We're HERE and I voted in the first Iraqi election

It's a little after 6 am, I got up at 5ish with the first call to prayer, which is beautiful but definitely reminds me I'm not in Oklahoma. We got in yesterday at 1:30 pm local, and got a cab to our hotel/hostel. It's perfect for us, small, but has it's own bathroom and access to the internet. When I went to ask what the wireless password was, I got out my blue pen from my carryon, and this happened.Leave it to me to make an accidental political statement in Turkey, because that's the ONLY thing that a finger dipped in blue ink reminds me of (voting in Iraq). I scrubbed, but I'm just going to have to deal with it.

Ben met us at the hotel, and it was so good to see him!! He walked us to get coffee, and then to the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia (which we are going to explore more in depth today), and then we found dinner and sat outside. (Ben did not lie to us about the weather here...) I had fabulous eggplant, and all the food was pretty good. We had chai at the end, and then it was chilly and we were tired, so we headed back to the Antique, where we're staying, but not before some baklava. Here's a picture of our hotel (not taken by us). Here we are with Ben:

And in front of the Hagia Sophia:

So far I've been groped by two people - the security woman at the Amsterdam airport who really made sure I was not carrying a weapon in my bra or underwear, and a man on the street who grabbed my ass last night.

And this is the "I'm excited about my birthday face" that Whitters has seen repeatedly already:
Okay, we're going to breakfast. We'll write more when we figure out a way to better charge our computers.