Reflections after spending time yesterday evening in the Istanbul Airport

I arrived at the Istanbul Airport yesterday a little after 18:00.  The airport shuttle I had booked picked me up from my hotel at 15:45, much earlier than originally planned.  Extra time was needed to get to the airport, they told me, because the road to the airport would be more congested than usual because a Turkish holiday was scheduled for the next day and holiday goers would be packing the airport for their getaways.

The shuttle company was right, the roads were crowded; we barely moved during much of the journey.  But, I felt fortunate that we made it to the airport about three hours before my flight was scheduled to depart.  Nothing unusual in the departure lobby; little did I know that in a few hours time the same departure hall where I was standing would be the scene of a horrible act of evil.  Checked my bag, went through immigration and security (twice), and then entered the secure area of the Istanbul Airport where I visited the wonderful bookstore there, then I sat by my departure gate and worked on a post for my blog, which I didn't post because I didn't have the time to upload the pictures I was going to use.

My flight was scheduled to leave at 20:50, but we had troubles at the gate where we were supposed to board the bus that would take us out to our airplane.  It seems the officious Turkish airline employee was not pleased at the mostly-Kyrgyz passengers' efforts to form an orderly line to board the bus and he refused to let us board until we converted our mob into a line.  Evidently he'd never been to Kyrgyzstan and witnessed the difficulties we have in my new country with forming orderly lines where people do not cut in front of one other.  If he had, he would have given up and just let us push and shove our way onto the bus as is often the custom in my newest residence.  But he was a persistent man, who believed firmly in social engineering, and our progress was delayed by over half an hour.

Finally, we were able to board the bus and then the plane.  I noted that we took off at 21:30 because I was trying to calculate at what ungodly hour of the morning I would be arriving in Bishkek. I cannot sleep on airplanes, so I decided to read one of the books I had purchased--Islam: The Oxford Very Short Introduction.  When the attack began at the airport at 21:50, a mere twenty minutes after my plane departed, I was, oddly enough, reading the chapter on terrorism and jihad.

I arrived in Bishkek the next morning and took a taxi to my apartment.  When I turned my phone back on, I noticed a message from the travel agent who had booked my flight, hotel, and airport transfer.  "Are you in Bishkek? Are you okay?" was the message.  "Yes, I'm fine," I texted back, impressed at the excessive attentiveness of my travel agent.  Then I opened Facebook and saw another message asking if I was OK.  That's when I knew it was time to turn on my television so that I could discover what in the world had happened in Istanbul.  That's how I found out about the airport bombings.

In a few of the news reports I heard today, it was noted that the terrorists had arrived at the airport by taxi.  I had been in terrible traffic, but the terrorists had left later and had probably found themselves in even worse traffic.  If my transfer company hadn't been on the ball and moved my shuttle from 17:00 to 15:45 and if the terrorists had followed the advice one of the hotel clerks had given me that I should skip my shuttle altogether and take the train, because it wouldn't be delayed by traffic, they would have arrived much earlier.  If I had taken the original, later shuttle time and the terrorists had arrived much more quickly on mass transit, perhaps our arrivals at the Istanbul Airport would have coincided and who knows what my fate would have been? Everyday little things like this occur that we are not aware of and each of our lives is altered in indiscernible ways we will never know.  Only in dramatic instances like yesterday's does one realize that every small step we take is connected to something else, and someone else, and every alteration of our paths has meaning, usually insignificant, but sometimes monumental.  My experience of yesterday also made me think of my past job of selecting Central American students for Walton Scholarships. The selections made for my university were entirely in my hands.  I wonder what extraordinary blessings and cruel tragedies I have unknowingly put into motion by choices I made as to who would go to the U.S. and who would not?  I realize more than ever today, that each and every one of our actions matters, no matter how large or small.

And what of those who were wounded or killed?  Why did their fate have to be this way?  I cannot accept "God's Will" as an answer to why these innocent met this fate, nor as an answer to why I blithely continued my journey onward unharmed, reading my newly-purchased books on the flight to Bishkek.  I cannot accept this answer because it implies a God who is cruel, or a God who is indifferent, or a God who doesn't have a very good handle on Creation management.  I don't have a decent answer, actually, and I haven't yet met anyone who does.  All I know is that it is up to us, any person who cares about others, to put into action what we perceive to be "God's Will" or the "Golden Rule" or whatever it is we want to call the impulse to love our fellow human beings unconditionally and to shower them with support and aid and kindness.  Whether it be to help the victims in Istanbul, refugees from Syria, or our neighbor down the street, we cannot enjoy the luxury of assigning the tag "God's Will" to whatever is good or bad and simply leave it at that; rather we must work to be instruments of Good and must work to act upon this impulse to love others and to aid the suffering and the hurting, no matter who they may be.  Determining the "why" should not be our focus, but we must instead be the "what" that brings comfort to those in need.

And what of those who when the bodies of the dead of Istanbul are still warm proclaim that actions like torture of our enemies will be the solution to our problems?  Evil met with evil never brings peace and only degrades those who follow this wrong path.  In fact, those who committed the atrocities in Istanbul want us to respond in a Trumpian manner to help bring about an intensified religious war that suits their purposes.  This Trumpian approach violates every religious code of conduct, Christian, Islam, or otherwise, not to mention that it also violates every legal standard ever devised in areas like this.  And it will not solve the problem of terrorism.  So, Trump and those who support Trumpian methods of torture and banning entire groups of people must be resisted.

What else can we do when faced with terrorism and evil that doesn't seem to go away?  I don't know the answer to that question either, but I do have a couple of thoughts.

First, we need to recognize that evil is always present. It is part of the human condition, unfortunately.  We cannot despair when facing evil, but realize that it will always be with us and we can't be frightened, we can't give up.  We must live our lives according to our standards and beliefs, no matter what.  We must be brave, even if it's very hard to do.

Today, I also for a split second had this thought, "It's a good thing I went to Istanbul when I did, because it's getting more dangerous there and I'll probably never go back."  Then I realized, no, I will go back to Istanbul whenever I feel like it.  Why should I punish the good, hardworking people of Istanbul because I am fearful?  Unless it becomes a complete war zone, I plan to go back to Istanbul, because it is a wonderful, remarkable, beautiful city with friendly people and fascinating history.  I will go back there some day if I am able, terrorism be damned.  Because when we run and hide, terrorists win, and I'm not going to help terrorists.

I also wasn't going to post what I wrote for my blog last night while sitting in the Istanbul Airport, because it is a little bit silly and not really the right tone considering what happened.  But then I thought about that.  There are few things terrorists hate more than joy and humor and laughing and being mocked and ridiculed.  Think about it, how many terrorists are humorous people?  How many terrorist organizations use humor and laughter as weapons?  One of the biggest problems with terrorists is that they take themselves and their causes much too seriously and their dogma and indignation has harmed their capacity for empathy and humor, especially self-deprecation.  That's why laughter and humor is a powerful antidote to terrorism.  While I didn't agree with the approach of some of Charlie Hebdo's humor, it is clear that their humor was something terrorists hated.  Why else would terrorists target a humor magazine like Charlie Hebdo for destruction?  Terrorists targeted a small magazine in Paris because humor is their enemy and laughter in their faces is a stronger affront to them than insult or gunfire.  If I were entrusted to construct an army against these terrorists I would recruit all the finest comedians of the world to launch an all-out assault of mockery and laughter against them.  It couldn't be less effective than torture, and it would be legal and a lot less messy--and the rest of us would feel much better if we were all laughing too.  So, I'm posting my silly blog entry later today and I'm posting my other posts of Istanbul at some point, because I refuse to let terrorists take joy and mirth and our daily routines from us all.

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Courage be with those of us who are afraid.  Peace be with those of us who have lost loved ones. Comfort be with those who are injured and are suffering.  May the souls of those who have perished find eternal rest.