Turkey. Such a funny name for such an intriguing country. I mean, who really names their country after a bird? I guess it's not like they planned to name it after a bird considering that English isn't one of their native languages. For all I know, United States of America could be some birds name in another language. I hope not, no kid would really be able to identify that bird easily, unless it's in something like Mogolian where it takes a whole paragraph to say goodnight. By the time your done, the kids already asleep.
Oh yeah, back to Turkey. So my new husband and I were thinking of where in the world would we go for our honeymoon. First it was Hawaii. Nope, pretty but please... could we go for something alittle bit more exotic. Considering that 50% of Americans end up divorced, we probably don't want to start our new life together where every other American goes for their first honeymoon. This is in the speculation that they get remarried. And everyone knows that on your second marriage, you go to Tahiti. On your third, you go fly-fishing.
So where could we go that wasn't going to set us up for disaster. Ireland! My husband says. Ireland? In October? I'm thinking. My husband is the biggest pain in the butt if he does not get his daily quotient of sunlight. Cloudy outside...forget it. You're setting yourself up for a day in Johnny-moody-pants.
What next? So I start thinking. What do I have to work with:
1. We have the whole month of October. Kool.
2. We need to make it relatively cheap. i.e. hostels
3. Make it fun. YEAH! Drink my head off!
4. Make it educational. Ah! Johnny is such a nerd.
5. Where do I know someone?
Ahah! I've got it. I almost forgot. So I have an uncanny ability to make friends that live outside of the U.S. How? Easy. first, I was an exchange student my junior year of high school to Switzerland. Ohhhhh! It was the best experience of my life! Highly recommend it to anyone with a spirit of adventure. So, now that I'm 24 years old, I have friends all over europe. Excuse, all over the world, because I specifically went to an english boarding school where everyone there was from another country. Second, I live in Dallas which has a huge international population. I make friends with a classmate that is from Hungary and is in the states because she is some rich family's au pair (nanny). Coincidently, she knows all of the other au pairs that are within her areas and tada! you've just now become adopted into a huge group of friends that are from all over the world.
Ok, back to square one. Honeymoon choices. Hhmmmm. Where to go? Well, I have two friends that live in Istanbul (capital of Turkey). "Maybe we could go there?" I say to my husband.
Of course, he looks at me like I've just grown a tomatoe vine on my head.
"Turkey? Where is that?" of course, he's heard of it before because he's met Betty* who is one of the girls I know in Istanbul. He just never knew where it was located. While I hate to generalize, Americans do have a rather known reputation around the world as being terrible at geography.
After I show it to him on the map, he asks why we would want to go there versus traveling around Europe for three weeks by train. (I've already seen most of N. Europe but seeing the South did sound tempting)
In the end, I convince hime its because I know people there and they had already invited us to stay at their homes. Since we would be traveling around, we wouldn't be staying too long at each persons' home. I worked on his cheap side. The compromise was that we would also go to Greece. Well, in the end the cheap side prevailed and we bought tickets in April for an October honeymoon. Maybe not the best idea to book a trip 6 months in advance. It was by a sheer stroke of luck that it timed out as well as it did.
