Things That are Expensive in Turkey (Relative to SoCal Prices):

Cars, even used
Gas ($8 - $10 a gallon!!!)
Meat (including a package of 8 hot dogs from the grocery store for $7!)
Potted plants
Gym membership
Canned corn
Electronics, good and funky brands
Filtered coffee
Apartments (nice one in our city, $250,000)
Paper plates and cups
Laundry detergent
Toys from the USA

Good-Bye for Now, Istanbul

Will you ever be mine?

Wide and Deep

This is the Bosporus, the thin waterway that separates West from East and divides Istanbul. How wide is the separation between the continents, for me, a far Westerner? Sometimes I cannot understand, and cannot be understood. And cannot be made to be understood, as much as I want to understand. Or maybe it is not my fault. I am trying, I have tried. Unfair, unfair.

Concentrate on Art

Yesterday on Istiklal Caddesi I saw a few art exhibitions, one that included work from John Baldessari and Jenny Holtzer (it was a group show on art and Freud) and another of some European performance artists. Today we revisited the Istanbul Modern Art Museum, saw some new Turkish painters. But my main success was that I got a catalog of my favorite Turkish artist, Inci Eviner, who I was pleased to find out is a woman. She uses many media, including sculpture, installation and video, but I really love her ink drawings. Her work often is about the body.
Here’s a quote:
Professionally, I do not think that women artists meet with any obstacles. Indeed, we outnumber the men. Unlike the female artists of Europe and America, we have experienced no difficulty finding a spot in the galleries and museums. On the other hand, we have an exceedingly muddled and agonizing sexual identity. For my generation (born in 50s), in particular, the female body was an arena for ideological models, which were insidiously connected to morality in general. The republican woman transferred the darkness of her own sexuality to men, in order to share their legal rights. In my view this was delusory. The body in socialist ideology, meanwhile, neutered the sexes and made them identical. In our own day, Islam controls women by covering them up. I feel that in Turkey the female body and the ideologies which surround it should be excavated and brought to light. Only then can there be a sound basis to discuss realms of freedom. If women in recent years have produced important work, it shows that they are traitors. They have betrayed the art training which was deemed suitable for their delicate natures, and betrayed as well their fathers, brothers and husbands.”
I’m trying to concentrate only on art and career right now, as the rest of my life is … I just got an exhibition for June in Ankara, so that’s good. I need to do a new project, maybe performance art starring me, Kloe, and critiquing an aspect of Turkish culture that is driving me mad… needs more thought.

Assassination

These are the flower sellers on Taksim Square in Istanbul, where I spent the afternoon with an old friend. When we returned to the hotel we saw on the news that a well known Turkish-Armenian intellectual and newspaper writer had just been assassinated on the street in Taksim in broad daylight. My friend, who happens to be Kurdish and very left leaning, explained that the writer was outspoken on the Armenian genocide question. The tv images showed him in his study filled with books and art. He took three bullets to the head.

The Jetson’s Lifestyle

We talk to our family in SoCal by video conference call several times a week. I can’t believe the difference this has made in us feeling OK about being away. Let’s just say the family was not pleased to hear we were going back to Turkey for a year. But now the kids chat with SoCal while eating breakfast in front of the camera; it’s almost like being at home with them.
A down side of video chatting is that my parents are making judgments about my emotional and physical state by seeing me—usually at 7am when I’m trying to get cocopuffs on the table, etc., or late at night when I’m tired. These are not my best moments. I wish I had one of those masks the Jetson’s mom used to wear when she got a video call (isn’t it weird the way some things stick in your mind?).
These same parents are arriving tomorrow and we are going to meet them in Istanbul. It still gives me a thrill to go to that Most Beautiful City, so exotic and amazing. I’ll be posting pics!

Why Did We Become Homeowners Again?

My God, there is a lot to be said about renting an apartment as opposed to living in a house. Like, NO YARDWORK. Like, if something breaks, someone else pays for it. Like, no $700 water bills because there was a broken water pipe that no one noticed. Like, smaller space, less stuff, less housework. Like, no alarm system that keeps going off for no reason.
Oh yeah, I remember, if you own a home you can have chickens…

100th Post Rant

Normally I don’t post more than one photo per day, but I want you to get the picture. These are just a few of the photo collages that currently grace our school hallway, a hallway I walk down multiple times each day. They are student work from a basic design course.
Now I know that 18-year-old college students, especially guys, think in imagery like this. They can’t help it. It’s the teacher’s responsibility to guide his students to make the right decisions. I like sexual exploration in art. But there is a difference between making a comment on sexual degradation of women (or men) and participating in that degradation.
So I’m getting all hot and bothered by these collages, and find out the teacher is a bit of an enigma (he doesn’t speak English, or I’d go talk to him in his smoke-filled office). He’s legendary for encouraging young students to let go of inhibitions, which are really present in Turkey. He’s a champion of free speech. A friend told me he’s even a bit of a feminist. But another friend told me he’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and “walks in the snow but leaves no footprints.” Meaning he’s a sexist pig who gets off on his young students.
In any case, I find it appalling that the women in my faculty are subjected to this imagery. My female students are less ambitious and more insecure than my male students, and this sort of stuff doesn’t help. So should I make a scene about this? I have already raised a few eyebrows with the conceptual assignments in my classes, maybe I’d be pushing too much.

And for Contrast…

A painting created by the head of my department and most senior faculty member.

IR in NYC—can’t wait to see you. Am I being cryptic? For a doll, I am very open (at least my grandmother thinks so, too much so!).
XOXO, Kloe

What Sells in Turkey

A painting of a colleague. His last show in Istanbul sold out completely.

Red vs. Blue

Here’s a cute item from the front page of Hurriet, a major Turkish newspaper, from last month, showing the culture wars here:
A Shepard from Konya arrived at a hospital “with severe pain and swelling in his testicles. An immediate ultrasound scan was requested, but radiologist xx refused to carry out the scan because examining male reproductive organs ran against her religious convictions. The patient was kept waiting until the morning, when Dr. yy showed up... unfortunately another headscarf-wearing woman… the 17-year-old patient only received a scan in the afternoon, when a male specialist arrived at the hospital. Doctors then operated on the young man, suffering from a condition called testicular torsion, and removed his left testis, which would almost certainly have been saved had the patient not lost one day at the hospital…” (not that the newspaper has an opinion on this rather racy story).
Sort of reminds me of American pharmacists who won’t fill prescriptions for birth control…

Down

Oh, everything was hard today. It was freezing and hail-snowing. I am so thin I am about to disappear, but I can’t think of what I want to eat. Our Turkish teacher canceled the last class before the final exam, so no review.
And Hubby performed a rescue on my hard drive with all my stuff from SoCal on it. Thousands of documents, none labeled or organized anymore. Every one has to be opened. There are letters I’d written home from when we lived in Turkey three years ago. Although we had wonderful experiences at that time, it has all been tainted in my memory by a family tragedy that hit at the end of that trip. I lost my brother, and everything is defined by this event, like 9/11. Sometimes I feel like I’m inhabiting multiple lives, past and present, Kloe and not Kloe.
I thought it might be hard to live in the same apartment with the same university furniture as last time. And sometimes it is. The couch I lay on for three days as I tried to process the idea that my brother no longer existed is the one I’m sitting on now. I can remember the pity I saw in the eyes of my Turkish friends. And I still regret my decision not to return home right away. That $3000 ticket would have been worth it.
Anyway, I miss him, even though he was not really good at life. I’m not so sure I’m good at life either. I am not really making good decisions.

Kloe’s New Year’s Resolutions

Get some new clothes.
Buy better wine (wine above about $10 is quite good here).
Get my hair done more often.
Don’t act my age.
Don’t discuss health issues.
Don’t talk about my kids in a professional setting. It hurts my career.
Get a job so support my other resolutions!
Take more risks. (And I took a doozy today. Can I talk about it? No. But I’m amazed at myself.)

If I Could Just Learn to Give Things Time

A few months ago I was feeling so alone here, discouraged that I was reaching out and couldn’t get through. Yesterday many Turkish friends reached out to me. My assistant gave me a nazarlik (evil eye for good luck) in a tiny box. My model offered her services in exchange for a small study (solving the problem of yesterday’s post!) My old friends helped me find medication I need. A new friend invited us to her birthday party this weekend. And others gave me warm greetings and Turkish kisses (both cheeks) throughout the day. Hubby is out drinking raki with the boys tonight, so I hope he’s happy too.

Naked Pictures

So I felt like painting during the holiday break. I have hired a model for my own work several times, but she’s a bit expensive, so I thought I’d work from myself in a mirror (I’m cheap). I’m doing these little fast paintings on paper to supplement my other work for a gallery show, as these nudes might sell easily here (well, more easily than my bigger conceptual paintings…)
But looking at them compared to some of the Turkish models, you can really tell which ones are Kloe, and I feel a bit weird about it. Maybe it’s a hang-up with my own body? I don’t know, but maybe I can’t show these studies in Turkey…

Winter Tourism

Afyon hisar (castle is up on the cliff) and town center. Too bad the castle couldn’t be reached in the winter.
Back in our Anatolian City the weather continues to be incredibly mild. I was able to do my Sunday morning walk around the campus (I miss you A.W.) in a sweatshirt.

Imagine This

You are swimming in an indoor thermal pool that smells vaguely of lavender. You dive through a tunnel into the open night. Steam is rising off the water. And falling on your head are snowflakes, so you are both warm and chilled. Your seal-son is bobbing next to you, looking up into the dark and describing how he is traveling in space among the stars. And because you are from SoCal, you keep thinking it’s not snow but ash falling from the sky. This is Anatolia—it both stings because it is harsh and melts you completely because it is beautiful.

Party Girls and Boys

Last week was party week at school, and I went to lots, as I’m shared around between several departments. Early in the week was the Painting Dept. (pictured above), where students have a rock band that is pretty good. Next day was the Printmaking party, more formal, as the Dean is in this department. Then Graphic Design, great decorations, and Ceramics, with hot wine. At all of these parties the profs socialized with the students, something that doesn’t happen as much in the States. Sort of makes a nice atmosphere.
Looks like snow again here. We’re off to Afyon for a few days, where the kids can swim in a warm pool. See ya.

Divas

On recent house visits, where the t.v. has been on as background noise, I’ve seen two rather fascinating and appalling concerts. The first was by Cher. She sang oldies, she wore wigs, she did her best to look 30 when she must be near 60. Her neck has no wrinkles and her face is the same mask it was years ago. Her dancers and musicians didn’t outshine her, and were not thin. Smart. But Cher was so funny in the old days, making sport of her beauty, and now what? How do we age gracefully? When do we bow out?
The second concert was by Madonna. I had heard that she was bringing back the highcut leotard, and there she was, not only in 1970s feathered-bangs hairstyle but also wearing a unitard! She’s muscled, she keeps up with her East L.A. dancers, but who can look good in a unitard? And a white one, too!
During this concert I was having a rather heated conversation with a prof friend about demeaning images of women I see around our department (I’ll write about them in another post), when Madonna stuck her hand down her pants and then licked her fingers. Which caused me to have to get down on bended knee in front of my friend and beg for forgiveness for my sex as he laughed his head off. Hell and damnation, one step forward and two back.

Milk and Honey

For the benefit of my foodies in NoCal, here’s what we ate on New Year’s Eve:
Red lentil and bulgur balls with fresh mint
Grape leaves stuffed with cinnamon rice and pine nuts
Stewed sweet celery root and carrots
Grated celery root, walnut, garlic and yogurt salad
Red cabbage salad
Green salad with pears
Feta cheese and olives (of course)
Roasted red bell peppers and spicy green peppers
White beans
Mixed nuts
Homemade butter from Trabzon with village bread
Raki (men), cabernet (women)
Cheesecake, gingerbread and s’mores (marshmallows from the States)
For the kids:
Pasta and butter
Milk and honey (literally)

First Day of 2007

Kurban Bayram:
Upon arrival for the breakfast, everyone got in line, from oldest to youngest, in front of the 85 year old grandmother. Kissed her hand and touched in to our forehead.
The kids received money and presents.
At the breakfast I ate one piece of liver to be polite.
We then visited other houses, each time taking chocolate. Every house served a plate of food and gave the kids money.

New Year’s Eve:
Casual dining into the night.
Kids all stayed up with legos and hot wheels.
Kids decorated gingerbread cookies and I made a gingerbread house (this was new for Turks).
Big slumber party, and woke up to a warm day that melted most of the remaining snow.

Now what will 2007 bring?

December 31, 2006

Tomorrow is a bit hard to conceive of–even Turks are impressed. No one can remember when the start of Kurban Bayram has fallen on New Year’s Eve. Kurban Bayram is a religious holiday in which each household is supposed to sacrifice a male animal and give to the poor, in remembrance of Abraham and Isaac. It’s something like Thanksgiving in the States, where families get together for a big feast (that goes on for three days). New Year’s has been adopted by Turks as a non-religious Christmas, complete with gifts, tinsel and trees, partying and red underwear (for good luck in the new year, didn’t you know?) So stack Thanksgiving on top of Christmas on top of New Year’s and you have tomorrow.
We’ve been invited for the traditional breakfast (to eat the sacrificial meat), and then we’re going to some friends’ house in the country for a low key party, as low key as things can get with four boys age 8, 7, 6, and 5 together…
Wishing you a New Year filled with love and kisses!
Kloe

Painting, Dancing, Walking in the Cold

Today I woke up enveloped in happiness, and it stayed with me all day.

Kloe, 2006 is Almost Through

Today I taught my fifth grade English-ers, and they were CRAZY, off the wall, ready for holiday. I feel your pain, grade-school teachers.
I let each student ask me a question:
What’s your name? Mrs. Bratz (teaching American titles).
What’s your favorite color? Blue.
What’s your hobby? Raising chickens.
What’s your favorite food? Chocolate.
How old are you? How old do you think I am? Eighteen (this made my day).
Can you swim? Yes, everyone in SoCal swims.
Can you play volleyball and football (meaning soccer)? No, I’m pretty bad at sports.
What’s the matter? (After explaining in what context to ask this question, I thought it a great one. Yes, what’s the matter? I’m living a double life, I’ve lost my appetite, I’m painting too much, I’m in love with Turkey, I’m waiting…)
The headmaster gave me a big bunch of flowers as a New Year’s present and said he wanted to take us to visit his village near Nemrut (in Eastern Turkey). Now wouldn’t that be amazing?

Listening to Intuition

I’m painting a series of portraits of Turkish women. But they are such a damn busy lot, that I started several and the subjects couldn’t come back to sit again for several weeks. During which time I got bored with the paintings. So one day I got a princess coloring book and pasted Beauty/Barbie all over the half-finished portraits. Sort of fun and subversive, cause these are serious women.
I’m thinking that the princesses are so ingrained in our collective culture that they are our modern-day protectors and shamans…

The Day After

Well, I got through yesterday. We went to the only Italian restaurant in our Anatolian City (which is below the only Chinese restaurant—they know the kids by name…) and I tried to pretend I was in a place where Christmas meant something. But today we woke up to a lovely whiteness, and the snow swirled around me all day, and I was in love with Turkey again.

And Know that I am Missing You

As a Christmas present to you, I excerpt from a short story called “The Word,” published in the Dec 26, 2005 issue of The New Yorker:

Then a miracle occurred. One of the last angels lingered, turned, and quietly approached me. I caught sight of his cavernous, staring, diamond eyes under the imposing arches of his brows. On the ribs of his outspread wings glistened what seemed like frost. The wings themselves were gray, an ineffable tint of gray, and each feather ended in a silvery sickle. His visage, the faintly smiling outline of his lips, and his straight clear forehead reminded me of features I had seen on earth. The curves, the gleaming, the charm of all the faces I had ever loved–the features of people who had long since departed from me–seemed to merge into one wondrous countenance. All the familiar sounds that came separately into contact with my hearing now seemed to blend into a single, perfect melody.
He came up to me. He smiled. I could not look at him. But glancing at his legs, I noticed a network of azure veins on his feet and one pale birthmark. From these veins, from that little spot, I understood that he had not yet totally abandoned earth, that he might understand my prayer.
Then, bending my head, pressing my singed palms, smeared with bright clay, to my half-blinded eyes, I began recounting my sorrows…But for some reason I could remember only minute, quite mundane things that were unable to speak or weep those corpulent, burning, terrible tears, about which I wanted to but could not tell…
Embracing my shoulders for an instant with his dovelike wings, the angel pronounced a single word, and in his voice I recognized all those beloved, those silenced voices. The word he spoke was so marvelous that, with a sigh, I closed my eyes and bowed my head still lower.
I shouted it…
Oh, Lord–the winter dawn glows greenish in the window, and I remember not what word it was that I shouted.

Vladimir Nabokov, 1923
Translated from the Russian by Dmitri Nabokov

My Health, It is a Breakin’ Down, or I am Served on a Platter

Last week I was ill and needed antibiotics to cure the problem. Because the most common antibiotic causes me to hallucinate, the pharmacy gave me a weaker one, which a few days later I realized was not working. This time I went to the doctor and got a stronger one.
Problem solved? No, two days ago I awoke looking like I had the jungle fever, which would have been fine if the rash had stayed on my legs, but it traveled to my face and one ear was now a radish. Back to the doctor, who diagnosed an allergic reaction and have me a shot in the butt (how embarrassing, like I was a kid again). I’m very sensitive to any drugs and got totally light-headed, but had a full day of painting planned that I was damned if I was going to miss. I can’t really recommend it, painting high.
I’m writing about this cause it’s a lesson that when you’re abroad, and far from your normal doctor (let alone your step-father the doctor), you’re at the mercy of a totally different system. Not to mention that a favorite topic of conversation among Turks is health problems, so that faculty and staff I barely know were coming up to me in the hallway and wishing me “Gecmis olsun,” get well soon. Humbling, very humbling.

Ninja Mama

Yesterday Kid.01 told me that a woman’s strongest weapon against men is her… purse. Now where did he get that idea?

And Don’t Forget the Winter Solstice

It’s rather a confusing time for us in Turkey now. Four holidays, backed up against each other: Chanukah, Christmas, New Year’s, and Kurban Bayram (the Sacrifice Holiday). New Year’s is celebrated here with Christmas trees, Santa, ornaments and presents. I guess it’s fair, Santa did come from Anatolia. And there is a pagan tradition of decorating a wishing tree with ribbons and rags.
Right about now I’d be panicking in the States, trying to finish buying/making/finding/wrapping presents for all the family members and friends who will give me or my family presents in return. Sort of nice to be out of the loop this year.

New Ways of Thinking

Today I am so happy with my advanced students. I am asking them to not paint, which they do extremely well (see above photo), but to create a “deconstructed body” using non-traditional media. So, abstraction or conceptual art plus installation/video/performance, etc. This is way outside their normal comfort level. And their ideas are fantastic. Really, how many teachers can say this? I am very lucky.

It Can’t be Explained

Painting from the model is always a crap-shoot for me: some days I’m on, some days are just a loss. Today I painted like a fucking angel, like my hands and eyes were controlled by someone else. It flowed calmly–I didn’t make a mistake. Two beautiful models, five beautiful small paintings. Maybe it's a consolation for having to teach through the holidays...

Bush (No, not that Bush)

Note: Stop reading if you have issues with female parts! (However, there is no cussing in this post, Gram.)
Turks are very modest people for the most part. Even in the gym locker room, women cover up on their way to the shower. They avert their eyes from me if I’m not fully dressed. One day I got hot doing the cross trainer, and took off my T-shirt to reveal my sports bra and you’d think I was naked they way people turned their heads away…
This makes it even more perplexing to discover that it is somewhat normal for Turkish women to shave or wax all their hair away that is not on their head. I work with nude models in my classroom, and yep, no hair there. Apparently there is something religious related, about hair not being longer than a wheat shaft. And someone told me her mother started removing her pubic hair as a young teenager, “for her potential husband.”
It sort of weirds me out, do men here want their women to look like young girls? Defend yourselves, my Turkish male friends! If it's just a cultural preference, whose preference is it?

Oh. My. God.

The holidays have turned my kids into raving lunatics.

Solitary and Joyful

Today I was by myself. Which is not normal for a mom of two kids or for anyone living in Turkey, which is a very group-oriented culture. (Hubby and kids were in Ankara for a Chanukah party at the Israeli Embassy.) I went to the gym and sauna. Then I went to my office to work in quiet. I love to paint with no one around, and no one waiting for me.
But late in the afternoon a friend and colleague knocked on my door and said I should come into the city with her. She felt sorry that I was alone, but I'm so glad, as she is a wonderful person who I want to know better. She did her masters at Pratt, and has great English, although she also tries to speak Turkish with me. She deals with a difficult family situation, and we talked about living happy for each day, rather than living for the future. We had coffee at Schlotzke's Deli–yes, var! in the middle of Anatolia, too!
This is one of her paintings. I feel I am loved and enveloped in color.

Amazing

This work, Breath, by Greek artist Nikos Navridis, 2005, was shockingly beautiful. It was a video installation in the Venice Biennial exhibition at the Istanbul Modern. You walked into a dark room and a still image of trash slowly bloomed in the middle of the floor, then started moving as if on a conveyor belt, faster and faster until it seemed to explode. All this lasted about 30 seconds. The sound track was heavy breathing, which made the experience more personal and intense. My students were also very affected. Why was the work so powerful? The content was both political and aesthetic, and duration was brief (no boredom factor), the experience completely engrossing and dizzying.

Be Still my Heart

Get a load of these heels! They are actually artworks of a Turkish friend. He’s made an entire exhibition of “takuye,” the wooden sandals traditionally worn in Turkish baths, but now associated with the Religious Right in this country. Each of his little sculptures is a comment on how dangerous it is for Turkey to be slipping towards becoming an Islamic state. Plus the works are wickedly funny, including an Islamic Swiss army knife, a polygamist purse in which to pack up your wives, and a stretch limo for Islamic politicians, all made from actual takuye.

Ill, not Sick

Today I was very ill with a U.T.I. (if you don’t know what this is be very glad). I walked to work, started teaching and, whammo, was in trouble. Luckily my friends–you saved me, thank you–drove me home and picked up antibiotics for me, which are available over the counter here.
I am ill, not sick, because “sick” sounds like the f-word (see Gram, I didn’t say it) in Turkish. Ill sounds so polite, and I really feel sick rather than ill.
It is really hard to be a woman sometimes.

The Problem with Blogging

I’ve gotten less email since I’ve been keeping this blog. Friends and Family: You may be keeping tabs on an 8 inch Bratz of dubious moral character (that my own sister won't have in her house, I might add), but you’re forgetting that I need to hear from you too! I follow the lives of several bloggers (and I feel I know them pretty intimately–the power of good blogging) but I never leave comments either. I’m telling you, it’s a weird feeling that I’m posting stuff out into the black hole of cyberspace and anyone can read it without responding. Hey, throw me a comment or an email! And for those at my University, whom my service bureau thinks are spammers or terrorists, sorry about that… gel and see me in person. I’m the blond short one in cowboy boots.

Pleasantly Thin

Since we’ve been in Turkey I’ve lost some kilos. It’s rather fun to get on a scale and have no idea how much you weigh because it’s not in pounds. Turkish food is great, and I’m sure I consume my fair share of calories in alcohol, but still I’m skinnier than I’ve been in a long time.
I bought some new jeans at the Gap before we left SoCal. I used to be a size 8, now I’m mostly a size 6, but these jeans were a size 4 and now they bag on me. Come on people, I’m not that small! What does Barbie do for clothes?
Here college age kids are mostly slender, but I’m afraid that’s probably due to smoking. Many Turks, like Americans, pretty much let themselves go over the age of 30. I belong to a snazzy gym here, and I am the most in shape person I've seen working out. And this from a girl who goes to the YMCA back home cause it’s full of old and handicapped people who don’t fit into the SoCal meatmarket mentality. But while Turks may be slightly plump, you never see the obesity here you see everyday in the States. OK, pass the olive oil.

Istanbul Modern

At the beginning of the semester I told the Painting Department that I would like to take my students to the Istanbul Modern, the only contemporary art museum in Turkey, for a field trip. So last Friday at 6 AM several other professors and I piled into a bus with our students for the long trek to that Most Beautiful City. And it was worth it. The museum, only a year old, is fantastic—I’m so happy for the art community of Turkey. The top floor is for the permanent collection of Turkish art, and the subterranean floor is for rotating exhibitions. We saw pieces from the last Venice Biennial. The museum sits right on the waterfront; we drank cappuccino and watched fishing boats unload. I saw great art—will discuss in later posts. I just love to have a museum experience like that!

Istiklal Caddesi

View from an art gallery. I’ve walked this famous street in Istanbul many times and it never fails to impress. Better than Rodeo Drive!

School

Each day we send Kid.01 off to a private (full-immersion Turkish) K-12 school on the service bus. We chose this school because the administration and teachers seemed flexible about having a foreign student, and they have lived up to their promises of extra help for our son.
Each week Hubby and I volunteer for a few hours at this school. In SoCal I volunteer in the classroom because it’s a good way to keep tabs on what's happening the eight hours you don’t see your kid. I haven’t written about these experiences here because they’ve been pretty traumatic. I teach fifth-graders conversational English with some art thrown in. I have seen teachers totally loose control of their classrooms, and they regularly yell at their students. I yell at the students. I’ve also seen a fight, and some other pretty upsetting stuff. To say the students are spirited and physical is an understatement.
But today I finally felt I made some headway. Each twelve-year-old was able to say the following: “Last weekend I ________ and this weekend I will ____________.” We also drew a three-frame comic. Small steps. For more insight on teaching young people in Turkey see www.kellyvaughan.net/blog/wordpress/

Istanbul and Art

Istanbul was great. We saw art, talked art, hung art, and talked some more. Although the institutional scene here is conservative, my fellow artists are hungry for change, and discussing how to do it is a good step.
This Los Vegas type blue building is the Guarantee Bankasi headquarters that hosted our exhibit. Banks do lots of charity and cultural work in Turkey. At dinner I sat next to the Foundation Doctor, a woman who works with poor families in Istanbul full time, sponsored by the bank. She told me that anemia is the biggest problem for kids here, followed by childhood obesity.

Burning the Candle

I am so exhausted! After the opening we ate at Reina, a hotspot Italian restaurant on the Bosporus (full on a Monday night), then we piled back into the minibus for the excruciating five-hour trip back to Our Anatolian City. We arrived at 4 am and I had to teach at 9 this morning. I’ll write more when I can see straight again.

Domestic Mini Goddess

I’m going to Istanbul this afternoon with the painting faculty to open our exhibition there. I’m so happy they invited me to travel with them, and I hope to have great conversations about Art (and to drink some raki with them).
I cooked yesterday for the family, lentil soup for Hubby and chocolate chip bars for Kids. I’m not a great cook, but have been lucky to live with a couple (one Italian, one Turkish) who taught me a lot. I still don’t have the hang of the baking soda here, though.

Grey Skies

Sometimes when you’re living abroad a sense of unreality takes hold of you. You can’t remember your old home clearly. Your new home is temporary, but your mind won’t grasp that fact. You’re afraid no one will remember you back home, but in your new home you fear you are not connecting on any significant level. You know that, as a woman getting older, you are less and less powerful/desirable/lovable, but you deny that time is passing. You are both terribly happy to have some fun, and miserable when the fun is over. You feel guilty that the kids are unhappy, but try to justify it by saying it’s good for them, and you can’t live your life through your kids. Am I rambling? This is what it’s like to be on the other side of the world.

Japanese Animation and the Sailing Channel

For my kids, living in Turkey has come with a bonus: TV. In SoCal we have no television (we do watch dvds). So for the first time in their lives, my boys are watching some mostly-non-violent-if-we-can-help-it commercial TV every day. Kid.02, already big on superheroes, has become obsessed, and Kid.01 is now Mr. Know-It-All thanks to the Discovery Channel. Thanks, Digiturk!