In which Cat's Turkish family saves the day

I am just back in Ankara after my whirlwind tour of the Southeast with my intrepid travelling companions Corey and Cat. Stories, photos, videos, and details will of course be forthcoming later, but I just had to tell you-all about our incredible trip home last night.
We'd arrived in Gaziantep on Friday, and before leaving the otogar went to buy tickets home on a Saturday overnight bus. We started at the better companies, feeling that a splurge at the end of our trip would be pretty nice, but quickly found out that it might be a problem getting home. The first 4 or 5 companies we talked to only had tickets available for Tuesday night, a full 3 days after we wanted/needed to return. So we went round every single company, asking even the sketchiest of places whether they had 3 tickets on Saturday evening to Ankara. It looked like we'd have to send 2 people home Sunday midday and one person home immediately Friday afternoon for a bit, until finally, at the last place, the ticket sellers said that yes, they had 3 tickets, and could even seat 2 of us together. We were obviously happy and relieved, paid for the tickets, and left to see Gaziantep and visit our friends there.
All this was well and good until last night. We got to the otogar in plenty of time, double-checked with the guys that sold us our tickets that we were in the right place and at the right gate, and pretty much chilled until our bus arrived. When it did, it looked a little sketchy: it had no company name on the side of it, and didn't even enter the otogar, we had to walk out to the street to get on. So we get on, and there's someone in one of our seats. And their ticket says they have that seat. At this point, we start to freak out a little that the company double-sold our seats, and immediately grab our other seats right before another group of people gets on and tries to take them. The bus attendant comes up, is very confused, looks at everyone's tickets, and gets on his cell phone and starts yelling at someone on the other end about how they sold seats twice. This went on for quite awhile before another guy came out from the ticket office, looked at everyone's tickets, and then told us that our tickets were for Sunday night. At that point, we got kicked off the bus, and off it went to Ankara.
So there we were, at 10:30 pm, in the Antep otogar with no transportation for another 23 hours, tired and really wanting to be on our way home. We were also really frustrated, as we'd asked for Cumartesi (Saturday) tickets, been told we were getting Saturday tickets, and been given Sunday tickets. And, of course, this being the end of Bayram, all the busses were full that night, as were all the flights the next morning. To say we were disheartened would probably be a bit of an understatement.
This is where Cat's Turkish family came to the rescue. For a tiny amount of backstory, Cat's boyfriend is Turkish, and his family kind of looks after her in Istanbul; they're very cute and very maternal. They also are the kind of people who can get things done. So, Cat called them, explained the situation, and put them on the phone with the bus company officials. It was very interesting listening to the bus official's side of that conversation; he started out with a lot of "the yabancis are lying, they're wrong, they asked for Sunday tickets" and ended suitably chastened. Cat's Turkish mom then spoke via phone with a second bus company, and got them to find us spots on an 11:30 bus later Saturday night. This was after every single bus company had told us there was absolutely no room. So we switched our tickets to the real Saturday night bus with the second company and waited. The bus finally got in at about 12:30, 1am, and we had to wait for everyone to get on, because although we had tickets, we had no seat assignments: we were told there would be 2 empty seats, and that the 3rd one of us could take the bus attendant's jumpseat next to the driver. It wasn't ideal, but it got us home.
So we wait, and the attendant finally gestured us on the bus, and there are no seats. None. Not only that, there are 3 other guys also standing in the aisle, also seatless. Fantastic. At this point, we're thinking we'll have to stand in the aisle for the entire 10 hour bus ride.
Luckily, even though being 3 young female yabancis couldn't entice anyone to give up their seats for us, it did apparently entitle us to the front stair area, whereas the other seatless guys were relegated to the back stairwell, all together. Corey and I shared the jumpseat, while Cat sat on the stair leading to the aisle, next to the driver. The jumpseat was definitely not made for 2 people, and neither Corey nor I slept for more than about 10 minutes. I also was on the side closer to the bus driver, which was enjoyable at first when we chatted about what we were doing in Turkey, but less enjoyable when he kept trying to pick me up and get my phone number. Internally, I was cringing of the thought of 10 whole hours of politely deflecting repeated requests for "senin cep numarasin" in Turkish while trying not to fall off my half-chair in my exhaustion. That's when I noticed the stairwell underneath the jumpseat looked low enough to sit in. So, at the first rest stop, I crawled under to the stairwell and slept there. Glamorous it was not. I did at least luck out and get a real seat for the last hour or so when a guy got off the bus early; that was pretty blissful. The other 2 were able to grab some sleep as well, but we rolled in to town pretty darn exhausted. I think the rest of my day will be pretty much napping and showering, and maybe uploading some photos; thank goodness we were able to get in today instead of tomorrow morning, or I'd've been a zombie for my classes.
I think the moral of the story is that if one ever, ever travels during Bayram, one should get one's tickets back to civilization well, well in advance. Or, at the very least, not try to get back to Ankara/Istanbul on the weekend. Well, I suppose I'll know next time...

The rest of my trip was really great; I have lots of experiences to relate. We climbed 5 castles or castle-type constructions, got shot with bb guns by little kids in Diyarbakir (something about that city is just crazy, but I really do like it for some reason), and had baklava in the Baklava Capitol of the World, Gaziantep. They'll have to wait until I have a little more sleep in me though :P
-R