Part 6

I was on my way to the U.S. Consulate when I snapped what I thought would be my last picture of Turkey

So here I am, dragging all my belongings, along with my sorrows, and the funny feeling that I have been in this situation before, just not on the other side of the world. What to do next? I decided to bypass many markets and convenience stores, until I arrived to one in particular…there seemed to be a voice that told me go go ahead and enter it. Little did I know, this would be my salvation!
I entered the convenience store and took one look around, it was just me and the store keeper (whom I later learned his name is Mustafa). And this is where I break down. Poor Mustafa didn’t speak a word of English, and here I am an American girl sobbing about her sorrows to a stranger who doesn’t speak English…I look back on this and laugh quite a bit.
He called someone that knew English and told them to come over as soon as possible (that’s what I gathered from what Turkish I knew at the time) then he ordered food for me, a lot of it! His friend who spoke English showed up and asked me what I wanted to do, I couldn’t seem to get through the sobs and the chewing so he made me set aside the food, and told me that crying wont solve anything, to which I responded that, yes, it would. I just needed to get the panic out of my system for ten minutes, then all will be fine.
I was finally able to spit out my situation to the man, the poor guy had no idea what to do with me, but he knew the first most important thing for me to do was to get my passport back from the U.S. embassy. He then took me to the restaurant that he owned and handed me 125 Lira. I then ran to the U.S. embassy and smart mouthed to the country that was supposed to protect its citizens, not make problems worse. They asked how I magically had money all of the sudden, to which I replied that the a Turk took pity on me when my own country decided to turn its back. As you can imagine, he rolled his eyes.
I then ran back to the restaurant and attempted to pretend I wasn’t tired, I slammed a lot of black tea, but the man, his name was Kazim, saw right through me, he pointed to a spot where I could lie down outside by a table without being bothered, and I crashed.
About three or four hours later, I awoke. Kazim introduced me to a woman that was sitting with him, her name was Songul, and told me that she and her husband would like me to come stay with them, not to work, not to do anything, but to relax and detox my brain from the situations I had gotten out of. Of course, right away I said no. I was scared, and at this moment, realized I could not enter into another persons home without having an anxiety attack.