The 12 Ways of Christmas... (Sneaking back into our Christmas-less country)

We knew when we moved here that living in a Muslim country would mean missing out on many traditions and customs that we count on as Americans.  Where would we be without Santa at the mall, fake snow on every window sill, twinkling icicle lights, animatronic and blow-up reindeer, the freaking Chipmunks singing "All I want for Christmas is my Two Front Teeth"?  I mean... would we make it?!?! Being a common Grinch, all I could think about was how lucky I was to be escaping the magic madness. But as the holidays approached and all of our friends and families started to email, and Facebook about winter break, and Christmas cookies, wrapping presents, and midnight mass, I found my little heart growing.  (Or something from that Grinch movie that I refuse to watch because I am not a child anymore, and I don't like movies that depict me and my kind in an unfavorable light.) I was even missing Christmas music... I had the urge to go CHRISTMAS CAROLING! This might be normal for Alan, and for most of you reading this, but I've been out of the Christmas spirit for so long that I don't remember what "jolly" feels like any more. (It feels kinda good. Weird. But good.) I missed the smell of Christmas I guess.  I missed people wishing each other "Happy Holidays," or even being aware that is was the holidays.  Turkish people don't celebrate Christmas, so we worked a regular day on Friday, and will again on Monday.  Alan had to put his foot down when they asked him to work on Saturday ("But that's Christmas," almost didn't work). Most of all we are both missing the family, friends, hugs, and general shared love that come with the season. 
So we worked together with a few fellow ex-pats to bring Christmas back to Who-ville. (Sorry if I'm totally butchering the Grinch story.) I present to you "The 12 Ways of Christmas" in no particular order.

1. Christmas Pageants: The city of Alanya held it's first annual International Christmas Bazaar. All of the schools in the area were invited to come preform Christmas songs.  We got to hear all the classics: Jingle Bell Rock, Jingle Bells, We Will Rock You, and The Lion Sleeps Tonight, sung by Turkish children who may have memorized what the words sound like, but have NO CLUE what they are really singing.  So sweet.  I saw many an older Eastern European crying. Either the children REALLY butchered the German songs, or they were genuinely touched to hear some traditional Christmas songs here.  I'm leaning towards the second one.

2. Christmas Candy: Alan's family tradition made it all the way here! He slaved away on some DElish Peanut-butter balls dipped in chocolate. So good he has been challenged to a Tatlı-off. Or a dessert making competition. What the challenger doesn't know is that his family has been grooming him for the "big dance" since he was old enough to roll a ball out of dough-like substances. He's sure to win.

3.  Spending time with Family: OK so they weren't our family members.  But they were someone's family.  And while we are in Turkey Jan and Adnan are our stand in parents; Sonya, Zeynep our stand in sisters, Kamil and Burak our stand in brothers, and Suzanne, Nicole, and Kenan our stand in cousins. We even got to celebrate with pretend distant relatives: some awesome Dutch people who had us over for international cocktail hour.

4. Christmas music: Alan brought his Uke and Nicole played her guitar so we could have a good-old Christmas sing-along.  Rudolf and Frosty were in attendance, along with Silent Night and many other classics.

5. Christmas Crafting:  Being that I LOVE crafting, I couldn't let being in Turkey take away my tradition of making some sort of ridiculous Christmas gift.  With no sewing machine, no yarn or needles, no craft stores in Alanya, and no time for anything elaborate, I settled on baked clay ornaments.  They turned out just as silly as expected. Perfect.

6. Trimming the Tree: with said ornaments.  "The Tree" was a house plant, and the ornaments only stayed long enough to snap the picture, but it was trimmed, and it was beautiful.  So there.

7.  Christmas Movie #1: ELF.  God bless Buddy the Elf and his syrup loving, long burping, hilariousness.

8. Christmas Movie #2: Love Actually.  Never fails to make me cry.  It even works on Alan. Sap.

9. Dressing Festively: I'm not sure I've owned a Christmas sweater since I was 5, so of course none made the cut when deciding what we could fit into our Turkish lives. So a bright read sweater and a bright green scarf would have to do.



10. More Christmas Music: N'Sync Christmas.  NEVER GETS OLD.

11. Our REAL families: We are oh-so-lucky to have skype and facebook to provide the gift of seeing our families faces even when they are thousands of miles away.  We miss you guys like crazy.  Can't wait for Google or Apple to invent the hug app.

12. Snuggling in PJs and slippers all day.  Nothing makes me feel more jolly than warm jammies, and a cozy nap.  Especially when I get to share those things with the guy I love. 



So to wrap up, MERRY CHRISTMAS! From the birthplace of both Christianity and Santa, and from the bottom of our hearts.

I Never Could Get Out of the Scissor Hold

Today I will write a blog not to inform everyone about a new experience in Turkey but to honor a man who meant so much to me and my family. My Grandpa D was a loving, caring strong man who set a high standard to live up to when it comes to being a "family man." He lost his battle to cancer this week and our world is left without Grandpa's hugs and smiles.

Of course we will all miss those hugs and smiles but there are plenty of things Grandpa left us with to remember him by. First and foremost Grandpa taught us that game night, while occasionally leading to hurt feelings, was more than just killing time. Whether it was Monopoly or Farkle, black jack or canasta, scrabble or golf, we built our characters in those games and Grandpa was always there to help guide us, unless we were showing him our cards at which point he would look and choose accordingly.

I will also remember the bike rides we would take to the beach. To this day I love riding bikes and I often remember the feeling of riding through the narrow tunnel near Hueneme Beach, a little fear that someone might be there and the joy of getting to the spot where we could just watch the ducks, where cousins later would take bread for feeding. Then we would get to the pier where we would have a hot drink and rest before making the trip home. While I don't remember having great discussions about important topics in those times I do know that spending that time with Grandpa was important. I looked forward to those trips, and I still remember them fondly.

My last memory for today is of the wrestling matches that the cousins and I would have with Grandpa in his younger days. Of course it would always happen in the evenings while we were all in the living room watching Tv. Grandpa would get down on the floor with us amidst the constant reminders of "Watch out for the Coffee Table". None of us cousins were impervious to the infamous "Scissors Hold." A hold seemingly so simple to avoid yet it never failed to keep us trapped and calling for mercy. Perhaps as I have witnessed children do, we intentionally put ourselves in harms way because we liked the challenge and we liked the game. I know even to this day the scissor move lives on during wrestling matches and tickle fights. Grandpa's move was an effective one.

If you look at what a typical family structure is in America today the legacy of the "typical American family" has been replaced by divorce, distance and disputes. The Demuth family has remained a strong unit through all of these year, no doubt a testament to the loving leadership of Grandma and Grandpa D. I will miss Grandpa's hugs and strong competitive spirit, but I know "Gene-o" will continue to be a part of game nights, bike rides, tickle fights and most of all my family.

Turkish Thanksgiving

First of all, sorry we have neglected the blog for the past few weeks, it has been a little bit of a whirlwind lately between lost internet connections and extra hours at work. But we're back.

So we finally got to make it happen. Ever since we left America it was our plan to share our Thanksgiving traditions with our new friends. The challenge about doing this in a country that doesn’t celebrate it is that they tend to make plans without knowing it would conflict with the holiday. On Thanksgiving we had our weekly staff meeting that lasted until 6:30 so we planned to have dinner on Saturday. Turns out the school was having a dinner to celebrate Teacher’s Day on Saturday, so postponed, Sunday was a fund-raising brunch to buy a wheelchair for someone in the community. Moved to Monday, the school planned a Foreign Languages (our department) seminar although we didn’t have to attend many of our colleagues did. Finally we said Tuesday it is, not ideal since that meant cooking on Monday night and reheating on Tuesday, but it needed to happen before December rolled around.

We went for it, all the fixins. 2 Large Chickens (Turkey wasn’t possible here we only found one that was severely freezer burnt) Stuffing, Cranberry sauce from the can (Thanks D & B, it was a hit with the locals) Pumpkin pies from an actual pumpkin, Mashed Potatoes and Gravy. Almost everything was delicious and the Turkish people were delighted to try things they had never tried. Turkish people have never been introduced to the delights of gravy! So they got to taste what Erin described as “Meat Pudding.” They continuously asked Erin how she made the Cranberry Jelly.

Cranberry Jelly, can rings and all

You may be wondering what wasn’t delicious. Well it turns out that when you are looking to buy chickens you don’t want to get the largest ones you can find. When you can’t read Turkish it is so easy to accidentally purchase the type of chicken (possibly a rooster) that people use for stewing and dumplings. So except for the breasts that were edible, most of the chickens were jerky. Some of it could be saved for soup for the next day, but mostly it was disappointing. Last night though redemption was had when I tried again and roasted a delightfully tasty chicken with crispy skin and juicy breasts. I couldn’t let that bad chicken be on my reputation for too long.

All in all it was a great opportunity to share a holiday of thankfulness with our new friends and a different culture. We definitely are thankful for having met such a great group of people here in Turkey. The transition to a new culture, language and job much easier.

Happy Turkey Day!

Shhh... Don't tell any Turkish people we call it that.  (They're very sensitive about the fact that we call that big goofy bird the same thing we call their country.) Anyway, we are missing America and our families so much right now.  Oh how we wish we were with you carving into a nice warm Hindi right now. (Hindi is Turkish for turkey.  After 20 minutes of discussing how rude it is for Americans to call that silly bird a turkey, we found this little tid-bit out. Once we pointed out that Hindi is the word for the language of India, and "why would you call them that?!?" the debate ended.) We have big plans to make the traditional turkey dinner and invite all of our new friends over (complete with a first Thanksgiving skit).  Unfortunately there are no turkeys to be found, except for one in a torn bag with just a bit more freezer burn than we prefer.  So we will be roasting some whole chickens instead. 

So continue on our ongoing "People we miss" series... FAMILY, WE MISS YOU! Moms, dads, sisters, brothers, grandparents, aunts and uncles, Thanksgiving isn't the same without your shining faces, warm hugs, and hilarious stories. We miss your homemade pies, and special recipe stuffing, and the gravy in the fancy gravy boat.  We have so much to be thankful for this year, but it's too bad that all of our exciting adventures take us so far away from you. We love you like crazy, and think about you all the time. We hope your Thanksgiving is relaxing and delish (don't send us pictures of the food though, that would be mean).

We're so Thankful for such loving and supportive families! We miss you!

Lamb Chops Don't Grow on Trees

WARNING!!! If you are the type of person who might be saddened or hurt by a story of animal sacrifice you may want to avoid this blog post. There are no graphic descriptions or photos, I just know that this may be hard for some people.

For the past week Erin and I have been on holiday in Ankara and Konya. It was great to get out and explore different cities in Turkey. What made this holiday special was that we went with our friend Zeynep to visit her family, we had a Turkish tour guide. In Ankara we visited Ankamall and Anıtkabir, both great sites to see when in Ankara. While these are both great places to visit, neither of them make the top story from this trip, that award goes to the experience of kurban (an animal sacrifice with the intentions of having good fortunes in the next year.)

About 2 weeks ago near our house there appeared some new wood fences and slowly different animals started to fill the pens, sheep, goats and cows. "The Sacrifice Holiday" was coming. 

When we committed to visiting Ankara and Zeynep's family she excitedly informed us that her sister purchased a sheep that would be sacrificed so that we could be a part of it. "How will you feel about this?" She sensitively asked.  "That will be a new experience..." "How will you feel about me crying? And throwing up?" Erin wondered. Luckily Zeynep said that is is very natural to cry over the lost life, and that no one would be offended. (Or call Erin a little wussy pants.) Phew.

Let's be real.  We aren't naive. Although we are both life-long meat lovers we are well aware of where meat comes from. But as Americans that don't own a farm, we aren't used to seeing the meat go from walking around in the form of a fluffy animal to "mmm-mmm-good" in an afternoon.

But in the name of learning about new cultures and having new experiences... off we went to the sacrifice grounds, which looked like the animal barns at the fair (for good reason: I have heard many similar stories of 4-H and FFA raised animals being sold by a tearful child). We found the sheep with our number spray-painted on the side and a man drug it off to the area with the butcher. This is where Erin bowed out of the witnessing, not a surprise for someone who once had to be consoled while her father killed a juniper bush in their front yard. So with her head down and my arm around her I guided her through the area where the sacrifices were happening (of course the path to the exit only passed by the sacrifices) and past the truck full of sheep heads and pelts to an area that looked like a butcher shop, much easier to take. I went back just in time to hear the man call our number, watch the sacrifice and then see a little of the aftermath. While our sheep died peacefully, others did not. It was hard to handle for more than a minute or so. I too went to the makeshift butcher shop to comfort Erin.

There's one DEAD sheep in those bags

Stage 2 of Sacrifice Day: Meat Party (conducted on the kitchen floor with large knives and techno music). Of course when you butcher an animal there are extra "parts" left that us grocery store carnivores are not used to dealing with.

The discovery.

Looking Oh-so Turkish

As you can see Erin found these things and had to ask "will you eat those?" This led us on a conversation about how different organs are used to make soups and yes, they do eat those. In fact Zeynep exclaimed "I hella like testicle soup!" (a potential contender for this blog's title). So although they hadn't planned on eating them that night they cooked up the sheep's testicles and Erin and I bravely sprinkled some salt on them and took the first bite. For those of you who are wondering they tasted like an extra tender chicken breast.

Surprisingly tasty.

Funny enough, none of the Turkish people jumped in to take a bite with us.  Instead they made nauseous faces and asked us how it tasted.  UHHHHH.... was this some sort of Fear Factor practical joke!?!?! Make the silly Americans eat sheep testicles?!?! Apparently some people eat balls, just not the ones we were dining with.

Less than a year ago we were sitting in Roseville for Thanksgiving beginning to hatch a scheme that would lead us to quit our jobs and move to Turkey. I knew life here would be different but who knew we would be starring in a Turkish version of a gross out reality show? Yea for new experiences! 

Note: For those of you who, like us, are wondering about the practice of ritual sacrifice, this is what we understand: this holiday is really about making a sacrifice of an animal while praying for good fortunes during the year. Since the blood of the animal has been shed, the blood of the family won't be. Once the animal has been sacrificed the meat should be shared with friends relatives and those less fortunate.

More people we miss...

Last year's pumpkins

Spooky web, Madonna Mt. 

With the crispness of fall making it's way to Alanya, and Halloween happening without us, we are really starting to miss the central coast and the activities and people that made that part of the world so special. If you are lucky enough to still live in the utopia that is San Luis Obispo make sure you take advantage of it, and take us along in your heart on a few of our favorite SLO activities. 

1. Wine tasting (DUH)

2. Apple tasting at Gopher Glen 

3. Farmer's Market: eat something with your hands while sitting on a curb and listening to an awesome performer like "puppet guy" or Lord of the Cello. 

4. Picking out pumpkins and amazing gourds at Avila Barn

5. Happy hour at the cliffs (year 'round fun)

Ok, so this wasn't Farmers, but you could dance like this anyway.

Anyway, we miss you.  We miss dancing with you, sipping wine with you, hiking and eating with you. Enjoy the start of fall, we wish we were there sharing it with you. xo

Baileyana, and our last wine tasting day is SLO.

"YOU LIVE IN TURKEY NOW!" My role as a woman...

Turkish Nights.  Notice the men on the floor.

As mentioned before, Alan and I have been blessed with very kind, generous, and fun coworkers here in Turkey.  For the past six weeks we have been doing a rotating weekly dinner at different people's houses.  These dinners started out as 'Turkish Lessons" (and sometimes belly dancing lessons), but as we have gotten to know each other better they have melted into a gathering of friends to eat, drink, and hang out.  We all try to bring some sort of offering to the host who has undoubtedly cooked an array of DE-lish Turkish specialties, and this week we brought chocolate chip cookies.  Now those of you who really know us know that Alan is the baker and I am the dishwasher, and these cookies were no different.  Little did we know how much of a stir this would cause.

We stopped by to pick up a lovely/hilarious friend, (one who scooped Alan under his wing as soon as we landed in Turkey, teaching him how to say "my man!" and do other manly Turkish things). He greeted me in his usual gentlemanly way, and then was so excited to see that "You baked!" Not one to take credit for someone else's work I corrected him, "Oh no.  Alan baked." The look of shock on his face was priceless.  He turned to Alan, "You BAKE?" "Well yeah.  I love baking," (and PS he's a kindergarten teacher in a school that has NEVER had a man working in that department.  And he plays the ukulele.  And he waltzed me all over the floor at the ball. He's not your average belching-spitting-crude-joke-telling-man's-man. Why is this such a surprise?)  Well the real kicker came when Kamil asked what I was doing while he was baking, and I said I was napping. "WHAT?!?! You're in Turkey now! The woman bakes and the man naps! Come ON!" Well, knowing Kamil to say whatever comes to his mind, usually in an effort to get a rise out of everybody, we laughed and reminded him that we are still Americans.

Turkish MEN

Later, at dinner I was retelling this story to all of the other Turks in the room, because it was hilarious, and I was expecting them all to think so to.  Now, Turkey is conservative. One of our DE-lightful girlfriends told us that she wont ever be able to get married because she doesn't know how to cook and do laundry, so no man would ever want her; another of our friends who is 23 wont tell her parents about the boy friend she has been dating for like 4 years because they wouldn't understand; and all of our unmarried friends still live with their parents because that's what you do when you live in Turkey. That being said, I was expecting a hearty laugh from the group of 12 young, open-minded, liberal Turks in the room.  While I did get some smiles and some chuckles, many took this moment to explain to us that in Turkey, much like in a few generations back in America, the men work, and the women do all of the household chores.  "Right, but I work too! All of the women in this room work. That has changed.  Shouldn't the household expectations change too?" They all nodded along with a smile, "Yes, yes, you both work, you are both tired, you should both work together to cook and clean." All the while Kamil is still spouting off about "no, not 50/50, 100% of the house work is the woman's!" And then, even though all of the other people in the room were "agreeing" with me, when the food was served all of the women (except me) hopped up to make all of the men (except Alan) a plate of dinner, and then sat down near their man's feet, like a good Turkish woman should.  UGH. So, because we're American and because we were enjoying messing with their traditions, Alan jumped up to make me a plate, which sent all of their heads spinning again.

Turkish ladies

Sometimes it is easy to forget that our cultures are so different.  We hang out with mostly young, liberal, and well educated people, who look and act much like our American friends.  We notice differences in language, and in food, but for the most part our attitudes and beliefs align closely with each other. This dinner and ensuing debate was an interesting reminder that our cultures are still very different in many ways.  The more traditional and conservative Turkish families still have very strict rules for what is a woman's role versus what is a man's role, as well as what is appropriate for a woman to be seen in, and who she should be seen with (Circa 1800's America?). But even some of the younger more liberal Turks act out the social rules that they verbally disagree with (1950's America?). I guess this is a good reminder of how slow change can be sometimes.  I mean this is a culture that has been around for 4000 years.  Some of their social rules probably run that deep, why would it surprise me that they would take a few decades or even centuries to change?

On a related note: Kamil would like me to set him up with one of my American friends.  When I told him that none of my American girlfriends would be interested in dating a man who thinks she should cook and clean for him, he told me it wouldn't be a problem. I'm not sure what he has up his sleeve, but I am interested in watching this unfold.  So if you're coming to visit me sometime, and think it might be fun to watch this guy "work his magic on you," stay tuned for our upcoming series tHarmoney (where the T stands for Turkey). We also have a few lovely Turkish girlfriends looking for an American guy who doesn't need her to cook and clean for him.  This should be fun.

As I watch the sunrise ...

Never in a million years did I think this would happen. Never did I think that when I moved to Turkey and started a blog would I write about something so American as college football and baseball. However, in an effort to feel connected to my home here I am staying up through the night to watch live coverage of Cal football and NLCS game 6.

I noticed we had Fox Sports in our cable package, but that was of little interest until the Giants' post season bid. I happened to see that the channel was showing the NLCS games. Unfortunately live games in America mean late night games here, a 4:30 pm start means a 2:30 am start here. So as a dedicated band wagon fan who is missing home I set an alarm and laid on the couch with the Cal game on.

The excitement of that game for me came not from the great score (which was nice) but from a trip down memory lane. In high school I was part of Cal's High School Band day where our band got to go to the stadium and play on the field during half time. Extra special that my sister got to be at the game to watch it too. Well today was High school band day and during half time the high school bands were out there playing away. In both instances the weather turned in the second half of the game and it started raining. Annamarie and I took the opportunity to use mom's credit card to get ourselves new Cal sweatshirts.

After I fell asleep during the second half of the football game, my alarm went off signaling 2:30 am, time to start rooting the Giants on. Is it because I am such a die hard fan? No. Certainly I want them to win it all, I have been rooting them on for as long as I can remember. But this is different. I feel a connection to home tonight, a connection to my family who I know are cheering in Cali. I understand the "nostalgia" that so many people talk about when they discuss the American Pastime. I remember "playing" in the living room while we watched the game. We made 4 bases out of pillows and played with a stuffed ball. I remember the "You better believe it" Grand slam when we felt like the announcers were talking to us because we were shouting "I don't believe it". Brett Butler's (perhaps it was Matt Williams?) 12 foul balls in the '89 playoffs before he hit the homerun, not to mention the countless games we went to to share the experience with the ladies hiding their schnapps behind their little Tv. These are the experiences that up to this point I didn't realize held such importance for me. It only took thousands of miles and a good playoff battle to help me remember.

So as I watch the Giants celebrate and the sunrise I look forward to reminiscing about the time I pulled an all nighter to watch the Giants win the pennant while Erin slept on the couch behind me. Then I did that silly victory dance to celebrate.

People We Miss: Part 3

Painting in diapers

I hate to anger a bunch of family and friends (we really really miss you, promise), but after our 5th week of school, we are REALLY starting to miss our ASI family. It's not that this week was any harder than the others, it wasn't.  We have been feeling the aching absence of coworkers who understand and value us, parents who trust and like us, and children who greet us with hugs, come to us for support, and who cry to us in a language we understand. We have had to remind ourselves over and over again that our first few weeks, days, and months at ASI weren't perfect either, and all of those things come with time, but right now all we can remember is how much like home that building felt.  Thank you to all of you who played such an important part in our lives.  You will always hold a family-like spot in our hearts.  We miss you dearly, and can't WAIT to visit in the summer. (We have plans to bring a few of our Turkish teacher friends with us to visit.  We are sure that they will be inspired.)

Baking in diapers

saying "goodbye"

My favorite chicken

One last day of "mandatory fun" with the whole gang

So... While writing this blog I was very disappointed by our lack of pictures from this very important chapter of our lives. We have NO pictures of us with our coworkers, very few pictures of children and families, and practically zero pictures of children doing awesome things like building a castle out of stars and straws, or leading their own version of group with flannels.  It's not that we didn't take a million, it just felt kind of creepy to take them when we left.  Now I feel sad that we didn't.  If you have any gems in your collection, of school, home, vacation, whatever, I would love an email.  xo

People we miss #2

My first addition to the "People we miss" posts are my sisters. This is the time of year that we would take on many "Why not" adventures such as Bridge School concerts and weekend sports events. Coming up this week both are happening with the Giant's recent playoff bid and the Bridge School concert happening in the Bay Area I am missing my sisters. In a recent email they sent me pictures of them doing the "Giants Stretch Cam."

I decided to show my support and Giant's spirit by stretching before checking the results of the most recent game. This came in quite handy when I had a celebration dance, I was all limber, no muscles pulled.

So to sum up. I miss you snisters. Wish I could be there to partake in some fall "Why Not" activities with you. Oh Yeah...

GO GIANTS!!!

The first in a series: People we miss.

Ok, So we have started missing people.  A lot of people.  So many people that if I tried to list all of you here it would take all day.  So instead we will be highlighting different people with different awesome pictures in a regular series.  As an added bonus, you will all have to check our blog regularly to find out if we are featuring our love for you that day.  We love you all.



People we miss day 1: Emily and Josh,  Congratulations on your new home! We couldn't be more proud, jealous, and excited to visit.  We miss you like crazy, now send us your address already!

Mail!

We thought a quick shout-out to show our appreciation was necessary. We have been lucky enough to have received mail from several people we love, and so far no bills or junk mail whatsoever.  (OK so in Turkey they just stick the bill to the door, but that makes our mailbox a sanctuary of joy.)

Thank you, thank you, Nikki, Mateo, Danielle, Bryan, Sandra, Melinda, and Mom. We now have lots of pictures on our fridge, cards on our table, and cranberry sauce for  Turkey Day.  Thank you for making us feel so loved.

For those of you considering sending us mail, keep in mind that we would love to see your beautiful face on our fridge!

Cat Bridge!

Since moving to Turkey Alan and I have been oh so tempted by the hoards of darling stray cats all over the city. I don’t know whether is has to do with their sheer volume, or that we live in a new country and have a new home and a new life, but all of a sudden I have developed the urge to be a pet owner. 

Many factors have stopped me from scooping one up and taking it home with us.  One major fear has been getting some sick sort of disease like rabies or the plague from these street-roaming, vaccination-free wild animals.  But my sister assured me that as long as I didn’t make-out or share needles with them, I was unlikely to catch anything serious (PHEW, neither of those activities were in the plan).  That being said, no amount of vaccinations, and/or flea medication will cure Alan’s cat hair allergy: factor two. The third problem is that I’m not actually responsible enough to have another living thing depend on me yet.  I don’t want to have to worry about who will feed my cat while I’m on vacation, or how to get it a kitty passport and visa when we decide to move out of Turkey. 

I had considered the idea of having a cat live on our balcony, but felt very guilty about what a small and confining place that would be for an animal that was used to having the whole city to roam on a regular basis.  We live two floors up, too high for a cat to safely jump down, and definitely too high for it to get back up.  I figured that If we weren’t going to offer it the comforts of a warm snuggly home in the winter, and an escape from the heat in the summer, we couldn’t take away it’s freedom to hang with it’s cat crew.

The friendliest cat on the block.  Just after we had trained her to come to our balcony,
our neighbors locked her in heir home.  boo. 

Just when I was beginning to come to terms with the fact that having a cat of our own was just not going to happen, one particular cat wiggled it’s way in.  This sweet little kitty had been extra friendly with us every morning on our way to work.  This evening as we sat on our balcony eating a snack, it stood two stories down and meowed at us to come play with it.  When we didn’t come down, it found a way to jump up onto the first floor balcony, where it looked at us like “I’m almost there.” Next it tried several different angles for climbing up the wall to get to us.  Unfortunately it’s not Spiderman. We enticed it up to the top of the fire escape which is only about a 6 foot leap to our balcony, but for some reason no matter how much Alan tried to convince it to jump, that cat was too smart to commit suicide just to visit us. 

That’s when we decided to help.  We tried to make a bridge using our deck umbrella, but she didn’t think that was a safe idea either. The next night we lucked out and found some wooden planks in the trash! (Ok we WERE looking through trash heaps, but let’s not call it cheap.  Let’s call it recycle-reduce-reuse. And let’s call it financially savvy).  Alan nailed the two boards together to use as a bridge between the fire escape and our balcony, and I made a trail of chicken bits up the stairs and across the bridge. The next morning all of the chicken was gone, and when we called out to the cat she came right up the stairs and across the bridge!   Success! 

Notice the chicken bones....

He only smashed his finger a few times!

We haven’t actually secured a cat as ours, but we have the will, we have a way, we have many different cats to entice into our lives. Hurray. 

A cat named Turkey.  Though we thought the name was just perfect, We are starting to think Chicken is more appropriate.  He scratches in the dirt for worms next door, and he is too skiddish to let us pet him, but he comes bounding over when we call.  

Are Pigs flying???

Well we never thought it would happen but the weather had turned and the crisp cool air of fall has come to Alanya. Two nights ago a storm came through that included Rain, Lightning and Thunder. Winter is coming and we are starting to feel like we may need more warm clothing than we thought upon our arrival. Last night as we were eating dinner on a restaurant patio we both ended up with quite a chill. We hear that they have what we would call an Indian Summer coming later in the year (Their phrase for it literally translates to "Hot Pastrami is Coming") After speaking to some locals this has nothing to do with a global climate change, it is quite normal, maybe hell hasn’t frozen over.

Doing the Translation Dance

Some New Turkish Friends!  Burak on the right, Zeynep next to Alan, out boss Jan next to her, and two Americans Roger and Tara. 

Having been here for two months Erin and I both have started to have the feeling that Alanya is actually our home. This is not to say that we don’t miss our California lives, which I do miss tremendously at times. Adding friends into our lives has made this feel even more like we have established ourselves in Turkey.

Beyond the surprise invitation from our neighbors we have also started a weekly dinner and “Turkish lesson” night with the Foreign Languages department. These nights usually include dinner, Belly dancing lessons (not that I need them) and great food. Originally it was supposed to include Turkish lessons too, but for the most part everyone lapses into speaking English. Erin and I did learn most of the important body parts. Here’s a recap:

Maş (mash)- head

Saç (sach)- hair

Omuz – shoulders

Diz – knees

Parmak – toes and fingers too

Göz – eyes

Kulak – ears

Az – mouth

Burun – nose

In all honesty Erin and I have learned and used more Turkish trying to communicate with our neighbors than at these nights, but we are truly enjoying the friendship. I realized yesterday as I was talking to Bilgehan, another English teacher who recently moved from Istanbul, that when you live in a town with relatively little to do it is important to have people to do things with. Alanya is a town that doubles in size during the tourist months. When tourist season is over restaurants and shops start to close and there is less and less to do. Building friendships is what will make the difference. Based on the past week we are well on our way.

A Pig, A Penis and Pizzas, Oh my! My first week in review...

My first full week of teaching in Turkey is through, and putting my feet up and vegging has never felt so deserved. Though I never pride myself in counting down the days until summer break, or at least the next holiday, I have to admit, the thought crossed my mind a few times.  Let's hope that by the first holiday (November) my students and I have come to some sort of mutual understanding and respect, and that I can make it through the night without nightmares of what could be awaiting me the next day in class.

The week started with a dangerously hot, half-hour, school wide ceremony.  It was all in Turkish, so of course it felt pretty meaningless to me, but I couldn't help thinking this was just too much for all of those kids.  The first days of school in the younger years are always filled with tearful children and parents, so I was not surprised to see many sobbing children clinging to their parents legs.  Although I am totally comfortable with crying children, not being able to communicate with either them or their parents built a kind of will between us that kept me from going over to offer help.  I stayed a few feet away and smiled and waved at the parents and children, hoping to offer the "let me know if you need me to pry him off of you" look. As it turned out, just as the ceremony was ending, and I could just taste the up coming air conditioning blast, one of my bosses asked me to hold a screaming child so his mom could go.  Sure no problem, Mom is asking for help, so I know I am not crossing any boundaries. Except, that this child is nine, which may sound young, but in all actuality nine above the age that I can easily physically restrain.  This child was WAY stronger than me.  Especially when he did the child patented noodle- and -kick.  It took everything I had to pry his fingers off of his mom's wrists, at which point instead of waving goodbye and leaving, mom stood there and cried.  OK.  Once his mom finally turned and walked to the car the child completely lost it.  I wasn't any more help in the comforting department than I was in the picking-him-up-and-getting-him-to-school-department, considering all of my comforting words came in a language that probably sounded like Martian. Just as his Mom got to the gate, another boss told me to give up and let him go, at which point he ran full steam off of the school premises and towards his car.  She said she would take it from there.  Good luck 8-months-prego-lady, you go for it.

Well my first class of the day, was my darling first graders that I told tales of from orientation. You know, the class with the children doing flips off the tables, screaming on the tops of their lungs etc.  Let's just stay that class behaved pretty much as expected.

My next class, surprise, surprise, had my wrestling buddy in it.  He didn't stop crying the whole day.  I soon found out that not only does he not understand me, he doesn't understand ANYBODY.  His family just moved here from Norway, and he speaks no English and no Turkish, so spends 8 hours a day in classrooms with teachers and children he can't communicate.  No wonder he's sad.

My second grade classes were a little better, because they kind of get this whole school deal.  Not that much better though.  I still had to do A LOT of moving seats, confiscating of school materials being used as weapons, and desperately trying to get them to listen.  I went home from that first day feeling like the WORST teacher.

I walked into day two filled with dread.  Please don’t let it be as bad as day one. Please.  And it wasn't! My favorite part of the day was my little wrestling-crying-Norwegian buddy.  Day two, he wasn't sad anymore... No-sir-ee. He was PISSED.  He let us all know how much he hated this situation by throwing every pencil he could find and by making loud farting noises whenever it got kind of quiet in the room.  The rest of the class seemed pretty capable of ignoring him, so I took the pencils that he had, and let him do his thing.  When I had the children draw a picture of them selves and write their names, I gave him one of his pencils back, and smiled like I hadn't noticed a thing.  When I came back around he had drawn a monkey, which I thought was just fine. At least he's busy.  I encouraged him to write his name on his paper, which he refused.  Thinking maybe he didn't understand, I started to spell his name and mock-write it on his paper.  Exasperated at my idiocy, he shoved my hand out of the way and wrote PENIS. Hmmm… "What's that?" I say, innocently. "Penis," he smiles. Alright... He knows at least ONE English word. Awesome. So I flipped over the paper, smiled sweetly again, and said "This time draw you!" And walked away.  five minutes later he proudly brought me his paper. On it was a suspiciously familiar looking girl in a suspiciously familiar looking dress, with the word "PIG" on top.  OK.  We are up to TWO English words.  Since then he has gotten more and more comfortable. He does work in class, and knows his numbers and colors in English.  Perhaps all he needed was to be able to express his anger symbolically.  (On a side note, I'm looking into getting his art framed to hang on my wall.)

For three of my four classes I am beginning to find things that they like.  One class LOVES to draw and color, they all LOVE guessing games (like guess the number, and "Little Mouse, Little Mouse), one class loves dittos and they’re work-books (freaks), and at least two of them like it when I tell stories. My fourth class is still trouble.  Yesterday, by the end of our lesson, I had accomplished NOTHING except to amass a ridiculous amount of scissors that were being used to cut hair, glue that was being used to adhere objects to the table, tattooing pens, flying erasers, paper-clip-chain-whips, and head ache inducing flutes. I have faith that at some point I will find out what works with them, and am hopeful that it doesn't come to Bill Cosby and my dad's favorite "Let the beatings begin!"

As for the pizza part of my week, I am lucky enough to work with a lot of really cool people in the English department.  A bunch of us went out for pizza and a drink on Wednesday, which turned out to be so fun we'll probably do it again every Wednesday. If my weeks don't get easier, at least I'll have that to look forward to.  This week, operation "make Turkish friends" took off. PHEW.

Things we've learned this week

Teaching young children in a country where you don't know the language can teach you some language quickly. Here are some new words:

Öğretmeni = Teacher (We learned this from the continuous chant of "Öğretmeni, Öğretmeni." Teacher Teacher still sounds like nails on a chalk board, even in a different language.

istemeorim - I don't want to.

Tuvalet - The Toilet. That's not to hard, but vital!!!

Hayır - As covered before this means No but I've heard it alot.

Ne? - What?

One of my other favorites:

Türkçe Billmiorum, English, English - "I don't know Turkish! English English."

Today I had a child look at me and tell me a paragraph worth of Turkish, none of which I understood. I told him "Turkçe Billmiorum, English English." He looked back at me and said ever so sweetly " Ingiliezce Billmiorum." And we were at an impass. I shrugged, he shrugged and then went on to play. We communicated, good enough.

When you start to work with the children of a different culture you get an interesting picture of the relationship between parent and child. The main thing that I feel here so far is that Children have few responsibilities for taking care of themselves. I witnessed a parent feeding their 5 year old child. Coming from a school where children who could barely walk were clearing their plates after lunch, this was hard to swallow, and I don't have anyone to spoon feed it to me.

Parents here seem to struggle with the same issues we faced with our classes in America. I have heard conversations about how a child is eating, the child who doesn't want to be in the English class, and have had several parents swoop in from the hall to pick up their crying child. While I didn't think that I would be getting away from parents I thought that perhaps I would be facing different types of concerns and conversations.

Although the approach and follow through may be different in cultures, I suppose a parent's job is the same all over the world, worrying about their child being happy and healthy.

The First day of School

Henry Miller, an american, wrote "Chaos is the score upon which reality is written." If this is the case we wrote quite a bit of reality today. Usually the first day of school (especially in the younger grades) tends to be filled with tears and misunderstood directions; then the children show up (Ha Ha). Today seemed like a little bit of a circus.

I've done first days of school before, with children who couldn't talk. Somewhere in the back of my mind I just figured that this wouldn't be too much different than that. We would get all of the children to follow our directions by miming the actions. Apparently this was not a safe assumption to have made. Granted it took more than one day to get this all sorted out.

What will make this harder is that as an English teacher I am sort of like a wandering minstrel, traveling from class to class performing my circus act of English lessons. I spend one hour with each of the 5 and 6 year old classes (thats 4 hours with 4 groups of children every day) and then at least 30 minutes with the 4 year old children. This doesn't include lunch or breakfast or any of these other details. So I have at least 90 names to learn, which is no easy task in a language where names are so different. Erin and I have both found it difficult to learn and remember names here in Turkey. First off the Turks seem to speak at a much lower volume, add to that the random syllables that make up a name and I find myself asking everyone I meet to repeat themselves several times. Now I have 90 names to learn, and 90 children to manage, no easy task when you don't have a relationship with them.

Erin and I both had the notion that if we didn't live 20 hours away from ASICC we might have called Patty and Tonya to see if they would hire us back. I suppose it was a good idea to move so far away. Up to today I forgot how nice it was to have the Evelyn and Sharon driven kitchen that was always on time and reliably got food to our children, I knew that I had Patty and Tonya to help me with a child who needed an extra place, and I could close an office door and let off steam with my coworkers and friends who I am missing so much. I have a faint memory of what it was like starting my first day at the children's center and I remember that I didn't know exactly what I was supposed to be doing and that there seemed to be a little bit of chaos. I suppose the first day on the job tends to be that way. Luckily there are no more first days at this job. We get to start building our skills and resources again.

Holy Crap! Watch OUT!!!

Ok... long ago, I promised a blog posting about the amazing driving stylings of the Turks, and have only just recently gotten the photos that this would be confusing without. So without further ado... lets talk about the traffic laws that aren't. For reals... anything goes: driving with your child on your lap while your other child hangs out of the sunroof, driving with 13 people in one car, or on one motorcycle for that matter.  All perfectly leagal. On top of that, there are no actual lanes that anyone follows.  Whether that means driving into oncoming traffic because you want to go faster, or driving 4 lanes deep on one street. There are no speed limits, seatbelt laws, helmet laws... nothing. We tried our hardest to get pictures of all of this for you, but struggled with how fast they whiz by us.

It's hard to see, but sitting on mom's lap is a little boy.  Notice that mom sits in side saddle (cus she's a lady) and never holds on... except to an infant, or sometimes a watermelon.

Turks have a keen ability to balance on a speeding vehicle, amazing bravery for tackling traffic nightmares like they do, and a can-do spirit when it comes to treating their motorcycles like mini-vans.

Notice how much extra room there is when the child stands in the front? You could fit three more kids, the groceries, and a dog on there. And often they do. 

Another common and hilarious sight is the man who drives the "shoe-mobile" (I named it that). this wise entrepreneur doesn't bother paying for a store or a booth at a bazaar to sell his shoes, but displays them all over the hood and roof of his car.  This way he can be open for business anywhere he deems to be a good location.  When he decides to move on, instead of waisting time moving the shoes inside and redesplaying them somewhere else, he just drives like that.  With all of his merchadise on display. 

 One of my favorite moments so far was taking the bus to the airport to go to Switzerland.  The bus doesn't actually stop at the airport, so when we got near the exit the driver just yelled out, "Airport!" pulled over to the side of the road and told us to get out.  Now... we were on the shoulder of the freeway.  So we had to take our bags and run across three lanes of speeding traffic, jump through the oleander in the center divider, and run though three more lanes of traffic coming from the opposite direction to get to the taxi waiting to take us the rest of the way.  I felt like I was trying to illeagally cross a boarder with all of my most dear posessions. 

When the taxi dropped us off on the freeway, on our way home, we had to HAIL the bus. Worked out just fine.