Level 2 Turkish

I am now in my Beginner Level 2 Turkish. It's getting more confusing and complicated but I am trying to stick to it. It would be a shame after all that trouble to have nothing to show for it! In case you're interested (hahhaha!!!) Level 1 was basically learning  greetings, numbers, telling time, days of the week, months :Yes - they have their own names for the months not like in Malay! Kasim is November and Aralik - December ... and then we learnt the Present Continuous Tense.

Level 2 has LOTs more grammar .So far we've covered Past Tense, Past Continuous. Imperative, Formal Tense (????) and also some prepositions and conjunctions (very confusing!). I can't begin to imagine what Level 3 is like.

Cafe on the 4th Floor where we hang out during breaks

The students in Level 2 are nice. The students from my last class in Level 1: the Polish (gone traipsing in Iran) and the Koreans (gave up -too much work!) have left. So now there's only me, and Farouk and Hamzah from Level 1. Then we have 3 new additions - Iceese (US) Reiny (Venezuela) and Mahmut (Guinea). They're all very nice kids and during break we chat etc. One time Reiny tried to teach us to dance the salsa during break....

Anyway, a few days ago it was my Turkish teacher's birthday so we all ganged up and had a birthday surprise for her. Here she is - her name's Hacer (pronounced Hajer) I think she's really pretty by the way...she's also lots of fun and very sweet and kind.

Bought her a cake with candles etc..
Then we took a class pic but Hamzah is missing here - he was the camera man, and Mahmut was absent

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It was kinda an impromptou thing because we just found out that morning. Farouk was good enough to run out to a bakery somewhere and get the cake!!! So that's Farouk in the pic


I have a Turkish exam next week BTW -getting really nervous, I don't know when I would have the time to squeeze in some studying but I will...Yo! Wish me LUCK!!!

It's SNOWING?

Right before dinner last night noticed white flakes drifting by the window. Ran to the balcony-  and sure enough - it was SNOWING!! Kids got really excited and everyone ran out to the balcony (only in our sweatshirt!) and stretched out our hands out to catch the snowflakes....It was already dark then and by the light of the streetlamps the snowflakes look almost magical...

Next morning all of us came down, the kids were going off off to school, J to work and me to my Turkish class - we saw Park Oran blanketed in snow.....

The children loved it - Syireen sempat  main snowball before catching her school bus, and then made a mini snowman when she came back from school...

Didn't last long though...just a few inches of snow and by evening there was hardly any snow on the ground. Expecting more snow soon though....

Considering a visit to a ski resort probably next month. There are two ski places close to Ankara -  Kartalkaya about two hours fron Ankara and another smaller ski slope at Elmsdag in Ankara itself - only about 40km away.

Trip to Antalya

The Hari Raya Haji holidays ( 5 days!) gave us the perfect opportunity to go visit places a little further from Ankara - so deecided to go see Antalya!

It's down south by the coast about a 7 hour drive from Ankara. Antalya has a wonderful climate - mmmm nice and toasty-warmy at 20C!!! - very mediterranean weather (Ankara is now already into the single digiits - about 3C!).

It's actually Turkey's largest international sea resort. It's also rich in history and dates back to something like the 2nd century BC and was a major city in the Byzantine Empire (Im no history buff -  info compliments of our Tour Guide hahahha..!)

Stayed at a 2 bedroom apartment with kichenette so we can fix our own breakfast & dinner (more money saved for shopping!)

Just arrived and taking a rest before unpacking

Toured Side (really beautiful old harbour town), Perge, Alanya, Aspendos and then Antalya. First stop was Perge,  a famous ancient Greek and Roman town - lots of impressive ruins.

Side - was particularly picturesque since it is right by the sea ( old harbour town)

Quaint little shops all the way to the harbour

Sqeezed in a visit to the National Park (can't remember the name!) waterfall - it had a great hiking trail.

Had lunch at Alanya - the restaurant was by the river and they had this deck built right over the water - really pretty especially with the ducks swimming around - gave it a nice touch. So, anyway- lunch was choice of kebab or grilled fish...with plenty of salad and Turkish bread.The bread would definitely be one of the things I would miss most when we return

My friend Sal and her family who was also with us

Yup! That's our lunch..

I like Aspendos best - the stadium was intact and one of the most well preserved;  you can get the aura of  a bygone era by just being there - sends chills up your spine!

Siddiq way up at he highest point of the stadium

Quite happy to enjoy the scenery from below

I could only go halfway up the stadium - my knees were shaking - it felt way high up! only Siddiq made it all the way up!

The final day we were given three hours to do explore downtown Antalya - which is a happening place

- by the time we had our lunch and prayed - there was only an hour to browse and shop - so tak puas hati sangatlah...kinda dissapointed. We didnt' get anything from Antalya and did not have time to explore Old town which was one of THE things to go ...sigh!

Oh yeah -went to a Leather factory/store in Antalya and tried on some jackets. Siddiq tried this on but at USD800 - NO THANK YOU!!!

Ummm - maybe I'll come back for this later...say in another 5 years?

Stopped at Konya (3 hour drive from Ankara) on the way back to break the journey and also for lunch and prayers. It's one of the oldest cities in Ankara, city of the whirling dervishes, the Sufi mystic Rumi, the Mevlani museum etc.. 

Had an interesting lunch - look at the Loooooong 'lamahcun' ( sthing like pizza )