Hi Gram,
Today was a fun day with friends. I woke up and did my morning brain puzzles and went for my morning walk, then Rob, Chris, Carl, David and I headed into the city for some exploration and fun. Three of us went to some tourist shops in a mall while Rob took Chris to the airport, then Rob joined us at the mall and we headed to lunch. I ordered something at a Turkish food shop of which I didn’t get the name and then watched as they prepared a meat pie the size of a pizza! My eyes were huge as I watched them prepare it, hoping everyone else had found shops with smaller dishes so I could share some of mine. It was delicious, though. A fine pastry enclosing chicken, spinach, fetta, “mojo sauce” and a few other ingredients, pressed flat like a quesadilla, then grilled and cut into slices. I squeezed a little lemon over it and dove right in, grateful for a little help from my comrades.

After lunch, we headed to the train station where we parted ways. Carl headed to meet with a friend that he’ll be traveling with for the next week while Rob, David and I took a different train over to the US Embassy so I could drop off my absentee ballot. The trains here are so great! First of all, you just tap your credit card on the turnstile. No need to buy a separate ticket or scan card in a machine or from a teller, only to tap or insert it into the turnstile 30 seconds later. Second, the train stops that we saw were clean and looked old with lots of tilework. Finally, the trains themselves were clean double deckers with modern seats and friendly people. Google maps told me that the embassy was open until 4:30, but we found when we arrived at 3:15 that we’d just made it in time! They’d shifted their hours to 3:30, maybe for daylight savings time, but they let me in and helped me to send my ballot in. I felt great for having voted! I’m eager to find out the results of the election in a few weeks.

David and Rob hung out at a coffee shop while I voted, then the three of us walked down to the river to do a little sight seeing. One of my favorite things is just walking through town or down a trail or anywhere, really, talking with friends. Sure, waterfalls or museums or temples or whatever are nice and make for cool pictures, but friends are where it’s at! We walked through an amusement park, along a path that led next to the harbor, up and down some streets and stairs and paths, and even stopped for some gelato along the way.

Tired from a full day, we headed to the train and made our way back to the house so we could nap, veg out, and prepare ourselves for tomorrow!