Things I Have Learned - Week 3

I am trying to post things as I learn them about once a week. Sorry these are not in order, but I just wrote as I thought about things.

1. An Umbrella is a must have!
I must take an umbrella to work. Walking from my office to the shuttle stop is only a three minute walk, but it seems much longer when it is raining. My walk from the shuttle stop to my apartment is about five minutes (up hill), but that is sufficient time to get soaked if you don't have an umbrella and/or rain coat. Lesson learned.

2. Starbucks can alter the strength of your coffee.
The Starbucks here always asks if I want my coffee "softer" and I usually say, "no, I would like it stronger." But they always tell me that it is already the strongest possible. Apparently the Turks like their coffee a little less strong, but then when they serve Turkish coffee, is it super strong. I also don't know how to order coffee in Turkish yet, but I struggle through and usually get what I want.

3. You can argue your way out of an accident.
I take a shuttle bus to work every day. Yes, I could walk, but I am lazy. I would say it is about a mile and a half walk, but I haven't measured it. I don't know that I am lazy, I just don't want to walk that distance carrying my backpack and having to wear tennis shoes with my professional clothes. Maybe I am too vein. Either way, they provide a free shuttle that runs from eight a.m. until nearly midnight. When I was on the shuttle bus yesterday, our driver was trying to merge and bumped a car in front of us. Another car didn't give way, so of course he blamed the car that didn't let him in instead of taking his fault. He argued from his seat (in the bus), which the guy argued from just outside his car. After a lot of hand gestures and yelling (of course in Turkish), the guy threw up his hands and drove off. I guess there was no harm, no foul.

4. Grocery delivery is amazing!
I live on the third floor and I have no car (yet), so carrying my groceries from the store by taxi, walk up a large hill, then carry my groceries up three flights of stairs is not my idea of fun. Some of the other teachers that I met here told me about a grocery delivery service that you set up online, so I ordered my groceries and four hours later they came. You can choose your time when they are delivered and they can come within a few hours of your order. The guy brought them all the way from the store to my door for $1!! It was fabulous. My order was accurate and they gave me a list and a receipt. I was so impressed. I will only be getting my groceries by delivery now. So fantastic!!

The only problem with grocery delivery is that the website is partially in English. The directions are in English, but the products are listed in Turkish with a loose translation. You can see the screen shot below. So, for example, with chicken, it says "meat, fish" which does not help me when I am trying to order chicken. So, I guessed on a lot of things and then just made notes when the order came. I also had an issue with the quantity. I didn't know how much a kilogram of something was, so I just ordered one of each and then made notes. A kg of eggplant is 5 large eggplant, but 10 small cucumbers. It turns out that a kg of lemons and a kg of plums is a lot. Oh well, I will learn for next time. The prices for fruit and vegetables are much lower than the U.S. (maybe half), but meat, frozen pizza, and alcohol are the same or just a little bit more. I also paid $8 for a jar of peanut butter and a little over $3 for a bag of peanut M&Ms, but whatever. I wanted some comforts from home, so I will pay the exorbitant prices.

5. Instant coffee is the mainstream here.
I do miss the variety of ground or whole bean coffee here like we have back home, but the instant coffee is tolerable. I got used to it in Uganda, but they have really nice varieties here that I have never seen before. This expresso version was more expensive than the regular version, but it makes deliciously strong coffee. I will most likely get a coffee maker, but for now, this is good.

6. Bilkent University knows how to welcome new staff. 

I attended a reception for new staff at Bilkent on Friday evening and was totally blown away with the leadership and the quality of the staff, both new and old. The reception itself was impressive, with hors d'oeuvres (both hot and cold) and magnificent wine. There were waiters coming around to give you a new wine as soon as you finished the last one. Before I knew it, I had downed two glasses of red wine, so I had to put on the brakes and focus on some water. I met such interesting people. Of course, all of the leadership faculty were there, including the Provost, Vice Provosts, Rector, Human Resources, etc. They were super friendly and really wanted to meet all of us. I just stayed in one place talking with my other FAE colleagues and they came up to us. As the came up to us, our director, Tijan, introduced us to them. It was such a nice way to meet some of those in leadership with pretense. The most exciting person I met was Onur Gökçe, former Turkish Ambassador who lectures in the International Relations Department. He was absolutely fascinating. I had to ask him about all of the places he has been and it turns out he was the first Turkish ambassador to Israel. Such an interesting man. I really picked his brain about a lot of things. When you meet people like that, you just want to sit down with them and absorb all of the wisdom they have to give. Such a nice experience. I love that students have access to people like this. Bilkent is known for the quality of its staff, so to interact with such people is an incredible experience. 

7. The students are fresh and ready. 

I have only had one class so far (we started classes on Friday), but the class was really sweet. I was waiting outside the classroom door because I thought there was another class in the room, but it turns out it was just dark. While I was waiting, a student came up to me and said, "Excuse me, are you Jamie Lynn Cardwell?" Of course I acknowledged how I was and the student introduced himself to me. It cracks me up that everything has my middle name of it, but that is okay. I love my name, so it is no big deal. I used an online name generator to ask students to introduce themselves and when my name came up, I introduced myself. After my introduction, the hands shot up. They had several questions for me, including questions about Africa. One student even admitted he read my blog. I thought that was so impressive. I enjoy writing my blog and I know people read it, but I am amazed that so many people do read it. It is humbling that people read my ramblings and definitely encourages me to continue blogging. 

8. Bodrum is a crazy place for a holiday. 

I joined up with some other teachers to go on holiday to Bodrum for Bayram. Bayram is the Turkish word used here for holiday. This particular holiday lasts for four days and then the government declared Friday a holiday too. So, technically we have 9 days off (with weekends). Everyone was buzzing a few weeks ago about where to go for the holiday and I met up with some other teachers who were planning to go to the beach. I love the beach, so I knew that I wanted to join them. So, we booked our trip and headed out.

Our flight was early on Sunday morning. Bodrum is about 700 km or about a 45 minute flight. It was very easy to get here. It is on the western coast of Turkey with beautiful, sweeping dramatic views. Life here seems a little bit slower and the sun is always shining. It is clearly a tourist area with many accessible shops, fresh seafood, and wifi everywhere. I love the outside areas that everyone has and how everyone sits outside all of the time. It actually reminds me a little of Italy. The food is so fresh, especially the tomatoes, olives, and cheeses.

It is amazing how kids are kids everywhere. While working on my blog at the hotel, I saw three kids totally engrossed on their ipads. It is a crazy site. They were speaking Turkish with each other and playing games on their devices. This is not the way I grew up, but this is the new generation.

The one thing I learned about Bodrum was that there are a lot of mostly older British women who seem to enjoy the attention of younger Turkish men. They are called "toy boys" and there is actually a documentary about it called "Turkish Toy Boys" on Youtube, if you are interested to learn more. I had no idea that this was the case before going, but I quickly learned about it from the first night. These young guys were dancing with older women, basically at their beck and call. They would bring them drinks on the beach during the day and grind on them at night. It was absolutely crazy. Some of these guys were not even old enough to have hair on their chest! I was so grossed out. When some of them tried to dance with me, I politely refused (well, most of the time). It was just too much for me. I could not believe it. I must say that the bars were fun and the views during the day were absolutely beautiful. We took a boat ride and stopped at various places along the way. The boat ride lasted all day and it was only 60 TL (about $20). That also included lunch and drinks. I was impressed. I was scared at first to jump out and swim, but then I just did it and enjoyed it so much. 

The color of the water was just amazing.

Those are real girls dancing on the bar.

These mussels were stuffed with rice and sprinkled with lemon juice. So delicious. 

I am to the right, just off center in the blue and white stripped suit.

I guess that is all for this week. I will start working on all of the things I discover this next week. It should be a busy one. Thanks for reading and hope you are well. 

Lessons Learned This Week

Well, it has been a week since I have been in Turkey and I have learned a lot of lessons as I have tried to navigate through this new system.

1. Wear comfortable shoes
My first day on campus was relatively easy with just a bit of walking in the morning. But the second day was crazy. I went to training and then I went to my office. But the problem is that I missed the shuttle bus in the morning (we waited in the wrong place), so then I had to walk to main campus, which was several miles. I have huge blisters on my feet, which makes walking a bit painful. I learned my lesson and I will wear comfortable walking shoes and then change into my good shoes when I get to the office. I also will not miss the shuttle bus again!

2. Learn Turkish
Learning Turkish is essential to helping me communicate with others and survive life here in Turkey. I can't even order food or read a menu at this point. I also don't know what anything is at the grocery store unless it is obvious. There are many, many mysterious cheeses, meats, etc. that I'm sure are delicious, but I don't know what they are right now. I also need to learn Turkish to communicate my maintenance requests. At the moment, I have to take someone with me or call someone and have them explain what I need. It is annoying and I feel like a kindergartner. Everyone has to take me around by the hand and show me everything. I know that I will learn, but it is annoying at the moment. I think the coolest thing is that most of the expats who are here speak Turkish. They don't assume is going to conform to them and they don't demand English wherever they go. They learn the language, the culture, customs, and holidays. I love that about ESL teachers.

3. You need a supportive network
This job has an incredibly supportive network - from the people to the services - everyone is so, so nice! I am super, super spoiled. The systems here seem to work incredibly well and everyone is so well adjusted.

4. Bilkent University is everything I expected.
Bilkent University is impressive. Not only is it large, but it is a well, oiled machine. Our offices are well equipped, the staff is knowledgeable, and everyone is very helpful. Bilkent has a reputation here for being an excellent university and it definitely lives up to its reputation. Today I helped out with an English test that all accepted university students have to take to check their level of English. This first test takes about two hours and all students who are incoming to the university take it. So, we had 4,000 students taking the exam this morning. Then, next Monday the students who scored higher will take a longer version of the test to really figure out their level. Apparently about 20% of the students I will have in English 101 have been through the PREP program. This is a program that prepares university students who are not ready to take classes in English at the academic level. After PREP and passing an examination, they are placed into their facilities and get to see me for their first English course. :) I will be teaching three sections of English 101 and I couldn't be more excited about it. In the future, I will design my own topic, but this semester I get to take someone else's topic, which really helps for a soft landing. Learning all of the grading systems, etc. along with dissertation will be enough.

5. The food here is so nice.
The food here is ridiculous. It is seriously the land of milk and honey. The olives, cheese, fruit, yogurt, olive oil, and bread are out of this world. I know everything is grown here, but the availability and accessibility is amazing to me. I can get any type of food I want here and I can even get it delivered to my apartment. Those of you who know me know that this is a dangerous option!

I bought these chips and thought they would be spicy, but they aren't. Kind of BBQ like.

food at the Bilkent cafeteria - yes that is baklava

6. You will cry at least once in your first week. 

I had an issue on Wednesday (the same day I got the blisters) and I had reached my breaking point. Jet lag is a crazy thing. It seems to sneak up on you and today was the first day that I actually had time to catch up. On Wednesday when I got home, I just wanted to heat up something, watch Netflix, and go to bed. The maintenance guys came by to bring me some extra chairs and remove a door from the kitchen. I asked the guy how to turn on the stove and he showed me. So, after he left, I turned on the stove. About five minutes later, I head a loud pop, saw smoke, and my electricity went out. It seriously scared the crap out of me. I haven't lived a long in about four years (well, except for Africa) and it was too much. So, I went downstairs to one of the other teacher's apartments and her husband came back up because we thought a blew a breaker. Apparently, it was more serious than that. So, I called maintenance and they came about 45 minutes later. In the meantime, I was on the phone of with a friend and I walked out into the stairwell to wait for maintenance and the wind caused my door to slam shut. Of course, I didn't have keys, so when the maintenance guy came, he had to call someone else with the keys. So, we waited in silence (because I don't speak the language yet) and then the other guy came. They checked my stove and told me not to use the oven, but I could use the burners. We had to do this using my cell phone while talking to one of my Turkish friends so he could explain what was happening. I would tell him and then he would tell the guys. It was crazy. I must learn the language. They flipped my electricity back on and said they would be back on Friday to work on it. After they left, I just sat down and cried. It was all too much...the culture, language, work, jet lag, new people, etc. It happens and I know to expect that. So, I had my moment and it passed quickly. Today (Saturday), they brought me a new stove. It seems to work beautifully, except I need to print out the conversions for the temperature in Celsius. I will figure it out. Hopefully, that will be my last issue with the electricity. 

7. The top floor is great except...

when you need to do laundry (down three floors) or bring up groceries (two floors). Holy moly I am getting my exercise. This will help with all of the amazing food that I am eating! This is a picture of the face of one of the washing machines downstairs. There are six free washing machines downstairs and they are great. However, the cycle I chose took like two hours, so I will take the recommendation of my colleague and use a different setting. I am definitely too used to convenience back home. There are no dryers, but I have three balconies and a drying rack that I can use to dry my clothes. The washing machines are much smaller than home, so I plan to do a few small loads a week. Then, I will have space to dry all of my clothes.  

I guess that is all for now, but I am sure there will be many more lessons.