istanbul = constantinople = brick fucking cold

So I took off as planned at 5:30 on the tenth -- got comfortable in my seat, started blasting the ruthie mix (not to be confused with the roofie mix, which is actually how I met her in the first place -- but thats a story for another time and place), kicked off the shoes -- life was good... that is, until the captain got on the mic and started blasting some turkish gibberish. Now the thing about Turkey is that English speakers are slightly rare, and by slightly I mean extremely. Luckily, Turkish airlines, anticipating the possibility that something might go wrong, was nice enough to prerecord a number of useless generic messages in case of such an eventuality that obviously explained absolutely nothing. Fantastic.

What I eventually pieced together, with the help of some of my fellow passengers, was that Istanbul was covered in a fog the consistency of a post-big mac dump, and that we would be making an emergency 5 hr pit spot in Anatalya. Then, when we got to Istanbul (and believe me, they were not joking about that fog -- even when it was safe to land, that shit reduced visibility ON THE GROUND to about 15 feet in front of you) they announced that our flight to Bangkok had unfortunately bounced 30 minutes before we arrived and that we would be spending a full day in Istanbul and catching a flight at the same time the following evening. This was all fine and dandy except I was expecting to be in Bangkok, and had dressed for the occasion -- long sleeve T shirt (go mets!) and shorts. Oh, and they had already shipped our bags to Thailand. Oh, and the temperature in Istanbul was below freezing. I ventured out for a brief walk but aside from that, spent my time sleeping and watching TV.

So eventually, the next day, I make it to the airport in Istanbul. Funny thing that I noticed: As soon as you get in, you're immediately searched and all of your baggage (carry on and checked luggage) is xrayed and searched. Cool. Then you go through passport control and into duty free. When you get to the gate, however, and are about to board the plane, you get searched again. I was obviously curious why -- I mean, didn't we get searched already? The answer, apparently, is that in duty-free they sell prohibited items that are not allowed aboard the plane. Knives, sharp objects and the like. So why are they sold? I asked. All I got was a shrug in reply. Apparently they sell it to you in order to confiscate it at the gate. Go figure. The other funny thing was that Turkish duty free on the plane consisted entirely of.... cigarettes. Nothing else. Gooooooooooooood.

Anyways, so now I'm in Bangkok. I checked into a spot, updated my loyal readers, and now I'm about to go make some friends. I'll let you knwo how it goes.