Slot-car racing

After an early morning ferry ride across the Sea of Marmara to the city of Yalova, I was walking along when I came across a few pieces of a slot-car race track lying on the sidewalk. They were just sitting there in front of a store. Another ten feet down the road there was a single piece on top of a traffic light signal box.

That was weird enough.

After a great interview with the mufti of Yalova I hopped on a bus to Bursa to catch an afternoon sermon meeting, and a couple hours later I was walking around a mall in the center of town looking for a bathroom. As I went down an escalator, I saw a large figure eight slot-car race track and a yellow stock car with an M&M’s decal zooming around. There was a young man controlling the car and a young woman sitting behind a table next to him. At first I just walked past, but then the coincidence sunk in and I had to go back to tell them what I’d seen earlier this morning. They didn’t have an explanation but I did learn that there are some people who race slot cars professionally.

I hadn’t seen a slot-car track for at least ten years, and never in Turkey, but today, within the space of two hours, I stumbled across one twice in two different cities.

I have no clue what the significance might be.