Le babysitting

Another way I spent my time was as a nanny. After a few weeks of living in Paris, I decided to fight the waning value of my US dollar by exploiting my valuable EMT status ("English mother tongue"). Through a friend, I found a weekly employment as the babysitter for Lina, an eight year old living with her mother in the 16th arrondisement. Specifically, they live at the Metro Trocadero (très chic) on the second floor of a Hausseman apartment with a little dog, a piano and a nearly empty refrigerator with only Nutella, liqueur and yogurt inside. Elles sont très parisienne. I looked after Lina on Wednesdays from noon until her mom returned home around six. Each week we went to McDo's (despite my better judgment) for lunch on our way to theater class, then came home and usually walked the dog, did homework, and played lots of games while speaking English. Attending a bilingual school, Lina speaks very good English, and will probably soon surpass me in secondary language skills. However, she did tire from time to time, at which point we would either speak in French or gibberish for a while.
One of Lina's preferred activities when it was nice out was to visit the park next to the Trocadero. It is a lovely park in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower and she sometimes played on the playground or climbed the trees, but we spent most of the time by a small pond where we could always find several large rats to chase. Bleh. Maybe it's because wildlife is so sparse in her neighborhood, but she really loved those rats."Look, Rebecca! A rat. He is very...grand!"
I have several memories of great adventures with Lina, like locking ourselves and the dog, Bobi, in their kitchen and chasing her through the Trocadero fountains. Before this job, I hadn't babysat in a few years and I was reminded how different friendships with kids are from adults. Like when playing a game of Chat Colour (Color tag) she would often bend and side-step the rules. I was inclined to be irritated and take offense, only to realize that she had no deceitful intentions whatsoever. She knows how to cheat, yes, but the deceitfulness of the world hasn't rubbed on to her yet. I think it was also refreshing, after walking around in a city where everyone wears sultry or emotionless masks all day, to just play and act weird.
My experiences as a nanny and some of the family/mother drama it entailed often reminded me of the book The Nanny Diaries. I sometimes feel like I, too, could fill a book with accounts from the inside of a wealthy, cosmopolitan family with high standards for everyone who walks in the front door. As a result, it was very bittersweet to leave their family. I sincerely hope that Lina has only wonderful, loving nannies in the future, however numerous they may be. 

Lina in a rare moment of voluntary piano practice.

Scaling the hallway.

Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it. Luke 18:17

catstanbul

Topkapi Palace

Dolmabahce Palace

Dolmabahce Palace

Galata Tower

Grand Bazaar

Blue Mosque

Ancient Cisterns

Hush Hostel (my hostel), Asian side

In Fethiye

Fethiye: everything you could want in one place

To round out my time in Turkey, I spent a few short days on the Mediterranean coast in the small city on Fethiye. Ozgur's parents (Suzan and Muharrem) graciously hosted me. His sister (Aysegul) also visiting Fethiye on holiday with her son (Ozan, age 7), is married and lives in England and spent tons of her time showing me around the area and translating. Ozan was born and raised in England, so despite some initial troubles with my crazy American (Japanese sounding?) accent, I also spoke and hung out with him. Five star hospitality, in every aspect.
I say that Fethiye has everything you could want in one place because it is basically this little enclave up against the Mediterranean surrounded by mountains. Muharrem and Suzan have a large garden in front of their home, where Muharrem spends most of the day working, and from where Suzan gets many of the ingredients for her delicious cooking. As in Ankara, I wish I had taken photos of the food because it rocked. At least the delightful dishes are ingrained forever in my taste memory. There were these pastries filled either with a thin layer of garlic minced meat or feta and something green, maybe basil. Mmmm. I ate them with each meal (including fourth meal). There are four houses on their little block, surrounded by fields and farms. Each of the homes are inhabited by a member of the extended, and we spent a lot of time visiting and drinking Turkish coffee and tea, or nescafé, and socializing. One day I drank ten teas and coffees gratis! Although too cold to swim, we visited a few beaches that are practically therapeutic just to look at. The neighboring Greek village was also a highlight. Okay, let's get on with the photos:

Garden. I probably ate those grape leaves in the foreground.

Old shed in front of their home.

Bay. Thatz Fethiye off to the left.

Aseygul and Ozan, putting up a bit of a fight. He wasn't a big fan of taking photos with anyone else. But he was a master photagrapher.

Swingin with Ozan along the bay coast.

 Ozan, Suzan and I walked around behind their house, toward fields of vegetables and ascending to the mountains. Ozan proclaimed it the best adventure of his whole life.  

Suzan catches us a baby goat to pet.

Frolic.

Two baby chicks. Pooped on my hand.

That beach therapy.

Old Greek village. After independence in the 20s, this town full of Greek people was evacuated back to Greece and abandoned. Asyegul specified that the community had not been entirely isolated from the Turks. There were inter-marriages and friendship making the schism painful. It has become quite desolate, yet entirely open to exploration.

A Turkish bridal magazine was having a photo shoot behind an old church. It was a bit spellbinding.

The other side of the church and beyond.

Evidently it's insane to only spend seven days in Turkey. Ozgur recommends that I return to Fethiye exclusively for at least three weeks, to really benefit from la vie en Turquie. I hope that I will someday, to visit the people I met plus see some other treasures, including Izmir, Antalya and my old buddy Murat (high school AFS student). Plus it would be cool to learn Turkish. In the meantime, anyone want some tea?

part of the family

The rest of my visit in Turkey was spent with various parts of the Oztabak-Avci family. I took the train from Istanbul to Ankara early one morning, getting to take in the Northern Turkish countryside in all it's glory. Green hills, orchards, farms- beautiful. Elif, a family friend who formerly lived with us in Shorewood, picked me up at the train station. Elif's husband, Ozgur, moved back in with my family for the past year as he finished his PhD at UWM while Elif and their daughter, Elfin, returned to Turkey. So for a short period his family hosted me in Ankara and then Fethiye while my family hosted him in Milwaukee. Darling.
 So, Ankara. I was with Elif, Elfin and Elif's mother, Meral. Here's a photo of them, plus Elif's grandmother, Bedia who joined us on the last night. That makes four generations of women on one couch. I was dying because it was so wonderful.

Meral (mom), Elif (daughter), Elfin (granddaughter), Bedia (grandmother)

Ankara is the new capital of Turkey since the 1920s when it became a republic and moved the capital from Istanbul. Elif and Elfin speak English in addition to Turkish, but Meral and Bedia know very little English and of course, I know no Turkish at all. I spent some time with just Meral and Bedia, and the funniest thing was that the communication barrier between us did not stop them from talking. In Turkish. They just chatted on and sure enough, although I didn't know any of the words, I often understood to a pretty high degree what they were saying. Elfin was born in Milwaukee 5 years ago when both Elif and Ozgur were at UWM doing their PhD's. She and I went to the same preschool (UWM daycare, holler). So while at first she was very shy about it, her English came back quickly and we had a grand time. 

Meral prepared us delicious meals (think olives, tomatos, yogurt, garlic, phyllo dough, grape leaves) in addition to some top notch restaurant experiences (kebap, meatballs, baklava, mmmmm) around the city.  Some photos to illustrate the other things I did:

Elfin being super cute. Although I ruin it a bit.  

Atatürk's mausoleum, which contains Atatürk's tomb and a museum of his leadership and of the Turkish War of Independence. Having led the war and then becoming the first president, Atatürk is the father of the Turkish Republic and is generally well-love in Turkey.  

My shoulder at the mausoleum. 

Meral brought me around the mausoleum and other parts of Ankara that morning. 

Elif at the Middle Eastern Technical University soccer field. Elif is a professor of English literature in the department of  English Instruction there. Devrim ('revolutiom) in the background was painted by students in forty years ago and the university could not manage to remove it. Apparently there were some very bright chemistry students involved in the maneuver.     

Me and Elif on campus. METU is a huge university with a huge campus that functions like it's own little city: banks and grocery stores and a pharmacy. It would be terribly fun to be a student there. 

A campus building where we saw a classical guitar concert.

A painting from an art show at the University. 

Yesterday after our Memorial Day cookout, I showed Ozgur (Elif and Elfin's husband and dad, respectively) all of my photos from my time in Turkey. A few weeks ago he completed his PhD, so will be returning to Ankara on Thursday. He is greatly anticipating the reunion with his family and country. "That will be, yes, a really great day," he said, beaming, after describing seeing Elif and Elfin after his long journey. Couldn't be happier for them.

La Turquie

Secretly I'm back in Wisconsin already, but I have plenty more to share so I'm going to continue blogging about the semester for a while. 

The second part of my Spring break was spent around the country of Turkey. For a few years, Turkey has been the country I most wanted to visit, probably due in large part to the three Turkish students my family has hosted recently. During both my first and second years of college, I applied for summer study abroad programs in the region: one in Nicosia, Cyprus and the other in Izmir, Turkey but didn't end up going on either because of a cancellation and deciding to go to Egypt instead. But, last month, I finally made it there! Albeit very ephemerally. But still, Turkey!

First I went to Istanbul for two nights by myself. I stayed in a hostel on the Asian side of the city and met a few really nice girls also there by themselves. However, I spent more of the time turing alone because my pace was slightly insane due to my time constraint. It was my first time really in a city where I knew no one and none of the language. For a while it was fun, but then just okay. I'd rather be with people. Luckily, even in a city of 13 million, Turkish people are really nice. I accidentally went into Paris mode a few times and started pushing my way through crowds on the Metro and ferries, which was absolutely unnecessary. Turkish people don't push. They also would drop what they were doing to help me find where I was going. Which may have been partly attributable to my blonde hair. But nice nonetheless.

There were a few things about the city that reminded me of Cairo, where I spent the summer in 2009. Mostly the mosques, the tea, the headscarves and the bazaars. But really, Istanbul is unlike any other city I've seen. At the delta of two rivers on the bank of the Sea of Marmara, there are three distinct landmasses connected by bridge and ferries: the west is the old city, the north is the new city and the east is the asian side. I never quite arrived at figuring out the ferry system and thus had plenty of extra long rides around the city. But it was sort of like a cheap tour cruise. Here are some photos.

Turkish Tulips- a national symbol of the Republic. They are everywhere and in every color. In fact, Holland got their first tulips from the Ottomans way back.

Outside of the Blue Mosque

Inside the Blue Mosque. 

Houses.

Inside the Dolmabahçe Palace. 

Dolmabahçe Palace gate. 

A cool floor in the Dolmabahçe Palace. We weren't supposed to take pictures inside, so most of my sneaky pictures are blurry. But look up photos of the chandeliers. They are absolutely enormous, the largest in Europe.

Metro entrance. 

Fishing off the bridge between the old city and the new city. Lots of yummy fish sandwiches under this bridge. 

Street view of the Galata Tower.

Haydarpasa station: the entrance to Asia. 

The underground cistern. I got in after-hours and for free because there was a modern dance and music concert the evening I was there. Vive la danse. 

Corpul Pacii: Moldova

Joyeuses Pâques! Happy Easter! I just returned from my spring break which, in this lovely country, is two weeks long. First I went to Moldova and then to Turkey. I'm going to have to write about them separately in order to not be overwhelmed with wonderfulness. 

So to commence: Moldova. You may ask why I chose to visit this small Eastern European country, especially when I have not yet been to many of the European destination spots, like Italy, London or Prague. Hopefully I will someday make it to those wonderful places. But currently I have two dear friends, Jess and Vin Noth living in Cahul, Moldova as they serve in the Peace Corps. And in my experience, visiting 'locals' always trumps simply being a solo tourist, no matter what locale. Here we are in their kitchen:

  Vin and Jess have been in Moldova for almost 21 months now, with about 3 remaining. Jess was my youth group pastor in Middle School, and Vin led my High School youth group. Additionally, they're the bomb. Talk about every Eastbrook Church youth's dream: to hang out with them exclusively for four days. In Moldova. While in the Peace Corps. !

I flew into Chisinau, the capital city and we spent the first night and day there. There are about 2 million people in the city, if I remember correctly. My initial impression was that it looked just as I imagined Russia looking. It was, in fact a Soviet state until the early 90's. Apparently much of the upper class remains nostalgic for the Soviet era and a bunch of Lenin statues remain around the city. While I was there, we visited the Piazza (the central market where you can buy everything), the city center and took a routiera (mini bus: the Moldovan form of public transportation) to Orhei Vechi, a monastery in the side of some clifs. 

In the meat market. Every and all parts of the pig sold here.  I had a little Lord of the Flies episode at this stall. 

Attacked by a tiger in the city center. In the background is the plaza which has a bell tower, a beautiful Orthodox cathedral and an Arc de Triomphe (to the left of the frame).

The inside the cathedral.

Me and Jess near Orhei Vechi (the monastery/monk coves). Jess can talk with those horses in the background. 

Cliff in which the monk coves are found. 

Inside a monk cove. Women have to cover their heads and wear a skirt.

Next we drove three hours south to their city, Cahul. Although most of my time was spent in the cities, Moldova actually remains a rural country full of small villages. We drove through several of them, each with an abundance of vineyards, cattle and small brightly painted houses. Moldova is a Peace Corps country because it is still very much a developing nation. With it's turbulent history between various empires and powers, it was in the end spit out as independent but not well equipped.

    My time in Cahul was great because I got to see a bit of what their lives in the Peace Corps looks like. I saw much of the city through tagging along with them as they carried out their jobs and projects. Jess is in the 'health' category and Vin is in 'development,' and it seems like they both have, over time, found several areas in the city where they can pour energy and make an impact. Some photos: 

Vin posing in front of the muddy street. It rained pretty faithfully throughout my two and a half days making the roads a bit difficult. Here we were on our way to meet with the YWAM Discipleship Training School (DTS) in Cahul where Vin has led and taught on worship a few times. It's Cahul's first DTS, consisting of three Moldovan girls. Praise God.  

Jess in front of the High School where she teaches health. She teaches three 11th and a 7th grade classes, which I visited. In each class she interviewed me on my experiences in Haiti and Egypt and how it's shaped my goals for the future. It was super fun. 

A crowded routiera. 

Here's Vin with some of the kids in the after school civics club called "The Village" where the kids have to invent, create and run a mini society to learn about civil responsibility. 

 There were tons of other events I saw and people I met while in Moldova. Did I mention that Jess and Vin speak fluent Romanian?  I was planning to leave on Thursday but ended up staying until Friday because when you're with people who totally love their country, it makes you really love it too and not want to leave (at least that's what happens to me). I could tell that it will be difficult for Vin and Jess to up and leave Moldova in a few months, but it will be great to have them back in Milwaukee. Peace Corps + Eastern Europe: A+.