A few weekends ago, Mike and I went to our landlord's wedding. We skipped the civil ceremony because it would have been 15 minutes of legal Turkish and therefore not very interesting for us. We chose instead to just attend the wedding party, which took place at an upscale hotel in Sultanahmet, the historic and touristy part of Istanbul.
We had no idea what to buy as a gift, and didn't get much help from asking Turkish people. We were told money, gold, and glasswear from a famous Turkish glass company are all popular gift ideas. We went with the cheapest option and bought Taylan and his wife Eda a vase with an evil eye in it. Who knows if they like vases, but they can always re-gift it!
The wedding was catered with amazing buffet dinner- mashed potatoes, beans, kebab meat, meatballs, rice pilav, beef, stuffed grape leaves, lots of salads, grapes, plums, carrot and celery sticks, and an open bar with beer and raki.
There were hundreds of people there, and we only knew the bride and groom and 3 other people- our friends Baris, Pinar, and Baki. We luckily found them right away (Baris has a shaved head and that always stands out in a crowd) and spent the night with them.
There was a gypsy band for less than an hour and everyone danced like crazy, Turkish-style. That means arms out straight, parallel to the floor, and lots of clapping and finger-snapping. I'm definitely not very good at it.
Taylan and Eda arrived, walked all around the reception hall greeting everyone and having pictures and video taken, and then spent the rest of the night dancing. Music was interrupted for less than 3 minutes when a cake was wheeled in, cut by the wedding couple at the speed of light, and then whisked away. Cake was served to the guests, but it wasn't the same cake they'd cut. Then the music was back on and dancing resumed. If I'd blinked, I'd have missed the entire cake-cutting.
The hotel had a roof terrace, and we went up with Baris and Pinar to check out beautiful views of the Blue Mosque and Aya Sofya. Unfortunately it was raining, but I still managed to get a few nice pictures of the mosques lit up at night.
Our friends all left before midnight, and Mike and I left soon after. Like most weddings I've been to, it wasn't a "social event" really. You talked to the people you knew and no one else. We were glad that we knew other people there, otherwise we'd have been all alone in a corner somewhere.
The morning after the wedding Taylan and Eda left for 9 days in Bali and Singapore- what a good honeymoon trip!
All in all, there wasn't much Turkish culture to be seen in the wedding. Most of the traditions seemed to be the same as at American weddings. Now I need to find a village wedding to attend- that will have a lot of local, non-Western flavor I'm sure. It was definitely fun to be at Taylan's wedding, but I think Andy and Aigul's wedding in Kyrgyzstan will stick in my mind more as a "local" wedding- horse meat, non-alcoholic beer drinking contests, and bad karaoke!
Monday, October 26, 2009
School Days, School Days...
I have started "hanging out" with my students during the 10-minute break between classes. I sit outside and students come up to me to "talk." Since their English is still very basic, we have a lot of conversations like this:
"Hello teacher! Hello!"
"Hello!"
"What is your name?"
"My name is Anna."
"Teacher what is your name?"
"Anna..."
"What is your name?"
and so on. It beats sitting in the teachers' room by myself, bored out of my mind. Last week I had a quite useful conversation with students. A few girls sat next to me and on my lap and started touching my hair and my earrings and putting pine needles in my hand and tic tacs in my mouth. They pointed at random things and said the Turkish word, then asked "My name is...?" meaning, "what is this in English?" I learned a few Turkish words from them. Then they were able to ask me how old I was (and understood the numbers in English!)
Then, one girl hugged me really tight and said, "Mommy, yes" and smiled. Then she hugged me again and said, "Father, no" and made a really sad face. So even as 7-year-olds, they already realize that their dads never hug them and are unhappy about it.
Come on Turkish dads, hug your children! Learn something from the Teletubbies... BIIIIIG HUG!
"Hello teacher! Hello!"
"Hello!"
"What is your name?"
"My name is Anna."
"Teacher what is your name?"
"Anna..."
"What is your name?"
and so on. It beats sitting in the teachers' room by myself, bored out of my mind. Last week I had a quite useful conversation with students. A few girls sat next to me and on my lap and started touching my hair and my earrings and putting pine needles in my hand and tic tacs in my mouth. They pointed at random things and said the Turkish word, then asked "My name is...?" meaning, "what is this in English?" I learned a few Turkish words from them. Then they were able to ask me how old I was (and understood the numbers in English!)
Then, one girl hugged me really tight and said, "Mommy, yes" and smiled. Then she hugged me again and said, "Father, no" and made a really sad face. So even as 7-year-olds, they already realize that their dads never hug them and are unhappy about it.
Come on Turkish dads, hug your children! Learn something from the Teletubbies... BIIIIIG HUG!
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Back to School!
If there were no schools to take the children away from home part of the time, the insane asylums would be filled with mothers. ~Edgar W. Howe
(Note: if you have no interest in teaching, this is likely to be dry and boring. Sorry)
I started teaching again at the end of September. I arrived in Istanbul without a job already lined up because I'd heard that it was "a piece of piss" to get an English teaching job here. However, it took me more than 2 months to find a job that I actually wanted. I applied to dozens and dozens, didn't hear back from most, and the ones I heard back from were unappealing- 6 day work weeks, no weekends off, split shifts, classes until 22:00, etc. The job I finally accepted is split- 2 days a week at a pre-school, 3 days a week at a 1st grade, as I mentioned in my last post. In both cases, there is a Turkish-speaking English teacher for 4 lessons per week, and I am the "speaking" teacher for 2 lessons per class per week.
Both schools are private and expensive, so my students all come from rich families. There seem to be two types of rich people- the ones who are very Western and European, and the ones who are more Muslim and traditional. The families that send their kids to my school seem to be the more traditional ones- a vast majority of my co-workers and the mothers wear headscarves and dress traditionally- I bought long skirts but still feel like I stand out! At a parents' open house on Saturday, out of about 80 mothers, only 11 had their hair on view. It's so interesting to work in such a different atmosphere than my home life because I meet and interact with a group that I otherwise wouldn't. Central European-side Istanbul is very Western, so in my daily life in my neighborhood and in the center seeing hair is still the norm. However, once you get outside the center, many neighborhoods are traditional and headscarves are worn by most women. Atatürk decreed that headscarves are banned in all educational settings, so no teachers or students are allowed to wear headscarves. My co-workers take them off when they arrive at work, and put them on again before they leave. Some wear wigs during the day so that their hair still isn't seen, and Mike said that some of his students wear hats all the time. I wonder if the teachers are uncomfortable interacting with male teachers since it's probably the only time ever that men other than family see their hair. I'd like to have long discussions with Muslim women about the personal significance of the headscarf because it's so interesting to me.
At the pre-school, I teach 3 classes of 5-year-olds and 3 classes of 6-year-olds. The classes have 11 students, and the classrooms are all equipped in a Montessori way- colors, blocks, art supplies, pillows, fake kitchen, plastic toys, abacuses (abaci?), etc. The students split their time between sitting around a big table and sitting on mats in a circle on the floor. For the first month, I am sharing all the lessons with my co-teacher, Vahide. She does mostly classroom management while I teach. After this month, administration hopes that the students will have enough English and will be used to me so that I can manage the classroom on my own. Vahide will then have her own lessons at different times. Most of the students are great. Since it's their first exposure to English they are shy, but they have no problem repeating and singing along. Some kids clearly have learning disabilities and/or behavioral problems, but they are just allowed to do their own thing while the lessons are going on. I'm not sure what the best way is to deal with them... Anyways. For both grades there's an English book program with posters, pupil's books, stickers, songs, a puppet, flashcards, and interactive games. The book for 5th grade is an all-around bad book, so I've been supplementing the book with lots of coloring activities and other songs. There's not a lot of planning involved because the kids are happy with whatever they're doing, and they're easy to manage for the most part. Since Vahide is always around to discipline and translate when the kids don't understand, it's a very low-stress job so far. No one else at the school speaks English, so I'm mostly in my own world except when I'm around Vahide. But everyone is friendly and smiley and people always bring me tea and simit (Turkish sesame-seed bagels). Vahide and I are doing a lot of work making sure the parents know that their children are learning English (and getting their money's worth!). We set up an "English Corner" bulletin board where we post photos of the kids having fun in English class. We send out monthly letters to parents updating them on progress, and I even write a weekly blog post for the school's parents' website about all the exciting things we did the previous week. Hopefully the parents like all the work we're putting in!
At the primary school, I teach first graders, most of whom are in school for the first time ever. There are definite discipline problems, especially for me but also for their Turkish homeroom teachers. My co-teacher, Yasemin, teaches her own lessons so I am always alone in the classroom- no Vahide-clone to help me with classroom management :( There are 20 students in each class, and all the classes have a few bad eggs. There are small groups of boys who aren't interested in school at all and just like causing trouble. For some lessons the homeroom teachers stick around to make sure the kids are behaving, but it's even hard with the two of us- boys don't want to sit down and color, they want to throw things out the window. The first days were really hard for me because I wasn't prepared for them to be so naughty, but I've gotten used to it and am getting much better at managing them. We use a great book with a puppet named Freddie the Frog, and the kids really like Freddie. They like him so much they spend every minute of the lesson when my back is turned stealing Freddie off the desk and trying to pull his tongue out. Poor frog!
The hardest part in all of this is learning all the names! In total I have about 180 names to learn (plus all the teachers!), and they are the generation of Turks that go by their first AND middle name. Some examples of student names: Ibrahim Emre, Zeynep Sude, Elif Saadet, Mehtat Can, Burak Furkan, Hasan Ahmet, Ali Nihat, to name just a handful. In most cases it is not ok to just call them by one name. Even the ones without middle names are still a mouthful to pronounce- Necmettin, Neslihan, Dilemnur. Even when I remember their names they make fun of my pronunciation. The only way I can learn their names is to take pictures of them and study them at home- 2 lessons per week aren't enough to memorize names.
Even though I come home exhausted everyday with a sore throat from yelling and sore palms from hitting the desks to get their attention, it's a really great job. It's rewarding to see the students improving their English week-by-week, and I imagine that by the end of the year it will be amazing to see what progress they've made! I am learning new Turkish words everyday since the teachers and students speak very little English. So far I've got "be quiet" "children" and "teacher" down solid, now I just have to work on "sit down, shut up, stop throwing things at your partner, don't squirt your juice box all over the floor, stop playing tug-o-war with my puppet" and a few other necessary phrases. I work just 14 hours a week and earn about $1500, and get free breakfast and lunch at school. I do have an hour commute each way so that adds to the time, but I'm home by 4:30 and have all evening to hang out and relax and do nothing before the next day rolls around. And working part time at 2 schools makes the time pass faster. The first day at 1st grade every week feels like Monday, but it's actually WEDNESDAY! The students all seem to like me and always wave and shout hello when they see me in the hallways or the lunchroom and hug me a lot. It's hard to be angry at students when they give me a big hug and say "Hello Anna-Teacher!" I'm a sucker for lovey gestures...
I got a medicinal care package from my mom to prepare for a snotty, sneezy winter surrounded by children. I got cough drops, NyQuil, VapoRub, gummy bear vitamins (my fave!), Ibuprofen, and Sudafed. Hopefully that'll get me through flu season. Now all I need are care packages full of chocolate :)
(Note: if you have no interest in teaching, this is likely to be dry and boring. Sorry)
I started teaching again at the end of September. I arrived in Istanbul without a job already lined up because I'd heard that it was "a piece of piss" to get an English teaching job here. However, it took me more than 2 months to find a job that I actually wanted. I applied to dozens and dozens, didn't hear back from most, and the ones I heard back from were unappealing- 6 day work weeks, no weekends off, split shifts, classes until 22:00, etc. The job I finally accepted is split- 2 days a week at a pre-school, 3 days a week at a 1st grade, as I mentioned in my last post. In both cases, there is a Turkish-speaking English teacher for 4 lessons per week, and I am the "speaking" teacher for 2 lessons per class per week.
Both schools are private and expensive, so my students all come from rich families. There seem to be two types of rich people- the ones who are very Western and European, and the ones who are more Muslim and traditional. The families that send their kids to my school seem to be the more traditional ones- a vast majority of my co-workers and the mothers wear headscarves and dress traditionally- I bought long skirts but still feel like I stand out! At a parents' open house on Saturday, out of about 80 mothers, only 11 had their hair on view. It's so interesting to work in such a different atmosphere than my home life because I meet and interact with a group that I otherwise wouldn't. Central European-side Istanbul is very Western, so in my daily life in my neighborhood and in the center seeing hair is still the norm. However, once you get outside the center, many neighborhoods are traditional and headscarves are worn by most women. Atatürk decreed that headscarves are banned in all educational settings, so no teachers or students are allowed to wear headscarves. My co-workers take them off when they arrive at work, and put them on again before they leave. Some wear wigs during the day so that their hair still isn't seen, and Mike said that some of his students wear hats all the time. I wonder if the teachers are uncomfortable interacting with male teachers since it's probably the only time ever that men other than family see their hair. I'd like to have long discussions with Muslim women about the personal significance of the headscarf because it's so interesting to me.
At the pre-school, I teach 3 classes of 5-year-olds and 3 classes of 6-year-olds. The classes have 11 students, and the classrooms are all equipped in a Montessori way- colors, blocks, art supplies, pillows, fake kitchen, plastic toys, abacuses (abaci?), etc. The students split their time between sitting around a big table and sitting on mats in a circle on the floor. For the first month, I am sharing all the lessons with my co-teacher, Vahide. She does mostly classroom management while I teach. After this month, administration hopes that the students will have enough English and will be used to me so that I can manage the classroom on my own. Vahide will then have her own lessons at different times. Most of the students are great. Since it's their first exposure to English they are shy, but they have no problem repeating and singing along. Some kids clearly have learning disabilities and/or behavioral problems, but they are just allowed to do their own thing while the lessons are going on. I'm not sure what the best way is to deal with them... Anyways. For both grades there's an English book program with posters, pupil's books, stickers, songs, a puppet, flashcards, and interactive games. The book for 5th grade is an all-around bad book, so I've been supplementing the book with lots of coloring activities and other songs. There's not a lot of planning involved because the kids are happy with whatever they're doing, and they're easy to manage for the most part. Since Vahide is always around to discipline and translate when the kids don't understand, it's a very low-stress job so far. No one else at the school speaks English, so I'm mostly in my own world except when I'm around Vahide. But everyone is friendly and smiley and people always bring me tea and simit (Turkish sesame-seed bagels). Vahide and I are doing a lot of work making sure the parents know that their children are learning English (and getting their money's worth!). We set up an "English Corner" bulletin board where we post photos of the kids having fun in English class. We send out monthly letters to parents updating them on progress, and I even write a weekly blog post for the school's parents' website about all the exciting things we did the previous week. Hopefully the parents like all the work we're putting in!
At the primary school, I teach first graders, most of whom are in school for the first time ever. There are definite discipline problems, especially for me but also for their Turkish homeroom teachers. My co-teacher, Yasemin, teaches her own lessons so I am always alone in the classroom- no Vahide-clone to help me with classroom management :( There are 20 students in each class, and all the classes have a few bad eggs. There are small groups of boys who aren't interested in school at all and just like causing trouble. For some lessons the homeroom teachers stick around to make sure the kids are behaving, but it's even hard with the two of us- boys don't want to sit down and color, they want to throw things out the window. The first days were really hard for me because I wasn't prepared for them to be so naughty, but I've gotten used to it and am getting much better at managing them. We use a great book with a puppet named Freddie the Frog, and the kids really like Freddie. They like him so much they spend every minute of the lesson when my back is turned stealing Freddie off the desk and trying to pull his tongue out. Poor frog!
The hardest part in all of this is learning all the names! In total I have about 180 names to learn (plus all the teachers!), and they are the generation of Turks that go by their first AND middle name. Some examples of student names: Ibrahim Emre, Zeynep Sude, Elif Saadet, Mehtat Can, Burak Furkan, Hasan Ahmet, Ali Nihat, to name just a handful. In most cases it is not ok to just call them by one name. Even the ones without middle names are still a mouthful to pronounce- Necmettin, Neslihan, Dilemnur. Even when I remember their names they make fun of my pronunciation. The only way I can learn their names is to take pictures of them and study them at home- 2 lessons per week aren't enough to memorize names.
Even though I come home exhausted everyday with a sore throat from yelling and sore palms from hitting the desks to get their attention, it's a really great job. It's rewarding to see the students improving their English week-by-week, and I imagine that by the end of the year it will be amazing to see what progress they've made! I am learning new Turkish words everyday since the teachers and students speak very little English. So far I've got "be quiet" "children" and "teacher" down solid, now I just have to work on "sit down, shut up, stop throwing things at your partner, don't squirt your juice box all over the floor, stop playing tug-o-war with my puppet" and a few other necessary phrases. I work just 14 hours a week and earn about $1500, and get free breakfast and lunch at school. I do have an hour commute each way so that adds to the time, but I'm home by 4:30 and have all evening to hang out and relax and do nothing before the next day rolls around. And working part time at 2 schools makes the time pass faster. The first day at 1st grade every week feels like Monday, but it's actually WEDNESDAY! The students all seem to like me and always wave and shout hello when they see me in the hallways or the lunchroom and hug me a lot. It's hard to be angry at students when they give me a big hug and say "Hello Anna-Teacher!" I'm a sucker for lovey gestures...
I got a medicinal care package from my mom to prepare for a snotty, sneezy winter surrounded by children. I got cough drops, NyQuil, VapoRub, gummy bear vitamins (my fave!), Ibuprofen, and Sudafed. Hopefully that'll get me through flu season. Now all I need are care packages full of chocolate :)
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Not your usual walk home
I started work at the end of September at a private school on the Asian side of Istanbul. I work 2 days a week at a kindergarten/nursery school, and 3 days in a primary school down the road as a 1st grade English teacher. At both schools, there is a Turkish English teacher, and I am a "speaking" teacher which just means that I'm there so the parents feel like they're getting something real for the tons of money they're paying for their children to be in an expensive school. More on the school in a later blog- there's a lot to say about my new job! My daily commute from home involves a 15 minute walk, a 25 minute bus ride, and a further 5 minute walk, and then of course the same in reverse on the way home.
Tuesday was Istanbul's Independence Day, so all schoolchildren had the day off. I still had to go into work at the kindergarten, but only for a few hours and just to make some worksheets and a big colorful poster with animal photos. I left work before noon, so was glad to have all afternoon off to faff about and watch lots of CSI:Miami on surfthechannel.com.
My bus ends in Taksim Square, the heart of modern Istanbul, but on Tuesday for some reason it stopped a few minutes away and let us all off in front of the Hyatt Hotel. The Hyatt was completely surrounded by police barricades, and on every street corner on the way into Taksim Square there were hundreds of policemen in full riot gear and gas masks. I had no idea what was going on, and the only thing I could imagine was that it was some sort of parade in honor of Istanbul's Independence Day. The park near Taksim Square looked like a policemen picnic, with cops loitering around in groups. They all looked like they were waiting for something, but there was nothing out of the ordinary going on. When I got into Taksim Square, it was EMPTY. This isn't strange if you've never been there, but just imagine Times Square empty mid-afternoon. All the roads had been closed and there were no buses and taxis, and the metro entrance had no people going in or coming out. Usually I walk home down Tarlabasi Bulvari, the main transportation street in the area and the most direct way home, but I wanted to stop at a language center, and walking down Istiklal, the main pedestrian and shopping street was a faster way to the language center. It looked like Istiklal, was closed, so I walked down Tarlabasi with the intent to turn off for the center further on down. There were more policemen and barricades up at all the intersections, and there was a police tank with armed guards all around it.
I realized that Istiklal was open, so I turned off Tarlabasi and Istiklal was almost empty, which only happens on a Sunday morning. There were lots of people with professional looking cameras running down the road, so of course I kept walking to see what they were going to take pictures of. All the shops that are usually full of shoppers all had their metal shutters almost fully closed. The windows at McDonald's and the Turkish bank were smashed, and at that point I REALLY started to wonder what was going on. As I got further down the road, I saw a police tank turning down an alley, and then thought I had gone far enough because I was getting closer to the "action," whatever that was. In a parallel alley, I saw lots of people running and then some smoke bombs being thrown, and started to feel a little scared. I kept walking home down Tarlabasi, but then smoke bombs flew out from an alley and a ton of people in makeshift scarf masks came running out into the street, and all the pedestrians in the area turned and ran towards me. I followed them, because what else do you do when a crowd is running away from something? People were ducking into all the open shops, and I followed in a trio of young-looking Turks hoping they spoke enough English to explain to me what was going on. They ran into a chai restaurant, and I followed them. We got inside just before the protestors turned onto our street and policemen followed in gasmasks. We hid under the bar, and I quickly found out that none of the 3 of them spoke any English. I got that it was an IMF protest, but it wasn't until much later that I learned that they were protesting the 2009 IMF/World Bank summit meetings, which were October 6th and 7th here in Istanbul.
The Turks I was with seemed really scared and also very worried about me. They kept saying "no fear" and "no panic" but I wasn't worried at all. In fact, I found it pretty silly that we were actually hiding in the first place, it's not as though the protesters were going to come in and look for us. Being off the street meant being out of danger, so I just enjoyed watching the "show." We saw some men who had been caught by the cops, and they had 2 cops restraining each protester, with one policeman following with a billy sticks. The protesters I saw were mostly middle-aged, overweight men. A few times smoke bombs went off right outside the cafe, and the staff had to quickly close all the windows. As soon as the danger passed, they opened up all the windows again and continued sitting on the sill, watching outside and commentating on the action. If only I spoke Turkish!
Up until yesterday, Mike and I were sharing one cell phone, and he had taken it for the day. I wanted to call him and warn him about the trouble, so I asked the gut in the trio if I could borrow his phone. I thought he'd understood me since we mimed back and forth and it looked like he understood I wanted him to lend his phone to me. But he got up and found a piece of paper and wrote down his email address for me. His girlfriend must have thought it strange that I was hitting on her boyfriend in front of her in the middle of a riot of sorts. And I never got to call Mike and warn him, but he made it home safely. The protests had finished by the time he was on his way home that he missed all the fun.
The staff at the restaurant finally thought it was safe enough to let us out (after about 40 minutes) and I was glad to be getting on my way home. The boy tried to get me to go walking with him and the two girls, but since we had a language barrier I really didn't want to waste my time. He finally got it that I wanted us to go our separate ways, but he still walked me to the intersection and cheek-kissed me goodbye. I didn't see any more protestors on my way home, but there were more and more policemen arriving, and I saw a police van with all the windows smashed. I was looking forward to reading about the protest online and blogging about it when I got home, but our internet was down and stayed down for 2 days. It's finally back up and running, which is why you're hearing about my adventure a few days after the fact.
I didn't take any pictures myself, although I wish I had. I was so confused about what was going on that I wasn't thinking right, and it probably is frowned upon to photograph anything that could be seen as police brutality. You can read more about the protests here and see pictures and a video here.
Stay tuned for blog posts about our visa run to Bulgaria and more information about my new teaching job!
PS. The new picture on my blog is the view from the teacher's room at my primary school job. Cool, huh?
Tuesday was Istanbul's Independence Day, so all schoolchildren had the day off. I still had to go into work at the kindergarten, but only for a few hours and just to make some worksheets and a big colorful poster with animal photos. I left work before noon, so was glad to have all afternoon off to faff about and watch lots of CSI:Miami on surfthechannel.com.
My bus ends in Taksim Square, the heart of modern Istanbul, but on Tuesday for some reason it stopped a few minutes away and let us all off in front of the Hyatt Hotel. The Hyatt was completely surrounded by police barricades, and on every street corner on the way into Taksim Square there were hundreds of policemen in full riot gear and gas masks. I had no idea what was going on, and the only thing I could imagine was that it was some sort of parade in honor of Istanbul's Independence Day. The park near Taksim Square looked like a policemen picnic, with cops loitering around in groups. They all looked like they were waiting for something, but there was nothing out of the ordinary going on. When I got into Taksim Square, it was EMPTY. This isn't strange if you've never been there, but just imagine Times Square empty mid-afternoon. All the roads had been closed and there were no buses and taxis, and the metro entrance had no people going in or coming out. Usually I walk home down Tarlabasi Bulvari, the main transportation street in the area and the most direct way home, but I wanted to stop at a language center, and walking down Istiklal, the main pedestrian and shopping street was a faster way to the language center. It looked like Istiklal, was closed, so I walked down Tarlabasi with the intent to turn off for the center further on down. There were more policemen and barricades up at all the intersections, and there was a police tank with armed guards all around it.
I realized that Istiklal was open, so I turned off Tarlabasi and Istiklal was almost empty, which only happens on a Sunday morning. There were lots of people with professional looking cameras running down the road, so of course I kept walking to see what they were going to take pictures of. All the shops that are usually full of shoppers all had their metal shutters almost fully closed. The windows at McDonald's and the Turkish bank were smashed, and at that point I REALLY started to wonder what was going on. As I got further down the road, I saw a police tank turning down an alley, and then thought I had gone far enough because I was getting closer to the "action," whatever that was. In a parallel alley, I saw lots of people running and then some smoke bombs being thrown, and started to feel a little scared. I kept walking home down Tarlabasi, but then smoke bombs flew out from an alley and a ton of people in makeshift scarf masks came running out into the street, and all the pedestrians in the area turned and ran towards me. I followed them, because what else do you do when a crowd is running away from something? People were ducking into all the open shops, and I followed in a trio of young-looking Turks hoping they spoke enough English to explain to me what was going on. They ran into a chai restaurant, and I followed them. We got inside just before the protestors turned onto our street and policemen followed in gasmasks. We hid under the bar, and I quickly found out that none of the 3 of them spoke any English. I got that it was an IMF protest, but it wasn't until much later that I learned that they were protesting the 2009 IMF/World Bank summit meetings, which were October 6th and 7th here in Istanbul.
The Turks I was with seemed really scared and also very worried about me. They kept saying "no fear" and "no panic" but I wasn't worried at all. In fact, I found it pretty silly that we were actually hiding in the first place, it's not as though the protesters were going to come in and look for us. Being off the street meant being out of danger, so I just enjoyed watching the "show." We saw some men who had been caught by the cops, and they had 2 cops restraining each protester, with one policeman following with a billy sticks. The protesters I saw were mostly middle-aged, overweight men. A few times smoke bombs went off right outside the cafe, and the staff had to quickly close all the windows. As soon as the danger passed, they opened up all the windows again and continued sitting on the sill, watching outside and commentating on the action. If only I spoke Turkish!
Up until yesterday, Mike and I were sharing one cell phone, and he had taken it for the day. I wanted to call him and warn him about the trouble, so I asked the gut in the trio if I could borrow his phone. I thought he'd understood me since we mimed back and forth and it looked like he understood I wanted him to lend his phone to me. But he got up and found a piece of paper and wrote down his email address for me. His girlfriend must have thought it strange that I was hitting on her boyfriend in front of her in the middle of a riot of sorts. And I never got to call Mike and warn him, but he made it home safely. The protests had finished by the time he was on his way home that he missed all the fun.
The staff at the restaurant finally thought it was safe enough to let us out (after about 40 minutes) and I was glad to be getting on my way home. The boy tried to get me to go walking with him and the two girls, but since we had a language barrier I really didn't want to waste my time. He finally got it that I wanted us to go our separate ways, but he still walked me to the intersection and cheek-kissed me goodbye. I didn't see any more protestors on my way home, but there were more and more policemen arriving, and I saw a police van with all the windows smashed. I was looking forward to reading about the protest online and blogging about it when I got home, but our internet was down and stayed down for 2 days. It's finally back up and running, which is why you're hearing about my adventure a few days after the fact.
I didn't take any pictures myself, although I wish I had. I was so confused about what was going on that I wasn't thinking right, and it probably is frowned upon to photograph anything that could be seen as police brutality. You can read more about the protests here and see pictures and a video here.
Stay tuned for blog posts about our visa run to Bulgaria and more information about my new teaching job!
PS. The new picture on my blog is the view from the teacher's room at my primary school job. Cool, huh?
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
The Perfect Craigslist Personal Ad
I spend a lot of lazy days at home on the internet, and often read craigslist istanbul to see what weirdos I share my city with. Craigslist personal ads are usually just inappropriate pictures with ridiculous pick-up lines, but when I saw the posting title "Hank Rearden is looking for Dagny - 28 (Ankara)," I thought that I'd found my husband. (For those of you who don't know, Hank Rearden and Dagny are characters from my favorite book, Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand).
Here is the man's full-text posting.
"Many guys dont want what I want. Any female must talk fluently what the hell she is talking about. Must be smart. Must be strong. Must deserve what she wants. I am a person of reason so I'm looking for same. Integrity, consistency, honesty are must. Sense of humor mostly comes with them. Appearence is important for me as long as one has the characteristics written here. Beauty is necessity but if you are not attractive -(beauty and attractiveness are different issues. For example: Adriana Lima, Megan Fox are beautiful women but not attractive for me. I prefer Gisele Bündchen, Rachel McAdams, Sienna Miller, Saffran Burrows;)) -it doesnt make sense at all. To hell, I'm not only looking for somebody to have sex. I must enjoy spending time with her.
Whatever, you must be single in every sense. No widows, no married and etc. If you have a boyfriend, dump him first before answer this. Age range between 20-28. Older than it is not ok. Younger is too young for me.
Send your picture please.I hate headshots. Find something spontaneous. Dont expect me to answer without it.
In case that I dont answer you even if you send your picture: You must know I am so pathetic that I cannot say "I am sorry, I didnt like you".
Lastly, keep it that way if you think I am an asshole.
Ps: I'm not like Hank Rearden but he's my role model. "
Turkish men don't seem to be the kind of people who A) read Ayn Rand and B)Of course the last thing I need is to meet strange men on the internet , but I thought his posting deserved a response. So I wrote to him, just telling him how much his posting "spoke" to me as someone who wishes to become a character from Atlas Shrugged and I asked if he could let me know if he got a date out as a result of the post, just to know if there are other girls with weird fantasies like me. I wished him luck in his search for his Dagny, and got a nice response back. If only he were really Hank Rearden...
Here is the man's full-text posting.
"Many guys dont want what I want. Any female must talk fluently what the hell she is talking about. Must be smart. Must be strong. Must deserve what she wants. I am a person of reason so I'm looking for same. Integrity, consistency, honesty are must. Sense of humor mostly comes with them. Appearence is important for me as long as one has the characteristics written here. Beauty is necessity but if you are not attractive -(beauty and attractiveness are different issues. For example: Adriana Lima, Megan Fox are beautiful women but not attractive for me. I prefer Gisele Bündchen, Rachel McAdams, Sienna Miller, Saffran Burrows;)) -it doesnt make sense at all. To hell, I'm not only looking for somebody to have sex. I must enjoy spending time with her.
Whatever, you must be single in every sense. No widows, no married and etc. If you have a boyfriend, dump him first before answer this. Age range between 20-28. Older than it is not ok. Younger is too young for me.
Send your picture please.I hate headshots. Find something spontaneous. Dont expect me to answer without it.
In case that I dont answer you even if you send your picture: You must know I am so pathetic that I cannot say "I am sorry, I didnt like you".
Lastly, keep it that way if you think I am an asshole.
Ps: I'm not like Hank Rearden but he's my role model. "
Turkish men don't seem to be the kind of people who A) read Ayn Rand and B)Of course the last thing I need is to meet strange men on the internet , but I thought his posting deserved a response. So I wrote to him, just telling him how much his posting "spoke" to me as someone who wishes to become a character from Atlas Shrugged and I asked if he could let me know if he got a date out as a result of the post, just to know if there are other girls with weird fantasies like me. I wished him luck in his search for his Dagny, and got a nice response back. If only he were really Hank Rearden...
Better Than a Horoscope
So Mike was typing in my blog address to read my new post and accidentally mistyped one letter. The blog he came to seems to eerily relate to what I'm going through in my life right now, so I wanted to share the most fitting part. It's like reading a horoscope that exactly sums you up at that moment in your life, only weirder because it's a random blog. Crazy coincidence! Imagine that the "you" is me, and the "I" is Aissa...
Thursday, April 04, 2002
Let's not have this coversation, you and me. We've done it before, and the same thing always happens.
You'll get pissed off, and I'll get self righteous, and we'll end up not talking for months until one of us comes up to the other on the street and we decide that we'll never part again. And six months later, we will.
Because you are fickle. And I am jealous.
You will find another and run off for a while, and when I call you on it, we will have this conversation again, and I will tell you that you won't find the pieces you're missing in another person and you will tell me to fuck myself.
And you'll know, as you always do, that I am right. But that fact will not be enough to stop you from going because...
Because you don't want me to be right.
So let's not have this conversation. Let's pretend that this has never happened, and never will, and when you don't call me I'll just shrug and write it off as one of those things that a person does when she is finding herself.
And we will leave it at that.
Thursday, April 04, 2002
Let's not have this coversation, you and me. We've done it before, and the same thing always happens.
You'll get pissed off, and I'll get self righteous, and we'll end up not talking for months until one of us comes up to the other on the street and we decide that we'll never part again. And six months later, we will.
Because you are fickle. And I am jealous.
You will find another and run off for a while, and when I call you on it, we will have this conversation again, and I will tell you that you won't find the pieces you're missing in another person and you will tell me to fuck myself.
And you'll know, as you always do, that I am right. But that fact will not be enough to stop you from going because...
Because you don't want me to be right.
So let's not have this conversation. Let's pretend that this has never happened, and never will, and when you don't call me I'll just shrug and write it off as one of those things that a person does when she is finding herself.
And we will leave it at that.
Observations
Now that I've been living in Turkey almost 2 months, I wanted to post some observations about Turkish life/Turkish culture.
Turkish people seem to view children as public property. It is expected that cute kids will be admired and entertained by strangers. My Russian teacher has a three-year-old son and a baby son, and she talked about how strange it was when she first arrived to have her kids manhandled without her permission. We sat together in a tea house outdoors, and one homeless man stuck his fingers into the stroller and started petting the baby's hands, a lot of people stopped and leaned over the stroller smiling and baby-talking, and a few people tousled the three-year-old's hair. Sasha said that in Ukraine the toddler was friendly and outgoing around strangers, but now is shy and reserved and uncomfortable being touched. In America, a woman would freak out if a strange man picked her baby up out of the stroller and started cooing at him! But here it seems perfectly normal and harmless.
_____________________________
In almost all countries in the world with the exception of the US and maybe Canada, soccer/football is the national sport. Everyone watches it, learns the chants, bets on matches, buys jerseys, and basically bleeds the colors of their favorite team. Turkey takes the love of soccer to a whole new level- here it is a way of life. Istanbul has 5 professional teams that all play in the top league in Turkish competition, and everyone has a team that they support- no one seems to be impartial here. When there is a match on, all the bars and cafes are full of people facing the TV, glued to the game, passionate about the result. Every vegetable stand and mini-market has a tv inside so that even men stuck at work can see the game in its entirety. The best games are the "derby" games between rival Istanbul teams. You can tell when those games are on because everyone is wearing a soccer jersey, and shouts drift out of the windows of cafes and homes when goals are scored or great saves are made.
Mike is big football fan and his favorite team is Manchester United, and he was ecstatic (as ecstatic as a British man gets) when he found out that they were coming here to play Besiktas, Turkey's champion from last year. We bought tickets online in the Besiktas section and I got to experience my very first soccer game. It was the perfect game to go to! Even if you hate soccer, you would have enjoyed this game. Besiktas fans recently received the title of "the world's loudest fans" at 132 decibels, and it was amazing to see the devotion for the game that all the fans had.
The stadium is designed so that 90% are home fans, with just a tiny section in the corner reserved for away fans. This section is fenced in like a cage, and even has a net over the top so that no one can throw anything at them. We could have gotten tickets to be in the Man Utd section, but they cost 123 pounds, compared to 75 lira in the home section. We also thought it would be a better cultural experience to sit with the Turks. Who really wants to spend 90 minutes with a bunch of British soccer hooligans anyways? :)
We got to the stadium an hour and a half before the match started, and already some people were there, eating bags of sunflower seats and every so often chanting Besiktas chants in response to the Man Utd fans in the cage. Once the game started, all the fans were on their feet and remained standing for the entire 90 minutes. Building up to the kick-off, all the fans were chanting and jazz-handing, getting louder and louder. At the moment the first kick was made, 32,145 (minus 2 because Mike and I didn't know what was going on... 32,143) fans simultaneously said, "Shhhhh" and then again built up into louder and louder songs. Everyone knew all the chants, and we discovered about halfway though that in the section opposite, there were 3 man standing up facing the spectators and leading the chant. Their section would start a chant, and then it would go around the stadium like an echo. These men are called "amigos" and their job is to plan and choreograph new chants and songs. Before the match, hardcore fans meet up to learn the chants for that game. The only chants we understood must have taken them hours to think up "Fuck you Manchester" and "Fuck you Rooney" (yes, very original).
Having heard horror stories about violence between Turkish and English fans and seeing the away section cage made me quite frightened to be a white faced, non-Besiktas-jersey-wearing, English speaking girl sitting voluntarily in a sea of hardcore Besiktas fans. We got some weird looks by the ticket collectors and security staff for clearly being foreigners in the Turkish section. The only fans we talked to were totally nice about Mike being a Manc and a Man Utd fan, and didn't make us fear for our lives even in the slightest.
The game was definitely not the most exciting game in history, but the atmosphere more than made for it. Manchester won with a goal 13 minutes before the finish, so Mike silently cheered while the entire stadium silenced for the first and only time all game.
Here is a video taken during the quieter second half to give a taste of what the stadium was like- imagine this x100 in your ears for 90+ minutes!
_____________________________
Mike got a haircut in a Turkish barber shop, and it was a great experience for me to sit and watch and learn about the 'secret' world of men's barbers. There were 6 or 7 barber chairs, and just as many barbers. The place was busy- every seat was taken and men were waiting for their turn. Mike went in just for a haircut, but most men were there getting shaved too. It seemed that the normal procedure goes like this: a man sits down in the chair and presumably tells the barber what he wants done. The barber slathers shaving cream on his face and neck using an oversized makeup brush and fits a new straightrazor knife into the handle. He proceeds to shave face and neck entirely, or to shape the moustache/sideburns into some ridiculous and very Turkish shape. As he shaves the hair off, he wipes the blade every few strokes on his non-shaving hand between thumb and index finger. He goes over each part of the face a few times to make sure all the hairs are gone, and then goes over it carefully again when he's done to make sure he hasn't missed anything. He rinses off the shaving cream and puts on one of two kinds of facecreams. Some men opt for a peel-off facemask- warm green goo that looks like leg wax and is applied using a tongue depressor, and some preferred a seafoam green cream that dries and is washed off 5 minutes later. Then, if the man has facial hair that wasn't shaved off (like a moustache), the barber goes through it with a comb and tiny scissors, trimming and shaping it symmetrically. Then he pulls out a spool of black thread, and proceeds to pluck the man's eyebrows using a procedure known as threading. One man even had a "tram line" cut into his eyebrow using a tiny razorblade. Once the beard/facial work is all done, the barber finally moves onto the hair. The cut is standard enough, except the barber uses no less than 3 different pairs of scissors, a straightrazor on the neck, and a mini-trimmer. The hair is then dried and styled using a hairdryer and round brush to spike or curl the hair into the silliest style possible. It seems as though every man then got a gob of hair gel and/or wax smeared into his hair and enough hairspray to kill the entire ozone sprayed on just in case the gel hadn't held the hairs in place enough.
Mike as a foreigner wasn't spared any of this barber shop tradition! Check out the style he got:
We can't decide if the barber was giving him a legitimate "normal" Turkish style, or if the fact that Mike is a Manchester United fan and he is a Besiktas fan made him give Mike an intention wanker style. I guess we'll never know! Once Mike washed out the tons of product, he was left with a good cut so it doesn't matter with what intent the barber styled him.
_____________________________
Ramadan (Ramazan in Turkish), Islam's holiest month, just ended on Friday. Even though Istanbul is a Western city where most people claim to be non-practicing Muslims, Islam is much more noticeable here than in Kyrgyzstan. There are mosques in every neighborhood, and 5 times a day, the multiple calls to prayer can be heard. Guidebooks warn that during Ramadan most shops and restaurants are closed because people should be fasting from sunrise to sunset, but the vast majority (if not all) shops in our neighborhood and in the center were open. We moved into our new apartment on the first day of Ramadan, and were awakened at 2:30 am by a drummer. He walked down our street and we heard him from other areas of our neighborhood too, always with the same beat and just a few seconds in between each. Groggily we couldn't figure out why a salesman would choose a drum and the middle of the night as a way to sell something, and were slightly disturbed that we were stuck in a neighborhood with midnight, drumming salesmen. Eventually we put two and two together and decided that he must be a human alarm clock, waking people up for the pre-sunrise meal. We heard him every morning for the whole month of Ramadan. A few times we got up to watch him walk past, and sometimes he had a child with him, sometimes he knocked on doors trying to get money, and sometimes he even sang to himself. We got used to him and even sort of like being in a traditional enough neighborhood where that kind of thing still goes on. You can read more about this tradition here.
Mike and I both have jobs now, and we start this week. Mike works at a university and I work at a primary school. We will both have regular schedules, lots of holidays, and evenings and weekends off. Much better than the Istanbul language center life where you work all weekend and only know your schedule a week in advance. We are not ready to get back to work after almost 4 months of vacation and traveling. Wish us luck!
Turkish people seem to view children as public property. It is expected that cute kids will be admired and entertained by strangers. My Russian teacher has a three-year-old son and a baby son, and she talked about how strange it was when she first arrived to have her kids manhandled without her permission. We sat together in a tea house outdoors, and one homeless man stuck his fingers into the stroller and started petting the baby's hands, a lot of people stopped and leaned over the stroller smiling and baby-talking, and a few people tousled the three-year-old's hair. Sasha said that in Ukraine the toddler was friendly and outgoing around strangers, but now is shy and reserved and uncomfortable being touched. In America, a woman would freak out if a strange man picked her baby up out of the stroller and started cooing at him! But here it seems perfectly normal and harmless.
_____________________________
In almost all countries in the world with the exception of the US and maybe Canada, soccer/football is the national sport. Everyone watches it, learns the chants, bets on matches, buys jerseys, and basically bleeds the colors of their favorite team. Turkey takes the love of soccer to a whole new level- here it is a way of life. Istanbul has 5 professional teams that all play in the top league in Turkish competition, and everyone has a team that they support- no one seems to be impartial here. When there is a match on, all the bars and cafes are full of people facing the TV, glued to the game, passionate about the result. Every vegetable stand and mini-market has a tv inside so that even men stuck at work can see the game in its entirety. The best games are the "derby" games between rival Istanbul teams. You can tell when those games are on because everyone is wearing a soccer jersey, and shouts drift out of the windows of cafes and homes when goals are scored or great saves are made.
Mike is big football fan and his favorite team is Manchester United, and he was ecstatic (as ecstatic as a British man gets) when he found out that they were coming here to play Besiktas, Turkey's champion from last year. We bought tickets online in the Besiktas section and I got to experience my very first soccer game. It was the perfect game to go to! Even if you hate soccer, you would have enjoyed this game. Besiktas fans recently received the title of "the world's loudest fans" at 132 decibels, and it was amazing to see the devotion for the game that all the fans had.
The stadium is designed so that 90% are home fans, with just a tiny section in the corner reserved for away fans. This section is fenced in like a cage, and even has a net over the top so that no one can throw anything at them. We could have gotten tickets to be in the Man Utd section, but they cost 123 pounds, compared to 75 lira in the home section. We also thought it would be a better cultural experience to sit with the Turks. Who really wants to spend 90 minutes with a bunch of British soccer hooligans anyways? :)
We got to the stadium an hour and a half before the match started, and already some people were there, eating bags of sunflower seats and every so often chanting Besiktas chants in response to the Man Utd fans in the cage. Once the game started, all the fans were on their feet and remained standing for the entire 90 minutes. Building up to the kick-off, all the fans were chanting and jazz-handing, getting louder and louder. At the moment the first kick was made, 32,145 (minus 2 because Mike and I didn't know what was going on... 32,143) fans simultaneously said, "Shhhhh" and then again built up into louder and louder songs. Everyone knew all the chants, and we discovered about halfway though that in the section opposite, there were 3 man standing up facing the spectators and leading the chant. Their section would start a chant, and then it would go around the stadium like an echo. These men are called "amigos" and their job is to plan and choreograph new chants and songs. Before the match, hardcore fans meet up to learn the chants for that game. The only chants we understood must have taken them hours to think up "Fuck you Manchester" and "Fuck you Rooney" (yes, very original).
Having heard horror stories about violence between Turkish and English fans and seeing the away section cage made me quite frightened to be a white faced, non-Besiktas-jersey-wearing, English speaking girl sitting voluntarily in a sea of hardcore Besiktas fans. We got some weird looks by the ticket collectors and security staff for clearly being foreigners in the Turkish section. The only fans we talked to were totally nice about Mike being a Manc and a Man Utd fan, and didn't make us fear for our lives even in the slightest.
The game was definitely not the most exciting game in history, but the atmosphere more than made for it. Manchester won with a goal 13 minutes before the finish, so Mike silently cheered while the entire stadium silenced for the first and only time all game.
Here is a video taken during the quieter second half to give a taste of what the stadium was like- imagine this x100 in your ears for 90+ minutes!
_____________________________
Mike got a haircut in a Turkish barber shop, and it was a great experience for me to sit and watch and learn about the 'secret' world of men's barbers. There were 6 or 7 barber chairs, and just as many barbers. The place was busy- every seat was taken and men were waiting for their turn. Mike went in just for a haircut, but most men were there getting shaved too. It seemed that the normal procedure goes like this: a man sits down in the chair and presumably tells the barber what he wants done. The barber slathers shaving cream on his face and neck using an oversized makeup brush and fits a new straightrazor knife into the handle. He proceeds to shave face and neck entirely, or to shape the moustache/sideburns into some ridiculous and very Turkish shape. As he shaves the hair off, he wipes the blade every few strokes on his non-shaving hand between thumb and index finger. He goes over each part of the face a few times to make sure all the hairs are gone, and then goes over it carefully again when he's done to make sure he hasn't missed anything. He rinses off the shaving cream and puts on one of two kinds of facecreams. Some men opt for a peel-off facemask- warm green goo that looks like leg wax and is applied using a tongue depressor, and some preferred a seafoam green cream that dries and is washed off 5 minutes later. Then, if the man has facial hair that wasn't shaved off (like a moustache), the barber goes through it with a comb and tiny scissors, trimming and shaping it symmetrically. Then he pulls out a spool of black thread, and proceeds to pluck the man's eyebrows using a procedure known as threading. One man even had a "tram line" cut into his eyebrow using a tiny razorblade. Once the beard/facial work is all done, the barber finally moves onto the hair. The cut is standard enough, except the barber uses no less than 3 different pairs of scissors, a straightrazor on the neck, and a mini-trimmer. The hair is then dried and styled using a hairdryer and round brush to spike or curl the hair into the silliest style possible. It seems as though every man then got a gob of hair gel and/or wax smeared into his hair and enough hairspray to kill the entire ozone sprayed on just in case the gel hadn't held the hairs in place enough.
Mike as a foreigner wasn't spared any of this barber shop tradition! Check out the style he got:
We can't decide if the barber was giving him a legitimate "normal" Turkish style, or if the fact that Mike is a Manchester United fan and he is a Besiktas fan made him give Mike an intention wanker style. I guess we'll never know! Once Mike washed out the tons of product, he was left with a good cut so it doesn't matter with what intent the barber styled him.
_____________________________
Ramadan (Ramazan in Turkish), Islam's holiest month, just ended on Friday. Even though Istanbul is a Western city where most people claim to be non-practicing Muslims, Islam is much more noticeable here than in Kyrgyzstan. There are mosques in every neighborhood, and 5 times a day, the multiple calls to prayer can be heard. Guidebooks warn that during Ramadan most shops and restaurants are closed because people should be fasting from sunrise to sunset, but the vast majority (if not all) shops in our neighborhood and in the center were open. We moved into our new apartment on the first day of Ramadan, and were awakened at 2:30 am by a drummer. He walked down our street and we heard him from other areas of our neighborhood too, always with the same beat and just a few seconds in between each. Groggily we couldn't figure out why a salesman would choose a drum and the middle of the night as a way to sell something, and were slightly disturbed that we were stuck in a neighborhood with midnight, drumming salesmen. Eventually we put two and two together and decided that he must be a human alarm clock, waking people up for the pre-sunrise meal. We heard him every morning for the whole month of Ramadan. A few times we got up to watch him walk past, and sometimes he had a child with him, sometimes he knocked on doors trying to get money, and sometimes he even sang to himself. We got used to him and even sort of like being in a traditional enough neighborhood where that kind of thing still goes on. You can read more about this tradition here.
Mike and I both have jobs now, and we start this week. Mike works at a university and I work at a primary school. We will both have regular schedules, lots of holidays, and evenings and weekends off. Much better than the Istanbul language center life where you work all weekend and only know your schedule a week in advance. We are not ready to get back to work after almost 4 months of vacation and traveling. Wish us luck!
Monday, September 7, 2009
Eternal Fame
So, in Kyrgyzstan there was a teacher who didn't like me because she thinks I "stole" Mike away from her. She left Kyrgyzstan less than 2 months after I arrived, so we didn't have too much time to not get along, but the feelings of hatred within her must have been so strong that she still feels the need to blog about me!
http://janesdailyblah.blogspot.com/2009/08/so-many-enemies.html
Check it out. At least she was still able to enjoy the book I recommended.
http://janesdailyblah.blogspot.com/2009/08/so-many-enemies.html
Check it out. At least she was still able to enjoy the book I recommended.
Saturday, August 29, 2009
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