back from the the turkish coast

I have returned from the big country to the tiny country with a million thoughts in mind.

This morning I was asked what the weather was like in Turkey.  “So nice and sunny,”  I said.
“It’s sunny here,” my friend replied.
“Yes,” I said, “but I think the sun is frozen.”

It’s cold, and upon returning to Armenia, I have one.  A cold, that is.  So, combining that and the fact that I am having trouble getting photos off my camera, I believe it will be a couple days before you see or read anything in the form of recap.  *COUGH HACK and NOSE-BLOW*

However, here’s two things:

1. Our Little Drifters project was featured on BOOOOOOOM.  You may know that I love this site, so getting featured for some work we’re doing here made my sickly little day.

2. Ok, I can’t totally hold back.  Here’s a little Turkey teaser:

 

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stranger’s home

(Mom, don’t freak out.)

I found a friend on the internet.   Well, Kelly and I found a friend on the internet, through Couch Surfing.  I am, some would say, late on the trend, and while I prefer to stay with an established friend, or heck, even a friend-of-a-friend, the lure of free accomodation and the chance to make a Turkish aquaintance hooked me.  And here I am, typing on his Sava roomate’s computer.

Last night, our new friend and his (now our other turkish) friend walked around Istanbul, hopped on rocks by the sea in a wealthy neighborhood where a drunk man’s whippy North  Turkish traditional music lifted right out of a rigged up car stereo to mix with a teenager’s voice which betrayed his borrowed angst, bellowing”With Arms Wide Open” and beating his guitar for his friends.

Yesterday, we arrived in Istanbul after an overnight bus picked us up in Izmir.  Kelly and I visited our friend Sarah there and got to know her fiance Osman.  I found myself all day wishing she were with us, waddling through the crowds at the Grand Bazaar and stopping by a corner cafe for tea and coffee.

Izmir is a completely different culture full of sun and college kids and cafes.  Istanbul is busier, grungier at first, but already I can tell the culture is more diverse, the cafes are better and more expensive, and the people we’ve met are kind and capable of great conversation.

I’ve been all over the map this trip.  My talks in Izmir we’re full of catching up, and from my side that meant talking about the future, after Peace Corps which at this point looks like a million different things.  I’ve got a dozen other countries on my radar.  London, Barcelona, Boston, Austin, El Salvador, Honduras. Dominican Republic.  Everything sounds like a blast. 

Why then, when I close my eyes right now and dream, it’s of a house on a quiet street, movie nights with friends, lazy walks through a grocery store, sitting on the side yard with my parents, hugging people I’ve known for years. 

I cannot seem to keep all this future whispers quiet.  My mind races with elations and fears over choices.  And, still, I should be careful not to miss a beat of my Armenian life.

And right now I should enjoy the Istanbul sun and time with new and old friends.

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any minute now

I should be asleep.  I’ll be waking up tomorrow at a very early hour, one I’d call unholy except that what could be more holy than a reunion?  I’m not even sure I can sleep because… wait for it…

… the reunion is starting in just a few hours.

See that friendship displayed above.  That is pure, unadulterated love there, captured in digital form the last time Kelly, Sarah and I were together.  That was Texas.  This time we’re doing things Eurasia style.

First things first, this one…

… is landing in a matter of hours.  HOURS.  This friend who travelled with me through Europe, who taught me to knit, who didn’t know what spooning was that one time when we all slept in the parking lot downtown, who, when we pulled over on main street at midnight to dance to “Thriller”, climbed up on my spare tire to play the part of the menacing voice, who in a park in Berlin let us bury her in plate-size fallen leaves, THAT friend is going to be here with me in Armenia tomorrow.

We’re going to eat good food, dance to everything, and talk late into the night.  We’re going to walk out to the ravine and soak up my small town in the fall.

Then we’re through some combination of vehicles, we’re going to be seeing this one…

… in Turkey.  Yes, the country, not the bird.  This one who, after meeting her for the first time told my hippy, peace-love-bean-burritos self that she was studying business to make money and I better be ok with that, but who only last month finished her Peace Corps service in Bulgaria.  I used to hang out at her apartment with my roommate and hers.  She’d come home from waitressing at that Mexican place, and I’d tease her about smelling all sexy and enchilada-like.  We used to go to the Episcopal Church together, both of us taking comfort in the ritual of the service, and the ritual of eating Taco Bueno together afterward.

The three of us will be missing a lot of our friends, likely sharing those little bits we  might know about who’s where, when’s their wedding, why she’s living in that city now.  We’ll probably talk about Sarah’s engagement, Kelly’s cheffing, my Armenia-ing.

One of our last days together in Abilene we went to get snow cones…

I can say that each of us knew that with Sarah going off to Peace Corps we wouldn’t be together again very soon.  There’d be worlds and borders and years between us.

But, y’all, we ARE going to be together. Any minute now.

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