Day 1: Separated In Istanbul

We left for Intercontinental Airport a bit later than I would like on Thursday. This was not a problem for catching our flight, but it was indicative of how unprepared we were for this trip. I was busy with a variety of growing businesses; Rachel was busy getting the house project on track. And both of us were overwhelmed emotionally with our church situation and conflict with immediate friends.

We made the flight from Houston to Istanbul, got to our seats, and set up shop. We were fairly prepared for an 11-hour flight between doing additional RVL reading, watching movies (Turkish Air has an amazing selection) and needing to sleep on this redeye. Unfortunately, there was an undisclosed problem and the flight left two hours late. I had remarked to Rachel when I saw the itinerary that we were cutting it close in Istanbul. And of course, we were going to miss our connecting flight.

This was a problem for two reasons. First, we were the black sheep of this group. No one knew us and we had a separate itinerary. We didn’t have a contact phone number and I didn’t know where to meet people beyond Istanbul. Second, I don’t speak Turkish. I do believe that you should speak at least the basics of Turkish if you are in Turkey, but I didn’t have time to learn before we left. So when we landed in Turkey, the real problem occurred.

We had already missed our connecting flight, so the question was whether we could make the next flight to Tel Aviv that left in 35 minutes. We got off the plane and walked the guy who appeared to be in charge. He waved us over to another guy who looked at our boarding passes. He gave Rachel a new boarding pass for the next flight. Wow, this is going to work out well. They were ready for us. Rachel took the boarding pass and starting walking down a hallway to the right. The guy kept looking for my new boarding pass. Still looking. He couldn’t find it. Ugh.

He told me in broken English that I needed to go to the transfer desk (I think). I frantically/calmly tried to explain to him that Rachel and I would have boarding passes together and there must be a problem. He did not understand English and forced me to the left. At that point, Rachel was out of sight. I called to her but there was no response. We were both forced down hallways that we were not allowed to walk back up. It was sort of like the opening scene from X-Men when young Magneto is separated from his parents at Auschwitz and he is yelling for them to come back.

This was a real problem. We didn’t have international phones and I didn’t know who to contact in Istanbul or Israel. I needed to get on a flight in 35 minutes … and this was not America. I ran to the transfer desk. I waited there for 10 minutes and watched no one get helped. Then I saw an English-speaking woman yell at the transfer desk guy that she was a Star Alliance Gold Member and she needed to get to Tel Aviv tonight. He sent her off to the ticket sales desk. I thought that she might be my only hope. I ran after this woman – I later found her name was Karol – and asked if she knew how to get through the Istanbul Airport. She said, “Follow me.”

This next 20 minutes was one of the most frantic 20 minutes of my life. I am not the best at directions and the Istanbul Airport is huge. Karol was a Star Alliance Gold Member so she got us through the passport area and security by raising her voice to the attendant. This made me a bit uncomfortable to be so close to THE squeaky wheel, but I had to make this flight. Then the real madness happened. Karol said she couldn’t run, so I needed to run to gate to tell them to hold the plane. We decided that we had to get to gate 512. This was about ¾ mile away. I had to make a run for it.

This was approaching my sprinting speed for ¾ mile, which I am not in shape to do, especially with a 25 lb. pack. I got to gate 512 and managed to tell them that they needed to hold the place. They said something to the effect of: “There are two planes going to Tel Aviv and this is the wrong gate. I need to go to gate 213.” Not good. For those at home, gate 512 is not close to gate 213. I made a mad dash for gate 213 dodging speeding carts and loud Turks.

I had slept about 2 hours the night before, so this was about the max of what I could do. But I got to the gate in time. However, the guy at the gate said that my boarding pass was not valid and that I had to go to the transfer desk. When Karol caught up to me at 213, she was furious. Karol was used to getting her way and her technique would have worked in America. But the Turks said that no means no.

Karol made one last attempt to go to the Turkish Airlines concierge for VIPs and see what yelling at them could do. Again, this didn’t work. Another very real problem that occurred to me is that I had no idea where Rachel was or if she made it to the plane okay. Rachel has not traveled much internationally and we didn’t have a plan for this. I just hoped that Rachel took her good boarding pass and got on the plane rather than looking for me in the airport.

I ran back to gate 213 to see if I could find Rachel boarding the plane. No Rachel. I asked the attendant if Rachel Martin had boarding the plane. He went and checked and said there was no record of Rachel Martin boarding the plane. Yikes. We are both lost in the Istanbul Airport without a way to communicate and I have no idea where Rachel went. I ran to get a calling card, so I could call Verizon to set up a temporary international calling plan. This part actually went well because there was a multi-lingual man who helped me navigate the calling card, and the Verizon customer service person made this easy.

Immediately after setting that up for both Rachel and I, I got a text from Rachel saying that she was boarding a flight to Tel Aviv and that she hoped I would be okay. Small victory! Rachel was going to make it. This put me at ease tremendously. I considered that this traveling experience was sort of a hard reset on my system that God needed to make before I was ready for the Israel adventure. “Don’t lean on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight.” He was going to take care of me and I had everything I needed. I went back to the transfer desk and got a new ticket for a midnight flight.

During the next few hours, I memorized the assigned Bible passages that I had neglected for the past 6 months. And I finally memorized the Shema, which Rachel had memorized years earlier. This put my mind in a much healthier place as I boarded the flight to Tel Aviv. I landed in Tel Aviv at about 2am local time. I then took a taxi for an hour to our hotel in Neve Ilan, which I am just arriving. Wakeup call is in 3 hours. We have a full day of hiking in the sun tomorrow. May God give me strength.