Summer life in İstanbul - does it get much better than this? I am temporarily living with a very wonderful and interesting collection of people. We lost Lütfiye in the Levent bazaar the other day. Permanently "in gear," she went from vendor to vendor, negotiating relentlessly all transactions. Matt and I had drifted away from the clothing and household goods part of the bazaar and were drooling our way through the fresh produce and cheeses. As with every other aspect of her life, as far as I can tell, everything that happened in the bazaar happened on Lütfiye's own terms. Tha [View Full Entry]

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I think my remarkably low expectations for Kuşadası actually allowed me to enjoy it more once we got there. Sure, the seaside is cluttered with mammoth cruise ships. Sure, restaurants list their prices in Euros on their all-English menus. Sure, the sand on the beach has been almost completely obscured by the densest possible coating of towels, umbrellas, and flesh. Sure, the souvenir shops stretch on as far as the eye can see selling cheap Chinese-made trinkets guaranteed to preserve - at best - warped memories of what Turkey is all about. Sure, miniskirts outnumber head scarves [View Full Entry]

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Here are a few more images of my adventures around Turkey with my mother... [View Full Entry]

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The heat in Hasankeyf was a fierce test of our stamina. Thankfully, we both passed, but my camera failed miserably and now only takes pictures with horizontal stripes. Though, even with a frustrating setback like that, it's hard to complain about much of anything right now. We have, after all, lately been spending most of our time in paradise... Our next stop was unforgettable Savur. We rolled up the hillside of the lovely little town on cobble stoned streets intended to service nothing larger donkey traffic. Nevertheless, our minibus driver was able to manage with some brave and creat [View Full Entry]

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Into the arrivals gate she stepped, looking a bit confused perhaps, but with a big smile on her face. Welcome to Turkey, mom! We hopped a Havaş shuttle to Taksim and her adventures began. After lunch on İstiklal Caddesi, we headed to İstinye to take it easy for the rest of the day... until the party, that is. Lütfiye kept me up into the wee hours the night before, rolling grape leaves and cleaning the apartment - which was already spotless enough, in my opinion. Mountains of food were prepared and good friends came in from as far as İzmit to [View Full Entry]

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As a sort of disclaimer to my mates, this entry is in no way me 'avin' a laugh. My continued fascination with the skilled and widely varying ways in which the Brits wield the English language stems from sincere admiration, and, at times, downright awe. I would love to be able to one day take the lift up to my flat, but, regrettably, I understand that it will always be an elevator that delivers me to my apartment. I assure you that someone who calls sleeping policemen "speed bumps" with a bland Upstate New York accent is in no position to [View Full Entry]

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I left off after an inadequate description of one of the world's finest castles, though I had already started my new adventures in Damascus by then. It's all a bit of a blur. Time for more catching up. After the castle, we were dropped off by a bus station in Homs, which appeared to be a rather uninspiring city. After using what we unfortunately discovered later were not actually the worst toilets in Syria, we grabbed some quick eats. For about $0.60 we bought fresh falafel sandwiches rolled up in thin pita bread. They hit the spot. We effortlessly hopped on [View Full Entry]

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"30 SECOND RULE! 30 SECOND RULE!" I shouted as Jen and I scrambled to rescue the Goldfish crackers that had spilled all over the floor... We arrived at the Syrian border around 11:00 in the morning, Friday the 13th, unsure of how the day would play out. Technically, US passport holders are supposed to jump through a lot of hoops (and spend a lot of money in the process) in order to get tourist visas for Syria. We decided to skip all the red tape and formalities and to rely instead on our charm and good looks. The ride to the [View Full Entry]

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Summer in İstanbul - does it get any better than this? I arrived a little over a week ago and have since been buzzing all over town, finding surprises at every turn. Sercan and Jaki have a new flatmate, Lütfiye, a longtime friend of Jaki's from İzmir. I was pleased to discover that her English is virtually non-existent. Hopefully we can learn a lot from each other this summer. Wednesday I wandered down to the quaint center of İstinye in search of an anahtarci (locksmith) who could make me a set of keys for the apartment. I will be coming and [View Full Entry]

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A few really busy weeks, nice weather, and a headful of thoughts too personal to blog about are collectively responsible for postponing this entry. Life is full of all types of surprises. Three weekends ago, Bahar Şenlikleri, Hacettepe Üniversitesi's annual Spring Festival, took place. It was also my first visit to our large, handsome stone amphitheater - probably the nicest thing ever built on this campus. It seems to be halfway between a modern amphitheater and some of the ancient ones that are on many tourist itineraries in this country. There are even two rows of columns linin [View Full Entry]

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