The End
The ending was kind of funny.
It began with a quiet night in Istanbul after a day of shopping, involving an unexpected reunion with Angie, our Aussie friend from Cappadocia. We woke up bright and early on a snowy Friday morning to get to Taksim square for an 8am bus departure to the Airport. We arrived 20 minutes early and were told to grab a coffee because the bus wouldn't leave until 8:30. No problem, our flight was at 11:20. At 8:30 we got back on the bus and we sat there until 9 before we left. Ok, still no problem.
Once we were moving, Annie and I, being so accustomed to sleeping on busses are dozing and in between dozes, I noticed at times that we were stopped on the side of the road. I sleepily asked Annie "why are we stopped?" and then fell back asleep before I heard a reply. Eventually, we noticed that we had been stopped for a while and there was no sign of us moving again. Now we had a problem.
Luckily for us, so did all the other people flying to Milan, the Italians. We had good faith in them to keep the situation under control. They wasted no time in gesturing wildly and marching up to the front of the bus to demand to know the problem. It turns out, the windsheild wipers were broken and since it was snowng, the driver couldn't see.
I was glad that he wasn't attempting to drive us through the storm without a clear view of the road but I began to worry about our flight, then scheduled to take off in about an hour. People started getting off the bus and trying to flag down taxis which, on the highway, is not a common site and nobody was picked up. In the bad weather, we were an accident waiting to happen.
The driver assured us that another bus was coming so Annie and I got back on the bus to wait. When we eventually got on the other bus, the new driver demanded 4 more lira from each of us before we could go the rest of the way. The other driver having kept all our money every though he only brought us halfway.
Of course the plane was delayed anyway so we had plenty of time to waste at the airport before we took off for Milan. I missed my train to Nice from Milano Central by 30 minutes and was told I could take a 5 oclock train to Ventimiglia and then change for Nice with the same ticket. When I arrived in Ventimiglia at 10pm there were no more trains to Nice. I found a 40€ room at a hotel and crashed until the next morning when I would renew my efforts at getting back to France.
I got lucky in Nice and talked my way onto the train to Toulouse with my old ticket, which just meant I didn't have a seat so I had to play musical chairs for 8 hours.
Anyway, I made it. I'm now in France writing to you from Pamier's mediatéque. The children are still brats but I still like them.
And now, I'm on to planning what's next. All the headache, money, and uncertainty hasn't left me satisfied but rather thirsting for the next adventure. I can feel the Call of the Wild and want to duck out of Europe and take to the woods. I blame Annie, who has me reading a Novel about Lewis and Clark called The True Account.
I guess it never stops.
It began with a quiet night in Istanbul after a day of shopping, involving an unexpected reunion with Angie, our Aussie friend from Cappadocia. We woke up bright and early on a snowy Friday morning to get to Taksim square for an 8am bus departure to the Airport. We arrived 20 minutes early and were told to grab a coffee because the bus wouldn't leave until 8:30. No problem, our flight was at 11:20. At 8:30 we got back on the bus and we sat there until 9 before we left. Ok, still no problem.
Once we were moving, Annie and I, being so accustomed to sleeping on busses are dozing and in between dozes, I noticed at times that we were stopped on the side of the road. I sleepily asked Annie "why are we stopped?" and then fell back asleep before I heard a reply. Eventually, we noticed that we had been stopped for a while and there was no sign of us moving again. Now we had a problem.
Luckily for us, so did all the other people flying to Milan, the Italians. We had good faith in them to keep the situation under control. They wasted no time in gesturing wildly and marching up to the front of the bus to demand to know the problem. It turns out, the windsheild wipers were broken and since it was snowng, the driver couldn't see.
I was glad that he wasn't attempting to drive us through the storm without a clear view of the road but I began to worry about our flight, then scheduled to take off in about an hour. People started getting off the bus and trying to flag down taxis which, on the highway, is not a common site and nobody was picked up. In the bad weather, we were an accident waiting to happen.
The driver assured us that another bus was coming so Annie and I got back on the bus to wait. When we eventually got on the other bus, the new driver demanded 4 more lira from each of us before we could go the rest of the way. The other driver having kept all our money every though he only brought us halfway.
Of course the plane was delayed anyway so we had plenty of time to waste at the airport before we took off for Milan. I missed my train to Nice from Milano Central by 30 minutes and was told I could take a 5 oclock train to Ventimiglia and then change for Nice with the same ticket. When I arrived in Ventimiglia at 10pm there were no more trains to Nice. I found a 40€ room at a hotel and crashed until the next morning when I would renew my efforts at getting back to France.
I got lucky in Nice and talked my way onto the train to Toulouse with my old ticket, which just meant I didn't have a seat so I had to play musical chairs for 8 hours.
Anyway, I made it. I'm now in France writing to you from Pamier's mediatéque. The children are still brats but I still like them.
And now, I'm on to planning what's next. All the headache, money, and uncertainty hasn't left me satisfied but rather thirsting for the next adventure. I can feel the Call of the Wild and want to duck out of Europe and take to the woods. I blame Annie, who has me reading a Novel about Lewis and Clark called The True Account.
I guess it never stops.
posted by emily at 4:26 PM
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