Before I get to the school stuff, I wanna blog about some not-so
fun parts. On the hall with us are some kind of post high pre college program
kids, and it appears that they enjoy running marathons in the hallway all night
long. They run, scream, bang on all the doors (including ours, not just theirs)
and laugh at us when we tell them to be quiet. It’s been 4 nights of obnoxious rambunctious-ness,
and we’re all tired of being tired. The walls are thin enough already (we can
hear music playing in each other’s dorms when it’s at a normal level) and the
doors are see through, so the hallway lights shine in, but they’re motion
sensor (and a sensitive motion sensor), so it’s more like a strobe light most
of the time. The other not so fun thing is that my and J’s room got broken
into. It was 6:30 in the morning, and we were sleeping. There was someone at our
door, trying to get the key to work. At first we thought it was one of the
kids, or a drunk trying to get into the wrong dorm, but he wouldn’t stop, and
eventually the door opened. He walked in, and then walked out. I thought I was
dreaming this, but J, being the smart adrenaline filled one, got up after he
walked out and looked at him. He was wearing normal clothes, not a cleaning
crew uniform or the security guard uniform, and he was walking down the
hallway. Supposedly, they have the
security at the front of the dorm to prevent non students from getting in, but
obviously he got in somehow. That he key eventually opened our door is super
sketchy too. I have all of my cash, electronics, and important documents with
me at all times now, because I don’t trust the door. We tried to tell security
on our way to class, but idt they took it seriously. We told Nihan, and I hope
she handles it. If I get kidnapped and sold into the sex trade, have the cops
look at the security tapes from this morning, because it was probably the
creeper who entered my room.
Moving on, school today was pretty interesting. We met Nihan
at 9:45 so she could show us where our classroom was (up 8 flights of stairs.
Idk why the buildings are so tall when there are earthquakes all the time, but
anyway) and our professor is the adorable grandpa looking guy with an awesome
accent. We had a guest lecturer, Feroz Ahmad, who wrote one of the books we had
to read before we got here. He’s originally an Indian Muslim, but he lived in
the US for 40 years, and then moved here a while ago, and now bounces back and
forth between the US and Turkey. The morning session was a hour or so of him
talking (mostly the same stuff from the first few chapters of his book) and
then it moved into a Q&A session. Then it was lunchtime, where we all (the
unf kids, the yeditpe students, and the two profs) went to the nice restaurant on
campus. It was my biggest meal in like a week, and it was probably the best
food I’ve had yet. We started off with a salad thing (carrots, shredded cheese,
corn, cherry tomatoes, lettuce, and what I’m pretty sure were beets, (hey O! I
finally had a beet, I think! Lol) then a soup which I thought was lemon soup,
but was actually lentil. (Sadface, Michelle. I miss greek soup!) But it was
still good. Then the main dish was like meatloaf, but not really, and then a grain
which turned out to be boiled wheat. It was mixed with veggies and hot sauce
(like usual) but it was still edible. Dessert we had a few choices- baklava,
some super thick pudding thing, sugar bread, banana crepe thing, and something
kinda like flan. I went with the flan thing, but it was too much and I was
pretty full so I only had a little bit. I even managed to drink half of the chi
(the post meal tea that everyone drinks. It’s either that, or the super intense
coffee, which I just can’t handle. One sip one time is plentyyyyy for that).
After our lunch, we had another class session, and this time
it was pretty straight Q&A, but the answers were a solid 15-30 minutes
long, so it didn’t really feel like a normal q&a. There were some
interesting viewpoints about the Armenian genocide/disaster/displacement, the
PKK, and freedom of speech that were completely different than my personal ones.
I can tell that I’m going to learn just as much from the profs as I will from
the students, about culture and the way history is viewed and just lifestyle
differences. I talked to two during lunch, and they were friendly, nice, open,
and interesting, so I hope the class goes well.
It’s about 5:30 here, everyone is super tired from not
getting adequate rest, we may go to Cotla for dinner or stay on campus. I’m still
super full from lunch though, so idk. Shout-out to my Daddy, today is his
birthday!! I was able to sing to him yesterday via Skype, but I’m kinda bummed
I don’t get to tell him on his actual day. <3
Love to everyone!
No comments:
Post a Comment