Turkish Lesson: Welcome and Bye Bye

Today i hiked out to Homer's Caves (I'll have a different post on that adventure. But as i walked out I'd the town of Eğridere, İ saw these signs and thought to pass them on to my readers.

Hoşgeldiniz (hawsh-gel-dee-neez) is the way to say, "Welcome." And since Turkish feels like it's arranged backwards to my native language, the sign translates to "welcome to Eğridere

(That smile over the g is unique to Turkish. The g is silent, but it turns the vowel before it into a long vowel EE-rih-der-eh instead of EH-rih-der-eh.)

On the other side of the sign, for those leaving town, are the words, "Güle güle." İ love saying this, but i have yet to have a Turk take me seriously when i use it. İt means "bye bye," and anyone who uses it above the age of seven sounds immature.

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Sunday at the İzmir Archeological Museum

After church today, I resolved to beat the heat and go to a museum. My target: the İzmir Archeological Museum , just south of the bazaar in the Konak district. My friend, Jen, had told me about a slogan she had seen: "Turkey, it's the world's largest museum." It's true. At any given place where I might stand, especially at an important harbor like Izmir, I may have seven millenia of history at my feet! I quickly learned, upon entering the gallery that ancient history is a pretty broad topic to examine. When we think of Ancient Rome, we think of a specific civilization that endured for 500 years. Ancient Greece casts our minds to Socrates and Alexander. But Ancient Turkey? There is really no one thing. I don't want to go into much detail here. I have years of living in and exploring this fascinating country ahead of me. So I have plenty of time to figure it out for myself. I'll just write that before the Greek civilizations, known as Ionians and Aeolians, ...

Turkish Lesson: Köpek

I passed this place on my way home from the train station today. I pass it every day. It's quite common to see owners here playing with a Köpek. It's not the only place I see a Köpek or two. Most are strays I see lying languidly throughout the day. In the evening they clean up the streets and make their rounds of alleyways. My landlord says they keep him up at night, but I haven't heard any barking...yet. Köpek . Your newest Turkish word! Postscript: i spotted this sign on my hike Saturday. I took several shortcuts, but never when I saw this sign. Var means "have or has" in English.

Dürüm: the Turkish burrito

When Americans and western Europeans think of Turkish food, the first word that comes to mind is Döner, that fast-food delicacy of shaved pieces of roasted lamb or chicken, stuffed into a pita with salad and hot sauce. As they say in Deutschland, " Döner ist schöner ," and the truth is that there are few snacks more beautiful or more delicious. But since I've been in Turkey, I have yet to eat Döner as I know it from England and Germany. İnstead, I have found dürüm, which looks like a chicken burrito 🌯 and tastes delicious. Like the burrito, the dürüm is wrapped in a tortilla. İ have seen tortillas for sale in the bread aisle, too. The meat for the dürüm is cut from the same, rotating spit of roasting meat that goes into a Döner. Unlike the burrito, the meat is really yummy. As you can see from the photo, it was served with red sauce that wasn't "peppery hot" as one would find in a Mexican restaurant, but was savory hot. There were small peppers...

Aegean Pearls: My Life in Izmir

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