We weren’t to be paid until Friday leaving me- for the first time in my life- with about $15.00 (30 TL) to last me two days. Now, this wasn’t the end of the world, but by the end of Wed, I was seriously considering spending 20TL on a bottle of wine and just not eating for a couple of days. There have been ongoing visa issues- due to the spelling of my name- since we arrived in Turkey. To make a long and tedious version slightly shorter, this has resulted in my needing a new birth certificate, new ‘parchments’ (not documents- be very careful in word usage) and the realization that Canadian bureaucracy is equally a big pain in the ass as Turkish bureaucracy. My wonderful parents have been aiding me in every sense of the word with the filling out of forms, the long phone calls and the trips to SFU to attempt to sort all this out. We discovered that although I authorized my father to drop off the ‘parchments’, I in fact didn’t authorize him to pick them up. Apparently a lot of fake dads (with the same last name as students) try and pick up parchments for no reason, thus meriting this kind of ‘security’ check. Alas, when I re-emailed them, my use of the word ‘parchments’ was ambiguous (I referred to them as documents), resulting in my clogging up the inbox at SFU simply so they could be handed over to the person who was already authorized to drop them off. Tedious- and keep in mind there is a slight time crunch. Alas, all that has come through and now all there is to do is wait and pray that the documents (the originals now have to be mailed over- much to my utter dismay and fear at their loss and repetition of this entire process) make it safe and sound to Turkey.
By the time payday arrived (I was practical and sustained from buying a bottle of wine), we were
ready for a nice meal out and a beer run.
We went into the school to finish lesson planning and patiently wait
until 2 pm (it had been nine weeks since I was last paid- the longest I have
gone without a steady income in many a moon).
During that time, we were messaging Mustafa (I mentioned him before – we
met on a bus) and he informed us that we were invited to his house for dinner
and that rejection of any sort would be met with resentment. He was joking, but we got the point. Although this threw a wrench in otherwise
lovely evening plans, we agreed to go.
Now normally we would bring a bottle of
wine to dinner, but one does not do that with a Muslim family, so we decided to
pick up a bouquet of flowers. I told the
saleslady my price point (as I have no idea what the names of flowers are in
Turkish) and she put together a beautiful bouquet of flowers, complete with
ladybug stickers, glitter and perfume…
Joe and I were both confused about the perfume as flowers typically have
a lovely scent, and this spray made the odor unbearable. We picked up a couple beers, grabbed a
donair, and tried not to smell the flowers the whole way home. We had about an hour to relax before heading
off to dinner, and Mustafa met us at the edge of his complex. Only about 300m away, it has about fifteen
towers or so. We followed him to find
his daughter, Asya (who is about 7) and then went upstairs. In Turkish culture, you leave your shoes
outside the door and then Asya went and brought us ‘house shoes’. Due to the prime minster being in town, his
wife (Sibel) was running late, so while Asya watched TV, we went onto the
balcony and has a Turkish/English discussion about linguistics which was a lot
of fun. Joe and I also made faces at Asya
everytime we saw her looking at us, and she would smile and wave.
Sibel came home and frantically started
cooking- as I have mentioned before, it is a very male dominated culture here and the men don't cook or clean. ( I felt terrible, but she wouldn’t let me help, and she didn’t speak
English so it was hard to convince her otherwise.) Dinner was a mixture of small fish (kinda
like anchovies- don’t know the name for them) battered and baked, salad, bread
and the best pickles ever. There were no
dinner plates- just forks to transfer food from communal plates to your mouth- and a small plate for the fish bones.
Conversation ranged from politics to philosophy to religion to language to
relationships and jokes.
Mustafa is an
excellent conversationalist, and his wife (a philosophy major) was quite
interesting when he helped translate for her.
We ignored their protests and helped clear the table, and then Sibel
made Turkish coffee (the best Turkish coffee we have had- a special brand that
you can only buy in certain shops) and they smoked like chimneys on the balcony
and we continued chatting. After coffee
was tea (lots of tea) and although Joe and I had to work early the next
morning, we didn’t manage to leave until about 11:30 pm. Sibel waited at the door until we were out of
sight (Turks never close the door until they can no longer see their
company) Mustafa walked us home and Joe
asked him about the conflict in Kobane (it is very interesting to her Turks
opinions on the matter.) and he said that he would worry about it if they got
in and made it Ulfa (the big town between here and the border). Until then it was Ulfa’s problem. Turks are very private people, not willing to
get into the affairs of others willingly, although the Kurds are more willing
to fight, and they firmly seem to believe their government is right in staying out of it. Granted we haven't talked to any Kurds, although I imagine their opinions differ.
When we got back to the house, there were police cars everywhere. Mustafa greeted them with a traditional Arabic/Islamic greeting (to get on their good side he said) and there were crowds of people outside one of the towers- including the mayor. Mustafa deduced that someone must have died (been martyred) in the fighting near Kobane and that they were either bringing his body back (why all the helicopters are flying overhead all the time) or informing the family. Either way, it was a rather dramatic end to the night and the closest we have come (and probably will come) to the conflict itself. It didn't mar the evening though. It merely cemented the fact that we are not in Kansas anymore.
When we got back to the house, there were police cars everywhere. Mustafa greeted them with a traditional Arabic/Islamic greeting (to get on their good side he said) and there were crowds of people outside one of the towers- including the mayor. Mustafa deduced that someone must have died (been martyred) in the fighting near Kobane and that they were either bringing his body back (why all the helicopters are flying overhead all the time) or informing the family. Either way, it was a rather dramatic end to the night and the closest we have come (and probably will come) to the conflict itself. It didn't mar the evening though. It merely cemented the fact that we are not in Kansas anymore.
It was a lovely evening of Turkish hospitality at it's finest.
** I'm sorry there are not many photos. I do not know Mustafa or Sibel well enough yet to be comfortable asking if I could take photos of them.
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