yesyes

Friend no. 2 is also here.

The three of us went out to have a Turkish breakfast yesterday: fried, crunchy dough stuffed with eggs, cheese, and parsley. Turkish tea in the little hourglass-shaped traditional glasses. So fucking good.

Happily full, we walked around a bit by the water, scoped out some of the seaside bars that have tables on the sidewalk three feet from the water we might want to check out later this week. We'll have to come back in the evening to figure out which of this strip of cafe/bars is not throbbing with too loud bass after 11 pm.


By the time we got home from our walk, my family was ready to head to the beach, and so was I. Quick change. Beach—the same one I went to on my first day here, where I swim across from one side of the inlet to the other topless everytime. When I came back from my swim, mom expected to see some sea urchin shells or mother of pearl. "I saw you dive in a couple of times in the distance," she explained. It was a good assumption—over the years, we've collected two big bowls of these things from my dives that decorate the bar that separates the kitchen from the living room and the table in the front yard. But no, not this time. "I was just diving in to put my top back on," I said. She grinned. She knows how I am in the water.

My sister just came back from the front yard and told me the shells in the front just fell off the table and mostly broke. It's fucking windy out this morning. Ah well. Over a decade worth of loot from beneath the sea—there's plenty more left.


Preceded by dad's broken-English tour of the backyard plants peppered with shouts across the yard for agrilinguistic help ("Tildaaaa! How do you say pomegranate tree in English?" "TILDA! What's apricot in English??"), linner was amazing. Whole fish (mmmm, fish cheeeeeeks), artichokes, semizotu salad (which made me realize I cannot tolerate low fat yogurt; to me, it's a waste of milk the same way decaf coffee is a waste of water, not to mention labor). While others had wine, dad and I had raki (Turkish version of ouzo). Half an hour later, dad had a buzz on, was cracking himself up joking around and being goofy. At some point, when I said there was something in his teeth, he started making fun of his fake teeth. He cracked up and told me he could just take them off and started pretending to pick the imaginary teeth in his hand with a toothpick. This was all in Turkish. Sis and mom were laughing, but dad and I were on a different wavelength together (well, maybe not—dad was definitely on the I am no longer sober wavelength whereas I was more on the I love dad when he puts on his goofy self because I have friends over, and he's hilarious when he's got a buzz wavelength). Dad was laughing so hard he had tears in his eyes, which, of course, made me laugh harder. Meanwhile, the non-Turkish speakers at the table hadn't waited for the laughter to subside and the interpretation to begin; they were laughing at their own version of what was happening at the table.

Turkish coffee and watermelon came to the aid of our post-prandial blahs. Then, someone began craving ice-cream. The three of us hopped on a dolmu(s)h, the public transportation minivan that takes people waiting on the side of a street on its route to wherever they need to go for a dollar and some change, and went to downtown Çes(h)me.º We checked out the touristy tchotchke stores, got delicious ice-cream cones for $1, and ate our gelato as we walked by the sea, by the boats that go on daily tours around the coast (we'll be doing that sometime next week). The moon was out and gorgeous over the dark sea. (Remember my favorite word, yakamoz? If not, I'll gladly explain.) Two guys were out with their telescopes and charging 75 cents for promenaders to look at the moon. Brilliant.

A little recap of the day over drinks at a quieter bar in Çes(h)me central, and we get lucky with our timing: the dolmus(h) we catch on the way back is the last van of the night, and I realize it's already past 1 am.





Ah, it's a hard life here...













º s(h) = my substitute for an S that should have a cedilla under it; the letter makes the 'sh' sound.