I was thankful to get off of the plane. My head was buzzing from the insane woman who had gabbed all the way from Frankfurt to Istanbul about how she could heal herself. And other people too. With her fingers.

Don’t. Even. Try. To. Touch. Me. I kept thinking to myself, during the flight. I became so overwhelmingly exhausted by her chatter that I started throwing books at her. My own, precious books, mind you.

“Please read this, you’ll LOVE it,” I said. “It’s about Lesch-Nyan syndrome—males who eat themselves like cannibals because of a genetic disease. Maybe you could heal them with your fingers.” I offered. I forced the book on to her lap and closed my eyes. She read for about half of a page and then began chatting again about her diet and how much she knew about the body and how she could be a doctor if only she had gone to school.

If only.

When I finally got off of the plane I dashed to get away from the woman and her equally strange family and found myself alone in a predominantly Muslim country.

It took me a long time to get through customs as I seemed to do everything wrong. By the time I was outside, in front of women under large black drapes and soldiers carrying machine guns, the sun was slanting toward the horizon. I looked at a map on the wall, saw where I knew my hostel was generally located; heard someone say something similar in reference to a bus; stood with those people and then paid my fare and climbed on to the bus.

My plan was this: I would be staying near Sultanameht, the Blue Mosque—the most notorious landmark in the entire city. No problem. I would simply look for its distinctive minarets and then get my bus or whatever to drop me off nearby. From there I had a scribbled Google Map to follow I had copied a few days earlier. I would be fine.

What surprised me more than all of the soldiers all over the place, holding large, imposing guns, and the stark, strange gun towers scattered behind barbed wire fences near the airport, was the sheer number of minarets in the city. Millions of them.

Crap. I thought. There goes my plan. The only map I had on me was a complimentary one they gave out near the visa station which had every high fashion knock-off store highlighted on top of the cartoon streets and landmarks of the city.

After about a forty five minute drive through the city and up a very steep hill, and after passing several mosques that looked just like the tour guide pictures of the Blue Mosque, I finally asked for assistance. I saw a man reading a book in English on the bus, so I leaned over and asked,

“Excuse me,” I said “Do you know where this bus is going?”

His face relayed near-repulsion at my question. It was as if I was the most absurd woman he had ever met. He haltingly told me where we were. I then asked him if he knew where the Blue Mosque was. He did. It was on the opposite side of the city.

“Right,” I said, nodding. “Thank you. Oh, and do you have the time?”

I had arrived in the city without a watch, a map, or a travel guide. I had forgotten them.

The strange thing is, in that case I was not very concerned. Sure, when it became dark and I was still lost and wandering around aimlessly on buses and facing hostile-looking strangers I became slightly alarmed. Eventually, though, I arrived at my destination unscathed.

In my “real” life, however, I am not so confident or cavalier (or stupid?) about being lost and confused and totally out of my element. I am remarkably more anxious about day to day occurrences in my safe, normal environment, than I am in situations of grave insecurity and danger.

Why is that?