Flight Club

30 Days in Istanbul: Day 1

We made it to Istanbul by the skin of our teeth.

Why am I surprised? Why do I expect anything to go the way it’s supposed to, when in the past 6 months of being here, that’s never been the way? Also, why do I still think the things I worry about are the things I should be worrying about, rather than the things it never occurs to me to worry about and then leap out of the ether?

Maybe I’ll be able to answer this question after 12 months.

I had 4 hours sleep the night before we left, and averaged about 5 hours a night for the two weeks previous. Why sleep when there are so many things outside of your control you can worry about? Like what was going to happen when I needed to buy groceries in Istanbul and I had to leave Django alone in a strange apartment? What if it was really loud there and he barked all the time? (Considering he barks when a tissue falls on the ground, this was not an unrealistic concern.) What if I had to order food and couldn’t figure out where I actually lived? (Not as uncommon an occurrence in this country as you might think.) What if the cab from the airport got stuck in traffic and Django had to pee? What if I didn’t make any friends in Istanbul, which was the majority of the reason I was coming here? What if I never make any friends again for the rest of my life, totally fail at my career and muck up all my remaining chances of happiness?

Not to mention:

1. The world is falling apart at the seams

2. The epicentre of this currently appears to be in my hometown (Ottawa, not Fethiye)

3. I have been in a legal situation for the past year which reared its head again, which feels vastly unjust and makes me want to stomp around and yell “it isn’t FAIR,” and which, in the form of a cherry on the not fair cake, I am not allowed to talk about publicly.

So yeah.

What I didn’t once worry about was this: after my dad dropped us off at our local airport, the Turkish Airlines people told me that my dog was not permitted on the flight.

It was about the carrier bag he was in. Which, I explained, patiently and kindly, we had used when we flew here from Canada. They informed me that this had been a mistake. I informed them that no, this was a mistake, and I had even sent their employers a photo of the bag before flying the last time. They informed me that this was irrelevant. I texted my dad. “Throw a fit,” he advised. I raised my voice slightly. They told me I could check the Turkish Airlines website, and that they were going to call someone local who owned a pet store and could bring the correct carrier bag over which I could buy. Bearing in mind it was 8 o’clock in the morning, and had this happened in North America, no pet store owner would do such a thing and the airline would have told me to go f*** myself.

So it sounded like a pretty decent solution. Right? Except I also knew, having obsessed over this for months before flying from Canada , that airline-approved-sized carrier bags are actually too small for Django, and that stuffing him into one was going to be a problem, and basically we were going to have to walk to Istanbul.

Desperate, I tried again.

“What’s wrong with the bag I have?”

“He must not be able to put his head out.”

“But it’s only an hour flight.” (As if they didn’t know this, being as there are 6 of these flights per day.)

“It is not permitted.”

“But he needs to have his head out. He’s very anxious.”

“It is not allowed, I’m sorry.”

In a country where many people can’t afford to buy gas or heat their homes, I did not feel right continuing this line of argument.

They gave me the number of the pet store dude. I called him. His English wasn’t great and quite frankly, at that point, neither was mine. Also, when many Turks speak English, they translate a Turkish term of politeness to “lady”. Which means that when someone in a shop or in customer service speaks to me, they’ll say, “Lady, let me get it for you,” or, “Lady, I don’t know,” which of course to a North American sounds rude, and even though I knew it wasn’t, I kept bristling as he kept saying it.

“Lady, how high is dog? Lady, is puddle?”

After a long, complicated exchange involving Facetime and me almost losing my shit on the airport floor while Django gnawed on his candy cane chew toy, the dude came with a selection of bags in the back of a truck. I dragged my giant suitcase and my anxious dog back outside. I chose the biggest bag, which was not big at all and which was almost tube-like, with plastic coverings with holes in them on the front and back ends. My heart broke at the look on Django’s face when I zipped him in. We raced back inside to the check-in counter, where all the women I had just been arguing with were, as Turkish people so often are, easygoing and relaxed, as if we were old pals.

They took my passport. They cooed at Django. They smiled.

“Do you have his vaccination certificate?” one asked.

My broken heart plummeted.

“We’re only travelling to Istanbul,” I squeaked.

“You must have a vaccination certificate for airline travel with a dog.”

I took a deep breath. She leaned over and chatted with one of her colleagues.

“Do you have an electronic copy?” she asked.

“YES!” I shouted, even though I didn’t actually know if I had an electronic copy. I swiped through 200 emails before finding a certificate from the vet, which is not actually a vaccination certificate but which I presented with such BS confidence (a skill I have improved upon here, learning from the best) that they deemed it enough and let us through.

“Lady, is puddle?”

We flew to Istanbul.

I talked to my dog in his tube the entire way there, like the socially desirable middle-aged dog lady I have become. We got a cab and breezed into the city with hardly any traffic, which has never happened before, possibly in the history of the world. We found my friend’s apartment, where we are staying for our first week. He wasn’t home yet. We found a place that had tacos. Django curled up in my lap as I gleefully stuffed my face.

We found a park. I almost fell asleep on a bench. My friend returned with another friend of ours named Jimi, who happened to be visiting from Bodrum. Jimi has dreadlocks and makes clay jewellery and hates the system and is one of the most loud and generous humans I’ve ever met. They helped me get groceries. We had dinner, and then went to a wine bar where Jimi knew the owner because he had, naturally, helped her harvest the grapes himself. She sat with us and brought over plates of soft, fragrant goat’s cheese. Django slept in my lap. We all stayed up until 2am, and then, despite the very loud clubbing noises surrounding us from the street, slept like the dead until morning.