A really, really long post

I guess my last blog entry was a hit. As my dad aptly put it, “6 or 7 people responded to your last entry, and I wasn’t even one of them! Neither was your mom.” Wow.

Of course, my newfound success has the drawback that I feel like I should actually update my blog on a fairly regular basis. It’s easy to procrastinate when you think you are writing to yourself, but now that I know that there are actually people out there who read this… I feel obliged to write more often, actually run a spell-check, and perhaps give a proofread. Fame, man… it’s a fickle beast.

So… İstanbul.

(Pedantic note: In Turkish there are two versions of the letter “i". The first is dotted-i: i or İ, and the second is undotted: ı or I. Dotted-i is pronounced as in English, but undotted-I is pronounced like “uh”. According to Wikipedia, it represents the close back unrounded vowel. Imagine you’ve been punched in the gut, and that’s kind of what it sounds like. Normally, this isn’t a problem when I’m typing, because when you are instant messaging it doesn’t really matter if you spell the word incorrectly. Sometimes, though, you can get into trouble. The word “sık” means often, but the word “sik” (pronounced exactly the same as English “sick”) means “f*ck”. That’s why in English classes here they teach students to say “I am ill” and not “I am sick.”

I’ll try to keep the Turkish minutiae to a minimum.)

İstanbul. Last week, I went on a school trip to İstanbul. When I heard that there was a school trip, I expected it to similar to a school trip that might occur in America. Of course, one should never, ever have expectations as an exchange student. I also need to stop comparing things to America. In a recent meeting with my counselor here, she pointed out that I have the habit of starting my sentences with “compared to America,” or “well, in America we…” and it’s a horrible habit. I’m trying to break myself of it.

So no comparing the school trip. I guess I’ll just try to describe it as best I can as a sui generis occurrence. The bus ride was about 13 hours, I think. We stopped four or five times so we could go to the bathroom, eat, and buy lokum (Turkish delight). We traveled in two separate coaches – there were almost 90 students and four teachers. I managed to get two seats to myself, so I was able to sleep about as well as is possible on a bus for a 6’2” person.

When we arrived in İstanbul… wait, this is İstanbul? Turns out we weren’t actually staying in Istanbul. We were in Şile, which is improbably situated in the middle of farmland, about an hour outside of the city. We were in a holiday village, which means that we were all staying in little villas, five to a villa. It was alright for about five minutes, until my villa was trashed and smelled permanently, I think, like cigarette smoke.

I think for many of the students, this may have been one of the first times they had stayed away from home. They certainly took advantage of the opportunity to… well, in Turkish, there is no word for “to smoke”. They say “to drink” – so you “drink” cigarettes. (Apparently in Azerbaijani, which is a close relative of Turkish, there is a word for “to drink”, so Azerbaijanis think it is hilarious that Turkish people drink their cigarettes. I do too.)

Anyways, there was a lot of partying and “drinking” (both types).When I got back to school on Monday, one of the teachers asked me “you didn’t drink (or smoke…) too much, did you?” And I hastily said, “no, no, I didn’t drink at all.” I’m pretty sure she didn’t believe me, and that she wouldn't have cared if I had said "yes".

What about İstanbul itself? I can hear my readers wondering. Well, unfortunately, I didn’t get to see a whole lot of the city. I got my feet a little wet, but that was all. İstanbul is a beautiful, beautiful city. I saw the Hagia Sofia and Topkapı Palace, but the main purpose of our trip was to give the students a chance to see the universities in Istanbul. The most memorable university was Galatasaray University, which was founded during the Ottoman period. The language of instruction is still French, and it is situated right on the Bosphorous. Beautiful.

We also visited Taksım Square, the heart of İstanbul. It was extremely, extremely crowded. I was a little worried because I had seen people protesting the war in Gaza as drove around İstanbul, but there was nothing of a political nature going on in the square. Phew. We were set loose to wander around, with a warning that if we weren’t back at 5, we would be left behind. Some people actually were left behind, and had to take a cab.

I managed to find some people who were willing to let me be their friend, and we wandered around. We went to Pizza Hut (because there isn’t on in Antalya) and went to a nargile café (because… well, Turkish people like nargile?) I have pictures that I am sifting through at the moment, and I’ll try to upload them to my Facebook eventually. I’ll make the link public and post it here so everyone can browse them if they so desire. If you already have Facebook, you can see other people’s pictures of me in Istanbul as well.

As long as I’m writing, I figure I should probably comment on the situation in Gaza. I’m not going to talk about my personal opinions here, as this really isn’t the appropriate time or place. I did, however, get this message recently, from the embassy in Ankara.

“This Warden Message alerts U.S. citizens to
Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip
and Palestinian rocket strikes into Israel.
The escalation of hostilities within the Gaza
Strip has resulted in a strong possibility of
large public demonstrations and potential for
disruption of traffic throughout Turkey. In
southeastern Turkey, demonstrations have
already taken place in the provinces of Hakkari,
Bitlis, Elazig,Mardin, Gaziantep, Diyarbakir,
Antakya, Sanliurfa, and Siirt. Demonstrations
have already taken place at the U.S. Consulate
Adana, U.S. Consulate Istanbul and U.S. Embassy
Ankara and may continue given the possibility
for long-term conflict. When possible, we will
update American citizens with the latest demon-
stration information.

We remind American citizens that even demonstra-
tions intended to be peaceful can turn confronta-
tional and possible escalate into violence.
American citizens are therefore urged to avoid
the areas of demonstrations if possible, and to
exercise caution if within the vicinity of any
demonstrations. American citizens should stay
current with media coverage of local events
and be aware of their surroundings at all times.”

Ironically, while I was in Oslo there was a demonstration there in front of the Israeli Embassy that turned violent. None of the provinces listed, though, are anywhere near me. Antalya is a pretty peaceful place. Nevertheless, though, people are very, very upset about what is going on. Schools across Turkey had a moment of silence this week to commemorate the Palestinian casualties, and the head of one of Antalya’s municipalities came to our school two days ago to try to raise money to send to Palestine.

The differences between the western media outlets and the Turkish ones are shocking. The BBC World Service and CNN International tend to show the same clips over and over again, of cameramen stuck in Ashkelon watching distant rockets explode, or of Israeli Magen David Adom workers running to the site of a rocket attack, wearing reflective vests with Hebrew lettering.

While foreign media outlets haven’t been allowed in Gaza, al-Jazeera has, apparently, six journalists who were there to begin with, and, since the borders are sealed, they aren’t going anywhere. The Turkish outlets tend to re-broadcast the footage from Gaza from other channels, rather than just showing Israeli soldiers sitting on tanks and replaying clips of Tzvipi Livni over and over.

Anyways, I’m going to abide by what I said about this not being an appropriate venue to discuss the conflict. If anyone has questions about what is going on in Turkey in response to the war, I’d be happy to try my best to answer.

P.S. This entry is dragging on, but let me just answer some questions that people posed me.

Uncle Andrew: the weather is decent. It’s usually in the 50s and low 60s during the day, as best I can reckon from my on-the-fly conversions from Celsius. It’s too cold to swim and it’s kind of damp, but I think it beats the -15 degree weather I hear Maine is experiencing right now.

I was also accepted to UNC. I guess I should probably have mentioned that sooner. I’m very excited to have another school. As my dad reminded me recently, it’s always good to have options.

Bob: The Norwegian girls were beautiful. Apparently the Swedish girls are prettier, though. In a lot of the stores the people working are Swedish – so they speak English with you. Literally everyone in Oslo speaks English. Cool, huh?

To everyone who sent kind words or advice in the posts: thanks. I appreciate it. It’s great to know your thoughts are with me.