Air Travel or How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Sick Bag

Sunday 7pm. I finally walk into my apartment, 2 days after my trip home began. In the grand scheme of things, a two day trip is really not unreasonable for a trans-Atlantic journey, and I'm quite grateful that its even possible. However, when it should have taken only 15 hours, its a little more than irritating.

The first 13 hours were without incident. Turkish airports, as one may expect, are secured tighter than a drum. Between entering the airport in Ankara, to transferring to my flight to JFK in Istanbul, I passed through at least 7 security checkpoints, including the mandatory pat-down and bag inspection required for all US bound flights. Once on board, travel with Turkish Air is pleasant, a decent movie selection, edible food, and even comfortable steerage class seats.

The real trouble began somewhere over New Hampshire. The in-seat TVs showed an alteration of course from NYC to somewhere over the Adirondacks. There, we would stay in a holding pattern for an hour and a half or so waiting for JFK to clear up. Moved a little further south, put into another holding pattern for sometime. Then, much to most everyone's dismay, the destination changed to Boston. The runway at JFK was closed to our flight due to heavy winds. Another half hour. Land at Logan, refuel, and sit on the tarmac for 2hours waiting for JFK to reopen.

Called the roommate, he had been waiting at JFK to pick me up; sent him on his way to celebrate St Patty's. 8pm, we start moving again! There is a collective sigh of relief. Half hour later, we are making the approach. The weather is rough and the plane is rocking and rolling. Under cloud cover, we can see the city, landing gear are down...and the engines go to full power and we climb again. We are going to make another attempt. The plane is still pitching around like a boat and people have started reaching for their sick bags. We make a second attempt, this is worse than the first. 200meters off the ground. The turbulence is getting worse; just land or kill me this needs to stop. The engines go to full power again. We're leaving New York and I'm throwing up in a little paper bag.

The GPS now says we're going to Chicago. The pilot gets on the radio to confirm this. The winds in New York are 70-80mph; it's not terribly safe to try to land the plane in that. An hour and a half later, I'm in O'Hare airport for the first time. Stand around waiting for luggage. Stand in another line; get a hotel voucher. I'm grateful its not an American airline, they wouldn't be handing these out so readily. Its now fast approaching midnight, and I have to be back at 4am to start the boarding process again. Also, the clocks are moving ahead, so we only really have 3 hours. The hotel, The Intercontinental, is absolutely gorgeous and normally $500 a night. It seems a waste that there's just enough time to grab a burger, take a shower, and attempt to nap for a half hour.

Finally, things are going according to schedule. Airport at 4, boarding at 5, taking-off at 6, land at JFK at 8. Share a cab into the city to meet up with my hungover friends. I'm finally done, albeit about a day after I was supposed to get there.

Despite the frustrations incurred, there were highlights. Bonding over how sick we were, I met a girl who works in social media marketing in Istanbul, has a radio show, and was conveniently going to a place a few blocks from my friend's for easy cab sharing.

As far as the airline is concerned, no hard feelings. After seeing the havoc the storm caused in the area, I'm quite content that the pilots didn't try to force the landing. While I was sitting and bitching to myself, they were working tirelessly to keep us comfortable for the entire duration of the flights, and were extremely accommodating without hesitation.(Or maybe I'm so jaded by domestic airlines that others need to do very little to please?)


Side note, I'm going to try to post in a more timely manner. Pictures from my trip are to come eventually...maybe...or you can just check out my Facebook photo album

Day 3 in Ankara

Note: Because I just started this blog, there will be no Day 1 or 2.
Also, I'll try to add photos later.

Did some fantastic stuff today; we trekked up to a shopping area full of restored Ottoman-era homes on a hill with a castle at the top. The castle is in various states of repair, but was especially neat because you could see how Ottomans built on the Seljuk built on the Byzantine/Roman built on the Greek structure originally there just by looking at the stones making up the walls. Sorta like looking at a cross section of the soil. There were some fantastic artisan shops (particularly the coppersmiths) and antique shops up there*. Among the gifts I picked up like faux-iznik porcelain, I found a nice chess/backgammon board with inlay work for only $20-something, what a steal! Also, if you ever wanted to get a hookah as tall as you, thats the place. I almost bought one, but couldnt figure out how I'd take such a thing home. I also happened to stumble upon a hookah contraption that is designed to go onto one of those huge magnum liquor bottles you see at the duty free shops (the ones with the big cradle thing).

As far as urban planning goes, Atlanta's got nothin' on this sort of urban sprawl. The outer rim of the city is a ring of apartment building construction in process. Its creepy to see at night on the beltway because the unlit band of buildings around the city. Speaking of beltway, last time i was here, I was quite confused as to why there was a highway built in the boondocks going around the city. Now I see that it has taken little time for developments to reach said beltway. A lot of the land was taken up by squatters who built crappy houses on state land (the kind that fall down when the ground thinks about quaking), it looks like the government is finally using some sort of eminent domain to drive them off and give them new apartments in their place. (I think I took pictures to illustrate this)

Driving: The people drive like they don't want to live. This, I believe, is why faith has a lot to do with living here. Perhaps its just correlation.

They haven't quite mastered (read: completely ignore) most posted traffic signs (what few exist) or lane markings. Speaking of which, there are no street signs. All of the streets have names, but you either need to just know it, or have a GPS because you won't see it marked anywhere. It seems the preferred way to get to a particular place is to drive to the neighborhood, yell at someone who happens to be standing nearby, and get the "take your second left and go a block" directions to your destination. My uncle offered to let me drive tomorrow, for the first time ever, I turned down the opportunity. My "frantic" driving, as my friends refer to it, is definitely genetic. While it may be exciting, if you are ever visiting Turkey, my advice is to avoid renting a car and stick to taxis and public transport.

Among the more mundane things today , we stopped into the new Ankamall for some gifts. Malls were a new thing the last time I was here, 10years ago, but the one I went to was easily as large as the Palisades in NY. Naturally there is a Starbucks, but hell, they even have their own version of Orange Julius. It was really unsettling to be somewhere so...American...yet hear a different tongue.

The food has, of course, been amazing. I've been having that "homecooked" experience, except... everywhere all the time. I particularly enjoy the fact that lamb basically replaces pork as a staple meat. I could really do without pork. This quickly segues into my first business proposal: bacon made out of lamb. I know there's turkey bacon, but its gross, I'm thinking of something just as unhealthy as bacon, but that Muslims could enjoy. Imagine the market potential!

On the topic of food, I just ate something with "kofte" (usually denoting some sort of meat) tacked onto the end of its name, although its mostly bulgur rice, tastes like I just bit into a handful of ground spices, and apparently has just a bit of raw meat in it. It was rather good, and I'm going to try to get the recipe.

Finally, I've realized why they only drink raki (similar to ouzo and sambuca) and domestic wine here, foreign booze has a 100% import tax on it! So a bottle of Absolut or Smirnoff goes for some $40, raki is half or less. Even a bottle of yellowtail shiraz-whatever on the order of $25. My 2nd business proposal: open a distillery making whiskey and vodka here. Undercut the American and European stuff, make millions!


*DO NOT buy any antiques if you intend to take them out of the country. The fact that one of the best places to see Anatolian art is the British Museum gives good reason for the strict laws. Refer to the State Department's advice on the subject.

Greetings and what have you

Welcome esteemed classmates and colleagues to the inaugural post of my e-commerce blog.

My name is John Akin and I am an MS PM student that looks to graduate in August. I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel! In 2007, I received a BS in electrical engienering from UConn (Go Huskies!) and am now a project engineer at Hamilton Sundstrand working on the control system for the new Pratt and Whitney PurePower engine.

As part of an attempt at a "work-life balance", I've found time to pursue hobbies beyond work and school. I enjoy reading, attempting to play golf, autocrossing (I intend to graduate to track racing this summer), and international travel.

On that last topic, I'm currently in Turkey visiting family for the first time in quite a while. It's been an excellent trip so far, and I suspect my posts in the immediate future will have more on that topic.