It’s a Small World

The plan was to leave the guesthouse at 3:45am but there was the incident of the key. Heath had pulled our key out of the door and had absolutely no idea where he had put it. That didn’t exactly surprise me, as we had been almost looney with exhaustion by the time we went to bed. So we hunted. And hunted. And hunted. And the clock moved forward and it was NOWHERE. Finally at 4:20 we said we had to go and if the guys didn’t find it they would just give her money to buy a new doorknob. Of course the police pulled us over just as we entered the airport area and had us unload our luggage for scanning. Forrest and Lance could accompany us to the first health check, and before they left we quick checked our bags again for the key. What do you know? Our fervent prayers were answered and it was in the bottom corner of Heaths backpack! Talk about relief.

Goodbyes are gross, but we were in a hurry so they were also short. The boys could go back to bed, and we started in the endless checkpoints with slow people manning the desks. For once I was feeling quite phlegmatic about it, but Heath was getting a little burned at the whole system. There’s just so much unnecessary stuff to do in African airports, but everyone was nice. We made it to the gate with a few minutes to spare, so all’s well that ends well.

The flight was unremarkable to Istanbul. We had an eight hour layover and were seriously dreading that. Istanbul used to have a really nice airport, but they just built a new one that caters exclusively to the uppest upper class. There is pretty much only designer stores and high priced cafes. Like not even any nice convenience stores to buy a drink or snack! But it does have nice napping areas so we spent most of our time in there, sleeping and reading and sometimes snacking on outrageously expensive bites of food.

Now we’re slouched in metal seats in the Baghdad Airport, waiting on our visa’s. It’s the dead of the night and we’re ready to sleep big time!