Real American in the Istanbul Airport

I want you to promise me something. No more flying off to these strange countries while all this is going on.

My mother’s phone request was prompted by the recent Christmas I spent stranded at the Istanbul Atatürk Airport. Visiting a good friend of mine from high school who works for the State Department and was living in Sarajevo with her husband and kids, I’d flown out of JFK on Christmas Eve and, due to the time change, landed in Istanbul late afternoon on Christmas day. I spent my three-hour layover bopping around taking pictures of the foggy landscape just beyond the terminal windows, snapping a selfie in front of a young woman in a bright red regional-dress costume working at the Turkish ice cream stand, and taking advantage of the free Wifi at Starbucks to post the touristy shots to Facebook.

When I had boarded the plane, I jinxed myself by thinking how smoothly everything had gone. We sat on the runway for some time before the flight attendant made an announcement in Turkish over the PA. I didn’t understand a word but when everyone around me stood up and removed their luggage from the overhead bins my stomach sank into my shoes. This can’t be good. They repeated the announcement in English, and I learned that due to poor visibility in Sarajevo they’d canceled the flight, which meant I’d be spending the night in Istanbul. Fear flooded my extremities. What now?

I have a long history of being stranded at airports in America. Once, due to a blizzard, my Sunday night flight home from Vegas to NYC was not only canceled but rebooked for TUESDAY. And because it was “weather related,” I was given nothing but a blue slip of paper with the number of a motel by the airport that, if I chose to stay there, I had to pay for myself. The next 48 hours of my life stays in Vegas…

If that was how I was treated back home, what was going to happen to me in this strange, dangerous country? I feared the worst. Reality, however, proved kinder than my fear. Turkish Airlines treats its customers far better than other airlines (I’m looking at you Delta) and I was quickly informed we were being put up in a hotel for the night. Frazzled after navigating the unfamiliar airport to locate the hotel assignment line, I asked a man I recognized from my flight if I was in the right place. He assured me I was and we started talking.

Ahmed, a stocky middle-aged man with fierce eyebrows, lived in Sarajevo and was headed home for vacation. In clipped English, he explained that, employed by an oil company, he works for 60 days, then has 20 days off. Later we were joined by Melek, a tall, silver-haired gentleman sporting a black Zorro hat with a welcoming landscape of laugh lines etched on his face. Like me, Melek stopped to ask if he was in the right place and then — chatting away and perhaps noting how far the line snaked behind us — he stayed on as if he’d met up with good friends instead of cutting.

Melek did something involving television production in Tunis but his pregnant (and from what I gleaned, much younger) wife lived in Sarajevo. She was ready to pop any day now, and he was flying home to be with her. As the line inched forward, Ahmed grumbled about this being why he “usually avoids night flights to Sarajevo” because the airport often fogs in during the winter months and your best shot at getting in, or out, is first thing in the morning. Melek countered by cheerily reminding us that our flight being canceled was actually a good thing.

“I would rather be delayed and LIVE,” he said, his lyrical accent giving what became our continued credo added flair.

Finally reaching the front of the line, we were issued our hotel and, while waiting for them to call our names for the shuttle bus, Ahmed offered to get us something to drink. The men laughed as I inspected my tiny cup of dark, inky Turkish coffee. The hotels near the airport were full, so I was able to catch a few fleeting glimpses of Istanbul’s sorcerous sights as the bus wound its way through the narrowing streets to a small boutique hotel deep in the city. The lobby was decked out for Christmas, and my newly acquired traveling companions laughed as I ran around taking pictures of the decorations and the Christmas tree.

Planning my visit to Sarajevo, I emailed my flight info to my friend, Ubah, and asked if arriving on Christmas was going to screw up anything for her family. She replied,

Ha ha, we don’t celebrate Christmas, so won’t screw up anything :)

Ubah is Muslim, and I knew she didn’t celebrate Christmas. However, growing up Catholic, I wasn’t even aware other religions existed until my mother, a huge Neil Diamond fan, took us to a neighbor’s house to watch his movie The Jazz Singer on HBO. This was how I first learned of this strange thing called “Jewish.” So, my insular side found it hard to believe they wouldn’t be doing something for Christmas. Even though I remained utterly ignorant of Ubah’s traditional holidays.

Getting to “Live” wasn’t the only upside to being stranded, as the three-course meal the hotel served us in their rooftop bar turned out to be the most unique Christmas dinner of my life. After we’d eaten, I peered out the windows at the shadowy dome of a Mosque lit up in the distance. The bar must have an incredible view of the city during the day, but alas, I would never see it because the shuttle bus was fetching us at 4 a.m. for our flight. The next day went like this:

3:30 a.m. We gathered for breakfast in a subterranean restaurant located beneath the lobby where hotel elves had set out an odd spread of feta cheese, stale rolls, amazing olives, and fresh tomato slices. To drink, we had our choice of cherry juice or watery coffee. As we ate, the hotel manager informed us it was snowing in Sarajevo and someone from the airlines would be arriving soon to let us know what was going to happen.

4:30 a.m. Having slept through breakfast, Melek stumbled downstairs with his silver hair spiking out in all directions just as a man from Turkish Airlines arrived and split us into two groups. My group, which included Ahmed and Melek, was headed back to the airport for the 7:30 a.m. flight. The other group had been bumped to the night flight leaving at 7 p.m. Most of the second group was made up of a large family and, at the news they were to remain at the hotel, the mother, a formidable woman dressed in all black, including her hijab, ripped the Turkish Airlines representative a new one. While she yelled at the man in multiple languages, her gaggle of children looked as if they were praying for the earth to open up and swallow them whole, ending their humiliation. Crammed next to Ahmed and Melek in the small shuttle van, we felt like assholes as we drove away leaving the family, their mother still screaming, behind.

“Watch,” Ahmed mumbled as we bounced along in the back of the van. “They will be better off staying here, seeing the city. While we end up delayed all day, stuck in the airport.”

As soon as he said it, I knew that’s exactly what was going to happen. And I wanted to punch him in the face.

7:30 a.m. We were all set to board when our flight was delayed another three hours. Tromping through the brightly-lit maze of the airport, we found our way back to the Starbucks, for coffee, and for the free WiFi. Even at this early hour, the Turkish ice cream stand was open, but now a man clad in the bright red outfit stood out front. Ahmed, sensing I blamed his prediction for our predicament, offered to get me a coffee.

“An Americano this time,” he said, eyebrows softening.

As Christmas carols played over the airport’s speakers, we drank coffee, emailed updates to the people waiting for us, and added more folks to our band of stranded brothers. One gentleman asked me where I was coming from, and I told him America. Later, when he switched to a language I didn’t recognize, I admitted that, unlike everyone around me who spoke two, or three, or in Melek’s case six, languages, I only knew English.

“Ah,” he said, “real American.”

10:30 a.m. We flew to Sarajevo. Victory! Almost. After circling the airport for over an hour, the flight attendant announced that the visibility remained too poor to land. She made the announcement in Turkish but when I heard the word Istanbul I burst into tears. Melek came up to my seat to make sure I understood what was going on. I nodded, too upset to speak. For some reason, he’d decided the family we’d left behind that morning were from Kuwait, and ever the optimist he chirped,

“I cannot wait until we are reunited with the Kuwaiti family and get to tell them how lucky they were to stay at the hotel!”

Time-has-lost-all-meaning p.m. Disembarking into the now familiar territory of the Istanbul airport, I sprinted down the long hallway, the New Yorker in me resurfacing as I pushed past my fellow passengers to make sure I was first in line at the desk. The agent worked on rebooking my ticket for, yes, you guessed it the 7 p.m. flight, but he couldn’t guarantee we wouldn’t be delayed again, or have to spend another night in Istanbul.

“This is ridiculous,” I snapped, “What if I canceled my ticket and booked a flight back to New York? Could you do that?”

“Kelly Jean, NO,” Melek shouted. Once again, he’d sidled up next to me in line. “You cannot give up now. You must go see your friend!”

“Are you two together?” the agent asked. I nodded yes, because by now we were, and told him to go ahead and rebook us on the night flight. At least when I tried to fly to Sarajevo this time, I’d be sitting next to a friend.

We shuffled along to the inner hub of the International terminal. The girl at the Turkish ice cream stand was back at work, a brand new day for her while we continued our causal loop.

“No Starbucks this time,” I told Melek, “I need a drink.”

Based on our multiple tours around the terminal, we headed to what we decided was the nicest looking bar. Taking a picture of our drinks, I posted them on Facebook with the caption,

We live here now.

A friend who Liked the happy pictures I’d taken when I first landed, what now seemed like eons ago, commented,

You’re still in the Istanbul airport!!??

The next few hours unfolded as if we were in the series finale of a television show. One by one the other members of our cast walked by, spotted us sitting with our drinks, and joined us. The same bright carols continued to play over the airport speakers, and we toasted our never-ending Christmas day. Eventually, Ahmed wandered by.

“Our friend!” Melek called out, “We thought we’d lost you.”

We had in a way as Ahmed, giving over to his pessimism, booked a flight to a neighboring city, three hours away from Sarajevo. His poor wife was making the long drive through the snow to pick him up. But Ahmed’s new flight wasn’t leaving too long before ours, so we were able to enjoy a couple more hours together before departing from each other’s lives.

6:30 p.m. Headed to the gate, the moment Melek had prophesied arrived as we spotted the Kuwaiti family moving toward us en masse. They’d likely given little thought to the assholes who left them behind at the hotel that morning, while we’d fixated all day on seeing them again. Naturally, the mother looked shocked and confused when Melek threw his arms wide, rushed forward, and embraced them exclaiming,

“Mi familia!! Let me tell you how lucky you are!”

In the middle of the raucous reunion, I explained everything to one of the daughters who did indeed feel better after hearing about our frustrating day of failed flights. Not only had the family received breakfast and lunch at the hotel, but the airline arranged for them to go on a tour of Istanbul. She was shocked, however, to hear that Melek assumed they were Kuwaiti. In a tone similar to my own when people mistakenly think I’m from Florida because I went to college there, she informed me they were from Dubai. A “real American,” I didn’t fully understand her surprise or the difference. I’d never thought past their hijabs.

7:45 pm. After one last flight and time change, we landed in Sarajevo! I hugged Melek goodbye in the parking lot as his wife, too pregnant to get out of the car, impatiently honked the horn. Throwing my luggage into Ubah’s car, I asked her why she never warned me about Sarajevo’s frequent fog-ins and she replied,

“I was afraid you wouldn’t come!”

When terrorists armed with bombs and guns killed at least 36 people and wounded hundreds more at the Istanbul Atatürk Airport, I imagined the glass partition surrounding the Starbucks shattering in the explosion. And prayed the costumed Turkish ice cream girl wasn’t caught in the crossfire. I pondered how many 60 days, then 20 days, there’d been since we’d been stuck there. Where in the cycle was Ahmed? Could he have been in the International terminal grumbling into his coffee? Or Melek, traveling back to Tunis with his young wife and small child in tow.

Many of my friends reached out to me after the shooting in Orlando because that’s where I’d gone to college. No one contacted me after the attack at the Istanbul airport. Which isn’t surprising, because, is my sole stranded Christmas with strangers enough to warrant my reaction to the tragedy being more intense than others? But in a world where there are too many tragedies to choose from, familiarity no longer dictates empathy.

I could promise my mother not to fly to these strange countries until “all this” is over. Except when will that be? And where is it safe to go? The men and women at the Istanbul airport who looked out for me, shared laughs, and translated other languages, as well as the world beyond my borders, were strangers but they are not strange, not dangerous. Ahmed, Melek, and my other stranded friends remain the rule even as it has become increasingly hard to perceive violence as the exception.

Ubah still works for the State Department and she is now living with her family in Jakarta. They’ve asked me to come visit, but I worry flying there would give my mother a heart attack. So, it’s probably safer on many levels not go. But then I hear Melek insisting,

“Kelly Jean, NO. You cannot give up now. You must go see your friend”

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