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I'm in Turkey. The call of the muezzin woke me up this morning before dawn, and it's cutting above the car noise to come in the apartment windows with the breeze.
We're in Izmit, where my mother's friend lives. It's an industrial city about an hour east of Istanbul (if you miss rush hour. Which we did not. In which case it's about two hours and a heart attack when the semi tries to merge right into you) - I don't like to say industrial city. It's technically accurate, but the description always makes me think of places like Gary, Indiana, where the buildings and shredded foliage are gray and the sky used to be orange.
Izmit, though it has its share of fine black dust, is not like that. Izmit has orange and sage green and cream apartment houses surrounded by hollyhocks and pink roses, growing right out of the grass. There's a tree-lined brick path that winds through the whole city and a downtown street where they sell giant frou-frou wedding dresses and gold bangles and simit, which look like broad skinny bagels covered in poppy seeds, and baklava.
No. Not just baklava. BAKLAVA. Trays and trays of baklava, layers of walnuts and pistachios and phyllo dough and sugar syrup (honey is either a Greek or an American innovation). We got half a dozen and I have been munching them in between bazaars.
I've been trying desperately to assimilate the word for 'thank you,' but it slips out of my brain like an eel. But I've learned the word for cherries - and exit - and three different types of bread! And chocolate. Chocolate is always some variation of itself, and therefore recognizable. Turkish uses the Roman alphabet, which makes things so much simpler.
I have an interview tomorrow. I'm sure it will be grand.
We're in Izmit, where my mother's friend lives. It's an industrial city about an hour east of Istanbul (if you miss rush hour. Which we did not. In which case it's about two hours and a heart attack when the semi tries to merge right into you) - I don't like to say industrial city. It's technically accurate, but the description always makes me think of places like Gary, Indiana, where the buildings and shredded foliage are gray and the sky used to be orange.
Izmit, though it has its share of fine black dust, is not like that. Izmit has orange and sage green and cream apartment houses surrounded by hollyhocks and pink roses, growing right out of the grass. There's a tree-lined brick path that winds through the whole city and a downtown street where they sell giant frou-frou wedding dresses and gold bangles and simit, which look like broad skinny bagels covered in poppy seeds, and baklava.
No. Not just baklava. BAKLAVA. Trays and trays of baklava, layers of walnuts and pistachios and phyllo dough and sugar syrup (honey is either a Greek or an American innovation). We got half a dozen and I have been munching them in between bazaars.
I've been trying desperately to assimilate the word for 'thank you,' but it slips out of my brain like an eel. But I've learned the word for cherries - and exit - and three different types of bread! And chocolate. Chocolate is always some variation of itself, and therefore recognizable. Turkish uses the Roman alphabet, which makes things so much simpler.
I have an interview tomorrow. I'm sure it will be grand.
