I arrived in Istanbul at midnight on the 30th of January andto be honest, I feel like I still haven't really had a chance to explore yet! I have just been recovering from the worst jet-lag of my life and starting my new job!

I live in a great dorm here in an old heritage building, which is fantastic! I have my own room and hot water showers! Wow!

The city has more people than I have ever seen in one place and time, and I have learned to negotiate the subway system to and from work, which is a huge success I think! ha ha. Now...I really must learn Turkish, because it seems like NO ONE here speaks any English, which is actually really great, and refreshing because I really want to learn Turkish and when people speak English to you it is so hard to learn the language. However, in the mean time it is causing me no end of confusion, like forget even being able to read a menu, I mean even in Central America if you don't speak Spanish you can at least get the gist of what you are ordering, but here it is a total crap shoot, so thankfully I have lovely co-workers to translate for me! And due to an embarassing mistake I have learned the difference between Bay (men) and Bayan (women)- there were no pictures on the bathroom sign to even give me a clue!!!

More soon!

xoxo