Sunday, February 13th, 2005

Well, strike one for going to Iskenderun. Don’t worry, I’m still on schedule and will arrive Monday morning. I just had some trouble figuring out what the deal is with the bus system here.

I’m traveling with ULUSOY, who are regarded as one of the best bus companies. I know this because all my friends would ask what bus I was using, and then say, “Oooh, so expensive! So good!” when I’d reply with the name. And the Rough Guide says that the seats are very comfortable, so woo hoo. It’s less than $25 for a ten hour journey, which in my mind is pretty decent.

Anyway, I wanted to make sure everything would work out smoothly, so I went to the ULUSOY office in Kızılay rather early today to check it all out. I had made my reservation earlier, so it seemed like things would be easy. But the lady working there did not speak English. We stammered around for a while; then she decided to call her friend on the phone, so that we could have a translator.

I tried to pay for my ticket, but was kept being told that I had to make a reservation first. Well I have a reservation. “Oh, ok, then come back at 6 p.m.” Can’t I pay now? “No, come back at six.” Ok, then what? How do I get to the bus station? “We have a service shuttle that will take you to the station after you pay.” Great. What time is my bus to Iskenderun? “It leaves at midnight.” Ummm… ok. Do I really have to come at 6 p.m. to get the service shuttle when my bus leaves six hours later? “I’m sorry, you must go at 6 p.m. There will be a lot of people.” Well, ok.

I went back to my dorm and hung out. I even asked my friend Mehmet about the time thing. He laughed and said, “Simon, this is Turkey. Anything can be!” Man, I have heard that phrase so many times in my half year or so here. Well, I packed all my gear, took a visit to the internet café, came back for dinner and then made my way to the ULUSOY office again.

This time the person at the desk spoke English. Everything went so smoothly, except I kept wondering why the place was empty. I paid for my ticket, and even got the student rate, saving me a whopping 3 YTL! Everything was wrapped up and I was ready to go. The ULUSOY rep. smiled and said, “Ok, please be here for the service shuttle at 11:00 pm.”

What? I was told to come here at 6 p.m. “Really?” he said. “I don’t know why they would have told you to do that. Our shuttles leave an hour before the bus departure time.”

Great.

So here I am, back at my dormitory. With nothing to do. I’ve been wandering back and forth from Kızılay all day long, and I’ve got one more trip ahead of me… in about four hours now. I guess I’ll just go surf the internet and try not to be too annoyed about it.

I keep thinking about all my misadventures here, and I wonder why these things happen. Is this normal? Is traveling always fraught with this much confusion, or am I doing something wrong? I feel like I plan things out as much as possible. I mean, I went in early today, we used a translator, I asked all the necessary questions (even double checking the information in Turkish!)… so why do these things happen? There must be some sort of secret that I’ve missed out on.

It could be worse though. I could have missed the bus, I could have bought the wrong ticket and ended up somewhere in Iran… I mean, can I really be complaining? I think not.

I’ll leave you all with better news… Iskenderun is forecasted to be cloudy tomorrow with a temperature of 56°F. I’m not even going to take my winter coat. There’s no need! If that’s the temperature when it’s cloudy… oooooh, I am one happy guy!