautiful as everyone says, but I will admit that I'm sort of glad that today is windy and rainy, so I can work on the computer and not feel guilty about wasting the day. I am saving a couple of major sights to see with Lucy, the famous Blue Mosque and the nearby palace and harem. But I did tour Hagia Sophia yesterday, and went to the Spice Market and wandered the city streets. Photos are in the online album, but here are some of my favorites.

And here are some last pictures of PCV friends: