The butcher and the fishmonger

I noticed while in Minnesota that meat was the center of all our meals. I don't know if this was my cooking style or cooking lack, but here we eat a lot less meat. Partly because its expensive, partly because we have Turkish style breakfasts during the week, partly because I love making different pasta dishes.

Typically I cook something more lavish on the weekends. A roast chicken with vegetables. Kofte. Chicken curry.

Lately, Tolga and I decided to specifically buy meat and fish on the weekends from the local butcher and fishmonger. The first week we bought Istavrit - which I learned later was Horse Mackeral. We bought a kilo of fish, they gutted and cleaned the fish, and we got some calimari too. Tolga fried the fish and we ate like kings.

The next week we got a kilo of meat. It was too much and I don't know what kind of beef it was, and I didn't cook it well so we chewed it up and washed it down with red wine.

Yesterday, we hiked through the snow back to the fishmonger and bought Lebrek - Sea Bass. I baked with with olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic, lemons and herbs. We had white wine with it, a salad and some calimari again. Afterwards, Tolga smoked his Cuban cigar given to him by a cousin.

What a treat.

Snow day

It hasn't snowed much here this year. It snowed just before Christmas some and Tolga and I were in Istanbul so we missed the worst of it. The city of Ankara has pretty extremely different elevations - I suppose like San Francisco, but much larger. It has an average elevation of 900 meters, but with a population of 4 1/2 million, the city is strangely laid out on the tops of and sides of steep hills, overlooking valleys that are almost like ravines. If you're on a higher point in the city, you can see the surrounding hills of even higher elevations outside the city. It is where the clouds leave their dust of snow on the mountain tops. It is strange to look out at such a heavy popluation, than to see hills and mountains that aren't that far away, but there are no homes on the land. I suppose it has left this city plenty of room to grow. It's on odd clash of modern buildings and old crumbling village houses. You will see these new apartment buildings going up next a old village home, made of cement yet still crumbling and falling to ruins. These village houses are stuck at random points between new construction, or clustered in the ravines far below the big apartments. Days like today, you can smell coal burning from these houses and leaving a black smog in the air.

Ex-Pat Bible Study

It was kind of weird listening to Beth Moore yell at us in the living room of a embassy member who lives two blocks from my home in Ankara.

I was a little distracted by several things.

1) the woman's furniture and apartment - I could have been in a nice apartment anywhere in America. I looked at it all quite closely because we still need furniture and I was liking everything about their apartment. Even the lamp that I'm sure she got at Target.

2) The woman's southern accent - of course we are watching Beth Moore. It must be a Texan pre-requisite.

3) Beth Moore - she uses big, pre-meditated words and jargon accessible to those in-the-know about Christian language, but somewhat exclusive to the masses. (I'm a little more sensitive to this especially seeing as I am somewhat excluded because of language everyday). The video I'm guessing is from around 1989 - and I was a little distracted by the intense bangs, thin lips, crooked smile and very shiny blue suit.

4) Preaching versus teaching - I don't want to be a preacher, nor be preached at necessarily.

5) I missed my old Bible study group - we had some beautiful relationships through it.

6) I was glad to be there.

Snack time

Today I am into the office with a plate full of miniature simit. I said to my department head - guess what I learned today? Snack time is at 9am and 2pm EVERYDAY.

I'm going to add to the list of things I didn't know but maybe should have been told . . .

Everybody's fine

Friday I came to school late because of paperwork that I had to complete outside of the building. I prepared worksheets, notes, class lists, and examples in case someone had to cover my class. I put a rubber band around all my materials and placed the materials on my department head's desk, telling her office mate the situation.

I returned late, and the materials on my department head's desk hadn't moved.

I was mad.

I summed up my feelings with, "I feel as if I've been hired solely for my American passport and not for my professionalism."

My department head was mortified, we sorted it out, and the scene was over within two minutes.

That's the thing with women. Logically the job wasn't done, the students will be behind, we will be off the yearly 'flow', and education will be compromised - the things that could be controlled weren't - but in the end, as long as those intangible feelings are heard and understood, everything will be just fine.

I was fine.

I met with the principal today to also discuss how things were going this year. It was a standard meeting issued to all new comers. I had to be given directions to her office. Her office was saturated with the smell of cigarettes, in spite of the school's (and the country's) no smoking policy. I had a list of talking points, but the question I was asked was: how do you feel here? Are you happy?


And the answer was yes.

Some smells

I went to the police headquarters the other day to file some paperwork for my residence permit and work visa. I don't really know what was done, I just did what I was told, followed some people around, handed over my passport when asked, signed here and there. Then it was done . . . I guess.

While waiting, I set next to a very large family from Azerbajan. They all smelled. Especially the kids, of manure and urine . . .

They reminded me of our old neighbors out in the country.

I wonder why its such an offense to my nose, and how it is completely accepted by another.

I wonder if some smells are universally bad.

Dreams

I had been talking to someone about Baba's love of everything salty. He wakes up, smacks his lips, and eats an olive. He forks a piece of white salty cheese, then fills his plate with tomato wedges and cucumber slices. He pours salt on his vegetables . . . a lot of salt. Then, eats many more olives, more white cheese, and maybe holds the salt over his fork and individually sprinkles each vegetable.

I dreamed last night that my sodium level was too high.

I mulled over the weird dream and started wondering, maybe the salt issue is making me crazy more because it has something to do with me . . .

Baba had a dream last night too. He dreamed that Tolga and he killed a big snake. Snakes, in Turkish culture, represent a few things, but in general they represent the bad - and Baba was pretty excited that they had killed it together.

What you don't know . ..

My department head was not happy when she heard, for the third time in a row, that I was still not receiving my school's mail. She told me, "You are responsible for everything that is written."

I started getting the emails. I was thinking about how in the past, email caused me a lot of stress at work (then again, everything was causing me stress at the time), and I was thinking about how different I feel now when I open an email. Maybe I'm becoming more even-keeled. Maybe I feel a complete lack of responsibility. Carefree. Unaltered by what information is given.

Maybe its due to the fact that my emails are in Turkish.

My department head asked me again if I was receiving the mail because I would be held responsible for the things sent.

I told her yes, but I couldn't understand the things that were sent.

She told me I was held responsible for everything sent.

Ogreniorum (I'm learning)

Sometimes my husband and I have a complete conversation in Turkish.

Sometimes at the end I don't feel like we really talked, or sometimes I start rethinking what was said, and wonder what I just agreed too.

Sometimes I wonder if our bird is going to learn Turkish before I do.

I have not been studying extra - my time is going into other things, put I have my books on my shelf along with my intentions.

Even so, I'm learning more I suppose everyday - maybe without even knowing it.

And, I keep trying with the non-English speakers around me - like my bus driver . . .
. . . I hope he understood I needed to be picked up tomorrow.

Sometimes you just need some fancy boots

I came home yesterday to a pair of tall black leather boots.

I've wanted tall boots since I moved here - there is a way of dressing in Turkey - fancy all the time. My practical and stylish Dansko's just don't seem to fit here. Neither do my black pants. I needed heels and boots.

I wouldn't have bought them for myself for several reasons - and surely I would have taken the entire season to decide on a pair I liked, so Tolga just bought me a pair. I put them on and instantly wanted to go horseback riding. (I couldn't help it).

But of course this isn't about the boots, is it. It's my husband who is always wanting my happiness, great and small because it is our happiness. Sometimes I'm afraid that it is impossible task . . . making me happy . . . but then again, I felt pretty fine in my high boots, with its soft black leather.

All things bloomable

One of my favorite books is by Sharon Creech called "Bloomability". The title comes from one of the character's foreign friends who mixes up his English words and instead of saying something is possible, he says a thing is "bloomable". The main character comments that her friends mistake is actually a better word, because of the picture it creates. Something that is possible is like a flower blooming, an idea becomes bloomable.

Today, I had a class come in to do presentations on a famous person. I opened up the categories to the person being fictional as well. One girl did her presentation on Sponge Bob. She sang a song, from Sponge Bob I guess, enlisting her friends to join in. She drew pictures. She gave great facts. And, in the end, I asked her to conclude with "He/She is famous for . . ." and she said "I think he is famous for his purity". She has the Turkish translation for the word as well.

I was awed by the observation. It was so unique and mature and . . . poetic. When I thought about it some more, I realize she may have meant "innocence" - He is famous for his innocence. But I like purity, it's a much more beautiful word to describe . . .Sponge Bob.

Star*bucks*

Jewel flew to my finger yesterday. We let him/her out, and she/he felt safer landing on my finger - it was really cute. So then we went out and bought more bird toys. Jewel has been staring at his/her reflection in the mirror for a couple of hours now.

Tolga and I also looked at more furniture today. We are still at the bare minimum: bed, bookshelf, two side tables, and a TV/play station, cheap kitchen table, two chairs . . . when I list it, it really seems like a lot actually.

We haven't liked any of the couches or dining tables that we've found - except ones of exceptional prices. Either way, we can't really afford much, so we've decided maybe just one piece at a time - and in the end hopefully it will all be a meaningful and colorful match. In the end, we just bought a coffee.

Jewel

We got a bird, a parakeet. I named it Jewel - for Abigail. Abigail names all her pets/dolls/etc., "Jewel" or "Lightening". The pair have lots of adventures together via Abigails hands. We may need to get ourselves a lightening . . . in the meantime, I'm trying to learn to speak bird.

Tolga says parakeets can talk sometimes if they are not paired up. Particularly the "J" sounds. I said, "Maybe it will learn it's name."

My mom said, "You should teach it to say 'Jesus!'"

Patient Patient

Somewhere along the way I lost my patience. I don't mean in a moment I lost my patience, but I lost the meaning of patience. Somewhere I long the way I reverted to that insatiable need to be heard and understood, and I think the effect of this need is often the reverse (or at least the feeling of the reverse).

These days, I'm feeling more patient. Maybe it's Tolga. Maybe it's being removed from a situation. Maybe it's directly linked to confidence and security, because these days teaching is going better and easier than ever before . . . and I am more capable of waiting and seeing.

I suppose I've always known this. My patience is first lost with myself, and when I've lost patience with myself -- not to much else stands a chance. I become a patient.

So, patience, patient.

The pieces that make us

Tolga and I spent the new year in Kusadasi with our family. The days were warm, the nights were cold. It is a summer home, so it isn't outfitted with heating units, but we huddle around electric heaters when its the coldest. We talked about going for a new year swim, but I was afraid I would never get warm again walking on the tile floors . . .

New Year's Day we went to the town center to by a tavla set for my yenge. While looking at a store, I spotted some wooden end tables with mother-of-pearl inlaid in the wood. It was beautiful and I went to check the price. While near the register, I spotted this most beautiful table that the workers were using to set their books, papers, and tea. It was a console with detailed wood pieces inlaid with many colors. Tolga and Hakan inquired about the price, and the man wasn't selling the table, but was easily swayed. He sold the table to us, and I imagine he is now wishing he didn't, or at least that he still had a table to set his tea on.

It's top opened up and turned on a screw, becoming a square table the was depressed in some and featuring a hidden tavla board. The table's wood pieces were chipping and it needed some restoration, but the detail is beautiful and an exciting find. The legs bow out in a Queen Anne style and it is our 5th piece of furniture.

We are building our home again.

New Year

What will this new year bring?

We spent this New Year in Kusadasi. It's my first New Year's in Turkey.

Tolga and I have been trying to list and track our "firsts"

Aug 2nd (ish) - we met in Yayalar
June 28th (ish) - Tolga's first visit to New York
November 5th (ish) - Tolga's first visit to Minnesota
December 24th - My first visit to our home in Kusadasi
December 25th 2007 - Our first birthday together, our engagement day
August 8th, 2008 - Our first wedding together
November 26th (ish) - our first American Thanksgiving
December 25th 2008 - our first Christmas in America
December 31st 2008 - our first New Year's in America
August 8th 2010 - our first anniversary apart
November 25th (ish) - our first Thanksgiving in Turkey
December 31st 2010 - our first New Year's in Turkey.

We have a lot of firsts to look forward to . . .