Michigan

I'm in Michigan! I've come here every summer of my life (minus one when I was traveling around France), so it's like a second home for me. Family congregates here and we also have a few groups of friends that rent houses near us. My day is generally like this: wake up early, exercise, eat a leisurely breakfast, study for the GRE (yeah, I'm thinking I should go to grad school), go to the beach and read or walk, come up and cook dinner or dessert, eat, walk to the dock and look at the boats and look for otters, come home and read. Life is good here!



I cooked this at home, and it's something you can do too. I found it in my Turkish cookbook. Fry green onions, eggplant, and potatoes, top with homemade tomato sauce, and it's best with garlicy yogurt on it.



I like to look my best when I cook.



Heath cooked us some delicious pizza where he made the crust himself. This pizza is topped with potatoes and oregano.



View from our house over Lake Michigan



Bonfire on the beach, followed by S'mores (if you haven't tried them with Reese's, you HAVE to!)



I decided to cook a Turkish feast. This is lentil, bulgur, and mint soup.



White beans with tomatoes etc, and stuffed eggplant.



A friend came and she made a Persian version of ayran (a Turkish drink with yogurt with some water and salt), it uses selzer water and ice cubes. It's really refreshing!



Milk pudding, but more like milk soup. I've tried to make it 3 or 4 times before but it just never sets! I've watched people make it and used various recipes but I'm doing something wrong!



Apricot compote (?). Sugar, water, and apricots boiled, drained, apricots forced through seive, and peeled apricots and ice cubes added to it.



View at the docks

As you can see, even in America I'm interested in Turkish food! I hope you aren't getting bored of those pictures. There will be more to come! I hope you all are well and take care!

Home!

Hey everyone! I'm so so sorry it's been a while - it's been quite a couple of weeks. I'm home now, in the states. It's nice to be home, but I do miss Turkey! The food, friends, the culture - but I'm happy to be here and with my family and cats and with my car and I can communicate so easily with people here! Most of you probably know, a couple of days before I came to the US a couple of big things happened - I finished my job and the day before that, my boyfriend and I broke up. Going back is going to be a little tough, I'll be without a routine or a solid person but it will be a good challenge. I'm not sure what the plan is, stay in Turkey or come back to America. It's a little stressful but I'm sure things will work out.
I usually don't go into personal stuff on my blog but you're probably curious what happened with the boyfriend and I, because I've been writing about him for such a long time now! I wish I could blame it on guys being pigs or something like that, but it was actually me. I just kind of drifted away and became distant. I don't think it's an abnormal thing to happen in a relationship, especially when you're young. He hadn't changed, but I just wasn't the same Sally anymore. Now that it's over it's a little tough because there was no good reason for me to act like that, and I wish I could have made a little more effort but I just didn't have it in me. Anyway, it's part of life and new doors have and will continue to open! Wish me luck with the new adventures to come!

A few days before my last day at work, we arranged a social gathering for staff and students at WSI. It was a lot of fun, besides the pouring rain everyone had to walk in! Here are some pictures from it:







Here's another Turkish carpet out to dry.



A nice mosque in Ortakoy.



And, home! Actually this is North Carolina. I live in Virginia but last week we drove to South Carolina to a cousin's wedding. It was a lot of fun and I'm so glad I was able to make it.





So...delicious...



Just a few hours later I'm shoving a delicious 5 Guys bacon cheeseburger in my face...I love America.

We went to a pretty park for a picnic as part of pre-wedding festivities. It was fun and some part of the landscape look very similar to VA and some parts are pretty different than VA because of the palm trees.







After the picnic we went contra dancing - it was new for all of my family but we all had a blast. The musicians were great too. I hope I can do it again soon! If you ever have an opportunity to do it - DO IT! Don't worry about your experience, your age, fitness level, height or anything!





We also got some lovely beach time, fortunately there was a breeze, otherwise it would have been too hot!

On Sunday, before the wedding, we went into Charleston to walk around. I drooled over many of the houses. I would have loved to have been able to go inside one of them - maybe next time!













This house had a joggling board in it's yard. A joggling board is like a bench but you can bounce just a little up and down on it. It's something that originated in the south, I think in South Carolina, and it was common to find them in gardens, dating back to pre-Civil War.



My family at the wedding.



Instead of a wedding cake, everyone brought pies which was a fun and tasty idea. My parents sliced ALL of them earlier so the 180 people in line don't waste time cutting them up. We had to fight people off until the bride and groom came and took theirs first.



Yay Spanky!

Turkish Music Thursday

This song can be catchy after you listen to it a couple of times. It's called "Yeter", by Hepsi.



Here's a bit of a slower song, just to try to change it up. This band actually came to Bogazici a few weekends ago - they are a little show for my taste but not bad. It's called "Durma yagmur durma" by Gripin (something like don't stop rain, don't stop).

Graduation ball and wedding

Phew it's been another busy week, but as the others, it's been fun. I had a social day off on Tuesday with two different groups of friends coming from the US that day. It was really nice to meet up with people from home and catch up on news and also hear their thoughts on the city. Here are some pictures standing on the bridge over the Golden Horn. Below the bridge are lots of fish restaurants, it's a good place to visit if you come to Istanbul.



This is looking to the north of the Golden Horn. The big tower is the Galata Tower.



And looking to the south, at the Suleymaniye Mosque.

Later that night, I took Group #2 to a good restaurant in Taksim where you can sit on the floor, and they serve some great Turkish food. It's called Gani Gani, turn left at the McDonalds while walking down Istiklal Cad. and then it's a little to the right.



While I was traveling around Eastern Turkey, I was with a couple who had never been to Turkey before and so their excited, keen eyes opened me to things I was used to seeing and didn't appreciate any more. For example, women hanging Turkish rugs out of the balcony to let them dry. The woman on our trip really wanted a picture of one but never managed to get one, but here's one taken from my apartment.



Sinan is hopefully graduating this year, so he went to the graduation ceremony and there was also a ball for it. I was a little nervous about going because I know how grouchy I get at these things, and here I was, going with people I didn't know speaking a language I can't understand, but it was more fun then I expected. I let myself go and danced in the grass with some girls. I was incredibly plain compared to the other girls - Turkish girls have a tendency to be very into makeup, hair, clothes etc - and I just washed my hair and put on a dress from 3 years ago that I can wear to the grocery store. Anyway, I didn't care and it was less pressure on me to enjoy myself because I didn't spend a fortune getting ready for it. Ok blah blah sorry.









With Sinan's roommate's girlfriend. She's incredibly sweet and the epitome of glamorous.



I had a scare last week that my gym was closing. It is so convenient, cheap, and many of the people who work there know me, and many speak English. Because I don't start work until 2:30, it's easy for me to go, and it's really become a habit and like a second home. Also my shower doesn't work well at home so I like showering there. I really was quite sad, but luckily I didn't sign up anywhere else because a different company ended up buying the gym - so same place, just a different name! Phew! A couple of the Turkish instructors have befriended me and I ended up going to a wedding with one of them. It was completely random and last minute but I've been dying to go to one of these types of weddings. Last August I went to a wedding but it was a very American, modern wedding - outside, unlimited alcohol, tasteful decorations and not a huge crowd of people. This though, was a more traditional one in a "wedding salon". Tons of people cram into this court looking room (very drab, but with lots of fake flowers), and I think you have a limited time slot. Once we got there the ceremony was over but people were lining up to kiss the couple and give them money or gold. Then there was dancing! I had a quick lesson in dancing then I got up and did it! I learned another that you'll see pictures of but I couldn't do it, it was too fast. I'm not very good but I think people appreciated a foreigner doing things like that. Anyway, this wedding style is not my cup of tea but it was really interesting to see. This post is getting a little long to give more details but look at the pictures, you'll see.



People lining up to give money and kiss the people.





That's the bride. That's a lot of poof.





I hope the video works, I'm not sure if it does though...

That's it for now! This week should be a little calmer but a little emotional - it's my last week at work. I've started telling the students and it's been really hard and they don't want me to go. I don't understand exactly why I'm leaving myself but I need a change I think and I don't want to get caught up in teaching English all my life. I don't want to say I'm quitting my job just for a holiday but I will go to America for 5 weeks which will be really fun. Then I'll come back, and then we'll see! I'll keep you posted. Thanks for reading!

Turkish Music Thursday

Hey gang, here are a couple more videos to watch if you are interested. Both of them are pretty upbeat - sorry, that's my style!

Yalin - Ah Be Kardesim (my mom sent this one my way, she read about it on NPR.org)




Ok this song is in English but it has a Turkish tune to it. This song won the Eurovision contest in 2003. It's called Everyway that I can, by Sertab Erener.