Memorable moments from Turkey

(Day 0 was our flight there. We got to our resort at 6 in the morning!)

Day 1.

¨Fairy tales from Turkey¨ or tales from any country for that matter....

Because we have a wonderful time just lying at the swimming pool, reading books, sunbathing and off course swimming!

And we are planning to do so for 7 more days.....

¨Cheers on a wonderful holiday and old women wearing thongs.¨ (temporarily blinded)



Evening 1.

¨What bored Turks do¨

I was attacked by an apparently bored Turk that came and offered me a HOT coffee.
When I declined the coffee (I don't drink this very mature black caffeine syrup*)....he threw the cup at me!!!
I ducked out of the way and shielded my face. The cup was empty and it turned out to be a joke.
The funniest thing turning out to be was my reaction. It's a pity I couldn't see this. Maybe then I to would find it as hilarious as my husband and the bored Turk thought it was!

* Coca cola is more my favorable black syrup. Maybe due to the cold factor and fun bubbles. I love bubbles.

Day 2.

¨Real Turkish delights so far…?¨

• We saw Turkish people but we also saw an invasion of German people. They even somehow managed the local Turkish people to speak German constantly!
• We eat Turkish Kebab served with Italian pizza, French fries, vegetables like Brussels sprouts and we wash it down with American coca cola.
• We saw Turkish women....but they were not wearing their headscarves like in Holland....
• And we played with Henna

¨ Our wedding symbol¨



Evening 2.

¨They will do art for only 5 Euros... ¨

The maids work hard and long hours and the pay sucks enormously! So at the start of the week we left 5 Euros on the pillow. We do it for them but also a little for ourselves.
Because we just love the art they make from bed covers and my plane blankie.



- German invasion COMPLETE! AAAAAAAAAAAAAH! Our favorite sitcom is raped! They speak GERMAN TO! -

 Day 3.

¨2 hours of pampering in the Hammam¨

-Sauna
-Mud body mask
-Scrub
-Soap massage
-Relaxing with tea and facial mask
-Oil massage

We first had to open our pore doors in the very hot Sauna. Then we were taking in to the hammam, were we got a layer of green mud spread of our bodies.
After ten minutes we were dried up mummies and they removed the mud with buckets of warm water. When we were rinsed of we had to lie on a warm stone bed.
They scrubbed our dead skin away making way for fresh, soft skin making us feel reborn (without the blood and gore of really being reborn, that is). After we shed our skin like a snake it was time for some fun with bubbles!
While covered in soap and bubbles they massaged us. It was wonderful and very relaxing. We were clean and smelling nice. We had had to put on some bathrobes and we had to lie on a bed, wrapped up with some extra towels. Some tea was presented and a facial mask applied.

To finish this lovely adventure we got an oil massage that was ridiculously lovely!

When we left the hammam we seated ourselves by the swimming pool, in the sun where we fell asleep....

¨You look like a red lobster!!¨ - ¨ You have fried like a croquette.....your skin is all crispy!¨



So I had to cool off...

Evening 3.

¨Thin walls¨

I do believe we all like to eavesdrop ones in a while as we are all curious by nature. But what if you can eavesdrop without you even wanting to??
Every night we have problems with our neighbors. Definitely British and we know they have a little toddler with them because she can't stop shouting at him!
They have fights and putting up with hearing every stupid, drunk and annoying argument they scream and shout to each other we feel awful.
I cried out the other night of desperation! There toddler is left alone in their room while they go out and drink. He was screaming and crying for its mum. I was helpless and wanted to hug the little one and tell him everything was going to be OK. But it won't be OK for him really, will it?

Luckily we sleep late so they haven't waked us up yet. But we can't concentrate on our reading so we just lie there...listening and praying they will soon stop. So after 1 hour of screaming we feel we should go over there. Agreeing that maybe wasn't a good idea as they already sounded unreasonable. 1.5 hours past and finally they fall asleep. (It went quiet so we figured they or went to sleep or they killed each other) Anyway it was quiet.

Now we could sleep to...

But I wasn't thinking of sleep. I was more thinking in the lines of poor toddler, stupid grownups, our stupid fights and promising myself we won't end up like that. At least we would not be so damn oblivious of our surroundings.

And on that note I also fell asleep on the rhythmic sound of the neighbors loudly snores....

Day 4.

¨Tangerina¨

I just LOVE the fruit naming of all the buildings especially TANGERINE. Somehow it makes me happy. I even asked my husband to consider it as a girl’s baby name.

He wouldn't.

Evening 4.

¨Volcanic ash cloud¨

Northern European airports are all closed and all flights are cancelled!! When will be able to fly back isn't sure.

Quote of today: ¨Your bla bla bla is my command¨

Day 5.

¨Dutch people complain a lot¨

So this last question of day 4 ruined the rest of our care free holiday! Luckily in these kind of situations the Dutch people always find each other!

When I lived in Denmark and for example was waiting for the bus I looked around as soon as it seemed clear the bus was delayed to see when other people would start to complain, notice or at least acknowledge the fact the bus was late...............NOTHING!

Now the complaining of the Dutch is sometimes really annoying but this time it was really comforting and I thanked the fact I was Dutch.

As we were lying at the pool we heard a Dutch young couple talk on the phone that were STILL stuck in Turkey. So we asked them when they would have had to fly.
It seemed they were stuck for already 3 days. From this day they on we teamed up together, speculated, wondered and discussed with them and 4 more older couples about when we would be able to fly.

But the most special thing was we made friends although we normally don't like to team up with other couples afraid we won’t be able to get rid of them. This couple was our age, lived in the same town!! She does the same work I do and the men had similar humor and loved to joke and fool around. It was lovely to see but me and her had loads of ¨rolling eyes¨ moments to. We played cards and had a lovely time together.

¨ Walla...hand gesture...playing cards with Turkish accent¨

Evening 5.

¨ Horrific night!¨

We had the most awful night! The neighbors kept us a awake. Fighting!

¨It was an horrible experience that still make me teary eyed.¨

Day 6.

¨Happy Nuts¨

We moved to a different room! Something we should have done sooner!!! But this will not happen us again!

Boat ride with the Happy Nuts we called them. (vrolijke noten) A Dutch couple that loved a drink and had a wicked sense of humor. Although we were really tired and grumpy at first because of the traumatizing night before, we had a lovely day together with them. We went to see a waterfall, had a lovely boat trip and visited a Bazaar.

Evening 6.

¨Lovely evening¨

We had a lovely but short night together with our young couple. We played cards, informed about knew information and laughed our heads off.
And told stories about our trip.

¨ My husband wanted to sell me for 6 camels and a goat¨

Day 7.

¨ Miracle¨

We should actually fly today. But we figured we would not fly because everything was still closed.
We went in to town with the other young couple and bought a suitcase (husbands suitcase broke on the way there) and lovely sunglasses.
Turns out my new girlfriend could knock off anything and we went back with really cheap things.

We had lunch and then decided we would play cards. There was no more news.

Suddenly we heard our room numbers from the DJ hut. We were asked to go to the reception. We figured they wanted us to pay for the extra night.

But when we came there we heard we had 15 min to pack and we had to check out because our plain would fly today!

We were extremely happy. All the Dutch couples were on the bus except of one. We were singing, cheering and really livid.

As we arrived at the airport our luggage was thrown out of the bus. While the bus driver was doing that we were informed that our flight was CANCELLED.

The bus drove away and we were stranded. Left alone.

We called our Travel agent. (the dog) We did not like him one bit as he made everyone pay and said if we wouldn't pay the hotel would through us on the street.

He kept saying: It's not MY problem, it's YOUR problem! He did not care about us one bit.

But HE needed to solve this. People starting crying, shouting and we all were disappointed! We decided we would just stay at the airport and other people wanted to get a taxi and drive the 2 hours back to our hotel. But in the end we heard from The Dog we had 2 choices:

1. He made sure the busses would come back. He would book a hotel (more expensive!!!) we would then be picked up by a bus at 3 in the morning and taken to the airport and hope we could fly back then...
2. Go back to our own hotel but he would not pick us up again and we would lose our flight ticket back!

So we chose 1....after the HELL really broke loose but we realized this was our only choice.

Our new hotel Miracle was more expensive but it was miraculously BEAUTIFUL! It was a pity we could not enjoy it much. We arrived at 7 and after checking in with in total a 150 Dutch stranded people we finally got a room next to our friends.

We drank SEX ON THE BEACH, Vodka Cola, Beer; we stole the content of the mini fridge and made sure we ate a lot worth the extra money we needed to pay!



Evening 7.

¨Sexy time¨

Husband asks the waiter: can I have a sex on the beach, please.

The waiter answers (for real): with me???

We danced and talked and made the best of it!

Day 8.

¨SKY Airline¨

We had 2 hours of sleep.

We were anxious....will we be able to go back today? Children were crying, people were on edge. Me and 149 others had to wait at the airport and then we heard what we wanted to hear.....planes were flying again!!

People did not want to jinx anything so they did not want to be to happy again....saying they would believe it when we would land in at least Europe!

BUT we were when we landed at SCHIPHOL AIRPORT at 10.10 in the morning local time!! We were happy we made it, we did not crash and we had our feet on Dutch soil!

Husband and I look back with mixed feelings. We had some really lovely moments, times with new friends, wonderful weather and scenery. But also some horrible moments caused by the neighbors and Mother Nature!

Today we are married for 7 months and still going strong, in all the whimsical moments and horrible moments. We are building memorable moments together and we LOVE them all!

Note: Don’t ever travel with DTI….ever!