60. TAXI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Leaving Istanbul wasn’t to be easy.  

Four hours before I was scheduled to leave for Attaturk airport by my prebooked private Mercedes,  I decided to test my new acquisitive skills.  I  went back to the Grand Bazaar to my favourite Turkman dealer - the one whose tiny shop resembles more a museum than a cluttered stall, and negotiated with him on two matching  what I think are museum quality Uzbekistan gold pendants I’d fancied ever since I saw them my first week in Istanbul.  The price was alarming. I had my tea. I considered. I looked at others.  A phone call was made.  The price came down. I refused. Another cup of tea, and another phonecall.  The price came down further.  I considered. Then I was told it was Turkish Lire which made the value one third less.  I bought them, with shaking hands , and with barely a half hour to spare rushed back with my plastic bag of what I know to be very valuable pieces,  to my hotel, to collect my luggage and wait for my driver. 

Goodbye Ottoman houses!

It was raining.  Twenty million Istanbulians were out on the town, this time under umbrellas.  It took me a half hour through the throngs to get back. I checked that the driver was on his way, and waited in the lounge. I checked my watch. I checked the driver was on his way, then I waited on the street. My friend in the lobby made a phonecall, frowned.  The driver couldn’t get across town.  He’d decided to return home.  Fock.  A taxi was called.  I waited in the rain. I cross the road to waited on the side the taxis came in. Close to panic, I went back to the lobby. Another phonecall was made. Big smiles, no problem, the taxi would be two minutes.   Then he would be three minutes. Then five minutes. Then two minutes. Each update necessitated a phonecall from reception. My plane for La Serenissima was taking off in two hours, and I hadn’t left the city yet.   I didn’t even have a taxi.  Standing in the rain, with two suitcases, twenty million people, trams and no taxis and a plane going without me. Fock. Fock. Fock. Fock.  

Farewell, proud Turkey!

I'm my own ticking clock.  A close to hysterical bomb waiting to go off.  Blood pressure three stories high.  Another close to hysterical phone call, and now the taxi said he couldn’t get through the traffic.  Standing in the rain, two cases, twenty million people on my footpath. A plane to catch, and a long drive before that.  No fookin taxi. Sheet. Fock. Sheet. Fock. Sheet. Sheet. Sheet Fock.   I kept checking my watch as if I had a nervous tick. Fock. Check clock.  Sheet. Watch watch.  Fock Sheet I’m out on the street and my fookin international plane leaves in an hour fortyfive.

Running on empty down this street to get a plane

Suvanna! Sussan!  COME WITH ME!  shouted the gorgeous man at reception, as he ran into the rain. This man who’d delivered my washing, given me room at the inn, looked after my luggage, carried my parcels and greeted me each day, now grabbed one suitcase and started running down the hill to the bus and taxi junction.  I followed, on clacking heels, dragging my new yellow four wheeled masterpiece of luggage design which just proved that it could do 0 to 15 in as many seconds.  

Move, out of my way, I have a plane to catch!

Move! Via! Move! Fook!  Sheet! We clattered and rolled and bumped and jaywalked and zigzagged all the way through Sultanahmet and down past Topkapi, knocking slow walkers aside and tripping on the toes of pedestrians.  Fook! Sheet!  Via! Move! Make Way!  Mscusi! Pardon! Sheet!  Fook!  Past the Locum Turkish delight shops, and the tapestries and the coloured lights.  FOOK! Not a single taxi in sight, luggage clattering over tram rails, all the way down that road I walked to the Galata bridge that took an hour - both of us running as fast as we could, as if we were being chased by our past.  We reached the ferries, the buses ... and a taxi stand, every yellow car jammed tight in the Saturday traffic. Running Hero practically threw himself on the bonnet of an idling taxi, begging him to take me to the airport.  

The driver laconically shook his head - Yok!  Yok!  No!  He was already hired. Running Hero, having abandoned the luggage while he fought for wheels for my airport ride, flung himself through the window of a second taxi, brandishing a fistful of Lire.  I leapt onto the bonnet, beating my breast and making heart attack movements.  One hour and ten minutes before my plane left, with a half hour ride ahead.  Was it rush hour?  I thought I was going to have a heart attack. 

Running Hero hauled open the boot of the taxi as it tried to drive off without me. He heaved my luggage inside. He yanked open the passenger door - but before he could throw me inside, I kissed him on both cheeks and hugged him and said thankyou, thankyou, just as he threw another handful of lire at the taxi driver and shouted GO! Once in the car, with my luggage in the boot, he had no option but to take me to the airport. 

We broke every speed limit.  I rushed into the airport, I gatecrashed the xray machines, I apprehended a stunned official who fast tracked me to check-in.   I arrived at boarding as the last of the passengers straggled in.  

Breathless, speechless, and practically legless at this stage after all the running and potential heart attacks, I was on my way to Venice. La Serenissima.  The most Serene of cities.  I certainly needed it.