Midway Through my Journey

It's hard to believe that I've been in Turkey for more than three weeks now. During my time here, I've tried to follow the advice given to me by alumni never to turn down any opportunity, because you never know what might happen.

Catching Up

Something that happen last week that I haven't yet filled you in on was my trip to a Turkish recording studio. Last Saturday evening, my friend Gavin invited me to go to Kızılay to meet him, his host brother and his host brother's friends at a cafe. My friend has an interesting host family, and I knew I'd regret missing any of the events that would inevitably transpire.

We met in a smoke-filled cafe (it's Turkey), and I was introduced to Gavin's host brother, a physics (or some other kind of difficult applied science) university student who loves philosophy and classical music, races cars, and is in an alternative rock band. His friends have similar interests.

They said they were going to their "recording studio" and invited my friend Gavin and I to come with them. Not wanting to be rude, I went along, but there was some uncertainty. The recording studio turned out to be a really nice facility. Gavin and I went into the small, acoustic room with the band, and we heard them play for about 30 minutes before we had to leave to go somewhere else. Not that their renditions of Green Day and popular Turkish songs were bad, just being an observer is not the most interesting thing. But, hey! I can now say I've been in a recording studio.

It was a surreal moment in which all I could think was, "what the heck am I doing in a recording studio in Ankara, Turkey?!..."

outside Studio A

Language Skills

This week has been going well at Tömer; I can see my language skills progressing. I am almost to the point where I can awkwardly communicate and sort of understand some of the sentences during dinnertime conversations. This is a great success.

This Week's Highlights

This Tuesday, all of the American exchange students and our host families were invited to an Iftar (fast breaking) meal at an upscale restaurant. I enjoyed a four-course meal, which culminated with Iskander, a grilled lamb dish that I'm still not sure if I like or not. Conversation was lively and my family stayed until around 11:30.

On Wednesday, my group returned to Hamamönü for a cultural excursion. We visited the Somut Olmayan Culture Museum in an old house, where we saw a traditional Turkish puppet show and got a tour of a historic two century-old home.

Turkish puppet show

Yesterday, my group visited the museum of Anatolian Civilisations, one of Turkey's best museums. There were various artifacts from the different civilizations that once rule and lived in Asia Minor- Hitite, Greek, Roman, just to name a few. The size of the museum was a little disappointing, but the museum was beautiful and well run.

just "Rome"ing around

Last night after the museum, I, along with two of my friends, got the bus driver to drop us off in Ulus, close to where I had read there were Roman ruins. I have moderate directional sense, but although I had a map, I actually had no idea where this ruin was. Luckily, my wise friend Anika had cellular data in Turkey, and we were able to use Google maps to navigate through the streets to what my guidebook called the "Column of Julian". After about a mile of winding streets, broken down cobblestones, and discreet map-checking, we found where this beautiful ruin was supposed to stand. But it was literally just a column. I suppose I should have realized this from the name.

Ankara's finest column

Since we had come so far, I dragged my friends Ella and Anika to what my book called the Roman Bath ruins. Using Anika's phone we followed a map to where the ruins should be, and ended up at a slightly sketchy and uneven gravel road that led up a hill. At the top, there was the remains of a wall that, as I observed, looked very old. The battery on Anika's phone was running dangerously low, and she was our only effective map, so we decided to climb up to the top of the wall's stairs. At the top was a beautiful, old mosque and many shops and restaurants in buildings that were at least a century old. And up against the back of the mosque... was my Roman ruin. Fifteen feet below, under the wall, you would never know what was atop, but both the sights there and the views from above were worth the journey.

a mosque built on the ruin site... nothing is immortal

We ended the afternoon with çay and dessert at an empty restaurant sitting near an open window overlooking the city.

hot Turkish çay

I then headed to Kızılay to have dinner with my friends. From our third-floor restaurant window, we saw bright and colorful paper lanterns rising up from the crowded street. After iftar, when the fast ends, the streets of downtown Ankara are packed with people and vendors, and everything comes to life.

Lastly, the day ended in a great way. Although my Saturday was a bit boring and uneventful due to it being a typical Turkish day of rest and relaxation, this evening was a simple, yet memorable night. After a good dinner of pasta and chicken, I went with my host brother, cousin, mother, and aunt to a don durma, ice-cream place. We sat outside and talked about many things (mostly in Turkish)- America, religion, holidays, and AFS, my exchange program. I ate a tiramisu, oreo, and chocolate flavored cone and I realized that this was truly the first time I had been able to carry out a conversation, as basic as my skills may be. The air was cool, and as we walked back to out apartment, my host brother told me about many Turkish plays-on-word and pranks, and I mentioned ding-dong-ditching, and he told me that if you tried that here, you'd get shot. I said it depended on how fast you ran.

Tomorrow my family is taking me to Baypazarı, a historical town about an hour away.

Please enjoy a few miscellaneous photo highlights of the week:

a fruit market near my school

a mosque under construction in Ulus

Midpoint Reflections

Much of the best of what has happened to me this summer has come as a surprise discovery, and I have had literally no idea how to interpret most of what I have seen. So many situations have been humorous, simply due to the fact that they were completely different from my expectations. Often I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing. But that's just life in general.