Arrival

I arrived in Izmir today after about 22 hours of travel. Professor Ferayal Çubukçu and Ahmet came to collect me and 150 lbs of luggage at the airport. They whisked me to my housing, and, assuming I’d be exhausted, left me here to sleep. Ferayal tried to make me promise not to leave the housing, but I knew that I’d need to go out and get some food or something, which I did. When they left, I walked into the bathroom and realized that while “freshening up” before meeting them at the airport I had put my shirt on wrong-side-out (and obviously so). So much for good impressions.

I am surprised at how little I can actually communicate here. At least in France, Spain, Italty, Germany. . .there are some cognates, but here, nothing is familiar. I managed to buy some ayran (a salty yogurt drink) olives, trash can, and toilet paper by pointing and mumbling something like “thank you”.

My studio is very small – the size of my kitchen at home, but I think it will be sufficient. On the plus side, I think it will be harder to lose things in a place this size, and cleaning should be easy.