3 Days: Dinner, Beer, then a Holiday with Friends

I feel a bit strange taking pictures of food. I mean it's usually not the visible qualities of the food that's what's interesting. For instance, who makes an audio recording of a fireworks show? Anyway, I was really excited about dinner, so I took a picture of it!

It was my new experimental, fish-in-a-bath-of-green-things with a slice of tomato and lemon on top.

Moving on... Way back when Hyde came to visit, he brought me some quality from the Boston area. We drank some of it together of course, but I've been saving up the stout because a responsible squirrel doesn't eat all his acorns in September. Well, the other night was a perfect night for acorns.


All the conditions were perfect for drinking a really good dark beer named after a sea captain. I'll list them.

It was dark.
It was stormy.
It was cold.
I was getting together with some old friends in an old looking place in an old part of town.

Seriously, it felt like we were in the galley of a ship during a storm, minus all the rocking. Again, I took a picture of something aesthetic but where that was not the most interesting quality. Also in the shot is Emir, a friend I hadn't seen for quite a while.
 
Cursed to drink only one kind of beer (due to some stupid import laws which I hear are changing very soon), yet I found myself holding liquid gold: a dark, nutty, deep and rich stout from Nantucket. Anxiously I took the first sip. I threw my arms out to the side and closed my eyes. Efes is like an arranged marriage... not my idea and I just have to get used it though I admit we sometimes enjoy each other. Captain Swain's Extra Stout was like everything I fantasize about when I'm drinking Efes. I think that about sums it up. Thank you, Hyde. Enjoy that Rally to Restore Sanity today and thanks for helping to restore mine. By the way, Hyde, whose blog is here, went to the Rally to Restore Sanity, an event I wish I could have gone to and an event they could really use here in Turkey as well.

Moving on... Turkey had its own kind of rally on Friday. The 29th of October 2010, marked the 87th year of the Republic. It's the first time I had experienced the event here in Turkey. I witnessed something which seemed unfathomable: the closing of Bağdat Caddesi, one of the biggest and busiest streets on the Asian side of İstanbul. Turkish flags and picket signs with pictures of Ataturk were everywhere. Those signs just seemed strange to me at first, because I associate them with political statements. That's when I realized that in these times, a depiction of Ataturk is a kind of political statement.

Oh god, is he taking a picture?

e highlight for me was seeing Kuthan and Emir again. I lived with Kuthan for a while when I first got here, but he since found a job that put him in Ankara. I have only seen him once since he moved. Word is that he hates it there, but he otherwise keeps a positive attitude. His girlfriend lives in France, so in that sense İstanbul and Ankara are both far away from a place he'd rather be. Emir lives in Kadıköy and I see him from time to time, but it had been a while. He is always reading up about interesting subjects and our conversations are usually either about or inspired by Sherlock Holmes.

A Clock in 15 Minutes (I think)

The clock in one of the classrooms was busted. The back part had crumbled and hindered the hands from moving. It had been like this for at least 2 weeks. It suddenly occurred to me today that I can fix it. I only had 15 minutes. I took it apart as fast as I could, traced its size, cut a fresh background, emptied out the broken bits of the old background, drew some numbers on it, inserted it and replaced the cover. Of course I also wrote "We Love Jeremy-Teacher" on it. It's my own special form of propaganda I guess. As I was finishing up, the students returned. The teacher reacted very positively to my creation. Since this experience, I have thought of how I could make a much better background given 30 minutes. Now I'm thinking of turning it into a craft that the students make.

A Rivalry Showdown in Kadıköy

Fenerbahçe 0, Galatasaray 0. Probably the result that the police were hoping for.

A guy in front of me jumps out of his seat and shouts at the Fenerbahçe offense (via the television) for failing to convert a golden opportunity into a goal.

Sometimes in football, favorable odds, home field advantage, momentum and high hopes lead to anticipation and even expectation of a victory. In this case, the majority of İstanbul expected Fenerbahçe to totally embarrass Galatasaray and their new coach with a strong win. Instead, there was a scoreless game which featured many chances from both sides. To summarize, Galatasaray played much better in the first half, Fenerbahçe better for most of the second half, the reffing was at time questionable and there were a lot of yellow cards. Fenerbahçe's goalie, Volkan Demirel (which means "Volcano Iron-Hand"), was phenomenal. Pino from Galatasaray really helped carry the team.

I watched the first half from inside a very smokey bar. If you're thinking hey wait a second, I thought smoking inside public places was illegal in Turkey, you're right. Like in the Matrix, some rules can be bent, others can be broken. I could hardly breathe, and I felt like a victim of a kind of societal stupidity. You're hurting the economy! I screamed in my head. It's true, the thing that annoys me the most about smoking is how much it hurts the economy and the overall quality of life in a country. Anyway, I left at halftime and watched the rest from outside a different bar.

One other cool thing worth mentioning is that I was listening to the game on the radio via my cellphone. By doing this, I could know that the cable TV signal in the smokey bar was about 1 second behind and the satellite signal in the other bar was 2-3 seconds behind. It was kind of nice knowing what was going to happen before the huge crowd knew. That's actually how I snapped the photo above. I knew they'd be disappointed! Also, listening to the game like that was good practice for my Turkish.

That's all for now!

Football and beer

Just as my life has found its routine, I am thinking about how to change it. In the meantime, I'm taking more careful notice of the things that change. I find that a day can feel special as long as it has in it a few special moments. Two is enough i think, but I haven't been counting.

Highlight of the week might have been the football match I played in. It was 10 versus 10, a 90 minute game. Each week, I play with the same guys against the same guys. We always lose, but in the recent weeks we've put up more of a contest. This week, we won 5-2. Shown below is my best friend from football, Batuhan, and the place we normally play.

Below, pictures from the hookah at which cafe we all celebrated our victory. I smoked a little of the orange-mint tobacco. It wasn't bad, but I can never smoke very much before my head starts aching. Therefore I tend to do much better with mild flavors such as orange, lemon or rose.

 

The other night, I went out with Pınar for a beer on my favorite street. I'll talk more about that street some other time. It's a special place. It was awesome to hang out with Pınar anyway. We usually meet up in Taksim or in Bostancı, so I treasured the opportunity to hang out with her closer to home.

I like that the guy on the far right of the picture is about to sneeze.

Polonezköy, Nurşin, Ümit and Künefe

Pictures were taken with my phone, hence the quality.

Met up with Nurşin and her brother, Ümit, and friends over the weekend. Went to Polonezköy but forgot my camera, but we didn't look around too much since it was raining. In the evening, we drank lots of beer and played Tabu. The girls won which mean next weekend, the guys are making them breakfast. After that, we went out for kğnefe, my favorite dessert. I enjoyed watching it being made.

I promise a better post really soon! The weather has turned here, and things are a bit different.

A WPI visitor and a surpise in Taksim

It seems that WPI faculty and staff like to pass through İstanbul. Since I moved here almost 6 months ago I've been visited by a small handful of WPI folk, mainly those involved in the international programs in one way or another.

This time it was Tom Thomsen, international student director, co-director of the Denmark project site at which I completed a project, and simply one of the nicest people you can meet at WPI. He was just passing through for a day, representing WPI at a college fair. One of his former students, Erçin, came by to help him at the booth, a major advantage over most of the other colleges there since she could speak Turkish with the recruits. I showed up about half-way through the event, right at a moment when a student had come by interested in learning about the aerospace program. I enjoyed chatting with students about my alma mater, and also learning from Tom (he insists that I no longer call him Mr. Tomsen, though the temptation is annoyingly powerful) about things that have changed there.

About an hour later, my friend Pınar came by and the four of us went for a beer. Tom raised his glass and uttered an old familiar Danish word, "skol!" I recounted some of my experiences in Denmark years ago, and we all proceeded converse on many topics. I was still getting over the shock of sitting across from Tom in İstanbul (I get this feeling every time someone visits me here), when it was time for him to go. I'll definitely miss Tom and his Danish accent, but perhaps he'll be back next year and I'll still be here. Either way, I'm sure I'll see him again before not too long.

Pınar and I then left for nearby Taksim. We got some food and then went to a place I like for some beer. There we were joined by an old familiar face and, in my book, a rather peculiar character, Jeremy. I met him at Vassar almost a year ago while visiting for a day, and he struck me as odd because he is an American named Jeremy and he speaks Turkish. It was a strange experience then, and when I saw him last night, it was less strange. His first remark once we had sat down was exactly what I was thinking. "It seems so much more natural to see you here, than back at Vassar."

Jeremy came to İstanbul to do a semester or two at Boğaziçi University. I had so many questions for him about his experiences since getting here just a couple weeks ago. I could relate to many of the things he described. Like me, his approach to this city is not as a tourist but as someone who wants to integrate and establish a deeper connection. His knowledge of İstanbul is quite vast, and he has a keen eye for its subtle riches.

I can say that Saturday was an interesting day. I can also say that I very much enjoyed seeing familiar face and even meeting some new ones. I wish the best to Tom and I hope to see Tom, Erçin, Jeremy and Pınar as time allows.