Last weekend, my lovely friend Thea was visiting from Morocco, where she is currently studying abroad. Due to the inexplicable difficulty of communicating without wifi in Turkey, we, unfortunately, were not able to meet up with her and her two friends until Saturday afternoon. Instead, some friends and I met up with Mira on Friday and went to Kadiköy, on the Asian side of Istanbul. Kadiköy has a very different feel from European Istanbul and I loved it! I have heard some people refer to it as the Brooklyn of Istanbul and I would definitely agree. It's very hipster and artsy with street after street of little restaurants, coffee shops, ice cream shops and clothing stores. We made our way down to the Sea of Marmara and strolled along the water before heading back to Europe, grabbing dinner and making our way back to campus.
On Saturday, I got up, ran (because somehow Kathryn coerced a few of us into signing up for the Istanbul 10k with her in April.. WHY..) and then just lazed around on campus until I went into the city to meet Mira and FINALLY find Thea and her two friends. We had a nice dinner in Karaköy, right by the Bosphorus and then went to Mado where I got a scrumptious dessert. We then made our way BACK to Asia to meet up with some of Mira's friends. Thea and I then took a dolmus back to Europe and found my friends and stayed with them for the rest of the night. We then, sadly, had to say farewell because Thea was leaving the next morning to go back to Morocco. It was so so good to see her, though. She hopefully will be able to travel some in France with Mira and I after the semester is over, which would be FANTASTIC! I'm also trying to figure out a way to go see her in Morocco so hopefully that works out too.
Sunday was spent mostly trying to figure out my debit card, which suddenly started refusing to get money out at ATM's (which is crucial because that is how I've been paying for everything.) Luckily my friends lent me lira and my Mom was able to figure it out and is bringing me a new card when SHE COMES TODAY! Anyways, the rest of the week was kind of dull. Everyone has a lot of midterms and, although the two that I still have got moved until after spring break (which still sort of sucks) I had two quizzes on Wednesday. One of them was Turkish, which is HARD! We have finally started learning how to make sentences and I would like all of you to be the first to know that I can officially say things like:
"Bunlar üzüm mı? Hayır, bunlar üzüm değil. Bunlar elma." (Are these grapes? No, this apple)
"Bahçede çiçekler ve ağaçlar var." (In the garden, there are flowers and trees)
"Çilek kırmızı bir meyve." (The strawberry is a red fruit)
Super advanced, right? And, actually, because word order is very different in Turkish, if you directly translate the sentences, they would be something like this:
"These are grapes, hmm? No, these grapes not. These apple."
"Garden flowers and trees there are."
"Strawberry red is fruit."
Anyways, I won't bore you any further with Turkish, but it's very interesting and although it's difficult for me to learn, I feel like maybe, potentially, I am slowly getting a basic grasp of it. Next week we finally get to learn verbs, WOO! On Thursday, our Italian friends invited us to dinner (thus the spaghetti and french fries). Mary and I decided that we were determined to make an apple pie and contribute it to the dinner, so, not having any ingredients, we went to the grocery store and scrambled around trying to find the things we needed. Leaving with everything except shortening, caramel and brown sugar (and with a square casserole dish that we were going to have to substitute for an actual pie pan) we got to work and actually SUCCESSFULLY made a nice square apple pie (props to Mary for making a spectacular pie crust minus any shortening)! We were very proud of ourselves for making it work in Turkey.
"Bunlar üzüm mı? Hayır, bunlar üzüm değil. Bunlar elma." (Are these grapes? No, this apple)
"Bahçede çiçekler ve ağaçlar var." (In the garden, there are flowers and trees)
"Çilek kırmızı bir meyve." (The strawberry is a red fruit)
Super advanced, right? And, actually, because word order is very different in Turkish, if you directly translate the sentences, they would be something like this:
"These are grapes, hmm? No, these grapes not. These apple."
"Garden flowers and trees there are."
"Strawberry red is fruit."
Anyways, I won't bore you any further with Turkish, but it's very interesting and although it's difficult for me to learn, I feel like maybe, potentially, I am slowly getting a basic grasp of it. Next week we finally get to learn verbs, WOO! On Thursday, our Italian friends invited us to dinner (thus the spaghetti and french fries). Mary and I decided that we were determined to make an apple pie and contribute it to the dinner, so, not having any ingredients, we went to the grocery store and scrambled around trying to find the things we needed. Leaving with everything except shortening, caramel and brown sugar (and with a square casserole dish that we were going to have to substitute for an actual pie pan) we got to work and actually SUCCESSFULLY made a nice square apple pie (props to Mary for making a spectacular pie crust minus any shortening)! We were very proud of ourselves for making it work in Turkey.
Today, my family comes and I AM SO EXCITED! I am meeting them at the airport at 4:30 and then staying in their hotel with them (except I have to come back to campus for class on Monday which is upsetting) and then from there my life is going to get crazy because we are going to Cappadocia on Tuesday, the coast on Thursday and then on Saturday they leave and I go meet my friends in Croatia for spring break! None of this seems like real life! Who just jets off to Croatia for spring break? Anyways, I'm just happy that the weather is finally beginning to be Spring-like here. Off to pack!
xoxo