First Friday! (Take Two)

September 5, 2012

ISTANBUL – 17 hours into my trip, 7 hours to go.

I took off from John F. Kennedy International Airport after midnight on September 4. Security, shoes off, shoes on, hurry up and wait. After a long, sweaty flight, I am in the Istanbul Atatürk Airport in Turkey. It’s crowded, hot, loud, and smells like chic perfume that I can’t afford to buy. I have yet to spot a person yet that looks more disheveled than me. No one else in this airport seems to be sweating, other than a pale, red-faced man I passed while I was searching for a place to sit with a T-shirt that read, “Irish Boys.” I am sitting on a worn leather seat in a row of nine in front of a swanky duty-free shop. It’s cooler here by the entrance than being amidst the swarming crowd passing by.

I wish I had a shirt to change into, but due to a last-minute packing crisis, I forgot to put a spare set of clothes in my backpack. Amman will just have to welcome me the way I left it last time I was there: a sweaty, exhausted mess…

AMMAN – So that was how I felt before I landed in–country. Since arriving, it’s been a jet-lagged blur that has finally abated after a few days of nightly insomnia and a Friday spent visiting with friends, hanging downtown, and pistachio picking.

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