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Published: July 12th 2005
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Justice Scalia and the Turkish Faculty
i have a pic of scalia and me that I will attach later... We have been in Istanbul for almost 2 weeks now. I have to say - I love the city more and more every day. We have class everyday from 8:30 - 12:45, with both Turkish and American students. There are students from several American law schools including KU, South Texas, New York Law School, and Temple. The Turkish students are really fun and open. We have gone out with them several times - they are completely willing to be our gracious tour guides, and most of them speak very good English. One of the Turkish girls named Merve had us over for a party last week. They are just really open and helpful and fun.
Actually, one of the students in the program from NY is half Turkish and fluent in the language. His name is Timur, and I can’t even begin to emphasize how wonderful it has been to have him around - the language barrier between the local people here is really huge a lot of times and that can get frustrating after awhile. Some people speak English - but most of the time when you are just going to local restaurants or stores, they don’t. But Timur
The gang with all of our new Turkish friends
They took us to this really posh bar on the rooftop of a huge building. It had amazing views of the water and the city. is right there, ready to translate, making sure every time we eat that my food doesn’t have meat or something scary in it, and that every time we go somewhere, he can at least ask for directions! It has been a huge perk that we have met some really wonderful people on the trip - both people from KU that I hadn’t gotten a chance to hang out with before and also from the other law schools.
We are in our second week of the study program and enjoying the classes, especially Justice Scalia’s class. There is just something about taking a law class from the person who wrote the Supreme Court’s opinion on the matter. Scalia really is a great teacher, although he says a lot of stuff that I don’t agree with. He is really sarcastic and very funny - we are all very intimidated by him of course, especially since whenever someone says something in class that he doesn’t agree with, he pretty much ridicules them. The other day a girl in our class asked a question about a “causal connection” but she kept saying “casual connection.” He corrected her once, and she said it wrong
again - when he interrupted her and asked very sarcastically, “What is going on? Are you dyslexic?” He said it very loudly with a smirk on his face and everyone laughed, but I know that I probably would have cried if that was me! He is constantly saying candid things about public figures… like referring to a particular independent counsel as “that asshole from New York.” He also constantly bashes liberals - but that was definitely expected. It is really funny - I guess that when you have life tenure, you really don’t have anything to lose! We have had various social events with Scalia, and I have talked to him a couple times. I got a picture with him which I will attach on another entry - it is on Liz’s camera.
The only thing that sucks about our classes is the amount of reading that they have been giving - honestly, if you were to do all that is assigned on the day it is assigned, you could easily spend 8 hours a day on the reading for just 2 classes! That amount wouldn’t be so bad if we weren’t in a fabulous foreign city wanting to
explore! But luckily, one of our courses ends this weekend, so we should have more time in the final two weeks of our trip.
Last weekend we went on a trip sponsored by the program to the ruins of Troy, Pergamum, and Ephesus. It was really amazing to see the ruins, but one of those things where we spent a lot of time on a bus and it may have just been easier to do it on our own without a bossy tour-guide herding us around. The first night we stayed in a little town called Assos, which is right next to the island of Lesbos. Our Turkish tour guide very frankly explained that the island of Lesbos was where the modern term for “she on she relations” comes from. It was one of those things where we had been on a bus all day and for whatever reason, that was about the funniest thing we had ever heard. The whole bus pretty much erupted in laughter.
That night, we went to a little basic convenience store down the block from our hotel (that was right on the Aegean Sea - I swam in it!) to buy some
The Trojan Horse
Troy really wasn't as impressive as I had imagined, except for the replica of the trojan horse... although our tour guide said that originally, it was most likely a rabbit, not a horse - go figure! drinks b/c they were ridiculously expensive at the hotel. The guy working at the shop asked us (through Timur’s translation of course) if we would like them to make a bonfire on the beach for us, and they would serve us drinks for as long as we wanted to stay. There were a bunch of lounge chairs and umbrellas on the beach and about 30 of us stayed out there for several hours, paying the equivalent of about $1 per drink, served to us on a virtually private beach on the Aegean Coast with a beautiful bonfire. It was pretty amazing. That is just one example of the incredible hospitality of Turkish people. They really are wonderful!
Anyway, better hit the books unfortunately - got a test and a paper due this weekend!
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Lacy Gilmour
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Miss You Guys
Just wanted to say how cool it is that you ventured off. I have always wanted to travel but have been to afraid. LOL. Plus I have all the extra baggage now. Would be difficult. Anyway, we miss you here and hope you return safely. Keep Tucker in line and have fun. Lacy