Consider this to be the slowest-ever-to-blossom blog... my apologies for all delays. It has been quite a year. Since arriving last September, I've experienced late summer, fall, winter and now spring.
I've been living in a land of rapid change. Imagine an urban village. There is a busy, four-lane boulevard. In the middle, there is a newly functioning tramway. Along each side of the traffic, there are crumbling sidewalks covered in light, dry dirt or pale brown mud-- depending on the time of year. Often, motorcycles will abruptly leave the road and head up the sidewalk, or ride against traffic. Women in ankle-length raincoats cover their heads with bright, silk scarves year round. They can be seen perched on the back or front of motorcycles, in flatbed trucks, behind the wheel of their own car, riding mini-buses, or sometimes walking in groups, often with their families. Farmers from the nearby villages send their goods in to town with their horse or donkey drawn carts, riding along the same busy road. Honking is a constant, 24-hour phenomenon. I pity those horses and donkeys, and residents with a roadside bedroom in one of the painted cement high-rises-- many recently built or currently under construction, especially along the edges of the city. Rugs, shirts, pants, towels... hang in perpetual ornamentation of the large, cement apartment complexes. From balconies and window ledges, people dry their laundry in the dusty air, polluted by auto exhaust-- and, in winter, coal that residents buy from corner shops also selling vegetables, soap, newspapers and other basic household supplies.
People drive up for the day to shop here-- usually Syrians... or folks from the village. Near the university, there are many trees-- olive, cypress, and pine trees. Upon approaching the city center, pistachio groves and the Jandarme Police compound flank either side of the boulevard. One block set in, there is a giant park... surrounded by older blocks of concrete and sometimes brick apartments. The park is the place to go on the weekend for peoplewatching-- children, teenagers speeding on bikes, packs of runners in uniform steer through the pebbly paths past old people lounging near fountains or bar-b-ques. During the holy holidays, the smell of cooking meat is ever present along the entire boulevard and the edges of the park. Heavy-set ladies in flowered pants and bright scarves chase children around jungle gyms and across fields. Elegant women in long raincoats chat at picnic tables. Everyone comes to enjoy the tall canopies of trees, filled with birds that take over all of the branches at night. A few couples stroll along, often headed to one of the nearby cafes near the Botanical Gardens after a day of shopping. At the far end, the giant, terraced Sanko Park shopping mall presides over the whole area, as the park continues to meander its way past the other side of the mall, toward a Cami (mosque) and ultimately in the general direction of the soccer arena. It is through Sanko Park's revolving glass doors and airport-style security gates and scanners that all of the visiting shoppers pass before they can enter and spend their money. Those arriving to town to buy or sell melons or sheep or mandalinas will opt for the nearby open-air markets in the older part of the city center instead... where it is still possible to have a suit or a pair of shoes custom made. This is truly an amazing place-- an urban village.
The people are relaxed and usually smiling, except for the tiny, thin old men in Turkish style black pantaloons or boys in jeans who push carts of odds and ends through the street... on foot, shouting their arrival and their wares as they push their way past, sometimes along the sides of the busiest roads. Some of the more well-to-do residents will have an apartment for most of the year, and a small house outside one of the neighboring villages-- for getaways with the family during good weather. The whole spectrum of economic and social status can be seen on nearly every sidewalk.
Interlopers like me stand out a mile. Wherever I go, people always try to guess my country. As one of my co-travelers has remarked, they always make sure I exit the bus at the correct stop. Local storekeepers often offer me tea, which they call Chai. They laugh at my rudimentary Turkish skills, often interrogating me kindly-- mostly in their language. A few ask in English: "Where are you from?"
They smile knowingly when I answer: "I'm from 'Antep." Even with the language barrier, they know a silly joke when they hear one! It is very, very different from Boston. And this is what I wanted-- I wanted to change everything. I wanted something completely different. This is.
Me, one month after I arrived...
I was overjoyed when this photo was taken at a small bike shop where I purchased my used bike.
