We spent the first 4 days in Istanbul going through the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia, we ate at a few
of the restaurants featured on No Reservations and spent time at the local
parks. The Mosque was beautiful the tiles and colours were striking the space
inside was so open, during religious holidays thousands of worshipers will pray
at the Mosque. The Hagia Sophia is so interesting because you have both the
Christian and Muslim in the same building. The food was delicious; we of course
ate a ton of Shish Kebabs and flatbread along with cheeses, meats and seafood.
The food was a little bit hard with Kellen but most of the time the shish came
with rice and fries so that worked for him. He also liked dipping the bread in
the tzatziki.
We then went down the coast to Altinkum. Altinkum is a small beach
town that is obviously growing quickly. The area was an almost jarring mix of
poor rural villages and new condo development communities that were obviously holiday
properties. Driving from the airport to Altinkum was interesting to say the
least, everything was in Turkish and we would pass farms, makeshift looking
homes and ancient ruins all along the roadside. At first we weren’t sure why
there seemed to be so much rubble and found out that at one time there had been
Greek settlements that were then abandoned. We also passed beautiful orchards
and that water was like a postcard, our view was of the Greek Islands. As we
got closer to the condo we rented we turned a corner and found ourselves
driving past the Temple of Apollo
along with goats and chickens roaming freely along the road. Our condo was
great, 2 levels with 3 bedrooms and a bigger kitchen then I have here at the
house. It had a view of the water and was a short drive down to the beach.
After the hustle of Istanbul the goal for our 5 days in Altinkum was to relax,
let the kids run around and just spend down time together. The little
restaurant in the complex was great and Kellen loved it because he could just
run laps and duck in periodically for a bite or two while we took our time
eating. One day we did drive out to Ephesus to experience the
closest we’ll ever get to walking through an intact ancient Greek city.
Overall the trip had everything you could want from a
vacation. It was culturally interesting, the food was delicious and we got to
try new things and we had enough time to take naps and just spend time together.
That being said 10 days is hard with really little kids especially when you are
moving around locations. The kids are getting better and better at traveling,
or we are getting better and traveling with kids. We are much more efficient
packers then we were at first and they are now used to getting through airports
and on the flights. Patrick is a pro at security and Kellen even understands
staying with us and walking through the metal detector, luckily Ella is just
strapped in the Ergo for now. We make an
effort to try and take sanity breaks for Kellen; whether that is time at a park
or just downtime in the room it seems to help.
One thing that continues to amaze me is how different the
kids are treated in other countries. After Italy we were amazed at how much the
Italians love little kids, playing with them in restaurants, talking to them on
the streets, it made the trip so much easier. In Turkey we found the same
thing. Walking down the street people were so friendly with the kids, they were
affectionate and playful. In restaurants Ella would make a peep and she was
scooped up and given a tour of the restaurant. Kellen fell down at a park and
another Mom immediately grabbed him and started comforting him until I got over
there. Getting through the airports we were routed through the first class
check in and security lines just because of the kids in Rome, Paris and Istanbul.
My sceptical side would say well of course the restaurant owners were friendly,
it supports their business, etc. but this was just people walking down the
street or customers, men and women. Walking through the Grand Bazaar with
the double stroller the amount of attention we got was over the top. When you feel like your kids are not
bothering the people around you and are actually welcomed with open arms it
makes the whole experience so much better.
The day after we got home I was online and read this blog
article, Should
Airlines Charge Parents with Small Children More to Fly?. After having
another great experience traveling with the kids this made me so mad. I can’t
say it’s just an American thing because here in England the response to kids
has been similar and the airline they are referring to is Malaysian but the
attitude that kids are the greatest inconvenience drives me crazy. I get it,
not everyone thinks my children are the most beautiful and gifted children ever
born, that’s ok. I also make a point to try not to impose them on other people
(unless we are Facebook friends) or assume that everyone find their squeals and
wiggles as cute as I do. But if we never take kids anywhere how will they ever
learn how to behave? While I’m sure when we visit home we’ll happily have a
dinner out at Red Robin I don’t want our kids to think it is the only
restaurant they are allowed to eat at, I’ve learned that the UK equivalent is
Pizza Express which I hear is “family friendly”. When it comes to flying I will
tell you that we put a lot of time and effort into making sure we have plenty
of distractions for Kellen and Ella is allowed to eat as often as she wants as
long as she is quiet on the flight. Ella has been on 11 flights in her young
life and it wasn’t until this last trip that she had a meltdown on the plane.
It was the last 10 minutes of our flight from Istanbul to Paris and she just lost
it, she could not be consoled and didn’t want to eat she just continued to
scream, it was horrible. Waiting to walk off the plane everyone’s eyes were on
me as I was on the verge of a meltdown myself, half of the people looked sympathetic
and half looked like they wanted to strangle us both. One tactful woman in the
row behind us even covered her ears. The frustrating part is that on the other
10 flights Ella hardly made a sound, if you were on the flight you wouldn’t
have known she was there, yet I’m sure most of the people on the plane wondered
why would even try to travel with an infant.
Why do some cultures seem to celebrate kids, not just tolerate them, while others try to contain them to large chains and separate them from adults as much as possible? I’m not sure why but I know which culture I would prefer to live in.
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