Recovery Period

Hi friends, thanks for keeping up with my blog. I have safely returned from my Europe trip and am recovering from the jetlag. I slept for 19 hours upon return, did three loads of laundry, and went grocery shopping as there was nothing in the fridge.

In the coming weeks, I'll be blogging about each of the cities I toured. There are a lot of places I visited within each city so as a fair warning, the posts will be long. For those of you that enjoy details, it'll be galore. For those that like brevity, I wish you well with skimming. Lots of photos will accompany the posts to tell a comprehensive story--because we all know that pictures tell a better story than words.

Tomorrow is Monday, the worst day of the week, and I'll be back to the grind with Turkish lessons, after school speaking clubs, and maybe substitute teaching, depending on how our administration is feeling. Stay tuned!

Winter Break in Europe

It was an uphill battle to get 10 days off from our university. They are sticklers of rules and therefore were keen on only granting us 10 days out of the country, the same amount for any other teacher employee, instead of two weeks. There are a few things frustrating about this approach. Firstly, we are not like other Akdeniz University teachers in any sense of the word; we do not have established classroom of students, we teach only 5-10 hours a week, and our duties can be summed up with optional speaking clubs and on-call substitute teaching. As Fulbright students, our circumstances are special and should, therefore, in my opinion, be dealt as such. We should be afforded special circumstances because quite frankly, we have special contracts. Secondly, I'm having a hard time understanding why our weekends count as part of the 10 days we are out of the country. Don't get me wrong, I'm all about following the rules, but their stance on this simply seems absurd. Thirdly, if we really do want to talk about contracts and legal language, I believe we are allotted 14 full days out of the country, per Article 12.

Not to mention that the school itself has winter break from January 15 to February 1st, which means there are no students at school for us to teach! I don't understand why the university can't just give us that same time frame off. I think the admin is being bureaucratic just for the sake of exercising its muscles, and as a result, making our lives miserable. This is further creating a negative experience. I cannot wait to provide this feedback to the Turkish Fulbright Commission in hopes that the situation improves for future scholars.

Anyhow, despite our efforts, the administration did not budge and officially only approved our leave for January 18-28.


As if things couldn't get any worse, we were miserable during the week leading up to our trip. All of a sudden, regular teachers were calling out sick (suspicious no?) and we became the scapegoats. Alex and I substituted a ton of classes during the week of student midterms, teaching almost 20 hours that week. It felt weird to be administering an exam for a class I never taught; it felt even more unethical to give oral speaking grades to students I had never worked with before. The entire situation was awful, and added to our growing frustration with the school bureaucracy.

Ok, enough venting. On to the better stuff, the actual places we'll be visiting on our trip! Our itinerary for the next two weeks includes: Barcelona, Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, and Berlin. If we didn't have to come back on the 28th, we would have added Prague, Vienna, and Budapest to our trip, but unfortunately they had to be cut because we are good girls and we follow school rules. We'll be returning on Friday and going to school just to show the administration our faces so that they can see we stayed within their approved dates. Plus, we'll use the weekend to catch up on rest!

Stay tuned for adventures from each of the above-mentioned cities! Let the #EuropeTrip start!

New Year's in Istanbul

December 31, 2015 – January 3, 2016

Happy New Year everyone!! May the year 2016 bring good health and happiness to you and your family.

New Year is one-of-a-kind holiday. It is special because it is celebrated universally, and it symbolizes many things: a new start, courage to let go of the past, strength to forgive and move on, and gratitude for being able to travel around the sun one more time. To me, a New Year is a mix of all these things. I look forward to what 2016 has to bring, while I smile at all what’s happened in 2015. I'm excited to let go of some of my past struggles and confront the new ones. For all the people that have hurt me or caused me anguish, I'm ready to forgive them and move on as a stronger person. And most importantly, I'm grateful to be alive for one more year, to spend time with my loved ones, and to live my life to the fullest.

I often use New Year's Eve as a time to reflect about the good and bad things that have happened in the last 365 days, while staying optimistic about what the next 365 days will bring.

As a recap, here are my 2015 milestones. I am grateful for all of these things.

• 2015 started with breathing in a sigh of relief after submitting all my grad school apps
• In March, I was selected for the Fulbright fellowship
• In April, I was accepted to the Tufts Fletcher School
• In May, I was offered the Pickering Fellowship, that brought me to tears
• In July, I left my work at Liberty Mutual with mixed emotions
• In August, I moved to Turkey, unaware of the challenges and opportunities that lied ahead of me
• Since August until now, I have been exploring Turkey, learning new things, making new friends, learning Turkish

Here are things I look forward to in 2016:

• Europe trip over winter break, if we can manage to plan it.
• Going home to America! Homesickness is real.
• Summer internship at the U.S. State Department’s Pakistan Desk.
• Moving back to MA for graduate school—brrr, hello snow again.

These are my three New Year’s resolutions:

• Drink more water. There is no better medicine than water. People drink a lot of Coca Cola in Turkey, and I plan to order su (water) at restaurants from now.
• Jog more and build stamina for running again, as I want to stay fit.
• Learn to read and write Urdu—Urdu is my native language and I can speak it fluently since I was born in Pakistan and lived there for 8 years before moving to the USA; however, I have lost the abilities to read and write this beautiful language. The alphabet is suppressed in my memory somewhere so I feel fairly confident that an intense summer course might bring me up to speed. Perhaps the State Department will allow me to study at their Foreign Service Institute (FSI) during my summer internship.

Traveling to Istanbul

Alex and I decided to spend New Year in Istanbul. We hadn’t traveled in three weeks, and revisiting Istanbul seemed like a good idea—we would get to see the famed fireworks and spend time with other Fulbrighters in Turkey’s historical city. We had a rough start, however.

Our administration failed to communicate to us that we had no speaking club classes the week leading up to New Year’s Day, which was frustrating because Alex and I booked an evening flight to Istanbul. Had we known we didn’t have afternoon classes, we could have booked an earlier flight. To make matters worse, it was snowing in Istanbul and there were an unusual amount of flights going to Istanbul, both of which contributed to major delays. Those that know me well know that I can be very impatient, especially during situations that do not have a logical justification. I could not figure out why every flight to Istanbul was delayed. Should the airport not plan for enough runways? This isn’t the first time people are flocking to Istanbul to celebrate New Year’s, therefore shouldn’t the airport officials and airlines plan for these types of situations ahead of time? Whatever happened to data analysis? If I were still at my desk at Liberty Mutual, I’d be slicing and dicing customer data like nobody’s business. Alas, I’m in Turkey and this place is surely teaching me patience.

Headed to Istanbul on NYE with Toffee Nut Latte.

Alex and I decided to kill our time by sipping Starbucks coffee. I’m actually not a huge fan of Starbucks—overpriced coffee is so overrated—but every once in a while, in peculiar situations like this one, when one’s soul is left with nothing but desperation, when frustration leaves you with no other choice, I resort to the multinational, multi-million dollar company to provide me with a warm cup of caffeine that can calm my nerves. And it worked. Toffee Nut Latte was just what I needed to calm my negativity and pessimism. I complained to Alex that we would miss the fireworks, that this trip was ruined, that it wasn’t worth it any more. I was grateful to her positivism because I was beginning to lose hope. That’s one of my favorite things about Alex; she reminds me of the light at the end of the tunnel. We make a great team!

Finally at a little past 10pm, our flight began boarding. In less than an hour, we were in Istanbul. Finally! But…it was snowing. We took a bus to Taksim Square. But the clock was ticking, and I feared that we would ring in the New Year en route to our destination. My fear came true. Alex and I counted the final minute of 2015 on an unusually quite bus. I couldn’t understand why everyone else was silent. Weren’t they happy for 2016? In hushed voices, Alex and I whispered “10, 9, 8, 7….” and then threw our hands in the air, and gave each other a hug. And this is how I spent my New Year’s Eve, my friends. No pity needed, because at least I was with someone I loved, Alex. Besides, all holidays are about being with the people you love. “Plus, it’s not New Year’s in America yet, so we really didn’t miss it,” said Alex, reminding me again to stay positive.

When we got to Taksim Square, we called our Airbnb host who directed us to take a taxi to the hostel. The weather was miserable; it was a blizzard as we got off the bus. We decided to taxi to our hostel, which was 10 minutes away. The driver made small talk with us and appeared to be very warm—but he turned out to be a crook! He asked us for 100 lira, which I knew was a joke; and then tried to tell us that he was giving us a concession and charging us only 50 lira. Which is still SUPER expensive. The ride should have only cost 10 or 15 lira, but instead we were forced to pay 50 lira. I begged the driver to give us 10 lira back so that we could buy baklava or something. Feeling guilty for ripping off two innocent girls, he smiled through the rearview mirror and handed us the 10 lira change. I expected rates to be high on New Year’s Eve, but this guy was a total crook. I don’t understand people cheat others. It’s an awful thing to do, and I don’t know how people live with themselves after having committed the deed. Needless to say, being overcharged by the taxi driver was the icing on the cake of our awful travel to Istanbul.

Hostel

Our hostel was actually pretty sweet, unlike the first one which was super sketchy. Four other girls joined us for this 7-bed hostel: Monica, Sara, Jessica, and Caitie. There were three sets of bunk beds plus a lone one. The hostel came with heating, towels, soap, shampoo, and slipper—I was super impressed. Felt like a mini hotel, but for a much cheaper cost of course. The only downfall of this hostel was the alley on which it’s located. Our host was also very hospitable, constantly checking in on us and being available at all times. The living situation was great, no complaints here.

Istiklal Street

Istiklal means ‘independence.’ Istiklal Avenue is one of the most famous streets in Istanbul. It is apparently visited by nearly 3 million people in a single day over the course of weekends, according to Wikipedia. “Located in the historic Beyoğlu (Pera) district, it is an elegant pedestrian street, 1.4 kilometers long, which houses boutiques, music stores, bookstores, art galleries, cinemas, theatres, libraries, cafés, pubs, night clubs with live music, historical patisseries, chocolateries and restaurants.” There’s even a historic red tram that runs up and down the street. The girls and I indulged in Persian food and sweets the night we hung out. I ordered an awful dish at the Persian restaurant—something sweet with walnuts, but curried in a dark gravy. Even though I didn’t enjoy my dinner, the cheesecake we had afterward totally made up for it.

 

Dolmabahçe Palace

One of the highlights of this trip was visiting the historical, extravagant, and ginormous palace of the Sultans. Sarah, Jessica, Alex, and I toured the Dolmabahce Palace on Saturday. It costs 30 TL for adults and 5 TL for students with IDs. The Dolmabahce Palace is a luxurious palace built by the many great Ottoman Sultans, and later used by the founder of modern Turkey, Kemal Ataturk. Ataturk used the place for work and occasionally lived in it. He also died in this palace on November 10, 1938 at 9:05am—all the clocks in this 285-room palace are stopped at that hour/minute to pay tribute to the father of this republic. Today, the palace is used as a museum and as a place to host foreign dignitaries. Maybe one day I'll be welcomed here as a representative of the USA. The palace is located near the Bosphorus, with huge gates smiling at the shining waters and waving at the tour boats swimming by. When my family and uncle visit Istanbul, I hope to take them on a Bosphorous ferry tour so that they can see the entire city. Because of the icy weather, it was very slippery to walk outside the palace. Our feet froze many a times, but we survived cold feet just to be able to see the magnificent interior. The palace had many rooms that were themed to a color, like the “red room” and the “blue room.” This reminded me of the East Wing of The White House, which, too, has color-themed rooms. We must have stolen the idea from the Sultans. Anyhow, even though we weren’t allowed to take pictures inside, the tour was lovely and this is definitely a destination I’m adding to the itinerary of my family’s spring visit.

Gulab Jamun Recipe

At one of the dinner gatherings at Adnan Bhai’s house, the dessert afte the main course was gulab jamun. Those unfamiliar with this mouth-watering South Asian sweet, allow me to introduce you. Gulab Jamun is a ball of deep-fried milk-solids and boiled in a sugar syrup. Gulab means “rose” in Urdu, and jamun is a type of purple, grape-looking fruit (known as Java Plum in English). The dessert gets its name form its rose-like smell and taste, and jamun-like shape.

Below you will find a recipe that I have taken from Madiha Bhabi. Disclaimer: there are many ways to gulab jamun and as such, you’ll find many YouTube videos and recipes out on the net. However, this is the easiest and most delicious one in my biased opinion. Before trying this at home, one should note that gulab jamun can sometimes take a few practices before they turn out “perfect.” I know this from first-hand experience, unfortunately; two weeks ago, my gulab jamun were a complete mess…they broke apart as soon as I deep-fried them. A big part of this failure is because I used coffee creamer in place of milk powder which I could not find in the local market—but I have found the correct milk powder now! Anyhow, without further adieu, here is the recipe!

Gulab Jamun Recipe

Makes 20 gulab jamun

Ingredients:

½ cup milk

¼ cup butter

2 tbsp semolina (suji)

2 tbsp all-purpose flour

1 heaping mug of milk powder

1 egg

2 cups sugar

A pinch of baking soda

A pinch of ground nutmeg

2-3 cups vegetable cooking oil (depending on size of frying pot)

Pistachios as a topping (optional)

Directions:

1. On low heat, create sugar syrup by pouring 2 cups sugar in 2 cups of water. Do not stir; let the sugar dissolve by itself.
2. Warm the milk, butter, and milk powder in a pot. Be sure to stir consistently so that there are no lumps.
3. Soften the semolina by letting it soak in warm water for 2 minutes. Add the semolina (drain if too much water) to the milk mixture on the heat.
4. Let this milk/semolina batter cool down by spreading it on a platter or tray.
5. Add 2 pinches of baking soda and 1 pinch of nutmeg to the spread batter. Mix well. Then add flour and knead well.
6. In a separate bowl, beat the egg with a whisk or fork. Then add 2 tablespoons of egg to the dough. (This helps keep the gulab jamun together.)
7. Once the dough is well mixed, make small round balls with your hand.
8. Warm up the oil in a deep-frying pot. Be sure that the oil is not too hot! This is critical because you want your gulab jamun to cook well from the inside; cold oil will not cook it while hot oil will burn the outside but leave the inside raw. The correct way to tell if your oil is the right temperature is to put a very small tester piece of dough in the oil and see if it takes time to rise to the top—if it does, then the oil is perfect. If it rises too quickly, then lower the heat or add more oil to keep the temperature warm.
9. Place the dough balls in the deep-frying pot of warm oil and stir slowly as the balls rise to the top.
10. When the balls have turned a golden-brown color, take them out and place them in the sugar syrup which should be ready now.
11. Once you have fried all the jamuns, turn off the heat from under the syrup and let the dessert cool down. You may add crushed pistachios on the top.
12. Serve when slightly warm. Enjoy with family and friends!

Christmas & New Haircut

Christmas Eve

My roommate Alex loves Christmas, and we have been playing Christmas carols in our house for the past two weeks. I was equally looking forward to a church service on Christmas Eve at the St. Paul’s Cultural Center in Kaleiçi. The service included singing, storytelling of the Three Kings, candle lighting for hope and peace, and a sermon about the miracles of letting stars guide you. I was touched to learn about the church’s efforts in assisting Syrian refugees in Antalya. Alex and I both signed up to get involved with this initiative. After the service, we enjoyed hot cider and Christmas cookies, and mingled with English-speaking expats from around the world. During this time, I made a unique connection. Pastor Dennis apparently worked at Wheaten College when Dr. Luke Cutherell studied there. Dr. Luke is my family doctor and close friend from Pakistan; I was born in his Bach Christian Hospital. What a small world! Who would have thought my two worlds, Pakistan and America, would come together in Antalya, Turkey? It’s as if my personal statement goals are becoming a reality…

Christmas Day

I’m sure Christmas was not the same for Alex, but we had a pleasant day nonetheless. She got to talk to her family a lot via technology, so that helped bridge the distance of being away on this holiday. We spent December 25^th at the hairdresser and Kaleiçi…

From raven black to ombré caramel hair. Time for change!

This year has been filled with adventures, and in this adventurous spirit, on Christmas Day, I decided to dye my raven black hair to ombré caramel. For those unfamiliar with hair styles, "ombré" means going from darker to lighter as the hair grows out. I first dyed my hair one tone lighter than black, so a super dark brown color. Now, my rich, dark brown hair flow down into a warm caramel brown/yellow. Change can sometimes be a tough transition, but I welcome this change with open arms, especially with 2016 around the corner. Cheers for new beginnings!

Christmas dinner with expat in Antalya.

Later that evening, Alex and I met up some friends for a nice dinner by the harbor in Kaleiçi. I had a çipura (bream) fish for dinner and Alex had curried shrimp, both of which were very fresh and delicious. We met these friends on a Facebook “Expats in Antalya” group. These ladies were from Ireland, Canada, USA, and Tunisia. The girl from Ireland, Grace, is interested in becoming our third roommate, so we will see what happens with that. When we got home that evening, Alex surprised me with a Christmas present. I was totally not expecting this! She gifted me pastel paints, paint brushes, and drawing paper and said to me: “Remember that day you stared at the sky and said ‘I know exactly how I would paint these clouds?’ Well, now you can.” How thoughtful! She knows painting is my childhood hobby and I don’t give it much time or attention; but now that I have supplies, maybe I’ll give the paintbrush a few strokes. Maybe I’ll paint a few landscapes from Turkey and bring them back to the USA with me. Overall, it was a lovely Christmas Day.

Weekend After Christmas

With some of our newly-made friends from the St. Paul Cultural Center, Liz, Alex and I attended the “Nutcracker” ballet on Saturday, a day after Christmas. Our friends kindly picked us up, and we drove to the theater, about a 15-minute drive. The new friends friends include an American girl, Nicole from Oregon, married to a Turkish man who spent 8 years in the USA, and their Turkish friend who could not speak English. It’s a nice group. The ballet was beautiful—there was more dancing than the story plot, but it was enjoyable nonetheless. I really loved the props on the stage and the orchestra playing in the pit. It was a perfect activity for Christmas spirit. For those unfamiliar with the Nutcracker, here’s a short synopsis stolen from Wikipedia:

Watched the "The Nutcracker" ballet after Christmas.

“The Nutcracker and the Mouse King is a story written in 1816, by E. T. A. Hoffmann in which young Clara Stahlbaum's favorite Christmas toy, the Nutcracker, comes alive and, after defeating the evil Mouse King in battle, whisks her away to a magical kingdom populated by dolls.”

On Sunday, we invited our Pakistani family to our house for a dinner meal. I am so blessed that these people are in my life; they are such a lovable, enjoyable, and caring group of people. I met this group through Suhaib Bhai, whom I met at Akdeniz University one day. The group includes: married couple Adnan Bhai and Madiha Bhabi—they usually host dinner at their house—and their one-month old daughter, Auj; Qasid Bhai from Swabi doing a Master's in Turkey; Saba from Rawalpindi, a recent high school graduate studying for her bachelors at Akdeniz; four artists Khadija, Nasneen, Usman, and Zainab who are doing a semester abraod from their master's program in Pakistan and specializing in various art forms such as carpet making, painting, and pottery. Typically once a week, we gather at Adnan Bhai’s house to enjoy a home-cooked Pakistani meal and play Ludo, which can become aggressive at times because we have many competitive players, myself included. We split the costs of groceries at the end, so that they do not have to foot the bill every time. I love spending time with such warm company. Alex and I are also learning to make delicious Pakistani dishes from the ladies in the group, which I’m sure my mom is happy about. Alex is even picking up Urdu phrases such as "aja aja" which means "come come" and can count up to 6 (because the Ludo dice have 6 sides). We've also learned to make sweets, such as Gulab Jamun, whose recipe will be posted on the next blog post...stay tuned!

With our Pakistani family at Adnan Bhai's house.

Merry Christmas to friends and family back home! And Happy New Year to friends and family around the world!

Guest Lecture

December 11, 2015
 

Last Friday, Alex and I were invited to guest lecture at our university representative, Meltem’s English classes. We skipped our Turkish classes that morning and were excited at this opportunity to actually ‘lecture’ since we don’t get to do that through our speaking clubs. Meltem said we could lecture about any topic we wanted, she wanted this exercise to strengthen her students’ English listening skills.

Alex decided to create a PowerPoint about Christmas, as she loves the holiday, and I decided to lecture about American government, as I love America and government studies. I think it’s important for students to understand American vocabulary that they might see or hear in the news, such as “Congress,” “Supreme Court ruling” and “Secretary Kerry.” I wanted to them have a basic understanding of how our government is set up and how it works. In order to understand why our government is a democracy, I whizzed through early American history and lectured about colonialism, “no taxation without representation,” and the war for independence from the British monarchy. When we got to the slide about Presidential Elections, kids shouted out "Is Donald Trump really going to win?" They were also confused about why we have 2-term limits on presidents..."if it's a democracy, people should be able to reelect a president if they want, right?" I told them while that is true, we prefer diversity of ideas to tyranny. They also asked a lot about Native Americans, much to my surprise. Needless to say, it was an engaging discussion and very much enjoyed by me. At the end of my lecture, I shared some photos of growing up in the DC area and my White House internship. On my timeline slide, I told them I empathize with their struggle to learn English, as it is also my second language.

After our lectures, kids played a trivia game and enjoyed being competitive with one another. For example, we quizzed them with questions such as “What are some Christmas traditions?” and “What do the stars and stripes represent on the American flag?” I felt like a true cultural ambassador on this day, because I was quite literally sharing with them American history and government. I could tell students were enlightened to learn that the stars on our flag represent the 50 states of America, and the stripes represent the 13 original colonies. Sometimes the best part about teaching is the moment you see your students enlightened by knowledge.

 

Videos from Istanbul

Here are some videos of various structures from my Istanbul trip. Enjoy!

Inside of Ayasofya

  Inside the Sultan Ahmed/Blue Mosque

After seeing the Süleymaniye Mosque