Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Istanbul-London

Last Minute Rambles in Istanbul:
We had made booking for a mini bus to pick us up at our hotel and take us to the Sabiha Gokcen airport at 10. 20 am—for 10 euros apiece. This journey would be so much easier than the one that had brought us from the airport to central Istanbul. This left us enough time to have a wonderful last breakfast in Turkey and head out to the Hippodrome and Sultanahmet Square for some last-minute strolling. Indeed, tour groups were already out in the square admiring the two obelisks that adorn it. We walked towards the shops and bought a few more sweetmeats before we returned to our hotel and boarded our mini bus.

It was interesting to go through the narrow winding streets of Sultanahmet with a skilled driver who managed to negotiate his way very effectively through them reversing expertly when necessary.

It was a lovely drive back to the airport on what was a lovely sunny day—we passed en route so many of the monuments we could recognize and had grown to admire—including the Dolmabahce Palace on the Asian side. In fact, I was quite tickled to see a signpost on the highway that said “Welcome to Asia”! Before long, we were at the airport where we checked in within minutes and waited patiently for our flight while sampling baklava and Turkish delight in the one and only duty free shop.

Arrival in London:
Our flight arrived in London on time and by 4 pm, we had boarded a National Express coach at Gatwick airport that took us directly to Victoria on a beautiful spring day in London. We had enough time to take the Tube home to Holborn, stash away our things and head straight for the National Theater where I had booked tickets to see Wole Soyinka’s award-winning play entitled Death and the King’s Horseman in the Olivier Theater. We had grabbed soups at the EAT eatery on the South Bank of the Thames as soon as we got there (having taken a Waterloo-bound bus from across our building).

I was excited as this was the first time I was visiting the National Theater—I have never managed to get tickets to any of the plays before this. The play was packed with well-dressed theater-lovers as Llew and I made our way upstairs and found our seats. For the next couple of hours, we were transported to Nigeria where we watched Yoruba rituals unfold even as they were being suppressed by the colonial British government. It was a drama that included music, song and dance as well as the wonderful poetic prose of Soyinka. Needless to say, it had a stirring unexpected end and I was very glad that we had chosen to see this play despite the fact that we had just returned from a long global holiday!

Back on the bus, we found our way to Holborn where we slept the sleep of the dead as we were world-weary from all our travels.