Vacation Plans

Ever since I had learnt that a big company was planning to buy us out, I had switched to a super saver mode and decided not to make vacation plans.

Now I know, that is not going to happen, therefore, I can start to make some vacation plans. I will still keep my budget modest.

I will be taking three weeks off. A week off late April, early May with mom, sis and BIL. We will go to Chios for three days and then stay in Izmir until the weekend. That will be my vacation with mom this year.

Later in the year, I will be going to the US for two weeks. I have already bought my ticket from Istanbul to New York at USD 470.-. That is a very good price.

I also booked a ticket from NY to Charleston, SC at USD 204.- Last time I drove and ate away too much time. Not doing it this time. Besides, it is less expensive.

Who am going to visit? Well, I have been friends with these amazing people since early 90s. The couple who live upstate NY used to be co-workers at a Turkish-American JV I used to work for. My friend living in SC now used to live in CT and she was also a co-worker at the same place. Over the years, her husband became a friend too and we have kept in touch in all these years despite the fact that I moved back to Turkey in 1992. Now that we have Whatsapp and Facebook, we communicate regularly. In the past we used to write long e-mails but they were not so frequent.

The couple visited Turkey once in all these years and the others never made it here. It is a bummer but it is life... Work, kids, health issues prevented them.

Whenever I get a chance, I like to go visit them. I am going to be 50 this year so, I do not know for how long I will be able to keep this up financially and healthwise.