A Week in the Life Episode 12

One day I visited a guy who is a bit on the crazy side. Actually my language helper says I am a magnet for crazy men and that I run into one of them at least once a month. I think this month has been more like once a week. Anyway, this crazy man told me he thought the Russians were responsible for hurricanes in America. I looked at him incredulously stating the Russians can’t control the weather. He argued with me and said it Russian women are the cause of the hurricanes. I continued staring at him in disbelief. I asked him to explain further. He said the hurricanes are named after Russian women, like Katrina, because they are the cause of the storms. At that point I declared this information to be ridiculous. I explained that the hurricanes have different names that go in alphabetical order alternating between male and female. I showed him the 2016 list: Alex, Bonnie, Colin, Danielle, Earl, Fiona, etc. none of which are Russian names. He continued to argue with me and the girl working with him took his side. They had both seen a news article stating their case. I scoffed at them and said you can’t believe everything you see on the news. 

Speaking of this, I saw a link on Facebook saying that Tom Selleck was such a strong Christian and attributes everything to Jesus Christ. I was curious since I had never heard this before. In the article, it quoted him saying that he had started acting but then God had a different plan and he went to Vietnam. Then he eventually stopped acting for a while to start a family because he felt God leading him to do so. Afterwards, he was quoted as saying he tries to live an ethical life. Nowhere on the link, nor anywhere on the web have I found where Tom Selleck has said anything about being a Christian or that he owes everything to Jesus. It is truly baffling why someone would write all of that and I wonder how many people read the article without an ounce of critical thinking. DON’T BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU READ ON THE INTERNET FOR GOODNESS’ SAKE! 

One day I stopped by the carpet store to pick out some gifts. When I went to pay for the gifts, I realized I was short on cash. My carpet store friend told me not to worry and I could take the stuff that day and bring some cash back another day. These are the reasons why I love living here. 

One day I successfully renewed my internet contract while the lady workers bragged on how awesome I was doing in my second language. I was hit on by a random man on the street ('cause I still got it) and then successfully evaded him as he began semi stalking me. I met with my friends at the immigration office to see what I need to do to renew my residence permit. Then I met another random girl in a shop who decided we were going to be friends. She basically bossed me around. As we were parting ways, she said, "See you later," but never got my contact info so I'm not sure how that will happen, nor am I sure I want it to. I finished the day by eating pan-fried chicken livers (they were actually quite tasty), drinking Turkish coffee, and watching a local television series with my local friend. I walked about 4.5 miles that day.

My plate of livers and a special kind of rice.

I don’t laugh as much here as I did in America. I think this is attributed to stress and fatigue. I also think that since this is not my first culture and language, I don’t always understand the humor here. Nonetheless, there are a few things that can make me giggle. My roommate and I have recently started using Snapchat. The pictures and videos that we come up with can sometimes make us laugh pretty good. Another thing I like to do is find random English on T-shirts around here. One day we went to the outdoor clothing market and searched for funny shirts. Pictured below were some of our finds. One of them even referenced Chattanooga, a city near my hometown.

One day I saw this quote posted on Facebook, “Everything you want is on the other side of fear.” It is so true for my life here. Especially in my early days, I had to do lots of scary things. I didn’t have a choice, I just had to find enough courage to ride the bus, knock on my neighbor’s door, brave the pazar alone, or some days just to leave my house. The more I did those things, the more I found my life here. We have to simply leap over our fears or else ignore them to get the job done and what we find on the other side was worth the risk. 

My city has been doing road work everywhere for months now. Part of this work involves adding new street lights in the form of these tulip lights. These lights are popping up literally everywhere. The lights, reminiscent of the fair, give me much amusement. In addition to the lights, they have been adding these giant symbols called tuğras in the big intersection. The word tuğra means sultan’s signature. Apparently the ones in my city are the largest tuğras in the country. A claim to fame for this tiny place.

The giant tuğra