Hope you’ll check it out!

Brittany

I woke up this morning to the news that we have finally decided it’s time for things to change. Although I’ve supported Obama from the beginning, I had no idea that I would have such a physical reaction when it actually happened.  Watching his acceptance speech this morning, I literally started spilling over in sobs of relief and excitement…positive energy has returned to the White House and, in turn, to much of the world.  Of course part of me wishes that I could be in the United States celebrating with all the people that made this happen, but I must say that the perspective from this side of the ocean is no less hopeful and engaged.  I had to make a terribly long journey across the Bulgarian border yesterday (long story, I’ll follow up on that later) and was amazed by the number of people who, upon discovering that I was American, would stretch their very basic English as far as they possibly could to ask me about the election and then to express their support of Obama.  My bus driver bubbled on for 10 minutes in an unintelligible mixture of Turkish and English about Obama, eventually repeating over and over “good man, good man…enshallah”.  “Enshallah” meaning “God willing.”  The nice woman on the bus in front of me leaned over her seat, cutting off a piece of the sweet and delicious “helva” that she was enjoying and offering it to me.  She said “Obama, up” while showing me on her fingers how much of a lead he had over McCain and flashing a huge smile of happiness and excitement.  Another bus driver, seeing me aimlessly wandering around the no-man’s-land between Turkey and Bulgaria, pulled over his bus and offered me a ride back to Istanbul, on the condition that I sit in the front seat and talk to him as best I could about the election.  These are just a few of the many examples of the positive outpouring of support that I’m seeing here, both for Obama and the American people as a whole.  I’ve been lucky enough to travel quite a bit over the last few years and I can honestly say that yesterday was the first time that I confidently and comfortably handed over my blue-bound passport without hesitation or fear of judgment.  I honestly wonder sometimes, particularly in a country such as Turkey which shares a border with Iraq, if this election doesn’t mean just as much or, very possibly, more to people overseas than it does to many Americans.  I’m looking forward to getting out into the city today and seeing how things feel, I can imagine there’s a lightness in the air in the States today.

I miss and love you all!  My apologies for the infrequency of my posting…I’ll try my best to do better

Here’s to the future, enshallah…

Brittany

That said, it was good to see that the pasta sauce I made was a success!  It’s always nice to know people enjoy the food you make…

Unfortunately, in my panic of trying to make sure that everyone was having a good time, I didn’t manage to get any photos during the evening.  My apologies, I know I promised.  Anyway, I’ll give you a quick run-down of a few of the people who stopped through during the evening:

First to arrive were my neighbors: Timothee, a 27 year old French teacher, skinny as a beanpole, heavily moustached, and speaking with an accent that sounds as if he’s holding five or six large marbles in his cheeks.  He arrived here two years ago on foot after having spent five months walking from Paris to Istanbul.  Ben, a Canadian who recently finished his Master’s in Ottoman history.  And Josh, a fellow countryman from Michigan who’s been here for two years teaching English at a university here in Istanbul.

Next was Nicki, a 30-something Irish singer who evidently shot to stardom under the pseudonym “Sharia” while teaching in Thailand last year.  She left the fame and fortune behind two months ago to come be with her Turkish boyfriend who sells carpets here in Istanbul.  They’ve since parted ways and I’ve been going with her on excursions various music venues in town to see if she can jump-start her career here in Turkey.

Then came Craig, William and Christopher.  Craig is a 35 year old former bookshop manager from Aberdeen, Scotland, William is a graphic designer from the Bronx, and Christopher is a UVA grad from New Orleans who got tired of working in the political machine in DC and has lived abroad for the past three years.  William and Christopher recently moved here from Morocco, where the said they got tired of haggling for every banana, beer, or loaf of bread they tried to buy and decided to try again in Istanbul…hopefully things will go better this time around.

Maggie, a lawyer from Minnesota, Elizabeth, a teacher from Michigan came next with Denwood, a Princeton grad from Bangkok who just finished his PhD thesis on mosques built during the Ottoman Empire during the reign of…one of the old sultans?.  And finally there was Ercan, the 50 year old scuba diver that I met a few weeks ago that’s trying to recruit my friends and I to join him in putting together a camp for disabled Turks to learn to sing, paint, and sculpt and then perform or show their work at some of the bars here in the city.  I have good intentions to help him out, we’ll see how far it actually goes.

There were a few other people in and out throughout the night, but this was the main crew.  Other than that there’s not much to tell.  I’ve been busy this week teaching, I recently picked up some new classes at a hotel in Istanbul so I’m doing a bit more traveling than I had to do in the past.  No complaints though, it’s a beautiful hotel and the cooks I’m teaching always manage to find a way to finagle us some delicious food at the end of the lessons.

I’ll post again soon!  Hope you’re all doing well on the other side of the pond.

Love,

Brittany

I just wanted to get a quick post up to let you all know that I haven’t forgotten about you, life has just gotten ridiculously busy in the past couple weeks.  I’ve started working a full-time schedule at school, which means I’m doing less lazing around my apartment and more actual planning and teaching.  I’m actually grateful to be working a bit more…I was starting to get a little bored with nothing to do.

I’ve also gotten to see a few films that are part of a small film festival here in Istanbul, ‘filmekimi’, which has been a lot of fun.  I saw the midnight showing of Vicky Christina Barcelona on Friday evening, which was outstanding…I’ll write more about this in the future.

I’m also putting together a party tomorrow evening at my apartment, so I’ve been frantically cleaning and cooking to get ready.  It should be a good time, I promise I’ll take some photos and get a serious post up sometime on Wednesday.

That’s all I have time for now!  I’m teaching an Intermediate class this evening and lesson-planning beckons…I’ll write soon!

Love,

Brittany

(ehrm…maybe you’ll get that after you read on a bit.)

After holing myself up in my apartment for the past couple days, feeling a bit under the weather and afraid to venture out into the rain and “freezing” conditions, I finally dragged myself out of bed this morning and made my way out into the world. It turns out the the “freezing” conditions I’ve been complaining about may just have been my skewed feverish perception of 60ish degree weather…I’m a little embarrassed.

Anyway, the sun is shining today and everyone is out in the streets celebrating the end of their annual 30 days of fasting (Ramazan) with the four-day “Seker Bayram” (Sugar fest!) Everywhere you look there are little dishes of chocolate and candy being scarfed up by ravenous passers-by and the city’s thousands of delicious sweet shops are full of sugar-deprived patrons waiting patiently for their puddings and baklava. I also keep hearing fireworks and sparklers being set off in the streets around my apartment…yeah…I’m waiting for the whole place to go up in flames. The Turks really love their fireworks.

Anway, I wandered down Istiklal Caddesi today and took some photos of all the delicious food and happy people…

Traditional Turkish dishes being prepared in one of the windows along the street

A few teenage boys riding the tramvaj down the busy street…they may have been aware of my camera and me

Cakes and puddings in the window of one sweet shop…

And tray upon tray of freshly prepared baklava and other traditional “syrup” desserts…

…and little Turkish ice cream for locals and tourists alike.

Finally, I took a video of one of the (many) bands that set up shop along the side of the street…this city is really a smorgasbord of different types of music. I’ve never posted a video before, but I think if you click on the picture it should start playing…

I think that’s all for today. I may take the train along the coast tomorrow and visit some of the smaller villages along the Golden Horn. Obviously I’ll post some new photos if I do.

xoxo,

Brittany

Anyway, not all my news is bad news, I’ve also had some exciting things happen in the past couple weeks.  I started taking a Master’s Course in ‘Ottoman Art and Architecture’ at Bogazici University. The campus is absolutely stunning, nestled on top of a forested hill overlooking the Bosphorus Strait that runs through Istanbul.  The University was the first American school established here around 1860, so all the buildings on the main part of campus remind me of the gorgeous buildings on many American campuses (maybe even a bit more beautiful.)  I don’t have my own pictures, but I’ve stolen a few from their website to give you an idea…I’ll follow up with a few more of my own next week.

View of the University on the hill

Students relaxing on the main quad…my class is in the building in the center of the photo.

The class itself is also great, only 8 students, mostly Turkish plus a French girl and myself.  It will certainly give me something to look forward to every week.

Otherwise I have nothing new to report.  I have the next four days off work for Byram, the festival at the end of the fasting month of Ramazan.  I’m going to use the time to do some reading, catch up on some laundry, etc., and hopefully find a few blankets and things to winterize my apartment.  I’m going to a film festival next week…new Woody Allen, Dardenne brothers, Mike Leigh films are showing, but I’ll talk more about that later.

Miss you all, I’ll write again soon.

-Brittany

This is the view from where I’m sitting now, including my delicious bowl of soup, half finished cup of coffee, and the basil plant in its make-shift teapot planter that I bought yesterday. I’ll post some photos of the rest of my place when I’ve cleaned it up a bit…

At the risk of seeming voyeuristic, I also took some photos of the building across from mine last evening just as the mosques were making their “iftar” call to prayer. That is, the call that lets people know the sun has gone down and they can break their fasting for the day. I could see families all up and down the street diving ravenously into the evening meals.

That’s all for now, I’m going to head to bed. I’ll write again soon.

Brittany

I left the conversation wishing that we could get some political leaders (ehrm) sitting and chatting in the way the three of us just had. It helped me to realize that many of these issues aren’t about facts that can be systematically judged “right” or “wrong” according to some overarching standard of what’s true and fair in this world, but instead that people are “coming to the table”, so to speak, from hundreds, thousands, even millions of different perspectives. These varying histories and perspectives make it simply impossible to pass valid judgments based on one ethnocentric viewpoint. We’re all bringing our own deck of cards to the table and trying to play games with rules that only work for one deck. We need to stop seeing this world according this single set of rules and look at the bigger perspective. I’m crossing my fingers that my meeting this evening is a sign of the times, that even if our leaders can’t sit and listen to one another, at least our people can. And these small changes and glimmers of mutual understanding between the teachers, writers, and students of the world might slowly work their way up to the top.

I know that was heavy, but I couldn’t help myself. Some of the things I’m noticing here are bigger than pictures. That said, maybe I’ll post one for the road

A boat in front of the bridge connecting the European and Asian side of the city…I’m heading over to Asia tonight to meet a few friends from the course, I’ll take a few more on my way home.

Signing off for now, I’ll spell-check in the morning…

Brittany

I handed him a coin and moved down the street, stopping to buy a week’s supply of tomatoes, arugula, dill, spinach, zucchini, carrots, onions and even a plastic bag full of red beets and assorted pickled vegetables. Eventually the bags on my arms became so heavy that I knew if I added one more I might not be able to make it up the five flights of stairs to my apartment, so I threw in the towel. I walked the 30 seconds home, my arms heavy with about 10 kilos of produce (I’m hoping I can recruit some dinner guests this week) and my wallet only about 10YTL lighter…I’m really beginning to love this country. The really amazing thing about all this is that NONE of the produce is imported, it is all grown here in Turkey. In fact, they’re an almost completely self-sustaining country in terms of their food production, which helps to explain why food here is so inexpensive.

I went back for some photos

This is the beginning of the bazaar…

I was surprised, rather than shy away from the camera, a few people asked to have their photo taken…

And a few for the road…

In other news, I finished my first week of teaching! So far, so good…I’ll write more later.

love

Brittany

I’m sure many of you remember Mitch Hedberg, the long-haired comedian that struggled with “koala infestations” and reminded us that “a severed foot is the ultimate stocking stuffer.” If so, I’m sure you’re also aware that he passed away from a drug overdose three years ago, leaving us die hard fans depressed and wishing for more.

It turns out that he had recorded another album before taking the high road in March 2005, “Do you believe in Gosh” will be released on September 9. This article talks a little bit about the new album and includes an interview with his widow…it’s worth reading if you were a Mitch fan.

A few quotes in memory of Mr. Hedberg

• An escalator can never break: it can only become stairs. You should never see an Escalator Temporarily Out Of Order sign, just Escalator Temporarily Stairs. Sorry for the convenience.

• Dogs are forever in the push up postion.

• Every time I go and shave, I assume there’s someone else on the planet shaving. So I say, ‘I’m gonna go shave, too.’

• I had a stick of CareFree gum, but it didn’t work. I felt pretty good while I was blowing that bubble, but as soon as the gum lost its flavor, I was back to pondering my mortality.

• I saw a human pyramid once. It was very unnecessary. It did not need to exist.

• My friend asked me if I wanted a frozen banana. I said ‘No, but I want a regular banana later, so… yeah.’

…I could go on, but I’ll stop there. I realize this has very little to do with my Turkish experiences, but it was worth a post.

Brittany