It’s a little like kindergarten

We have reminders similar to this at all our food spots.
It's a lot like kindergarten.

Anyone who has more than one child knows that if one gets sick, the other gets sick, and then the parents get sick and then it cycles all over again.  God bless school teachers. I have no idea how they’re not sick every single day of their lives. Little kids are germ spreaders.

The best thing to do, of course, is to continually wash your hands. Forget those sanitizers. Studies show that hand-washing is the best thing to do to prevent the spread of germs. With all those kids sharing space, it’s the proven way of halting germs.

This place doesn’t have any kids, but we’re teeming with humanity. Many times, it’s hot and sweaty humanity, but even on the best air-conditioned days, it’s still a bunch of people sharing spaces. So when one person gets some kind virus, like a cold, it has the potential to shoot like wildfire to the rest of us. For the most part, we all congregate in the food spaces, especially. There’s more than one of them, but most people, at least twice a day, are going to congregate in our feeding halls.

To combat fast-spreading colds (or worse), we’ve got to wash our hands. One way to make sure we all do this is to not let us eat until we do. I’m not sure if this would work with kindergartners, but boy, it seems to work for hungry adults.

Prior to every meal, whether we eat in or take out, we have to do two things. One is swipe our food cards, and that’s just because the government counts everything. We’re not billed personally for our food, but somewhere at pay grades higher than mine, someone has to calculate who ate what. My guess is somewhere someone sets an average price for a meal and that our little cards tell some system what my hiring mechanism is, like if I am a contractor, direct hire or what. The bill, I suppose, goes from there. I really don’t know; I just know that I have to tap my card before I can grab a tray and go through the line.

Similar to a photo on the rotating announcements screen.
It says something like, "This person forgot to wash her hands.
"Don't be this person!"

But before that, I have to wash my hands. It’s just kind of silly to me, because, in general, the last thing I did before heading to the food room was go to the bathroom and wash my hands. (Tip I heard this week: always pee before you leave a building, because you never know what will happen before you arrive at your destination.) But once I get to the food place, whichever one it is, I have to wash them again.

And they make it obvious and easy. There are signs everywhere to wash your hands, reminding us of the evil diseases that can spread. And there are sinks. Many stations of sinks, like maybe a dozen. These bewildered me at first, because there’s no handle and I thought that meant they were motion-detected.  The first meal, I waved my hands under one after another, trying to turn one on. Finally someone bailed me out; there’s a foot pedal. You pump it, add soap, wash and dry. And you can’t eat until you do so.

Honestly, I have no idea how the person at the card-tap place can possibly check everyone, because he or she is always busy assisting with the take-out containers, but apparently they have been known to catch people trying to sneak in with dirty hands.

There are several TVs going in the main food hall, and one of them runs slides of announcements. There’s once slide with a photo of a woman with her eyes censored out so you can’t identify her. I haven’t sat close enough to that TV to read the fine print, but from what I understand it says something about her not washing her hands. We’re into shame, I guess. But hey, if you didn’t learn it in kindergarten, there’s just little hope for you now and maybe shame is the best way to go.

Simba is lion

My world shrunk. It’s now the size of a tiny college campus and I live in a dorm. Well, I guess most dorms don’t have kitchens and mine does, so maybe it’s an apartment. Although there's nothing in the kitchen except a Twix bar, a tea bag and a packet of microwave popcorn I took from the Marriott in Rosslyn. That's pretty dorm-y.

Whatever the little place is, it’s home until May 2020, inchallah. After a three-day journey that encompassed three planes and a helicopter, I arrived in Baghdad on Thursday. It was a little worrisome getting out, because Florence was still hanging around the DC-NY path, which was my first leg. The flight left about an hour late and I had a tight connection but wound up leaving for Amman from a fairly close gate and even had enough time to grab another bottle of tea before hopping on the 10.5-hour flight.

Since, more or less (mostly less), the flight from Amman-Baghdad was a charter (VERY “less;” this is a pretty generous description but I’m not sure how else to classify it) that leaves in the morning, the itinerary calls for coming in the day before and staying at a hotel (hi, Marriott!) and then turning around the next morning for the last airplane flight and short helicopter ride.

A word about the Marriott: Oh, man. There is a world of difference between a regular Marriott breakfast and a Marriott Residence breakfast. There was so much to choose from! Not a lot of time, since it opened at 6:30 and my ride left at 7, but still. It was fabulous.

The evening before, I was so tired from the overnight flight from JFK that I didn’t bother trying to go out and scrounge food. I ate right at the sports bar in the hotel, Champions. They had several games going on, but I don’t follow “futbol.” I chose a seat in the decidedly American display section, sitting under autographed pictures of Nolan Ryan and Wayne Gretzky, even as the music played “Daydream Believer” by the Monkees. My stay in Amman was short, surreal and sleepless. Totally jet-lagged, I crashed heavily at 9 p.m. but woke up three times between then and midnight and couldn’t get to sleep at all after that.

So, by 1 p.m. the following day, I was nearing zombie-like status but tried to keep up with my sponsor, who showed me around the place.

The post here has been described to me as “a cruise ship that never docks,” a high school or college campus, Communist Russia and a minimum-security prison. I think those last two are because there’s a lot of security, a lot of cameras and we have to wear our ID tags everywhere.

But this place is fantastic. My apartment is laid out nicely, has two TVs with American channels and water I can drink straight out of the faucet. I’m also conveniently located across from the building that houses the smaller (and less intimidating) gym, the pool, post office, little shops and the place that’s called Baghdaddy’s, which is a cross between a bar and a multi-purpose room.

This place is not all Americans and Iraqis. There are contractors here, and they are from, quite literally, all over. Some are TDYers from other embassies and will be here for 3 months to a year or so, and some have resigned from their embassy jobs to take spots here as contractors and have been here for years.

There is food everywhere. This is where the “cruise ship” part comes in. Each meal is served for a number of hours every day, but if you miss that or just want something small, there’s another place to go to grab that, too. And it’s good food. The first night, I had Jamaican chicken and couscous. I split a cinnamon roll with someone this morning and it was fabulous. I also had pancakes, grits and bacon. I had soup and collards last night, mostly because I was stuffed from the spinach, chicken and mashed potatoes I’d had for lunch.

Fortunately, there are two gyms. I missed spin class today because I was either in the wrong gym or the wrong room, but I got back on the elliptical for the first time since leaving Istanbul. So today I hurt, but I earned the half a cinnamon roll.

Since the weekend here is Friday-Saturday (meaning I haven’t gone to work yet), Today (Saturday) is our Sunday. As a result, I had the opportunity to go to church, which is held in Baghdaddy’s. There is a Protestant service and a Catholic service, plus several others for other religions.

I’d gone to a Bible study my first night here (too jet-lagged to remember much) and was expecting a similar crowd, like maybe 10 people or so. Instead, there was a room full of people from all around. It was pretty cool. It was a real church service and not a substitute, which made me happy. We weren’t allowed to go to church in Istanbul.

After three or four contemporary hymns and an intro, a group of black singers came up and sang an African gospel song, in some African language. They had the translation up on the screen and it was the same phrases over and over with different African countries listed. Think “God bless Uganda!” “God bless Botswana!”, etc.

The them was something about a lion, and today I learned that “simba” is “lion” in whatever language it was. While I saw “The Lion King,” I didn’t know the translation was literal.

It looks like I have the potential to learn a lot on this tour, and I’m not counting work. The possibilities here are mind-boggling. So far, I’ve been to Bible study and attempted a spin class (I’ll find it soon). There is a knitting group (Baghdarners, I think it’s called) that I’ve already asked about and today at lunch I sat with some folks who were doing salsa. One was the instructor (an Air Force guy) and one a student. She was an Iraqi-born Michigander who’s back in the country for two years as a contractor doing something in addition to learning salsa, but that’s what we talked about.

They were so enthused about it that I somehow got looped into it. This is definitely going to be a unique tour.

A little loopy

It’s my last week in Washington and I’m officially down to the wire to get stuff done. I have a little list next to me that’s got more crossed off than left on, but it’s still substantial. Monday is going to be a big day.

As bad luck would have it, I discovered on Friday evening that there is a Chick-Fil-A in Foggy Bottom. This is on me; I have no idea why I didn’t think to search earlier. I’ve spent a lot of time in the area, but I tend to walk right out of the metro, and Chick is on the left. And Thursday evening, the evening before I had the brilliant revelation to search for a place, I was right in Foggy Bottom, leaving a get-together famished. I could have used a six-pack of nuggets, but I didn’t know.

Today I thought about going, but after a visit to the Library of Congress with some friends, we hit up the food trucks for lunch and that was just too much good. I mean, not enough food to forfeit swinging by Georgetown and stopping for cupcakes at Baked and Wired, but too much to think about another meal. There’s always room for cupcakes.

Since going to Chick is out of the question tomorrow, I’m planning on going both Monday after lunch (don’t judge: I’ve got two more appointments after lunch and will grab soup to take home) and probably Tuesday as my last meal.

It’s been a big week. Beyond fighting a cold and sitting through a class with talking head after talking head and the air conditioner set for what felt like like 52 degrees, I met some new folks and, most importantly for next week, got my passport back. My visa arrived last Thursday and I’m good to go; I even had time to run by the Global Entry place and get it registered, which was as big “cross off” on my calendar. No point in paying for the program if you can’t register the passport you travel on, right?

Fortunately, Florence has stayed away from D.C. and it looks like I’ll still be good to go on Tuesday.  Unfortunately, it looks like I might be flying into the path of residual rain. We’ll see how it goes. This past week I met several people headed to post who were leaving earlier and were a bit panicked. It’s kind of exciting that it’s all coming together.

I’ll be there until May 2020, inchallah. I hope all goes well. I’m not concerned about the situation in Baghdad; I’m concerned about me adjusting to a job and not being able to get away on a short trip every month. Instead, I’ll have long trips every four months or so. For me, that’s something to get used to.

It’s also a long time on the road at one shot, although not as long as I’ve been in DC this go-around. God bless Marriott, but I’ve hit my limit for hotel nights in a row. I’m in my third hotel room since August 12 and really tired of the same breakfast every day.

It’s not that it’s bad and I to vary it up, but you can only vary scrambled eggs or pancakes so much. This morning, instead of toast, I had an English muffin and tomorrow, if their Sunday menu holds, I’ll opt for a biscuit and gravy.

They also have the standard cereal option, although they don’t have what I find in most hotels, which is corn flakes. I’m not capitalizing that because I’m fairly confident that although Marriott appears to go with Kellogg’s, I seriously doubt some of the other places I’ve stayed in spring for the name brand.

They have some healthy option, Rice Krispies and Froot Loops. I don’t do healthy and Rice Krispies without marshmallows and butter taste kind of like sugary (because I add sugar) air, but crunchy. Which isn’t bad, but I decided to have a bowl of Froot Loops my first day here. I haven’t eaten Froot Loops since they added green, purple and blue and figured what the heck. (Looked this up: 1990s.) I wanted a little something sweet after the (likely from a powder) scrambled eggs, toast and sausage. I took a small bowl and crunched away, because milk in cereal is just gross. Use a glass, people.

And now I am a loopy addict. I probably shouldn’t admit this, but I’ve now eaten Froot Loops daily at as a little dessert after breakfast. You’re only as old as you feel. I don’t even bother with a spoon.

Summer camp and back-to-school shopping

In a word, yesterday was expensive.

Back from my summer camp week – more on that later – I met a friend at the Tyson’s Corner mall, which is a huge, fancy schmancy mall that’s (thankfully) on the metro line. The trip itself took about half an hour and cost $3.40, but it was a drop in the bucket compared to what I’d eventually spend.

Heading out, I swear I really did need a bra, and like LL Bean’s Perfect Fit Pants to much (I wear a different color each day at work) that I wanted to get a pair of the capris. But that was all I planned on, and, honestly, the bra was an iffy purchase. I still can’t get my arm around my back so I wanted a front-closure one but they’re such a pain to buy.

The plan had been to meet up with a friend around 2, and while on the metro, she mentioned Victoria’s Secret had bras on sale. Not having any memory of the layout of the mall, I suggested meeting there around 2:15. The Internet wasn’t playing fair and she didn’t get the message until much later, after I’d located Vicky’s and was ensconced in bra-shopping.

The mall was teaming with people, and I swear 30 percent of them were in the store. It was absolutely packed, perhaps drawn in by the $35 bra sale. I’m pretty claustrophobic and had to control breathing to go in, searching for front-closure bras. Not much to choose from, but once in the “sports” section, I saw one and immediately salesperson asked if I needed help. I explained the situation and she asked what size. I guess I stammered and she offered to measure me. Sure thing.

Well, turns out I’ve been doing it wrong. She said I had D-cups and I almost choked. Really? I just had to laugh. But in the end, holy smokes, it worked. Of course, “in the end” was a full 45 minutes, three changes of close and, no kidding, about eight different salespeople later, I walked out with two bras that, even on sale, are the most expensive things in my wardrobe.

That started a cascade of shopping, which I normally hate, but I’d met up with my friend and it made it tolerable. She found a dress for a wedding -- $20! – and stalked LL Bean like there was no tomorrow. I found the one color Perfect Fit Pants that I didn’t have but had trouble finding the capris. After asking in the shoe section -- $90 boat shoes for $35! – I learned that if they had any, they’d be in the clearance section. I’d hit the clearances but not really the pants since I’m almost set there. I really need shirts.

Anyway, lo and behold, a pair of $40 Perfect Fit Capris lay waiting. They were $15 before the extra 25 percent off. So, somewhere in the $186 that I gave to LL Bean, I got the one pair of pants that I wanted, drastically on sale.

I’m running out of shampoo and I really J.R. Liggett’s but Whole Foods, darn them, don’t sell it anymore. I’ve ordered some but don’t have it yet, so I thought what the heck, I’d buy a bar of Lush’s and see how that worked. Of course it’s staggeringly expensive (and not on sale) and they have a separate conditioner bar. Twenty-eight dollars for four months of shampoo and probably a year of conditioner.  I don’t think that’s good, but I splurged.

Eddie Bauer also had a 50 percent off thing going and I finally got some trail pants that I wanted but don’t really need, plus some socks and a green shirt. I love green but don’t have much.

Couldn’t find a 2019 calendar at either of the dollar-ish stores I went in but found stuff I wanted in each, and, to top everything off, I’m going to two parties this weekend so I went and bought something to bring to each of them. And, mental note: cupcakes really should be kept top side up. They’re no longer pretty.

I haven’t checked with American Express to see the damage that I did, but it was substantial. Now I am going to have to ship a box to myself, I think, because I don’t have room in my bag to take them. And I learned I need a watch battery late in the day so that’ll have to get fixed later.

The splurge came off of a week of “summer camp.” Really, it wasn’t that, but a five-day class. It’s not in DC proper, so large group of people get transported in what are essentially modified school busses, split into groups and given a program for the week. It really smacks of summer camp, but of course it’s a work program. No crayons of kumbaya involved, although I think at one point, karaoke was an unofficial option for one evening. It’s just kind of funny because there’s even a color-coded bracelet and an end-of-camp event, so to speak, on Friday.

And now school begins again. I still have a couple of weeks remaining here before I head off to the real program, and I’m glad to have Labor Day (and football season) here.

Playing catch up

For everyone who works in foreign service, being back in D.C., whether it’s our hometown or not (more often than not, it’s “not”) is a series of reunions and blasts from the past. People we’ve worked or trained with, for however long and however long ago, appear before us, prompting a series of catch-up conversations, happy hours and other events.

Even if the person crossed your path briefly, it’s a time to find out where the person has been, where they’re going and why they happen to be in D.C. And you don’t know when the reunions will occur. Usually, it’s at our little college-like training center, the main office building or any random hotel where we congregate (in my case, Marriott Residence in Rosslyn), but they happen all over the D.C. area. For example, Trader Joe’s (the one in Clarendon) seems to be a place where all us posted overseas come back for a fix and we run across each other there.

Last go-around, I left Guangzhou on a Friday and had a class on Monday morning. When I arrived, I discovered the person teaching the class had been one of the TDYers who had come to work in my department. I didn’t recognize her at first, but we both thought each other was familiar and discussed it enough to figure it out. When realization hits – THAT’s where I know you! – suddenly, you’re old friends catching up. (In that case, we had yet another commonality: she’d just come from India the Friday before and we were both jet-lagged like nobody’s business.)

Since I’ve been here, on a daily basis, I’ve met up with at least one new person from my past each day. Two of my colleagues from Istanbul randomly showed up for their own trainings, and both brought their wives and little girls. One of the wives is one who worked closely with me before she went on maternity leave. I’d thought I’d seen these people for the last time in my life, and then suddenly, we’re having breakfast together every day. It’s just random and wonderful.

Some of the people you catch up with, you’re seeing for the first time. A reunion of someone you’ve never met sounds odd, but we have so many e-ways of communicating that you can know someone without seeing them in the flesh. On Monday, when I walked into my classroom, I found I knew via e-measures three people plus had met one before my first tour started. Of the others, one was headed to where I was going and another to the same country.

It’s all very incestuous. When you ask someone where they’re going or where they’ve been, your brain jumps around, trying to find the people you know who might know that person. Invariably, there’s someone.

In an effort to track down everyone, we do things like plan post reunions and throw out a net to invite anyone who might have walked through the post when you were there. I’ve got two such get-togethers on the calendar, one for Guangzhou and one for Istanbul. I’m looking forward to both equally.

It’s a small world for us in foreign service. Today, I took a bus to a different site. There was a woman struggling with her bags – she’s headed out to her new assignment after this training and didn’t have a place to leave it – so, after loading them up, it seemed natural that we sit together and chat. 

Turns out, we’d both been through Guangzhou. She whipped out her photos and showed me some. In the very first one, one of my friends, whom I’ve made a point to meet with since I’ve been there, beamed back at me. That person had been in Guangzhou a year after me, and the lady started to show me more from that trip.

The sights were familiar; she’d lived in my same apartment building and had similar photos to what I took. She also went to one of the hot springs while she was there, a trip I made twice. In viewing the photos on her iPhone, I took a look at the dates and realized that she’d been in Guangzhou in February of the same year I was there, and I left in April. We overlapped and didn’t realize it.

In one of her hot springs photos, I thought I saw another familiar face, albeit behind a pair of sunshades. I took the camera and did the englarge-y thing with the fingers and confirmed that yes, in the small world of foreign service, that was indeed me in the photo.

I’d been catching up with a colleague without even realizing it.

Getting back at it

 Home leave is an amazing thing. It’s a time mandated by Congress that I spend in the U.S., getting back in touch with the country I represent overseas. For me, it’s something to take seriously, which is why during both of my home leaves so far I’ve spent a chunk of time on the road. The first one, I drove to Nashville and then Disney; tell me that’s not an All-American thing to do. This time, I went to Birmingham, Orlando and then Prescott, Arizona, taking in a lot of the country.

 

Of those, I think Universal Studios in Orlando was the most fun. I met a Foreign Service friend and we stayed with another friend on Disney property, so it was kind of the best of both of those worlds. I’d never been to Universal and loved it; it’s a bit edgier than The Mouse.

My favorite was “the Mummy” roller coaster: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZhW1wBCA7I. We did that one twice. Honestly, the Rock N’ Roll one was probably better, but it kept breaking down and there was no single rider line. It took us well over an hour to get through it. Had it taken half the time, it would have been No. 1. The start is straight up so, literally, after that first drop, it’s all downhill after that. The fun thing is you select the song you listen to as you ride. I went with ZZ Top’s “Sharp Dressed Man,” and it would have been fun to try it with a few more genres. I mean, c’mon. It was a chance to hear KC and the Sunshine Band again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NQHNDCAF6k.

I did all the roller coasters I could, but wasn’t a fan of The Hulk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsjdYQJc748. Maybe it was the time of day or something, but it didn’t do it for me. The Rockin’ one and The Mummy, though, I’d go back again and again.

What is with the virtual rides? There were so many of them, like King Kong, the Simpsons and the New York thing with Jimmy Fallon. I think it was Jimmy Fallon. Those, more than the roller coasters, make me a little sick. The Harry Potter ones were pretty bad, but I thought the Simpsons was worse. However, I loved wandering down through Springfield.

Universal has thoughtfully now included stationary seating for some of the 3-D shows and man, I just wish they’d have put a little more thought into it. We opted for the seating for the Minions because it was a 5-minute wait vs. a 90-minute wait for the “lively” seating. Now, note: the seating is just seats. They move, but they stay in one place. So the bounce, lean up, down or sideways but you don’t go along a path in any way. The show is on a movie screen, and the stationary seating is on the very first row.

This was a mistake. While it’s true you’re not moving, you are craning your neck straight up. Honest to God, it made me more nauseous than the roller coasters combined. Oh, man. Done in by Minions.

The purpose to the trip, as much as there was one, was to check out Harry Potter Land. I can’t remember what it’s called, so I just referred to it as Potterville. It was pretty amazing, I must say. My friend got chosen to do the wand selection and played along well.

Wandering around Diagon Alley and taking the Hogwarts express was just too fun. There were so many people; it was by far the most crowded part of Universal. Everyone wanted a piece of Potterville. Gosh, it was so much fun.

We stayed on Disney property, though, which was also a lot of fun. I hadn’t been to Pop Culture before and thought it was a trip going back through time. We were in the 80s building; the one with Rubik’s Cubes framing the staircases.

We stayed in the 80s. Good times.

We did two days at the park, dining at City Walk around 6:30 p.m. and then going back into the park to finish it off. The Hard Rock didn’t have fish and chips and I wasn’t into burger so I took a chance on this spicy chicken macaroni and cheese and holy cow, it was fabulous. I couldn’t believe how amazing mac and cheese could be. And I got my fill of fish and chips the next night at Margaritaville, so all was good.

On the third day, my Foreign Service friend had planned on doing Disney but I was just going to hang out by the pools at the hotel. However, my Foreign Service friend was a stranger to Florida humidity and by day three was not up to yet another theme park, so after a late start she headed to Disney Springs. I hung out by all three pools and finished my Janet Evanovich book before meeting her at a movie (Jurassic World; it seemed appropriate) and finishing the day at Disney Springs.

That was about halfway through home leave and I decided that every Foreign Service person should meet up with a colleague halfway through home leave. We live such an odd life that is hard to explain to our pre-service friends; it’s nice to decompress halfway through with someone who gets that part of your life.

It’s almost comforting to get back to the work routine, and that’s where I am now. It’s still this in-between part of my world, but I’m in the “training” phase prior to my next deployment. This means I head to DC and go to class in one of a handful of different locations before I am shipped far, far away again.

I only arrived on Monday but got right to it; it really is nice to be back into a routine. It’s sort of a twilight zone. I’m working but kind of not, because the hours are 9-4 with an hour lunch and a 15-minute break both in the morning and in the evenings. There’s a shuttle to the worksite, so it’s kind of this grade-schoolish thing. I’m taking a school bus and, next week, plan on bringing my lunch. There’s a cafeteria but I ate there this week and not only was it expensive, it was bad.

Especially compared to food in the area. DC is a smorgasbord of good food. Today I had a three-hour brunch at a place called Farmers Fishers Bakers, which is owned by North Dakota farmers. We left around 4 p.m.; four hours later and I am still utterly stuffed and cannot think of ingesting another morsel lest I explode. The night before, I ate at this wonderful place called Nando’s; it’s a South African-based restaurant that I discovered while in Malaysia. Before that, it was a Vietnamese joint. And I’ve eaten at “Tonic” twice already; it seems to be the place many of my colleagues head to for lunch, so I met two on back-to-back days there. The salmon chowder with a side of tater tots was a smart choice!

I’ve got several more weeks in the DC area before I head off to my next post, so I’m open to dining suggestions.

Red light, green light

I’m on a side trip now and thoroughly enjoyed the interstate, even though the scenery on I-10 isn’t exactly spectacular. Part of the enjoyment, I think, was that there aren’t any red lights on the interstate.

To get to my parents’ house – I guess now “my mom’s house” – you have to take one of the main artery roads in Tallahassee and drive a stretch. The “truck route,” as longtime Tallahasseeans call it, is a heavily-traveled road most hours of the day. And my mom’s house entails several left turns.

There aren’t left turns in Turkey. There aren’t really stoplights at all, really. There are a few, but mostly there are crazy intersections and mirrors, with some roundabouts thrown in. On day, walking to work with a colleague, we got to the five-way intersection that I walked by every day, and he looked me dead in the eye and said: “I’m going to die at this intersection.” There were a couple of mirrors – the intersections are totally blind so without the mirrors it would be a total leap of faith – but that was all. No stop lights, no stop signs. Basically, the main rule, as much as there is one, is “first come, first serve.”

It’s chaotic, but once you look deeper, it’s controlled chaos. Well, sort of. There are rule of thumb – but not really a rule – is that bigger ones have the right of way. “Bigger” can mean either cars or balls.

Istanbul traffic. It makes sense in its own way.
Photo from:
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSJstVmD6fBp_3ylMgQ3ppzvdBw5w9RFw1mlt8g8RjebgVKdjNq

I figured this out driving through that intersection. There were four roads intersecting, but not in a star shape. There was a “main” road, or main road-ish thing, so coming from both directions, then two roads coming off diagonally; you turned one way and there was another road immediately there; it was impossible to tell which one people were aiming for. (Apparently, blinkers are illegal in Turkey.) To top it off, there was a large apartment building with a driveway there.

Taking a taxi home from one direction, I’d have to give the direction, “right,” and then “straight, no straight right, but not that straight right.” The turn was some kind of geometric angle gone wrong, but I usually got it right.

And walking was frightening, but driving no less so. With no stop signs, I felt back on my American mentality, which is, again, wrong in Turkey. In America, people don’t have “the right of way.” Laws, at least in Florida, are written not as “this person has the right of way” but “In this circumstance, this person yields the right of way.”

So silly me, I get to the main “T” of that intersection (meaning I’ve held my breath past one of the roads and the driveway) and to me, I’m on a secondary road approaching a main-ish road, so the main-ish road people have the right of way. However, in Turkey, if I get there first, I am expected to go first. This seemed to me to be even in the case where there were cars coming – quickly, I should add – from both directions. Since I was trying to turn left, this would mean, in America, I have a little wait in front of me before I can turn, because both those guys – as well as the guy behind one of those guys – should have the right of way.

But in Turkey, this is not the case. If you hesitate, like I did, the guy behind you will get pissed off but not honk. Honking is only done when you have no other move, like when you really are at a stoplight and it turns green. In that instance, even if you’re 17 cars back, the Turkish rule is that you lay on the horn immediately, as you’re powerless to do anything else. But if you’re at an intersection and some let-me-yield-the-right-of-way-to-these-two-fast-moving-cars-coming-at-me idiot, the correct thing to do is swerve around the idiot and turn in front of him/her in front of the fast-moving car(s).

As a result of this, although I miss Istanbul, I do not miss driving in Istanbul. However, you gotta say, if those rules work, there’s something to them.

The first come, first serve method would save me a lot of time on the way to my mom’s house. The heavily-trafficked artery is full of left turns, and since there’s so much traffic, you have to sit and wait forever on the green left turn arrow.

Probably 20 percent of my home leave has been sitting at left turn arrows stuck on red. I don’t understand it. I get there first, but I have to sit and wait for minutes on end. Sometimes as I drive up, I can see the darn red left turn arrow from afar and by the time I get there, it’s still red and I still have to sit and wait. It’s especially aggravating at the little tiny crossroads, like the last one I have to cross, because it takes forever for enough cars to pile up to register that it’s time for the light to change.

We can learn from Turkey on this one. First come, first serve, biggest balls win.