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We, 32 of us including the priest from Sabah, finally set foot on Turkey to begin our 12-day Trail of St Paul pilgrimage (after minusing the 2 days on the air plane from and to Singapore) on the morning of Saturday 30 May 2009.
Ideally, I should have blogged my first posting from Turkey last night, our first night in the country, before going to sleep. However, there were two reasons why I didn't, or rather couldn't.
Firstly, although the hotel where we stayed at Antakya provided FREE Wi-Fi Internet service in its premises; my fellow bloggers would know that does not necessarily mean you automatically get connected. This is because there may always be a technical hitch, like the modem blinking and so on (those with modem at home would know what I mean).
Then, there was a relief. I saw notice in the hotel room saying you can get connected either through wireless or LAN. I quickly rushed downstairs to borrow the connection wire from the counter - only to find that there was no such socket in my room. Even if there was, it was sealed/blocked (tiada lubang).
To cut the long story short (since I'm supposed to write on the pilgrimage rather than the problem) by the time I finally got connected it was already late at night (wee hours in Sabah as we are 5 hours ahead of the Turks). I tried my best to blog, but while my fingers were on the keyboard my eyes began to half-close until I finally dozed off with the computer still on my lap.
The culprit was the long and tiring journey from Singapore to Istanbul. We left Singapore late Friday night and landed in Istanbul early Saturday morning. In other words, we spent the nite on the plane. Those of you who ever experienced that, on the economy class especially, would know how tiring it is as you can't rest properly, never the fact that you can't take bath.
As if that was not tiring enough, instead of starting our pilgrimage straight away on Saturady morning from Istanbul, we had to take a connecting domestic flight to Adana. Even that after waiting for almost two hours at the Istanbul airport (on top of waiting for half-a-day at the Singapore airport on Friday!).
The flight from Istanbul to Adana took slightly over an hour, something like from Kota Kinabalu to Kuching. Just like Singapore-Istanbul, it was also Turksih Airline which took us to Adana. The only consolation for the extra journey was that despite being a domestic flight, the inflight service to Adana was even better than form Singapore to Istanbul which was an international flight. And the domestic flight crew spoke better English and more polite too!
I have to stop here as we have to go upstairs of the hotel for a briefing/slides show followed by dinner. I will post my Part 2 before bedtime, hopefully no more technical hitches this time. And hopefully my eyes won't be that heavy.
See you. Aramaiti! (Miss the Kaamatan at home)
Ideally, I should have blogged my first posting from Turkey last night, our first night in the country, before going to sleep. However, there were two reasons why I didn't, or rather couldn't.
Firstly, although the hotel where we stayed at Antakya provided FREE Wi-Fi Internet service in its premises; my fellow bloggers would know that does not necessarily mean you automatically get connected. This is because there may always be a technical hitch, like the modem blinking and so on (those with modem at home would know what I mean).
Then, there was a relief. I saw notice in the hotel room saying you can get connected either through wireless or LAN. I quickly rushed downstairs to borrow the connection wire from the counter - only to find that there was no such socket in my room. Even if there was, it was sealed/blocked (tiada lubang).
To cut the long story short (since I'm supposed to write on the pilgrimage rather than the problem) by the time I finally got connected it was already late at night (wee hours in Sabah as we are 5 hours ahead of the Turks). I tried my best to blog, but while my fingers were on the keyboard my eyes began to half-close until I finally dozed off with the computer still on my lap.
The culprit was the long and tiring journey from Singapore to Istanbul. We left Singapore late Friday night and landed in Istanbul early Saturday morning. In other words, we spent the nite on the plane. Those of you who ever experienced that, on the economy class especially, would know how tiring it is as you can't rest properly, never the fact that you can't take bath.
As if that was not tiring enough, instead of starting our pilgrimage straight away on Saturady morning from Istanbul, we had to take a connecting domestic flight to Adana. Even that after waiting for almost two hours at the Istanbul airport (on top of waiting for half-a-day at the Singapore airport on Friday!).
The flight from Istanbul to Adana took slightly over an hour, something like from Kota Kinabalu to Kuching. Just like Singapore-Istanbul, it was also Turksih Airline which took us to Adana. The only consolation for the extra journey was that despite being a domestic flight, the inflight service to Adana was even better than form Singapore to Istanbul which was an international flight. And the domestic flight crew spoke better English and more polite too!
I have to stop here as we have to go upstairs of the hotel for a briefing/slides show followed by dinner. I will post my Part 2 before bedtime, hopefully no more technical hitches this time. And hopefully my eyes won't be that heavy.
See you. Aramaiti! (Miss the Kaamatan at home)
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