Early Summer 2016

  We had a lovely summer.  My sister and my friend Maura came to us on holiday in June.    They were both so tired due to their busy work schedule and so excited to be here at last!  It was great to see them relax and enjoy themselves as the days went on.  We invited our Turkish friends over for garden parties.  We laughed, eat lots of food, drank wine and chatted under two sun umbrellas as we sheltered from the hot afternoon sun. 

My sister in particular loved being outside with all our friends,  this is something you cannot do every day back home in Ireland. It has been six years since she was here and she really needed a sun holiday!  Our lovely Turkish friends, Dilek and Suha invited all of us over to their beach and to dinner on their balcony.  Such wonderful home cooked food and great conversation.  Everyone so happy and content.   

 We went swimming every day,  my sister would gaze at the roses and the kittens (yes they are growing big and get more cute every day!) as she swam in the pool.  Sometimes she could be seen pulling the odd weed which managed to escape my not so often garden endeavours in this heat. I had to put pressure on her to just sit down and chill out.  She is so used to working that she found it hard to sit still.   

We went often to the beach where we again sat under an umbrella to keep out of the scorching sun.  We swam in the clear waters and it was so great to have company and laughter all around me. We cooked meals at home and eat them on the balcony while we chatted away till the early hours.... We had meals out which we also enjoyed as we watched the beautiful sunsets.  

The day came for their return home.  It was as always heart wrenching to say goodbye.  I had a few rough days......  I immediately went on-line and searched for flights back to Ireland.  After much searching, I found flights to London and from there later that evening to Dublin.  I was ok,  we would be going home at the end of July for a stay of nearly 4 weeks. Things were looking up!

AN EVENTFUL NIGHT

The night of July 15^th started like any other night.  I went to bed around 10pm listened to music until about 11 then turned off the CD. I drifted into a light sleep and woke about 2am to the sound of the “calling to prayer” at the local mosque.  I took a second glance at the bright red display on my clock radio.  That’s odd, I thought to myself, “this guy is way too early”.  The first call to prayer is always just before dawn.  This was followed by an announcement from the loudspeaker from the minaret which I could not make out.  I got up and as I headed for the bathroom, Mr. D. was just finishing brushing his teeth.  He had been up late watching a film.  He said to me he had just checked the BBC world news channel for the usual headlines and that there was a coup going on, according to the BBC, the army were attempting to take over the government!!!   He then said,”  nothing for us to worry about....they have had them before  and the country always bounces back,” ,  we just had to wait and see,  it will all be over by the morning”. 

Well my reaction to this was nothing as calm. To put it mildly I was terrified.  I asked him, “what does this mean, where is it happening? Will someone fly planes over us and drop bombs?  Will we be able to get our flights?  (We had flights booked to visit family in Ireland in 10 days time)

He said it was in just two cities, Istanbul and Ankara and not all of Turkey and just go to back to sleep!

Mr.D is an expert on world history, he has read hundreds of books on the history of Ireland, England, Europe, first and second world wars, Korea, China, Russia, Japan, America, you name it and he can discuss the battles, the leaders, the dates, the kings and queens.  In a quiz, this would be his specialised subject!  So he can recognise patterns of events.  He knows what way things will go as history really does repeat itself.  So this is why he had the foresight and was not filled with fear and panic like me and so many others here in Turkey. Some ex-pats were so afraid of a civil war that they immediately sold their homes at a loss and left Turkey only to regret it a week later.

Within 4 minutes of our conversation he was asleep!  However, this did not reassure me. As I lay looking at the ceiling, listening  to the odd car horn and yacht sirens from the marina, thoughts flooded my mind.  I felt like we were sitting ducks with nowhere to hide!  I feared that enemies of Turkey would see this as a time to attack and we were all vulnerable while we waited and waited for morning.  I thought “this must be a hint of what it must be like for the people of Syria as bombs fall on their towns. There were no bombs falling here.  Still the silence of the night did not bring me any comfort. I had a feeling of lead in my stomach which made me feel physically ill.  I came to the realisation that there would be no sleep for me tonight.  At 3.30am, one and a half hours of torturing myself with my own thoughts, I decided to get up.  I looked out my windows, several neighbours also had their lights on.  After starting up my laptop, I checked Facebook,  I wanted to see some photos of my family and friends in Ireland.  On opening it, I went immediately to the messages.  There were several.  Anxious friends had seen the news (they are 2 hours behind us in Europe) and seemingly it was all over the news in graphic colour earlier and the media was replaying it making it look like it was all around the country.  I immediately reassure everyone that where we were was quiet just like any other night.  I then turned on the TV. There were images of soldiers surrendering and walking with their hands in the air.  It turned out to be just a small group within the army.  The army leaders had pleaded with them to surrender which they did.

Mr.D. woke up about 4am and joined me watching the TV.  We waited for the president to address the nation.  The TV presenter said he was now in Istanbul.  As we waited I began to relax a bit,  Please God, let it be over.  He addressed the nation around 5.20am. He reassured everyone that it was now over and asked everyone to go out on to the streets to celebrate.  Democracy had won. After the speech I looked out from our kitchen window.  Our neighbour’s lights were going out.  People could relax now.

Later that morning,  I still felt tense.  I couldn't shake it off. All our neighbours were carrying on as before.  People cut the grass, went to the beach, went shopping, restaurants were still busy.  I kept asking Mr.D. to check the news and  wondered why our neighbours did not have their televisions  on all day to see if all was still ok!  I must have seemed a nervous wreck when I asked  “are we ok? Is it really over? What will happen now?  They all tried their best to reassure me and it took me about five days before the lump of lead left my stomach.  Mr. D. says,  in future he will not give me any bad news during the night. It's now over a month since all this happened.  We did get home for our holiday and we are back in Turkey again enjoying our life in this beautiful country. 

  

If the cat had kittens.........

If the cat had kittens.......well she did!  and yes it's my fault!
We have fed stray cats over the years since we first came here.  The first one was a very friendly tabby which we called Leo.  He was very thin and miserable but soon built up and filled out.  Our neighbours in the house behind us said he was a good cat, very strong and would keep snakes away! They don't really like cats so they would not feed him but informed us that Leo came to our door often when we were back in Ireland for the winter. We had him neutered so he would not be aggressive with the other street cats. He was here for about 3 years and one summer when we returned,  he was nowhere to be seen. Many cats and dogs were being poisoned and we think that this may be how he met his demise.

After Leo I only put food out by the bins for the cats. We were not here full time until 2009. Our neighbours next door who are here for the summer months love cats and they always feed them.  We continue to feed these cats as long as we are here when our neighbours have returned to Istanbul.  The neighbour in the other house behind us hates cats and is very cross with me for "encouraging" them!
But what should I do?   a thin, hungry and miserable creature comes to the door,  rubs of my feet and mi-awws!  I try to resist,  I really do,  but I can't let any creature be in agony with hunger.  I am compelled to help them on their way.  I do the best I can while I am here when they present themselves at my door. Here are two that were here around 2014 being fed by our neighbours and then by us.

Last summer our neighbours from Istanbul were feeding "Pirtik" a long-haired tortoiseshell cat from the street up behind us.  They knew her name!  She was also thin but was already spayed and had a collar.  When they returned home after the summer,  she came to my door most days and I fed her.  Sometimes we were away cat-sitting for friends,  when we would come back she would not be here but a week or so later she would come around again.  She is quite fussy and often turns her nose up at dried food preferring instead to have some cooked chicken!  Food being left outside does not last long,  cats seem to tell others that there is a food source here.  About a month ago a new young female cat came by.   Pirtik, who is a very quite and gentle cat, accepted this "not at all good-looking cat"!   "Oh, you can have my leftovers but the humans are mine and mine alone!!
 I noticed that while the cat was very thin,  she seemed to have a big tummy and I wondered whether she might be pregnant.  She was always very hungry and readily eat the dry cat food that the other cats would not eat. 

One morning I noticed her with no tummy!  She was hungry so I fed her as usual and wondered where her kittens were. She had given birth somewhere but I didn't know where until later that morning I heard her hissing and spitting at the bottom of the garden.  There she was with what looked like a bunch of kittens lying uncomfortably across a wild rose shrub which was stretching itself along the gravel and mother cats and kittens were on top of this trying to shelter under the foliage.  I hushed away the male cat and immediately set about cutting back the rose stems and made them more comfortable by placing a fleece blanket under them.  One kitten looked dead,  it was lying on its own under a big leaf away from the other four.  I checked the little creature and it was warm and just about breathing.  I put it to the mother cat where it immediately started suckling and I counted 5 kittens in all.

They were born on 2nd May. We happened to be house/cat minding for a friend who lives nearby so I had a busy week between our two sets of animals.  I made a little house for them and covered it with a few layers of plastic to keep the rain and sun out. I put some foliage at each of the sides to camouflage it from possible predictors.  We have a garden gate,  dogs will not be able to come into our garden so at least she will be safe from dogs.  I'm just worried about the male cats.  She has a few cuts on her head and neck,  possibly from fighting off cats during the night.
The kittens are now 11 days old and doing really well.  They are starting to fill out and gain weight.  They are very beautiful and their eyes are now open.  One of the tabbies has an eye infection but I am keeping it clean and have got cream which seems to be working.

Mummy cat who I have now called "Audrey" is very affectionate towards me.  She seems to know I am helping and looking out for her and the kittens.  She often stops eating and rubs her head off me as if to say "thank you" and then continues to scoff down her food before heading back into her bed with the little ones.
  We hadn't planned to have any cats here because we want to travel.  Mr. D was very cross with me for feeding Audrey and as he put it "you have landed us with 6 cats".  We even had an argument while I drove our scooter.   It was quite stressful for me,  I was being pulled both ways.  My gut reaction was to look after this mother cat and her kittens and let the future take care of itself but in doing this I have now tied us down, but really there was no choice.  I had to look after them.   I'm taking it day by day.  Who knows in six or eight weeks there may be people wanting to adopt the kittens.  I'll get Audrey spayed in 7 weeks time and at least she will not be having kittens every six months. The kittens will have a good start in life.  I will socialize them so they will make good pets and hopefully they will all get good homes.  Wish me luck!

FINDING TIME TO BE STILL

Everyone needs a place of stillness, our very own place of tranquillity where one can be still, away from the sounds and stresses of the world, to relax, unwind and think. It can be your own special chair in a quiet place in your own home, on a balcony or an outside space in a garden, on a terrace or a quiet spot by the sea. In the world in which we live,  we are reminded daily and sometimes hourly from our TV screens about the plight of our fellow human beings.  Our elected leaders cannot agree on a single solution.  The feeling of helplessness which we all feel had brought on severe depression and hopelessness in a rising number of the world's population and this in turn leads to people feeling  anxious, sad and without energy resulting in them just wanting to stay indoors and not really live their life at all.

I too have days when just one of the morning news headlines can knock me down for the rest of the day or week.  The images of hungry homeless children stays in my mind and my motivation to do or go anywhere becomes like a mountain which I cannot climb. 

I try to work  against this,  I push myself really hard.  I try to keep busy.  I made a "To do list" and work my way through it as best I can.  The list is never finished,  I cross off what I've done and add new jobs.  I started a patchwork quilt and it has stopped while I got on with spring cleaning and painting walls.  We had asked a painter to come and do the painting but they are all so busy and we are still waiting....... I decided to go ahead and make a start on it myself.  Mr. D then took over so that was a great help.  Both of us suffer with our backs so we are having to do a little each day but we are getting there.   I hate housework but also hate to see dust and unclean walls.  I cleaned all the windows last month and now they are dirty again, so that means "clean windows" will be added to my list yet again!  

Some days,  I can work for hours and still feel I've got nothing done.  I always feel I need to do more.  On these days,  I really need to stop!  take an hour off...go and sit in my "still place". 

 On occasion,  I'm good,  I will have a chat with myself and say " You've done good this week,  you've done some hard jobs which you previously put off and now they are done,  you deserve a reward,  take time out,  forget the world and it's problems and just chill"   This is when I get my book and head for my "favourite still place".  I recline,  look around me at the flowers and scrubs,  inhale the fresh air and the scent of the roses while I listen to the chirping of the birds.  I forget everything else and take in where I am while gazing up at the clear blue sky.  I relax and now, I'm ready to get lost in my book. 

 

Decisions

I struggle with decision making, It does not matter if it's a small or big decision, I like to mull things over.  The more experience I have with a particular type of decision, I find the safer it is to go with my intuition, since the subconscious has a wealth of reliable information from which to draw.
On rare occasions,  I've been spontaneous and throw caution to the wind.
Let me tell you about a recent but not really important decision, still it took me most of a week waking at 4am  mulling it over. I had a gut feeling I'd made a wrong choice but I had made the decision and would have to run with it!
As we now live in Turkey, we would like to see as much of it as possible. As a traveller you are confronted with so much choice and I've always want to go to a city called Konya which is one of the oldest urban centres in the world. Excavations in Alâeddin Hill in the middle of the city indicate settlement dating from at least the 3rd millennium bce. 
I mentioned this one day to my ceramics teacher who organises bus trips for our class.  However,  I did not realise quite how far away it was and had automatically thought it would involve a short flight followed by a bus trip of an hour or two.   Two weeks later she rang me and asked if she would put our names down for a trip to Konya the following Friday!  On impulse,  I said YES!  My husband 'Mr. D'  said,  "yes somewhere new will be great".  Then I stated googling!  
Travelling all the way by bus with brief stops every two hours  would take 10 hours.   O my God!  what have I said yes to?  I have suffered from travel sickness all my life!  I'm fine on planes and trains but long distances on buses are not for me,  but this is my one chance of going to Konya with a group of Turkish people who have been there before and who know where to go, what to see and the best places to eat.  But I'll be miserable with nausea, a stomach like a balloon and a headache,  am I mad?  maybe I'm being a wimp,  maybe I'll be ok,  I'll see if I can buy motion sick tablets here and then I'll be fine.  But they do not always work and I've never travelled longer than five hours on a bus and I always got sick!  These were my thoughts for the next few days until I eventually rang my teacher and said "Sorry, I don't think we can go to Konya.  I explained why but she said "it's not a mini bus, it's a midi bus, very comfortable and I have your names written down, please, please come,  you will love Konya, it was your idea,  think of Rumi.  So I said ok,  yes we will go......
I tried really hard to be positive thinking about nothing else until the morning of our departure which was very early on that Friday morning.  We arrived at 2.45am for our 3.00am departure to find everyone already had their bags on their seats.  All that was left for us were two seats at the very back of the bus,  a MINIBUS!  On setting eyes on it , Mr. D, said "that can't be it!  there must be another bus!"  but I recognised our teacher so I knew at once that this was it!
I had taken my travel sick tablets so I was going to make the best of it.  The journey was broken every two hours by stops at petrol stations where we could use the toilets and if there was a shop or cafe we could buy ourselves some tea.  Most of the passengers were well used to long bus trips and promptly slept as soon as the bus moved off.  Even though we both had our travel pillows,  there was no way either of us got a wink of sleep.  The same went for the two other passengers who shared the back of the bus with us. Two rather large ladies and the lady beside me was kind enough to apologise on the occasions when she overflowed on to my seat!
At the petrol station stops, she was most anxious to get out of her seat as quickly as possible.  I would usually try to get up before her thus giving her more room.  She still managed to reach part of her body over to where Mr. D was sitting.  I got to hear some choice words as we drank our tea and again when he saw her get back into the bus.  
Getting out of the bus really helped me get through the morning of travelling.  I was able to stretch my arms and do a few back stretches.  Mr. D.'s hip was causing him a lot of pain due to being twisted in his seat.  There was not much room due to the lady in front having her seat reclined somewhat.  She was elderly and slept most of the journey.  He did not want to make her uncomfortable by insisting on her straightening her seat.  
I was amazed by the high standard of the road surface.  There was duel carriageway all the way to Konya.  There were a huge amount of trucks using the roads. As we went further inland away from Milas the land became very flat.  You could see for miles.  The scenery was beautiful. Sometimes we saw some distant hills and they were covered in snow even though the temperatures on the ground were a comfortable 18c.

There were little old houses similar to Irish country cottages scattered along the countryside. There were rows and rows of fruit trees with their beautiful pink flowers glowing in the spring sunshine against a backdrop of green and grey velvet.

I read every sign along the way and eventually saw a signpost for Konya.  We were almost there and I was ok. We arrived in the outskirts of the city around 2pm in the afternoon and arrived at our hotel at 2.20pm.  

Konya was the final home of Rumi (Mevlana), whose tomb we visited in the city on Friday afternoon.

In 1273, his followers in Konya established the Mevlevi Sufi order of Islam and became known as the Whirling Dervishes. We were delighted to eventually see them.

We visited the Mevlana museum, Mevlana cultural centre, Alaaddin mosque and the Ince Minare Medrese (Seminary of the Slender Minaret) which is among Konya's finest and most impressive Seljuk Turkish architectural masterpieces.
 Many of the women in Konya dress in black with black veils on their heads. Some younger women dress casually and fashion does not seem to matter.  However in the centre where the very big shops are,  there were plenty of women dresses the same as western women.

 Our teacher Zeynep who has been going to Konya for over 10 years recommended some very nice restaurants where we enjoyed  delicious meals.

    We also visited Sille. A  village outside Konya which has a landscape much like that of Cappadocia. You can read about it here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sille_%28village%29

    
 Sunday morning was a free day so we chose to walk around and found our way back to the mosque we had visited yesterday.  We stayed around that area and took more photos walking into side streets and finding some quaint shops selling unusual clothes.

The old doors and the buildings are a photographers dream. 

     

We found our way back to our hotel early. I wanted to get my travel tablets from my hold-all bag before we set off for our journey home.  I was in for a shock!  Our two drivers were waiting outside the back door of the bus and informed me that it could not be opened due to the amount of shopping which was packed in.  There was no way I could get to my bag, so it was to be a long trip home with no medication.  
 As you can imagine the trip home was a long one which seemed like it would never end.  Within an hour of setting out,  my stomach felt like a balloon and the usual symptoms followed.  On one of the breaks a kitten sought my company and did much to cheer me up.

 Eleven and a half hours after leaving Konya,  we eventually arrived back in Turgutreis.    I was dizzy and distraught but so glad to get off that bus.  While it was wonderful to see Konya,  long bus trips are not for me!    It will be quite a while before I get on a bus again even for a short trip.     

Loss and loneliness

Thinking back:   Our grandparents house.  The house where my mother spent her childhood.   As a mother herself, she brought us there often to visit our grandparents.

From left to right:  me, looking down,  my elder sister in white dress and my younger sister with her hand to her face,  crying! in front of my grandparents house in Lougher, Co. Kerry, Ireland.

I took this photo in 1965 with the family camera a  "brownie"  of my younger sister and my grandmother who we called "Nana". Nana died in 1966.  I have wonderful memories of her and still miss her so much.

                                                   

My granddad  circa 1958.  He died in 1962.  I have few memories of him but my mother told us many stories about him.

Here is a photo of my mother doing some painting!  She didn't really like art but did it at the local daycare centre to pass the time.  She would prefer to be knitting but could no longer do it due to arthritis in her hands. This photo was taken in 2007,  She is wearing a long cardigan which she loved. She had a large collection of them. On one occasion, I counted 29 and when I told her, she would not believe me!  She would have us search many shops until we found one with pockets, always handy for a handkerchief!   I'm wearing on of her cardigans now,  it keeps me warm in these cold winter months and I feel close to her when wearing it.  I thought of her this afternoon at my ceramics class.  The mother of my teacher sat in class with us.  It was lovely to see her sitting proudly next to her very talented daughter. They sat opposite me.  My teacher was helping another student with her design. As I looked up from my clay, I saw not my teacher's mother but an image of my own mother sitting in the same position with her wool and two knitting needles clicking together while she chatted and drank tea.  I was a young girl again,  back in the 1960's in our small cottage living room....it was a warm memory of a good day in summer when all was well.   I blinked a few tears away and cast my eyes downwards to my project on hand.  No matter what I write in this post, if you haven’t lost your mother, you won’t fully understand the depths of grief one goes through. The pain is crippling, with a terrible sense of loss and emptiness.  It hits you at random moments at any time in your life. When we were growing up, she was a very strict mother, we did not always get along but we all knew we were loved even though she never told us so.  She was always there for us.   She died in February, 2009.  I still cannot believe I'll never see her again.  The realisation of loss of our parents, and grandparents is an innate part of the human psyche,  it cannot be solved like a puzzle; it cannot be alleviated only hopefully made less painful as time goes by.  The old saying "Time heals all wounds" is not entirely accurate, but not entirely inaccurate either. I don't know if the wound of losing a mother is ever healed. The pain does get more bearable over time. But how long it should take? No one can say.

A new year, the same me and the same back!

It's the start of yet another new year.  When I lived in Ireland I really hated the months of January and February.  The days were so dull, wet and cold. I couldn't plan to do much outside in these two months and had to contend with being indoors all the time whether it was at work or on my days off,  life had to be lived indoors. A bright sunny day was the exception rather than the rule.  In anticipation of summer, I was wishing my life away. 

 Now that I'm living in western Turkey,  I take a different view of things.  I can do most of what I want to do right now!  I've already mentioned that I'm doing a ceramics course.  I can look forward to getting up early and walking in the morning sunshine for 10 minutes before I start my class at the local cultural center. There is so much to learn.  It's all new to me and I'm having a wonderful time absorbing all the knowledge and techniques involved in working with clay. My teacher is wonderful! She is a very beautiful and creative person always full of life.  She is in much demand throughout the day helping students with their work.  There are some very experienced students who are very helpful and will stop what they are doing to help me when the need arises.   I'm having to learn with my eyes rather than my ears.  Turkish is spoken by everyone and I miss out on a lot of the instructions but this does not deter me.  I can see what she is telling us by looking at what she is doing with the clay.  It is also good for my learning of Turkish, I understand some and am picking up little bits here and there. Watching the advanced students at work with red and white clay,  I have learned so much already.  I've learned that even the best and most carefully done pieces will crack and split in the drying process!  but I've also learned that all of this can be corrected.  My very first project was a breakfast tray with a lid.  This is now drying on a shelf.  I've had great fun on my second and easier project which is a tortoise,  he is also drying.  My next project is a crazy teapot. I've done 6 sketches so far but have not decided as yet which one I'll do.  Curves and handles could cause problems?

Before I know it,  it's lunchtime.  I take a leisurely walk home.  My route takes me past my local beach where the view never fails to take my breath away.  For a few moments, I pause, gaze and soak up the atmosphere. 

After a delicious lunch prepared by Mr. D,  we relax on the roof terrace.

I feel lazy now..... a morning of crouching over a table has left my back stinging.  I've had back problems for a very long time.   I promise myself I will do some exercise in the near future.  The recliner feels good.  I stretch out,  I am free, I am relaxed.
Mr. D. tells me about his morning and listens while I tell him about mine. Then I start to doze, I could sleep now,  I'd like another hour of chilling......   But No, I can't do that!  I have made a commitment and will follow it through.  I drag myself from my comfy slumber and I head back, put on my navy overall and again I'm absorbed in the world of clay.  What's new challenge will it be this afternoon? what new things will I learn.  I am happy in anticipation.....