i love turkey...

... and not the thanksgiving type. It was my favorite for several reasons, not in any order of importance:

1. Dichotomies and laughable pseudo-westernizations such as above.
2. The bizillion degree heat seemed bearable there. Although this might not be the norm. The day before it had been 45 degrees Celsius, which is like 120 in Fahrenheit. Il-hamdu llilah, as we said there.
3. The mosques were beautiful and the whole skyline was minarets.
4. Sitting in a Victorian imperialist garden backyard eating rice pudding served by locals whose only words of 'English' were "bon appetit!", I simultaneously heard Dean Martin and the call to prayer in the middle of an oppressively hot afternoon.
5. Atatürk. Not only a mother could love this face. He's everywhere.

How could I have waited this long to see the world?