Kolay gelsin, Türkiye.

Three days ago, Skylar and I spent the evening with Gülşah and Alp in Kadıköy. When we finally said goodbye at the docks, Gülşah hugged us both tightly, then looked at us and so genuinely said, "You are my friends." That was my first wave of emotion about leaving Turkey.

That night, we took our last ferry ride of the trip.

Yesterday, we had our last lunch with Harun and Mehmet. Harun looked honestly sad when we left. We tried to catch them (and our fruit guys) this morning, but even they aren't awake and working on Sunday mornings. So that was goodbye to the Ortaköy Mantı Evi. 

Last night, we started saying goodbye to those who were leaving in the middle of the night. Some, I'll see in Chicago within the next two weeks; some when I visit over Fourth of July weekend; and some in the fall. Waking up to an empty room with all my belongings neatly packed felt strange, but it still hadn't quite hit me that I was leaving. I got my last zeytinli açma with Skylar, my last börek, and my last cup of vending machine çay, sitting and chatting with Megan until it was time to call a cab.

Saying goodbye to Megan hit me simultaneously in the gut and the sinuses. That was my second real wave of emotion about leaving Turkey--and, more importantly, the people I will forever associate with Istanbul.

After several sleepy hours at the airport, I finally find myself sitting on a plane, waiting to take off for New York. I'm surrounded by American accents for the first time in months, and it's now sinking in that I'm leaving this pocket of the world that has graciously offered me a home for almost ten weeks.

I'm feeling everything, all at once: a deep, longing sadness that I'm leaving, bursts of excitement and joy at the thought of being back in Chicago in just a couple of days, and a warm sense of pride knowing just how much I've accomplished and just how far I've come since I first got off at Atatürk airport, groggy and feverish. 

If I regret anything from this trip, it's that I didn't write as often as I had wanted or intended to. I want to blame the incompetence of Turkish Internet for that, but honestly, I fell into bed most nights just ready to pass out. And that's not something I can really even regret.

As Skylar said, we did Turkey right. Really, really right.

And now, we're about to take off. One last time, Turkey, thank you and goodbye. Inşallah, Görüşürüz. 

Hot Air Balloon

5:40 am, and still sitting in the waiting area at Ürgüp Balloons. The guy at Shoestring who checked us in on Thursday night--the guy who generally gives me the creeps--walked into the dorm area at 4:15 am and started waking up those of us who were doing the balloon ride, telling us to hurry up and get dressed.

First of all, there had to be some kind of miscommunication, because we were told we had to be ready to go by 5 am latest. I'm way too sour in the mornings if I'm rudely awoken and rushed to get ready. Especially by a stranger.

Secondly, it was raining when we left, and it's still at least misting now. The sky is more or less a blanket of gray that has gradually gotten brighter since we got here, to the point where I'm pretty sure the sun is good and up now. Even if we get into the air at this point, I'm not sure if we'll be able to see anything.

12 minutes until they call it, I think.

---

They called it. Going back to bed. Sigh. 

On Customs & Airports

I keep a vague mental catalogue of customs officers in different countries. Post-9/11, I haven't found any as surly as US ones--though Turkish ones appear to come in a close second. At least they don't eye you with suspicion the way American ones do. And I don't understand why the deadpan demeanor is necessary. Wouldn't it be easier to do your job if you did so with a smile on your face? Or at the very least, if you returned the smiles or even just reacted to "have a nice day" wishes from passengers? I will never understand this.

In other news, I'm on a plane waiting to take off for Vienna. The flight attendant when I got on started directing me to my seat in German--until he saw I looked confused, more so than my usual here, and he laughed, switched to English, and apologized. There's also what appears to be a decently sized group of students on this flight, all speaking German. This is the most diverse flight I've taken on this trip--and it's still Turkish Airlines, just like the rest of them. There's just something I love about hearing Turkish, English (in at least three accents), and German being spoken all around me.

On that note, it is definitely time for a nap.

So behind

This is a backdated post, but I've been so bad with writing things down that at this point, I'm just trying to keep track of what I did when. So here's a list of two weeks' worth of activities, with relevant photos either in photo dumps or to be added here.

***

First Friday:
Sulemaniye trip, getting lost between the Grand Bazaar and the Spice Bazaar, finally finding both the Spice Bazaar and the warm deliciousness that is Develi Baklava & their katmer

Saturday:
Making brunch in Republika, Taksim, Zencefil, trying raki for the first time, Efe's Turkish beer, getting denied by taxis after the dolmush ride back to Beşiktaş

Sunday:
I stayed in and did apps.

Monday:
Beyoğlu, a thrift store (By Retro), and Turkish kahvalti with Skylar and Jonny at Van Kahvaltı Evi

And then it rained the other days. =|

except Wednesday:
Grand Bazaar with Megan, pide, Altan Şekerleme (best lokum, amazing hard candies), Develi Baklava again, Osman's textile shop, Aziz's shop of odds and ends from Central Asia & Turkey, view from atop the Valide Han

Friday:
Edirne! Which was pretty, but tiring. Plus, I was cranky and lacked caffeine.

Saturday: Moda and Ali Usta for ice cream, stumbling upon Cherrybean Coffee, then dinner at Tandoori

Sunday: Mevlevi Hanesi in Galata, then the Black Sea restaurant for dinner and Shake Shack?! which was delicious, as well as Gwen the New Yorker's first taste of Shake Shack ever

Monday: Skylar's tattoo at Golden Arrow in Moda/Kadıköy, casually falling a little bit in love with the tattoo artist, Gülşah

Tuesday: back to Renkli Limon for lunch, then more studying

Wednesday: Turkish and studying; nothing exciting
Went back to see Harun for dinner, and we could actually say a few more words to him hooraaay! He got us to drink two cups of çay before we excused ourselves to go study.

Thursday: left in the afternoon after our final for Konya; 10 hours on a bus later, we did in fact make it to Adnan Bey Hotel in Konya.

My thoughts and feelings, organized.

I know this is supposed to be a travel blog, but even on the other side of the world, this is what's been consuming my thoughts all day (besides conjugating predicates in Turkish). Normally, I wouldn't put this kind of writing anywhere that other eyes could see it. But I feel incredibly strongly about this, and as I've only been watching the events of the past couple days unfold on the internet, this is the best way I know to respond.

So here are my somewhat coherent thoughts and feelings on the announcement to close all nine houses in Breckinridge, Broadview, Maclean, Blackstone, and New Grad after the 2015-16 academic year.

******

UChicago, I understand why you made this decision. I understand that with the opening of North, it would be economically irresponsible to keep all of the previously existing dorms open as well. I understand that this is the kind of decision that has been made before and will be made again for the purpose of making the University more appealing to a larger applicant pool (and their parents). In five years, every student who lived in these nine houses will have graduated. The eight new houses will have developed some semblance of new culture in North, keeping some of the existing traditions and adding others to craft a new identity, as houses do. In order to make that happen, someone--a group of someones--inevitably has to deal with the painful transition period. I get that.

What I don’t get is your inability to admit that this decision will have lasting, detrimental side effects for anyone who lives in housing for at least the next two years. I don’t understand why you either can’t see or won’t admit the fact that you are demolishing places and communities that people love dearly, in which people grew, bonded, laughed, cried, screamed, and made a place for themselves for four years. Yes, homes are defined by people, feelings, and experiences more than the actual buildings, but when the buildings facilitated so much of how these communities developed, and when you are ready to strip these houses of their identities down to their very names, you are, in fact, destroying homes. And when you decide that’s something to celebrate, without any form of apology or even a recognition of major loss? Without even a hint of genuine commitment to honoring their place in individuals' lives and in UChicago history? You are 100% in the wrong.

Most of us won’t be directly affected by this. Most of us won’t have to see the places and communities we love destroyed. Even many of those who would lose these homes will graduate before the change actually happens. But the College community as a whole will feel this massive blow to an aspect of our school that we’re supposed to take pride in, that’s supposed to make us unique, and that has defined so many people’s UChicago experiences.

Yes, I recognize that the housing system is not for everyone. And yes, there are certainly bigger issues on the UChicago campus that need to be addressed, even just within housing. But this is yet another instance in a long list of scenarios in which the UChicago administration flat-out refuses to admit that its policies, its decisions, and its actions have negative consequences on the campus community.

I come from Crown, a South house with over 100 residents in any given year. My house was created by the merging of two former Shoreland houses when a similar move was made to what was then a brand-new dorm. Even by my first year, most people in Crown would never hear of Dudley or Bradbury, and most after us would never even realize that the Shoreland was once a dorm.

I will not see the Crown I know affected by these kinds of administrative decisions. Crown, housed in a shiny, modern dorm and named after a still-living and recent donor, will be safe for many years to come, both in location and in name. We've had incredible RHs, RAs who are some of the most inspiring people I've ever met, and a warm and welcoming community with its own strange culture and traditions. And I have loved my house more and more for different reasons every year; it has been my home and my sanity at UChicago.

But my experience is not for everyone. My huge house would be overwhelming to some, not quite out there enough for others, not close enough to public transit or other parts of Hyde Park for still others. It’s not old in any way, it’s not what you think of when you think "classic" UChicago, and to be honest, it’s still not quite sure what it is after only six years of existence. The ability to choose the type of community you wish to live in--with an actual variety of options in environment both within and without--is an enormous part of what has made UChicago housing as incredible as it is for such a wide range of people. Removing those options simply cannot leave housing as a whole unaffected.

I won’t see my home destroyed, physically or through the stripping of identity. But as someone who understands and deeply values what the housing system can do for a person, my heart breaks at this news, and rages at the attitude this university has toward its own community. I stand with the satellite dorms. I stand and I mourn with the nine houses that now have an official expiration date.

Long live Breck, Maclean, Blackstone, Broadview, and New Grad. Long live Talbot, Palmer, Wick, Tufts, Henderson, and Midway. Long live Pierce. Long live their traditions, their love, and the homes they gave to hundreds of students over many decades.

A side note on the deepest homesickness I know:

There are many adventures and many wonderful things that I have waiting in drafted posts, but today, I need to write about something more pressing.

They don't tell you what you're going to miss when you go abroad. It's impossible to know, really, what you'll miss the most, until you're actually gone.

They don't tell you that the homesickness hits hardest at 6 in the morning, when you're awake for interviews, the sun is just barely rising, and seeing the face of one of your best friends on Skype makes the tears pour forth.

They don't tell you how removed you'll feel from some of your favorite campus events, and yet how strongly you'll feel the aftershock of an announcement from Housing that, technically, doesn't even directly affect you.

One of the reasons I wanted to study abroad was to get away from the high-pressured and often detrimental climate of campus. Just for a quarter, I wanted to be able to escape from all that, while still learning more than I ever could've dreamed in a new city, a new country, a new culture. I've been getting a lot of what I wanted in that respect, but right now, there's nothing I miss more than the deeply impassioned students of UChicago. It feels wrong to be abroad when there are so many issues that so many people I love are dealing with. It feels wrong to Skype into RA interviews when I care so much about them and want this position so badly. And yeah, part of me even feels wrong for having such a strong reaction to all of this because it's not my battle or my loss--but isn't that one of the most important things about a community? Aren't we supposed to fight for one another?

I want to do something to help, but I can barely offer an ear from the other side of the world, let alone anything more.

I miss community more than anything today--today, when nine communities have effectively been put on death row. I miss the comfort of my friends-turned-family, I miss the warmth of sitting on my couch watching Chopped with someone I love curled up next to me, and I desperately miss the real-life, touchable faces of the people who have mattered most to me for the past three years.

Today, more than anything, I just want to go home.

Today I learned:

You do, in fact, get offered tea at tattoo parlors.

And if you're there for a while, you get offered tea or coffee multiple times.

I also learned just how incredible this tattoo artist in Istanbul is, as Skylar got a beautiful piece done.

And the endless hospitality and kindness of Istanbullus continues to show itself every single day, warming my heart and drawing me more and more into this city and this culture.

Photo dump!

Okay, after many internet struggles and finally just using the Teras Cafe wifi to get my photos on Flickr, here we goooo~

The Ortaköy mosque as seen from the Bosphorous Tour that Patrick, Skylar, and I spontaneously took the first Saturday in Istanbul. It was chilly and we were still horribly jet-lagged, but this was a beautiful introduction to the city.

 

Dried fruit & nut shop on the main road in Ortaköy. The street (and the city, really) is full of them, but this is one of the fancier ones in Ortaköy. We stopped here on our walking tour with Megan the first Sunday after landing. Honestly, I haven't been back since that first visit, because there's a similar shop literally next door to it that sells the same things, but cheaper. Admittedly though, I love the colors and the display of this shop more than any other like it that I've seen.

There's a park on Barbaros between Yıldız and the main area of Beşiktaş that includes a large ring of full-sized exercise equipment--but the most bizarre exercise equipment I have ever seen, most of it made for pairs of people. Apparently, people actually use these things, and they're in parks all over Istanbul. Needless to say, we were all simultaneously confused and endlessly entertained.

Renkli Limon in Beşiktaş, which is still one of the best restaurants I've eaten in so far--and also the beacon of hope for being able to find vegetarian food in Istanbul. (Hooray for people on the trip not starving!)

Istanbul is truly a city of cats. Thankfully, no sneezing on my part yet.

View from the ferry between Beşiktaş and Kadıköy--i.e., the cross-continental ferry ride that you pay for the same way you pay for any public transit. I still can't wrap my mind around the fact that this is the normal daily commute for thousands of people.

Skylar's first time in Asia! It needed to be documented.

Calligraphic inscription on the Sülemaniye mosque, which we visited as a class. This is just one of the many, many places I read about in my religious classes as a kid--places that I'm starting to see in real life on this trip. It's surreal to an extent that I can't quite put into words.

For all its cats, Istanbul is also a city of stray dogs. This one was lounging in the cemetery outside the Sülemaniye.

I think Vincent made a friend that day.

After several hours of searching and desperately waiting, Gwen the die-hard coffee addict finally found a cup of Nescafe to ease her caffeine headache. Take note, because this is the face of true happiness. Also, on a related note, Turkish coffee is not as big of a thing as I thought it was. The tea is what everyone is addicted to; the coffee seems like a waste when half of the tiny cup is just grounds anyway. It's better to just grab Nescafe from a machine or street vendor for a caffeine fix.

Arch inside the Şehzade mosque, which--unpopular opinion--I liked way, way better than the Sulemaniye. It felt simultaneously quieter yet bolder than the Sülemaniye, despite being in the exact same style. Things I've learned in Turkey: Sinan built like ten of the same mosque, but you can in fact call some more beautiful than others.

The aqueducts of Sultanahmet, perfectly weaving past and present as so much of this city does.

Yes I will end up with lots of photos of Skylar; it's fine. This is what he looks like about 50% of the time we're wandering the city.

A stall at the Spice Market/the Egypt Market--pretty to look at, but anybody who knows anything about spices knows that this is a rapid route to staleness. I wouldn't actually buy spices from the Spice Market.

Çay, which as far as I can tell runs through Turkish veins instead of blood. I've taken to drinking at least 3 of these a day.

Dweeby photo #1 of Skylar holding things proudly. This time it's a pair of paper napkin roses from the charming owner of Develi Baklava in Eminönü--the man responsible for making the most incredible pastry filled with pistachios and kaymak, or water buffalo clotted cream.

There will be more photos--so many, many more--but this is what I've managed to edit and upload until now. Yay for finally updating after almost two weeks! (Oops.)

March into April: Classes, a blackout, an unexpectedly lovely dinner, still tongue-tied, and Asia

It's so, so hard for me to believe that I haven't even been here for one full week. I figure it's a good thing that each day feels so long and full of interesting things, since that probably means I'm using the days well. And yes, there's been an inordinate amount of reading assigned already, but I honestly feel no inclination to finish all of it, so I'm not terribly bothered. I would rather explore and get at least decent sleep.

Speaking of exploring: on Monday after class and a quick campus tour of Yıldız, Megan walked us down to Beşiktaş, which has this packed market of winding streets and countless little stalls and shops, rows and rows of buses and shared taxis, and public ferries to cross to the Asian side of the city. (This city spans two continents. Just...what.) We split up and wandered the market for a while before making the 45-minute trek back from Beşiktaş to Ortaköy. (Megan claimed it was about 25 minutes. Lies. All lies.)

Yesterday included our first Turkish classes--as well as a country-wide blackout, which is one of the most bizarre things I've experienced in my life. The Republika and the campus both have generators, so it wasn't noticeable for us for the most part. But then we stepped out onto the main roads, and nearly every single store or restaurant was dark, their owners perched on stools or chairs outside, seemingly killing time until someone figured out the cause of the blackout and fixed it.
The power came back at some point in the evening, so that by the time we stepped out for dinner, the main road in Ortaköy was buzzing again. Skylar, Naila, and I made our way down to the same place Skylar and I had been to a few days prior, where we bumbled our way through ordering gözleme with the help of two other American students who happened to be eating there at the time as well. This time, we came armed with more Turkish phrases--enough to learn the incredibly friendly waiter's name was Harun, and to introduce ourselves. (Admittedly very, very poorly, but hell, we tried.)

Right as we're waiting to order, the power blows again. We sit for a few minutes in the dark upstairs seating area before deciding we should probably just leave--and then one of the other waiters sees us leaving, and tries to get us to sit back down: "Food? Sure, yes!"
He proceeds to hoist a table and four chairs outside for us, where the sun had almost set, but we could easily see. We then see Harun jogging back to the restaurant, two packs of candles in hand. In a minute, he's back outside with a lit candle for our table.

I died more than a little bit. We all did. This man is by far one of the sweetest people I have ever encountered, and I am so, so glad that Skylar and I walked into that restaurant when we did.

Today on the way home, we passed Harun again, and he greeted us both with a massive smile and a kiss on each cheek. Pretty sure that means we're friends now.

On that note, Skylar and I ventured to Kadıköy right after class today, where we killed another few hours wandering another open-air market--though the whole neighborhood seemed much newer than Ortaköy in general. We got a late lunch at this fantastic, super vegetarian-friendly restaurant called Çiya. According to Megan, the owner has his own farm to grow the specific vegetables he needs for the endangered Anatolian dishes he serves. One of the younger waiters spoke excellent English, and he put together a full plate of vegetarian dishes for us to try. (Truly, there is no shortage of pleasant, helpful people in Istanbul.) Everything was delicious, from the self-serve meze bar, to the Nowrüz drink (with mint and dill and spinach and lemon and sugar? I think), to the sugar-and-vanilla-soaked eggplant dessert served with clotted cream. Definitely a spot to remember.

One thing I noticed about Kadıköy: tons more tourists than in the area around the Republika, or in Beşiktaş. More tourists also means more English-speaking locals, which made our way a little easier. Something tells me other areas of Istanbul are similar in that respect. I can now politely greet people, say please and thank you, and order things using numbers--but I still can't understand a word anybody else says. Everyone speaks so damn fast, and my brain is nowhere near capable of processing Turkish at that speed--not even the most basic of words. Still, I try, and hopefully look a little less foolish every day.

The rest of Kadıköy is best explained with photos, which I swear I will actually upload after I finish today's reading.

Azaan

For me, one of the most appealing aspects of coming to Istanbul was the idea of being absolutely surrounded by mosques. Ancient, beautiful, historic, and even modern mosques seem to pepper the entire landscape. And with these mosques comes the regular call to prayer--the azaan.

There's something about the azaan that makes me want to stop in my tracks, close my eyes, kneel on the ground, and just listen. In my entire life, I have yet to hear a muezzin with anything less than a perfect voice, ringing clear and beautiful through the streets. And while this has never been a part of my own religious culture, there's something in it that draws me in. Makes me want to be a better Muslim. Calls for me to do some soul-searching, to connect myself to Islam's roots. I don't know where this comes from, but I can definitely say that this is the feeling that brought me here in the first place.

24+ Hours In

Yesterday was long, to say the least.

Over 9 hours on the plane, 2 hours at the airport, another 2 in the cab (for what should've been a 15-minute ride, according to the taxi driver), and too many spent restless in bed after finally unpacking. Between jet lag and what I've chalked up to a lingering stomach flu, I have been a grumpy traveler since before I even left my house.

But I've already begun to adjust. Armed with Pepto and surrounded by delicious Turkish coffee and tea (and food that my stomach hopefully starts to accept!), I'm finally beginning to actually feel the excitement of the quarter ahead.

After orientation activities for today ended, a few of us walked down to the Bosphorous and took a tour boat on a whim. It was gorgeous and absolutely the right decision, especially after the sheer disorientation I was experiencing up to that point. I didn't expect the language barrier to present such a huge problem. It's not just that I can't understand any of the words, music, or signs around me; it's to the point that I feel like I'm being downright rude because I don't know Turkish customs of politeness. I don't know how to kindly turn down someone who approaches me asking me to buy their goods. I don't know how to say "excuse me" (afedersiniz) or "please" (lütfen). I can barely order food.

This is the first time I've been anywhere in the world in which I have literally zero understanding of the language. I don't know how quickly I'll be able to learn enough to get by, but it's my new goal to try to do so as soon as possible. I came to Istanbul to explore a culture with countless connections to my own, and I know that without Turkish in my pocket, I will deeply struggle to gain the understanding I am looking for.

I have my work cut out for me, but I also have more than my share of adventures ahead of me. Strangely enough, I'm looking forward to classes and getting to talk to someone who can hopefully help unveil some of the magic I know this city has.

For now, though, I have jet leg to get over.