PSATs (I Got A Splinter From An Onion Yesterday...Isn't That Pathetic)

Okay, I'd written a full post and was about to, um, post it, but then something happened and, considering that not many of you are going to read this all the way through, I had to put it at the top.  During lunch today, I and a couple other people made ice cream with the chem teacher.  He poured a lot of milk, cream, sugar and half of one of those little bottles of vanilla into a big bowl, gave me a huge, thick pair of gloves and a wooden spoon, and told me to sit down.  The madman (this is the same person I got my guinea fowl from) proceeded to open up a huge flask of liquid nitrogen - food grade, he assured us - and pour it in while I stirred.  Even with the gloves, it was freezing and I couldn't see what was going on in the bowl for all the cold, white vapours billowing out.  I felt as though I was brewing some ghastly potion.  Anyway, after about three minutes of this we had some rather lumpy-looking, but very proper-tasting ice cream, which we proceeded to consume and distribute joyfully to the population of the hallway!  Geekiest fun that I've had in a while.  Okay, here's the original post:

I Should Be Doing Homework

I just realized that I never posted this.  I took it weeks ago on the bus back from a weekend at home.  There's another long weekend coming up in a couple weeks.  I'm sitting on a wide, high-up windowsill in the dorm lounge right now, and waiting for structured study to start.  I think I might have failed a chemistry test today, and I'm facing an evil essay whose only grace is its comparative shortness - it's still killing me.  With all that in mind, I should probably take my leave now, lovely reader, much as it grieves me. 
Hoş çakal.

What We Do Here

Yesterday, after getting up off my downstairs neighbors' rug - there was a Saturday-night sleepover.  You should see my nails - and dragging myself to the cafeteria to make up for the dish duty I'd forgotten about the night before, I begged off a cappella with a sore throat that's still bothering me and went for a walk with the guy whose hair I dyed a few posts back.  We took a couple pictures while roaming the grounds, and this is a celebratory post because I can now upload them.  I was having to do it by email before, which meant limiting it to about three photos per post.  Unacceptable.  But the tech guys here are all-knowing and I can now do whatever the hell I like with photos, as well as access the iTunes store and finally watch Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.  I have to keep this really short, because I have a chem test on Thursday and an English paper due Friday that I haven't even started, but here's what we did. 

Oh, and my Maytag model asked me to do it again.  He's dyed his hair since, and I haven't done much with these photos, but here they are anyway.

 

I'm also filling out my application for the NSLI-Y programme again.  I don't think I could graduate from here if I did a year or semester in Turkey, so I'm going for a summer in Tajikistan.  I need to know more middle-eastern languages. 

The Grindstone: Modern Education

Oh, well.  All extended weekends must pass.  My bus was the first home, at about half past five, and there was no seven-to-nine structured study as people were trickling in all evening.  I hung around in the lower lounge with people and, among other things, read someone's anti-feminism post-modernist short story and was offered $20 by one of the guys.  To feel my breasts.  People, take pity on me in the asylum I live in, and … oh, I don't know… go watch Gentlemen Prefer Blondes this weekend.  That'll make me happy.  It's what I plan to do, after a whole lot of nonvolunteer work that the school organizes for us to do. 

But, really, it's nice to be back.  It was great to see my friends at home, to visit my old school (It feels so weird to write that), where I sat in on a French class and realized that I still have all the vocabulary, but can't conjugate in anything but Turkish, and to sleep in my own bed, and be woken up by my little brother at ungodly hours – before one p.m.! – but I'm glad to be back on a routine.  The weather's really cooling off here, but I was able to watch a bit of the football soccer game (I confused a lot of people this evening when I told them about it in british terms) that the local school was playing tonight.  Boys' team.  A couple friends are on their team (that's what we have to do if we want to play sports), and 'we' were actually winning when I left to eat some of the glorious bread and cheese and vegetables I dragged back with me.  There were many jokes made on the bus about gardens being shifted, and they developed into a (rather speculative) discussion about when plants stop photosynthesizing.  We are geeks and we are happy.  (I am all about the brackets tonight, aren't I?)

There are a few other people here who are into photography, which is nice.  I can't lie around in plain view without somebody instigating an impromptu shoot, and I'm running out of space on my hard drive!  (Who cares?)

Oh, and, if nothing goes amiss, I'm going to the Common Ground Fair this weekend!  It's been said that if a bomb were dropped on the Common Ground Fair, Maine's surviving hippie population would be countable on one hand.  This is completely undesirable, as they happen to make it a thoroughly enjoyable and entertaining place to be – from their no-refined-sugar-within-the-gates policy to the totally delicious deep fried shiitake mushrooms, falafel and gyro (who'd have thought?), to these ridiculous displays of hundreds upon hundreds of varieties of dried beans, barrels-full through which you are allowed to run your dusty hands for as long as you should please… I get very excited about the beans.  There's no disgusting typical fair food or people, and there are all sorts of lovely animals and – my god – activists.  I'll admit, my primary motive in signing up for the trip this weekend is so that I can go to all the political booths, from the Amnestly International people to the Trade With Cuba people to the My Body Is Not Public Property You Freaking Right-Wing Conservative Bastard And I'll Have Abortions Whenever The Hell I Want To people and sign their petitions and buy about forty pins and badges to stick all over my backpack… oh, wait, I don't use one of those any more.  I shall have to find something else to stick pins into…

So, there's really not much more to report.  Oh, wait, sweatshirts: L. gave me his, you know about that.  Well, his girlfriend, my lovely down-the-hall neighbor, had another lovely hoodie that belonged to her maybe not-so-lovely ex back home, and, though I'm not quite sure how, it's become… well, mine.  And I love it!  It's blue and warm and soft and utterly delicious.  That I'm coveting sweaters surely means that summer must be over in my mind, and I'm loath to bid such an eventful season farewell, but I am looking forward to the rest of school.  This time last year, I couldn't imagine myself doing that with much of anything other than resignation – to wasted time and unfriendly people, alleviated, admittedly, by my wonderful darlings at home and a couple good classes.  But to actually be excited about this year is, well, exciting.   I'm enjoying myself here.  I know, right?  Maths homework, which I'm taking a break from right now, is actually quite fun in a therapeutic/numbing sort of way, and I have to ring up my dad in a bit to get him to scan and email a baby picture of me – some secret project the English teacher has lined up, and I forgot to get one while I was home.  But there's always a buzz of sorts in the dorm and the academic building, as they so grandly call it, and I do love that. 

Okay, I have to look what I've said in the face now and go enjoy my maths homework.  Hoş çakal!

'Home?'

School doesn't feel like summer camp any more.  I'm home for the weekend, but I keep catching myself saying 'when I get home...' and 'I need to take such-and-such home.'  I haven't really lived here in this house since pre-Turkey, and I suppose it can only be taken as a good sign.  But it makes me a tiny bit sad.  I have to think about where things are in the kitchen, and what colour the floors are, and things like that now.

Of course I'm eating myself into a stupor - in preparation for another month in a town whose only shop doesn't have butter -  and it's great.  Greens, eggs, yogurt, meat, bread... stuff that's just better here, as well as special, coastal things.  I think we're having mussels at some point tomorrow, and my dad's melons have gotten so ripe and juicy and beautiful that I died this morning... okay, afternoon... when I got out of bed and came downstairs to find something to eat.

I am also finally over being sick, which is wonderful.  I took Friday off as well as Wednesday, which is a shame because I have to make up for that huge chemistry test next Wednesday morning.  All my friends here have school tomorrow, so I shall study insanely.  By Friday evening I felt better and did some hanging, and a few of us decided to watch Some Like It Hot.  We made cookies and locked ourselves in one of the rooms on my wing, and, ah... bras were put on stuffed panda bears, for a start.  And when Marilyn Monroe is all over Tony Curtis on a 23-inch screen and there are blankets all over the place and you're as tired as we were, strange things happen.  We also burned pieces of broken furniture and, for some reason, used-up Korean math papers, on the camp fire they sometimes set up on Friday nights.  Midnight lights-out annoyed the hell out of me, but I was glad later because we all got up at 6:30-ish to get on one of three 7:15-ish buses to go home... four hours for me, and then another in the car.  However: I acquired a really, really nice sweatshirt on the bus (thank you, L!)

(I took this before stealing his sweater.  He's now said I can keep it (I hope it looks as good on me (wow, parentheses withing parentheses inside more parentheses... I'm treating this sentence like algebra)), because he's cool, and yeah, I know he's reading this).

 (I figured out that my camera has two different black-and-white settings - genius amateur that I am, the manual is still on my to-read list) and then a few more clothes with my currently-extremely-popular-with-me mama before going home.  I tore the Gap men's section up looking for just the right cardigan, and also (my host mother in Turkey will be pleased to know) found, finally, some brown mascara that didn't cost a year of college (My god, they give you a lot of free crap when you buy makeup.  I now have all these removing things and sticks of black eyeliner and colourful powders I get the feeling are intended for eyelids and lord knows what else that I'll never, ever use.  Okay, I lie, I will use them, for photo shoots, I'm just amazed what these companies will do to sell you a tiny tube of sticky supposed-sexiness.  So actually, that's kind of cool).  That made me happy. 


Oh, and then there were these.  How many articles of clothing do you see in this picture?  This kind of thing - clothes so loud they keep me up at night - sets me squealing.

Saturday evening, I was back with the kids and it felt good.  There are apparently some really fun new international students at my old school.  I'm going to try getting permission to visit on Tuesday, just so I can hang out more and be berated by all my old teachers for not deciding to go to art school or something and heading up north.  I'm going to bake some cakes to bring back with me, and also need to restock on essentials such as chocolate, chocolate covered almonds, chocolate dipped pretzels, hot chocolate, chocolate caramels and toothpaste.

Well, on Tuesday it's back home to school, and I have miles of essay to wrestle before I sleep, so, iyi geceler, take care of yourself, world, and I will talk to you whenever the hell I next get around to it.  Not that you're not the center of my universe, dear reader.  It's just that my math teacher doesn't love you as much as I do.

Cake and Other Nice Things

All right.  Remember the package?  The one with the Nutella?  Or just scroll down.  One day later - yesterday - my parents sent another one.  Smaller.  Heavier.  Two slabs of brownie, one on top of the other.  Goddamn, I am getting popular here. 

That wasn't even the best thing about yesterday.  Actually, yesterday was horrible, but some cool stuff happened.  The horrible was that I was 'home' sick.  Didn't go to any classes, not even chemistry.  And there was a chem test scheduled for today.  I took my blankets and books down to the lower lounge again and dozed on the sofas because they are more comfortable than my bed, and people came and went and chatted and I got far too little done.  But the cool thing was that we had Student Senate elections - there were five spots open and the eleven-or-so of us running given speeches the night before (mine was about the diplomatic importance of Turkish in student government), and I'm in!  The others elected were all boys.  I'm rather excited.

So, today my benevolent chemistry teacher let me off and said I can take that exam tomorrow.  I came home with the honest intention of studying for it... and saw this.  And, come on, why did my mama send me poppy seeds if not to have me bake beautiful cakes with them?  I'll study... um, after I'm done blogging!  But I feel obliged to share this recipe with you, wonderful as it is.  I'll tell you that it's well worth a few points off a chem grade.  And about twenty other people agree with me.  So make it if you get a chance, okay?

1 cup poppy seeds
1 cup of milk
1 cup (8 oz., 2 sticks or 16 tablespoons) soft unsalted butter
2 cups of plain flour
2 cups of sugar
3 eggs, separated
2 teaspoons of vanilla (I used a little less because I'm a low-budget student.  Ha.)
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

Preheat your oven to 350°F and grease a cake pan.  The recipe said to use a tube pan, but mine was an 8" X 11" Pyrex baking dish, and that fit beautifully.

Put your poppy seeds and milk in a small saucepan, bring them to the boil and then take them off the heat to cool (they should be more or less room-temperature, because you don't want them to melt the butter later).
Cream the butter and sugar together with an electric beater (handheld in my case...I miss my KitchenAid!) until light and fluffy and transcendently deliciously fatteningly good.
Mix in the egg yolks and vanilla, followed by the poppy seed mixture, and beat the hell out of them until everything but the seeds is pretty homogeneous.

Slowly add the flour, salt and baking powder, folding them in gently.
Clean your beaters and get a nice, clean bowl to whisk your egg whites in (if anything greasy touches egg whites, they won't whip.  In case you didn't know.  I really hope one of the delinquents I live with is reading this and figuring out some chemical reason for this).  Aaaaanywaay... whip the egg whites until stiff, but not dry.  They should hold peaks.

Trying not to deflate them too much, gently fold the whites into the rest of the batter.  Then scrape the batter into the pan and bake for about 1 hour (I'm not actually sure how long mine went for, because I had to run to English and had a friend take it out for me.  But about an hour.  And it was perfect).
Share it with your friends and remark upon how incredibly jewish this cake tastes.  It's one of those smells that makes me think of German bakeries and Fiddler on the Roof and good things like that.

Yeah, on the topic of jewishishness.  The astronomy teacher here is pretty religious, and he's been trying, through emails, to get me to go to a lot of services at what has to be the most northerly synagogue in New England.  Anyway, he asked me to come round to his classroom yesterday and introduce myself, which I did, and God.  I didn't feel like I was in The County at all.  I've never felt so liked for the necklace I was wearing... But it's kind of cool to know that there's one more person here to throw a little Yiddish around with.

And I'm still trying to get over how great people are here.  A load of us got locked out of study hall today and I had way too many books sliding around in my arms, and a guy on crutches took my laptop for me.  Insisted!  My god...

Oh, and last night, due to sickness and such, I went to the Residential office (it's just in the dorm lobby) to ask the cool Brit Lit guy who also makes sure that nobody kills anyone around here for some painkillers.  The exchange went something like this:

Me: Hey, please could I have a couple of ibuprofen?
Him: What's the complaint?
Me: Aaaaaaahhh... (I was thinking, okay?  I happened to have a lot of complaints)
Him: Okay, I've lived here long enough to know what that means (reaches for medication box as other staffmembers go crazy laughing).

I'm not easily embarrassed.  It was cool.


 Still very tired from being thusly hasta, so I'll go be responsible now.  Ish. 

In Need Of Your Wisdom

I need to rename this blog, maybe even change the url.  I don't know what I was thinking, choosing such a specific title, and now, post-Turkiye, I feel rather foolish.  So, what should I do?  Give me some advice here, please.  That's what comments are for.  I want to turn this into more of a photography site, and be able to write about whatever interests me without the expectation of everything applying to the incredible time I spent in Ankara.  I'm at school now, and school has very, very little in common with what I did this summer, maalesef.

Well, September Eleventh does seem to have rolled round rather hard this year, no?  It doesn't help that it's currently Ramazan (Rosh Hashannah, too.  Happy New Year, people), but there is no excuse for the bigoted way in which some Americans are behaving.  It makes me very glad to have dual citizenship to hide in. Burning the Quran, indeed.  Of all the horrible, stupid ideas... Since being in Turkey, which is politically not an Islamic country but is populated with the most wonderfully friendly people I have ever had the good fortune to meet, the majority of whom happen to subscribe to Islam to some degree, American ignorance about Moslems grates on me even harder.  I hope what I've written about on this blog has done some good in that regard. 

I've got a shoot now, scheduled with a most beautiful classmate, and one does try to keep these appointments.  Therefore, though I cannot withdraw without regret from the company of you, my dear readers, withdraw I must.  We shall speak soon.  May we all be a little less prejudiced by the next time we talk.

Photos!

I went to our wonderfully clever technology person here, and he fixed all my problems inside of a half hour despite being a total non-Mac person (this school's crawling with the infidels).  So, I am now able to upload photos!

They asked me to do a quick shoot.  They picked the laundry room, where the lighting is motion-activated and therefor totally unnegotiable, but everything worked out.  We must have been in there about 45 minutes, and I took hundreds of photos and had the best time ever.  I'm building up a rep, too.  People see my photography books lying around with kitchen implements I'd been sketching or whatever, and they know whose they are. 

I'm not done editing these (you'll see a couple of them need cropping), but I'm very pleased with them and my models are okay with being posted (on of these is his facebook profile anyway), so here you are.

Oh, other than that not much is going on... Not too much homework this weekend, except for a load that the tech teacher assigned.  He's big on positive/negative debates about technology, and today we watched clips about the benefits of WoW to society.  Yeah, I know.  But I've got to write some sort of paper about a good or bad aspect of some piece of modern technology...does that include food processors?  Electric toothbrushes?  Sliced bread?

I suppose I may as well make this one of those crazy posts with way too many pictures... Here are some of the weekend.

I have biking in a half hour, and I need to eat something.  Oh, I made chocolate cake last night.  Lots of fun.  I'm getting way too many kicks out of listening to the Beatles interspersed with Marina and the Diamonds... okay, bye.  Sizi özledim, ama şimdi internet var, ve herkes çok mutlu!

The Problem of 'Stress Not Quite Covering It'

It's about half past ten at night and we just had a fire drill.  This involved absolutely everyone, all hundred-and-something students and all the res. staff, exiting the dorms through one very narrow door on my wing, right next to my room.  Delightful.  Then we huddled outside in the surprising cold - it rained a lot earlier and civil feet were with civil rain made cold - as the standard roll-call who's-missing oh-damn-we're-locked-out procedure took its course.  A dearth of clothing of the underneath variety rendered yours truly particularly chilly, but I got a kick out of just leaning against the wall and watching all these sheepish boys reenter through the girls' wing afterwards. 

And there aren't enough kicks to go around at the moment.  Stress Week.  Today I had another chemistry test - I got an eighty-something on the last one, which isn't bad for a first exam - and I think i went all right, but I spent all of Monday and esterday working on that and not the maths test or English paper that are both happening/due tomorrow.  So structured study was not fun.  I'd be working on the essay right now if I hadn't just bribed a neighbor with copious quantities of chocolate to proofread it. 

Oh, and someone convinced me to run for student senate.  I got all the nomination signatures I need, and I've decided that my platform will be returning to monarchical rule.  I'd also like to do something about the cafeteria.  It's sometimes all right, and actually can be very nice on weekends, but there's also a lot of really not-nice frozen food, and some simply illogical practices that could be easily remedied... such as the idiotic use of Idaho potatoes.  This is Northern Maine, people, get a grip!  That really frustrates me.  And it seems like the student government here actually gets its shit together and does things, which is cool.

In my attempts at avoiding the cafeteria, I've actually made some rather nice friends.  The kitchen is a good hang-out/faux-study spot, and tonight I made pasta and shared it with a few girls and talked about their boyfriends, etc.  I'm also becoming That Deranged Blonde With The Camera.  There's a guy here with really, really incredible style who wanted to join LookBook, and he needed photos of himself and a friend.  They asked me to take them, and we ended up having a 45-minute shoot in the laundry room, and we were all on top of the driers and I got some abfab and some rather risqué shots.  It's nice to have such a range of models, from study-geeks to such pantherine fashionistas.  I have another shoot planned for Saturday with a very pretty new friend, and I promise I'd be showing you all this if the internet here weren't so funky.  It replaces correctly-spelled profanity with *censored*, and I initially thought that blogger was fucking with my posts and shit, but it's just the goddamn bloody school filters (rebellion-inductive).  I can't seem to upload photos to blogger, either, or use iChat, and my mail programme won't send, though it can receive.  I've got to get to the tech guy and have it all straightened out, but for now you'll have to perch tensely on the edge of your chair and just keep refreshing this page. 

And my lovely next-door friend has just returned with notes on my disaster of a literacy narrative, so I'll sign off now.  Weekends used to be a nuisance, but they're becoming my drug... why is it only Wednesday?  No matter, I'm going to read a bit of Emma before bed tonight.  God, Austen is becoming my second-choice narcotic. 

Rosh Hashanah, happy new year.  The Jewish astronomy teacher is volunteering to take people to the nearest synagogue.  I think I'll go this weekend, just to see how they manage it up here.  

Oh, and the dorm dog got into my room today and ate my dried meat.  I've been leaving the door open because I've lost my key.  Whatever.

Frustrated, Homesick and Generally Happy

Merhaba, everyone, and happy July fourth ıf that's what you go for.  I love fireworks, but who doesn't?  I missed school this weekend, if you can believe it, because it's turned out to be the time I can unwind a little with people who speak fluent english.  Living wıth my host famıly ıs great, fantastic really, but it's also nıce to be in a constant settıng for a bıt.  Yesterday after goıng to the haırdresser's wıth my mother and sıster:

(he didn't speak englısh, so I only found out afterwards that thıs ıs permanent) I went bowlıng wıth Alkım and her frıends, and we had dınner wıth some old frıends of my parents.  The same frıends, plus the guy's brother and hıs famıly, came over thıs evenıng.  I ımprovısed a couple pıes - one apple and one made wıth tınned blueberrıes I brought ın my suıtcase - and they were very well receıved, whıch made me happy.  I felt a tiny bıt homesıck for the fırst tıme when I tasted the blueberry (I am the dısqualıfıed champıon of the Maıne State Blueberry Pıe Contest 2010), and the US embassy ın Ankara set off fantastıc fıreworks, whıch we could see from our balcony here. 

Earlıer today, my anne and sıster took me t Atatürk's mausoleum, whıch was very ınterestıng.  There are soldıers there who don't move at all, sımılar to the ones around Buckıngham Palace, and the structures and museum there are very dramatıc.  Turkısh people really, really love Mustafa Kemal, as Atatürk ıs also called, to the poınt, ıt seems to an outsıder, or worshıp or deıfıcatıon.  From what lıttle I know, he was a great guy wıth revolutıonary ıdeas way ahead of hıs tıme, and I can't thınk of a sımılar hıstorıcal leader who gets such posthumous adoratıon.

After the mausoleum we vısıted Ankara castle, whıch ıs a gorgeous stop, though I haven't fıgured out the hıstory yet.  Let me mentıon here that today ıt was 40 degrees celcıus, before the thunderstorm set ın, and almost unbearably brıght outsıde.  We ate lunch ın thıs ıncredıbly cool restaurant wıth crumblıng tıle rooves and two women ın headscarves who sat and prepared our food over a sort of ındoor grıll.  Then the castle ıtself - one of the hıghest poınts ın Ankara (thıs ıs a serıously underrated cıty, people, you should come here) and very old and beautıful.  So, yes, I am more than exhausted.  Oh, and we got up at noon thıs mornıng.  TUrkısh breakfasts on the weekends are the best thıngs imaginable.  Helva ıs my new favourite food, and we had omelette, olıves, pancakes (okay, that part's not so Turkısh), cheese, simit....Mmmm! 

So...I'm actually too tıred to wrıte anythıng more,  so I'm just goıng to show you some of the pıctures I've taken...apologıes for thıs completely ınexcusable excuse for bloggıng....ıt's just too hard to stay awake when you've been toastıng pıe all evenıng and readıng Paradıse Lost all nıght for a week.

Grr.  Okay, blogger beıng dıffıcult.  More tomorrow, I promıse and I do apologıze.  Bye.

A Post With A Ridiculous Number Of Pictures

Selam, everyone.  It's the end of a beautiful hot day, and I'm packing right now.

AFS has very strict rules about what you can bring, and I have to keep my luggage under 44 pounds.  I'm culling my clothing selections to make room for the America and Maine-themed things I'm bringing my family.

On Saturday night, I went with my family to dinner with some friends who used to live in Turkey.  They put on a wonderful evening, and we watched a slideshow of photographs projected on a sail outside.  It kept billowing back and forth in the wind, and we made a lot of jokes about all the earthquakes in Turkey.  We ate the most delicious turkish food - grilled meat, aubergine, and feta cheese wrapped in phyllo and deep fried.  I made baklava for the first time, and was very pleased with the way it came out.

I spent yesterday with two lovely friends from the AFS orientation.  One of them, Silvia, is from Indonesia and going home next weekend after a whole year in Augusta.  The other, Danielle, lives here in Maine and is going to Turkey on NSLI-Y as well, for a semester.

We cooked Indonesian fried rice, which was absolutely delicious, and a lovely syrupy middle-eastern dessert.  Silvia stayed the night, and only just left.  I went to work babysitting for a couple hours while she hung out with my mum and some other mothers and kids at my house, and when I got back we went to the beach.  We waded, caught hermit crabs, and drew maps in the sand of the US, Indonesia and Turkey.

We also wrote our names in the sand.  She did hers in Arabic, and I wrote my hebrew name, לאה (Leah).  I think Arabic is far more güzel than Hebrew.

Some guys from my school showed up at the beach, and I introduced her, and when we left we put flowers on their various cars (identifiable by the college bumper stickers they sport.  Notable is the Harvard convertible) for them to find.  Then we went kayaking, which Silvia had never tried before.  She got quite good at it, and we were very happy and tired by the end.

I am SO excited about going to Turkey.  I fly to New York the day after tomorrow for the orientation, and on Friday to İstanbul!  I've found my host mother and sister, Didem and Alkım, on facebook and we've added each another as family.  They seem so nice, I just can't wait to meet them.  My host father is a chemical engineer, my anne studied psychology and works as a sales manager, and Alkım loves rock and plays the piano.  They've been to London, too, which is really great since I lived there for the first nine years of my life.

These rocks are just some pictures I took at the beach, but I am so enamored of the sharpness achieved by the Lumix that I couldn't help it - even if I kind of am echoing Ian's posts.  Whatever, he does it better.  In any case, I implore you to click on these to enlarge them and marvel.

And with that, my dears (sevgilim in Türkçe), I must away to my suitcase and figure out how to make it all weigh something that I am capable of lugging around Türkiye on my own (I'll have you know that I lugged some pretty damn heavy kayaks today, through the stickiest mud thusfar traversed by womankind).  I'll try to fit in another post before I leave, and then I'll be writing from Ankara!  I imagine that I'll be quite a mess when I first get there, so you must bear with me.  And just because this is a post with a ridiculous number of pictures, I'll throw in just one more:

İyi geceler.

Porcelain

And one more for the road...

Illustrated News

Merhaba again, everyone. This is utterly shameful. You are going to think I have absolutely nothing to do, no friends, no life in general, which isn't really true. But I am thoroughly in love with my camera and want to show you everything, and, this being another ridiculously hot day for Maine (it was 90° Fahrenheit yesterday!), I have opted to stay inside and edit photographs just for you. Above are two pictures from the farmers market, my first attempts at food photography. Black and white in Türkçe is siyah ve beyaz.

Below, I demonstrate to you the inconceivably amazing powers of the Lumix. The two cropped shots are just that - little zoom-ins from the original pictures, and look how sharp they still are! I am totally in awe of this. I also like the smaller shot of the arm and hand because, if you don't see the original and don't know these two friends of mine, it's hard to figure out whether the hand and arm belong to the same person.

News: only 4 days until I leave! I didn't receive a reply about my host family, but the old information has appeared back on the site, so I'm guessing there was just some kind of glitch on the AFS web site. I've also gotten an email from my host mother! It's just a short note, in slightly broken english, but very sweet... I can't wait to meet them. My sister in Ankara is 13, just like my sister here, my father is 39 and my mother isn't telling her age - in a goodnatured and humourous sort of way. She says "we look forward you to be a member of our familiy" Well, me too. I am çok excited.

I'm not babysitting today, so maybe I'll go to the beach. I kind of feel like finding a butterfly to photograph, too. And I must do some RosettaStone... If you know how to download video files from cameras, please do leave a comment. I can't figure it out. Teşekkurler!











Tamam (that means OK, I just learned it), Güle güle!