campus

Our school is on the edge of a large university campus.  I drive through the campus everyday to get to the far corner where the kids are tucked away.  The university is a huge wooded area with banks, cafes, stationary and grocery stores - all centrally located and if you can find a parking stop - a good place to stop on the way home.  

I left during our lunch break to run to the bank.  There is a function within the Turkish taxes that pays a portion of my salary while on extended sick or maternity leave.  To receive this pay you must go to a government hospital, or if private - one that works with the social security offices - and the doctors sign papers and the hospital files these with the social security offices.  A month or so later, one can go to a designated bank chain - give your identification number - and collect or unemployment.  My school had continued to pay my salary - requiring that I collect my unemployment from the social security offices and transfer this payment to them.  It's great to continue getting my salary, to not have a gap in a pay and need to wait until the end of my leave to receive the amount - however it adds up to a large amount I am responsible for.  

And they don't make the collecting part easy.

I have to go to the designated bank during the designated time of the month, submit my ID, learn they don't have it, call the social security offices so they will send the money, go back to the bank to tell them when I will pick up the money (because they may not have the cash on hand), and then come that day with my ID number AND my passport.  Collect and sign for the cash.  Deposit the cash in a different bank in my schools account.  Get a receipt for both transactions and deliver it to school.  

It's hard to believe they leave that kind of job in my hands, or anybody's hands - waiting for me to collect and transfer.

I tried today, unsuccessfully.  The bank was on campus, so I drove there with my colleague - I took Michael to help translate any technical difficulties - and a couple times a year - we go there to eat cheap campus food: Chicken roasting on a huge spit, shaved off and rolled into an oily wrap, served with ayran and a waffle as desert.  Waffles are a thing here - they make the waffle and you can a bazillion items to put on your waffle - white, bitter, caramel, strawberry sauces, fruit, nuts, ice cream and more sauces.  But no syrup.