Amanda's Blog

Turkey Update

We haven't ventured into the city yet, we've just been enjoying relaxing by the sea (85-90F) and visiting with various family who drop by from time to time.  When we arrived in Istanbul Sunday night, we were loading luggage at the curb and Munevver had opened her driver's side door to come around to the trunk to help us load luggage and while we were hurrying to load our things, someone drove into her door!  They only hit the edge of it and the corner of the door popped their tire somehow (doesn't make sense to me either!) but it was crazy.  And they stopped, stared at each other, and moved on.  Even crazier, no yelling!  The door still shuts, but it's damaged. After the airport, Suleyman asked if we could please go to the Home Depot-like store to get a bug zapper (his grandfather had one in Cesme and he loved hearing the zaps).  So we drove and drove and were completely lost amidst the thousands of people barbecuing at nearly 10pm for Father's Day along the coastal road.  It was crazy, but we finally found the store 10 minutes before it closed and got the bug zapper. However, it's rather weak so instead of actually killing bugs, it severely handicaps them and grosses me out.  Also, Suleyman has insisted we sleep with it in the window so I have had to learn to sleep with a giant purple light illuminating the room.  Good times!

We went out to the only restaurant on the peninsula the other night and had a great dinner with all our favorite foods.  Today, Suleyman's two great aunts will come spend the day with us.  I am enjoying making fresh Turkish breakfasts every morning and watching the freighters cross the sea.  This morning, I felt extra ambitious and made a double batch of Asure (Noah's Pudding) so we can all have dessert with our afternoon tea today.  Friday, we'll tour the Princess Islands which from what I've heard is very much like Mackinac Island, Turkish style.  Hope all are well!

In Turkey

Just a quick hello, taking advantage of borrowed wifi.  We've been having a lot of fun here in Cesme with Suleyman's grandparents.  They have taken us just about everywhere in this small town full of antique charm and incredible beaches.  The Aegean Sea is so clear and the beaches are beautiful turquoise.  We've been in the water everyday.  Tomorrow, we pack up and fly to Istanbul (Bayramoglu) for the next 2 weeks with the other side of the family.  Today, I accidentally plugged my blowdryer into the wall using only an adaptor and totally forgot I needed to also plug in a transformer.  Fire shot out of it and charred my hand with a loud POP! that blew a fuse and roasted and toasted my hairdryer.  I have a giant black tattoo on my hand from the plug shape and though it didn't hurt, I screamed so loudly they probably heard me in Greece.  It didn't hurt, but I'll be blowdryer shopping when I get home...

Glad to hear Gramps is doing well in his new place, thanks for the updates! 

P.S.  If you birthed me, please pick up your phone even if the caller ID is unknown.  I keep trying to call and no one ever answers. =(

A Little More Green!

After several gardener interviews, we landed a very nice one.  I took pictures, naturally, from before/during/after the lawn work.  For perspective, here are pictures from when we moved in

You can see the grass is thinning and the dirt is being exposed.  Add a dog, and it just gets worse.  Here's our yard at the absolute worst:

Then a truck showed up with flowers and plants and the gardener prepped the yard to be sodded.  

The next weekend, it showed up again with sod and gravel.  And now, we're back in business.

Shaken, Not Stirred

We had a 4.7 magnitude earthquake on Sunday night and we are STILL having aftershocks now that it's Wednesday! In a 71-hour period,  we've had 22 earthquakes, magnitudes ranging from 1.1 to 4.7, all within 1.04 to 4.77 linear (as the crow flies) miles from our house--Suleyman researched and plotted each one!  The 4.7 occurred just as I was backing out of the garage.  I backed all the way out, just up to the property wall, and had my foot on the brake to shift into drive and the car was still moving!  A lot of things crossed my mind--Did I hit the wall?  Did I run over a person or animal?  Was the engine about to explode?--but then I looked up and saw the garage just shaking all over the place and we just sat there like WHOA.  We proceeded to dinner and watched the news while we ate.  Turns out the epicenter was 3.77 miles from our house!  When we came home, we found that many pictures had fallen from a shelf, breaking 2 of my collectible cows and several picture frames.  The wall-of-many-photos just looked like we were trying to be artistic in our haphazard placement.  The rest of the night had me pretty bugged out.  Then, we had another one while I was napping on Tuesday, a 4.0--an aftershock of Sunday's.  This time, Mom and Dad's picture jumped off the wall and fell down the stairs.  They're strong, though, so they didn't break!  Tonight we had another little shake, a 2.7 that was 2.6 miles away, while I was making dinner.  I'm really ready to stop moving involuntarily.  Tornadoes were much more fun!

On Tuesday, I went to the podiatrist who was not happy with the progress my foot is making.  I'm not either as it seems to have regressed back to its original state, or worse.  I have my left foot in a temporary cast for 3 weeks, and it has already proven to be a total pain in the you-know-what.  The sole is so thick, I have a contraption on my right shoe that balances me (or tries), but already I've tripped several times, stepped on the dog's foot (she cried, so did I), and gotten it stuck under my emergency brake twice.  Stairs take, on average, about 2 minutes in either direction.   Oh, and I get to sleep in it, too.  Fun stuff!  I feel ridiculously useless and it's only day 2.  The plan is to go back 4 days before we leave for Turkey, take it off, check progress, and get cortisone shots in both feet so Turkey will be as comfortable as possible.  I applied for 5 jobs this week, none of which I will hear back from.

Tomorrow night, Matt is coming over for dinner.  He's the guy from CLC back home who moved out here to take a job and most recently had that nasty sinus surgery (after which I his personal popsicle provider).  He asked if he could come hang out so I'm making stuffed pork chops and mashed redskins and strawberry shortcake (which I will not be eating, sadly).  

On Friday night, Suleyman and I are going to the Dodgers vs. Angels game at Dodger Stadium because I miss baseball.  It's not a Tiger's game, but it's as close as I can get!  

On Saturday, we're having 3 gardeners come out to give us quotes on our previously quoted yardwork.  The first gardener we were excited about gave us a ridiculously high quote and when we asked him to give us a breakdown, we received this:   

Perhaps I should've been more specific and asked for it in English.  And if he only wants $80 a month to keep it maintained, is he saying he's doing 8 months worth of labor in the 4 hours he estimates for the initial visit?  I don't think so.  Anyway, we'll diligently obtain other quotes and see if he's way off or we're just clueless.  

I think that's all she wrote.

Google Earth - Panoramio

After all of that fun mapping and playing with Google Earth, I realized that the pictures that you can scroll over (blue squares) are uploaded by the public.  I guess that makes sense, it just never occurred to me.  I created an account with Panoramio today and uploaded my pictures from Paris and Istanbul so now when I look on Google Earth, I see my own pictures!!  I posted airport pictures, mosque pictures, seaside pictures, etc.  I'm the only one to post any pictures in Bayramoglu so that's pretty cool.  If you have pictures of anywhere, it's pretty fun to upload them and pop them on the map.  I think I'll work on posting some pictures of Milledgeville and San Diego and wherever else I've been that I still have pictures from. Thanks again, Pam!  You really got my gears going this weekend!  www.panoramio.com