Her şey yolunda [Everything’s okay]
Hello hello,
I know it’s been a while since my last dispatch and as such there are plenty of interesting things I could relate, but in the spirit of “done-is-better-than-perfect,” I will set a timer and just see what comes out!
My classes have been going well—I’m doing some things from the textbook, but spending most of the class on activities I make myself. It makes for more interesting classes, but unfortunately I am not so good at gauging the level of the recordings I bring in (from Youtube, NPR) and so I think the class has been much more challenging than some students expected or really can handle. I’m working on calibrating that. Part of the difficulty is that some students are ready for and want to do that kind of stuff, and those students (being the most motivated and confident) are the ones who come to class most often and who participate most, the result being that it’s much harder for weaker students to jump on board when they do come to class. But overall I think things have been good, and students have been engaged. Yesterday, during a break, one asked me, “Teacher, why can’t caucasians say the n-word in America?” so I don’t know how they can get much more engaged with language and culture than that!
I’ve been making friends here too! Last week, I met up with one of the other students in my Turkish class to walk along the beach. He offered to make me dinner, and I had such a lovely time talking to him (he is a 60-year-old Swedish-Iranian man who has had a vacation home here for the last 15 years) and meeting his Turkish friend, who promised to take me to see his village, and also to be there for me, day or night, anything I need. I’d been feeling so lonely, and they just hit me with a tidal wave of hospitality and kindness. I don’t have a way to express the kind of gratitude I feel for the warmth that has been shown me.
In his bathroom, shocked at my good fortune!
The director of the school of English has assigned me several projects that are far above my pay-grade (I spoke to a professional about one of them, who called it “ludicrous” that I would be given this task) which really stressed me out and made me wonder, what am I even doing here??? And I’ll admit that coming alone to a new country in the middle of a pandemic when some forms of socializing are illegal can be isolating to say the least. But my colleagues are wonderful! Two Fridays ago, one of them took me on a walk around the center of the city, which was absolutely beautiful. There were people on the beach and street vendors and even someone playing music in the square: all public life that has been dormant for the past year. I also finally visited the famous cave here, known for its stalactites and its alleged power to cure asthma. (And now, after visiting it, I don’t have asthma! Although I also never had asthma in the first place.)
The same colleague also recommended a hiking group, so last weekend I signed up for a day-trip to some waterfalls. Through the tried and true method of asking, “Can I sit with you?”1 I met some lovely people, including a mother and son who I walked with most of the day. I practiced Turkish, I walked down a mountain, I climbed around a stream—what more could I ask?
I have just finished my A1 Turkish class, and I can tell that I am improving. I can usually figure out the main topic of conversation when listening to my colleagues, and I’m able to understand more what people are saying to me. I still have plenty of experiences where I am absolutely clueless (see: every time a bus driver talks to me), but I feel more confident. Today, for instance, I could understand the simple directions I was given—mostly, “Netta, gel.”2
I was pulled into a ‘celebration of the centennial of the Turkish national anthem’ by the Turkish-teaching department, which required me to memorize and recite a stanza of the Turkish national anthem—they’re making a video with various foreign students all reciting it. I wasn’t so psyched about having to be recorded badly pronouncing phrases like “you are the glorious son of a martyr”3 and “this heavenly homeland”4 but I didn’t really see a way out of it, given the quasi-diplomatic purpose of my being here. I’d thought it was over with, but yesterday I was told I’d need to come in today (on my first day off since I got here!) to record it again. I was less than excited about it, but it was actually quite nice to meet the other foreigners (all at more advanced Turkish levels—the only reason I was there was that I was American) and see the very fancy Rektörlük5.
View of the university from the Rektörlük. I didn’t get any pictures of the inside of the building, but lots of gold and marble and mirrors.
Even in a room full of foreigners—Azerbaijanis, Russians, Kazakhs, Somalis, Iranians, Iraqis—I am special for being American and everyone seems so much more excited about me than about everyone else. People want to speak to me in English and are desperately curious about what I’m doing here. (Today, they also asked me if I could speak in an English accent and did not seem to understand why I kept saying I couldn’t.) I met one guy who initially thought I had moved here permanently and was totally baffled. He said, “What, American wasn’t good enough? Everyone is trying to go to America, and you come here?” He turned out to be from Iran, and so I joked, “What, Iran wasn’t good enough?” And he was like, “No! Because of America!” Which, you know what, absolutely fair.
But I love talking to people in those kinds of settings, and me becoming this Iranian dude’s first American friend feels important and like I am actually engaging in global citizenship. Things are opening up here—the weekend curfew is now just Sunday, and restaurants and cafes are now open for limited hours. This weekend, I’m traveling to Cappadocia with the two other ETAs from Minnesota. Suddenly, it seems like my time here is very very short.
Please feel free to respond if there’s anything in particular you want to hear about—I probably need prompting to get to the good stuff.
All my best, Netta