In Seattle for the weekend!
So, I was staying over at a friends house on the Tuesday night of March 6th, and at appx. 4 am Wednesday morning, March 7, I was awakened by an unusually loud call to prayer right outside the window. After reading for a bit, I got onto iChat and started talking with Bryan - around 6 am my time. He mentioned that he was going to be a panelist at a Conference over the weekend. On a whim, I jumped onto kayak.com and searched ticket prices to Seattle from Vancouver. When I discovered a suprisingly cheap ticket on the esteemed British Airways leaving at 9:10 am, Wednesday morning, March 7, from Istanbul, Bryan and I had 5 minutes of rather hurried discussion regarding a quick trip. I decided to see if I could even buy an airplane ticket less than 3 hours before the flight was to leave.
I guess you can because at approximately 6:39 I was throwing on my tennies (still in my pajamas at this point) and jacket. After writing to B - "im coming" I threw my computer into my backpack, told Mary I was going to the States last minute (her bleary eyed comment, "That rocks!") and literally ran out the door. I careened down the hill to the Bosphorus skirting the edge of the cemetery, my shoelaces flying. Upon reaching the coast road, not a car/person/thing was in sight, so I turned and starting running for Bebek, about half a mile away. As I ran, a bus running curiously early for being driven by a Turk drove up and pulled over to my wild gesturing. I jumped on, disheveld and I'm sure bewildering to the occupants of the bus.
At the next stop I jumped off of the still moving bus (time = 6:51 am) and ran towards a taxi stand. All the drivers were hotboxing in one of the cars, but one of them got slowly out and got into his car. We had a quick conversation after which followed the absolutely slowest taxi ride I've ever had in my life, let alone Istanbul, and I only wanted to go a mile or so. The quickest road was closed so we had to take a winding detour up the steep hill. When we reached the dorm gate, I jumped out and ran all the way in and up three flights of stairs past the suprised door watchman.
I entered my room at 7:01 am. By 7:09 I was completely packed and changed and back out the door. As I ran out the door past the door guy, I asked him to call a taxi, which drove up to the gate just as I ran up and jumped in. The nice and chatty taxi driver took off as I took the time to finally tie my shoes and double check that I had my passport. I didn't think to double check my sanity. No time.
He got me to the airport in a little over half an hour, a trip that usually takes me over 2 hours. I walked up to security around 7:46 am, went right through, walked up to the ticket counter that had no line, got my ticket, walked to customs, no line, went right through with a smile and had time to go to the restroom to brush my teeth before going to my gate and walking pretty much straight onto my plane.
When I got to London I figured I should probably tell Mom what I had just done, and double check that B knew I was nuts enough to actually be coming, and not just joking.
When I arrived in the States, B suprised me and met me in the airport, saving me the bus trip over the border.
We had an awesome weekend - skiing at Whistler, shopping, going to an awesome SS workshop, feeding lemurs and giraffes - and all before my flight took off 7 pm U.S. time on Sunday, approximately 98 hours after I had arrived, to finish off my more than 40 hours of total travel time.
It was a pretty quick trip, but I would do it again in a second - it was so much fun! I'm not sure my bank account would like me to do it again too soon though... :)
So, I was staying over at a friends house on the Tuesday night of March 6th, and at appx. 4 am Wednesday morning, March 7, I was awakened by an unusually loud call to prayer right outside the window. After reading for a bit, I got onto iChat and started talking with Bryan - around 6 am my time. He mentioned that he was going to be a panelist at a Conference over the weekend. On a whim, I jumped onto kayak.com and searched ticket prices to Seattle from Vancouver. When I discovered a suprisingly cheap ticket on the esteemed British Airways leaving at 9:10 am, Wednesday morning, March 7, from Istanbul, Bryan and I had 5 minutes of rather hurried discussion regarding a quick trip. I decided to see if I could even buy an airplane ticket less than 3 hours before the flight was to leave.
I guess you can because at approximately 6:39 I was throwing on my tennies (still in my pajamas at this point) and jacket. After writing to B - "im coming" I threw my computer into my backpack, told Mary I was going to the States last minute (her bleary eyed comment, "That rocks!") and literally ran out the door. I careened down the hill to the Bosphorus skirting the edge of the cemetery, my shoelaces flying. Upon reaching the coast road, not a car/person/thing was in sight, so I turned and starting running for Bebek, about half a mile away. As I ran, a bus running curiously early for being driven by a Turk drove up and pulled over to my wild gesturing. I jumped on, disheveld and I'm sure bewildering to the occupants of the bus.
At the next stop I jumped off of the still moving bus (time = 6:51 am) and ran towards a taxi stand. All the drivers were hotboxing in one of the cars, but one of them got slowly out and got into his car. We had a quick conversation after which followed the absolutely slowest taxi ride I've ever had in my life, let alone Istanbul, and I only wanted to go a mile or so. The quickest road was closed so we had to take a winding detour up the steep hill. When we reached the dorm gate, I jumped out and ran all the way in and up three flights of stairs past the suprised door watchman.
I entered my room at 7:01 am. By 7:09 I was completely packed and changed and back out the door. As I ran out the door past the door guy, I asked him to call a taxi, which drove up to the gate just as I ran up and jumped in. The nice and chatty taxi driver took off as I took the time to finally tie my shoes and double check that I had my passport. I didn't think to double check my sanity. No time.
He got me to the airport in a little over half an hour, a trip that usually takes me over 2 hours. I walked up to security around 7:46 am, went right through, walked up to the ticket counter that had no line, got my ticket, walked to customs, no line, went right through with a smile and had time to go to the restroom to brush my teeth before going to my gate and walking pretty much straight onto my plane.
When I got to London I figured I should probably tell Mom what I had just done, and double check that B knew I was nuts enough to actually be coming, and not just joking.
When I arrived in the States, B suprised me and met me in the airport, saving me the bus trip over the border.
We had an awesome weekend - skiing at Whistler, shopping, going to an awesome SS workshop, feeding lemurs and giraffes - and all before my flight took off 7 pm U.S. time on Sunday, approximately 98 hours after I had arrived, to finish off my more than 40 hours of total travel time.
It was a pretty quick trip, but I would do it again in a second - it was so much fun! I'm not sure my bank account would like me to do it again too soon though... :)
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