Suddenly Erin scooted next to me and I sat up. An older middle eastern woman inserted herself into the non-existent seat between Erin and the other girl sitting in our row of chairs. She smiled at us in a friendly way and pointed to her leg to indicate that she was tired. The other girl stood up and our new seat mate motioned her friend to join us. Neither of them spoke English, but soon enough they were pulling pictures of their grandchildren from their bags and showing them to us. The oohs and aahs of admiration didn't need any translation as we looked at the adorable kids. These women were so pleasant, it was a balm to my stressed out soul! When one of them pulled out a bag of bread, she gave each of us a roll stuffed with cheese and parsley. We all sat together munching on our bread until we had to board. As we gathered our things and stood up, the women smiled at us and blew us kisses. What a sweet moment!
Returning to Bulgaria was wonderful for me. I knew more of what to expect and didn't feel so oppressed by culture shock. I took a taxi with my friends back to their flat and then took the metro back to my place. What happened next is NOT normal, at least in my experience. I was sitting on my suitcase as I waited for the metro to come and an older man came over to me and asked me (in Bulgaria) why I had such a huge suitcase. (Unless you know someone, you typically do not talk to strangers in the metro.) In a mix of broken English and broken Bulgarian, I explained that I live in Sofia and teach English here and he told me that his daughter had gone to college in Miami as a basketball player. The next thing I knew, he had called his daughter from where she was sitting, and they helped me with my luggage and talked with me for the whole trip to my stop on the metro. Talk about feeling loved! I had total strangers looking out for me on my trip. It reminded me that if these strangers cared about what happened to me, how much more God cares! I can trust him, even when I'm uncomfortable or anxious. It was a great end to my trip to Turkey.