A Passing

My neighbor died on Sunday. At least, that's the best conclusion I came to based on observation. No one told me, and I didn't know how to ask for more information in an appropriate way. But all of a sudden, the door down the hall was left continuously open and people, mostly men, started coming and going. And I knew that there is a period of visitation here after someone dies.

Those neighbors had always been a bit of a mystery to us. We knew they were an older couple, and we saw their grown children occasionally. When they sat on their balcony, they were a few feet from my bedroom window. We had brought them food a couple of times, as we did with other neighbors, and the grown daughter always answered the door and returned our plate promptly. We were never invited inside. My roommate thought she heard once that the wife was ill. We ran into the husband periodically on the elevator. He was always nice, courteous, and as friendly as is appropriate between an older man and a young woman. Which meant our conversations were brief. But even though he could easily tell I didn't understand Turkish well, he still tried. Then I saw the couple together getting off the elevator once. The wife was taking very small steps, and her grown son held one arm to help her. I smiled at her, and she smiled back and said "hello, dear."

So when the door was left open, I drew conclusions. I called my teacher and asked what I should say and do to pay my respects. In some ways, the customs here may be similar to traditional American customs. Then again, I've never really been part of traditional American customs either. All the relatives I've known well have been cremated, at least since I've been old enough to remember. Maybe it's the German blood, or maybe it's my faulty memory, but it seemed like we had a memorial service, and then we moved on. Here, they have a seven-day period of visitation. The family leaves their door open, and friends, family, and neighbors come and go for a week. You bring food, so the family doesn't have to cook. And for words of comfort, you say "health to your head."

So last night I went to the bakery, bought a bag of my favorite pastries, put them on a nice plate, and went to the neighbors. Unfortunately, my roommate was leaving town shortly after we heard the news. Out of the two of us, she's more compassionate, socially sensitive, and expressive. She wanted to pay her respects. But instead I was left to represent. A middle-aged lady came to the door. I wished her "health to your head", and she cleaned my plate off in the kitchen and brought it back to me. She inquired, and I said I lived down the hall. I wished her a good evening, and that was that. This morning, a young man to the door. He came from the neighbors, and was carrying a tray of small plates of food. Apparently they, too, bring food to all the neighbors while in mourning. Always hospitable. I don't know if this specific food was part of the tradition, but it's some sort of grain, perhaps a fine bulgar, soaked in sugar syrup. A simple sweet snack. It's a little strange to American tastes, but I like it alright. And so I ate it in memory of her, the smiling old lady down the hall whose name I never knew, but whose mourning I am a part of because I am their neighbor.

Learn to Cook Turkish--Sigara Boregi

Just so you don't think I've fried like an egg yet, some good news in the weather: after Turkey had the hottest July in 78 years, the temperatures have actually dropped to more reasonable levels this week.
Yesterday I learned to make sigara boregi (silent "g"). I think it's the simplest Turkish food you can possibly make, but I made it mostly by myself, so I'm proud. Of course, my roommate told me what to do every step and approved all my measurements. But I delight in small victories in my new culture. Sigara boregi is filled with a mixture of chopped fresh parsley and the 2 main kinds of cheese in Turkey. Both are white. One is very mild and salty, kinda like monterey jack. The other is tangy and crumbly like feta.

At the store you can buy a thick , cooked filo dough that resembles a very thin tortilla, called yufka. You cut the yufka like a pizza. You put a small amount of the mixture at the wide end of the pizza slice (see above), and roll, folding in the ends.

After that, all you do is fry them to a golden brown! Together with my roommate and our other friend, we had quite a spread. Whenever our Turkish friends come over for tea in the afternoons, my roommate generally prepares a feast. She made the kisir (bulgar salad), and
our guests brought assorted cookies and other baked things to complete the feast. Don't worry, we had a whole other dessert plate after our tea/lunch with chocolate pound cake our American friend made and the cookies our guest brought. While we ate dessert, I learned to play okey for the second time. It's kinda like rummy, but you play with tiles, and instead of putting your sets on the table you keep them on your stand, and you always have 15 tiles.

So, it's been a good week for learning new things and having a good time doing it.

How's the weather?

The question everyone asks is "how's the weather?" The most accurate answer I can give you is "hot." I have been told that weather.com won't give you accurate numbers, and based on what the thermometers around town have been saying, I'm prone to agree. It tends to underestimate actual temperatures around here. Even so, it said that the low here tonight is 80 F. Of course, if you read the newspapers, or ask a local, you'll also get different answers. Like a game of telephone, people tend to exaggerate actual forecasts, even if it's unintentional. According to locals, the heat index on Monday was 60 C, or 140 F. Actual temperatures, with humidity, are probably somewhere around 110, with a 10 degree margin of error.

Of course, most of my friends and family back home will say "so? it's about that hot here, too." My response to them is "how many minutes of your day do you spend in those 110 degrees?" I never noticed the heat at home unless I was working outside. The only room in our apartment here that has air conditioning is the living room. My roommate and I sleep on the couch every night. The tile in my bedroom feels like a constant 80 degrees. If we want to go somewhere, we have to walk, or take the bus. After 5 min on foot in the afternoon, you're covered in sweat. Most of the buses we ride on do not have air conditioning. I've heard saunas are good for your health. If that's so, I'll be very healthy by the end of the summer, because the outdoors and most of my apartment feel like an oven. You want to lose weight, just come live here!

In the "cool of the day" (at about 7 pm when it's only 88 degrees outside) it's delightful. You can walk down the street in mostly shade, and there's a cool breeze. The best part is, there are people everywhere! When I was visiting Italy with my family, I remember learning about the piazza. Every evening, people gather in the piazza to walk, talk, meet, greet, people watch. The main street by my house becomes a piazza every evening at 7. It's quiet, almost empty during the day in the summer, but by 7 pm there are people walking everywhere. Young, old, male, female, and lots of families. Some are men walking by themselves on their way home from work. My favorite are the clusters of women and children. Some look like they're on their way home from the grocer, but most are just strolling, socializing. Then again, it's hard to tell. Even when people are on their way to a meeting, they still walk like they're out for a stroll. You can watch their faces, study their clothing. And what a variety of clothing there is! In my city you can see it all. Some are covered from head to toe--head scarf, coat, long skirt, even in summer. A few will go outside with their children in long shorts and a tank top. Most are wearing pants, especially jeans, and a short-sleeve shirt. I love to smile at the children, who usually love the attention from the strange-looking light girl, and occasionally catch the eye of their mothers. It's a habit I picked up from my first few weeks here. All I could say was hello and how are you, but I wanted so much to connect with the people around me. I made a game of smiling at ladies I passed on the street. Occasionally I would experiment with a "hello", which isn't common behavior among passers-by here. I discovered that if you say hello to an old lady, she will always respond back with a warm "hello, dear" and a smile. Occasionally I get tired of studying a new language, or tired of strange looks, or of the heat, but I never tire of the people whose culture I am learning more about every day.

Lost in Translation

Anyone who's lived overseas for some period of time has a story of embarrassing themselves terribly with misuse of their second language. This week was my opportunity. I applied for a one-year residence permit. In order to do so, I had to take a certain large amount of money in US dollars and exchange it into lira (the local currency). The purpose of this was to have the receipt as proof that I have a little money to live in the country for a year. I happened to be running errands near the bank where I pay for my language lessons at Global Connection every month, so I thought it would be a good place to exchange my money. Here, you can pay many bills by simply depositing money at the bank into the account of the business that you are paying. Since this bank was accustomed to doing business with us foreigners, I hoped it would go smoother. Before I went in, I looked in my dictionary for the word "exchange" and rehearsed what I was going to say. I walked into the bank, handed the familiar bank teller lady my handful of cash, and she said a word that sounded similar to the word for "exchange." Great, this was easier than I expected. She counted it out carefully, I verified the amount, and she handed me a receipt. But no money. I look at the receipt. At the top it says "Global Connection." That's right, she deposited the entire amount into Global Connection's account. I laughed as I said in my broken Turkish "lira...I wanted...I wanted exchange." The nice lady immediately understood. She called the manager (who didn't look as amused as I was) and got all the lira I needed. As I signed some forms to make the change, I paid very close attention to what she was saying, even if I still didn't understand all of it. And actually, I did need to pay a small amount to Global that day for my language lessons, so as she was finishing, I said "after, can you deposit this amount to Global Connection?" Fortunately, she obliged. There was a really long line as I ran out after that, avoiding eye contact with anyone!
I think my cat could have done a better job communicating...