I haven’t been to Istanbul, but I have lived and traveled to Europe. You don’t need to go to Amsterdam to find Graffiti, traveling alone is stupid, and her hopping from Istanbul to continental Europe and back again makes no sense. Oh, and I take pictures and am a mom, too. I would check out her financial situation. Maybe she was naive or maybe this was pre-planned and went bad.
Courier-business. Flies into Istanbul, but barely stays a few days. Flies into Amsterdam for 24 hours. Flies into Munich for 72 hours. Flies back to Istanbul. Never been anywhere in Europe ever before. Spent $10k in less than two weeks.
Angle? Came into Istanbul pick up a drug load. Everything went ok. Carries a diamond load from Amsterdam to Munich. Then carries some bank checks from Munich back to Istanbul. Digested the final drug load to run back to the US, and something went wrong....was dying, and they simply cut her up to retrieve the bags that were unaffected. End of story.
Probably a thousand couriers carrying out these episodes every month. Most all are successful except for the trans-atlantic flights.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/03/nyregion/vacationing-staten-island-woman-found-dead-in-turkey.html
She worked part time in a chiropractor’s office and was studying for a bachelor’s degree at the College of Staten Island.