Playing in the Garden after School |
Our lovely routine consists of trips to the local gurme market for meat where Mum has been learning how to say half a kilo, minced and sliced, Monday at the market where we've discovered a lovely stall with men who offer us cay (tea) and then, for a small fee, will keep our fruit and veg and deliver it to our house later in the afternoon. We are enjoying traditional Turkish breakfasts with mother's of Findlay's school friends and weekends are spent in the park with Daddy and taking strolls down Bagdat Caddesi. We are sharing pick ups from school with our new friends.
It is so funny that what was unusual for us before has become very normal. We phone, and pay for huge bottles of water, we eat cheese, tomato and cucumber for breakfast, we order takeout food A LOT, we walk to school, we don't always have a bath every night, Findlay talks of his friends Doruk and Erai.....
Being an expat is not like being a citizen of that country. We will always be "different." For example, I don't think I will ever be able to wear sock when it is 25 deg outside, Findlay and I won't ever manage to stay up until 9 or 10pm as it seems a lot of the Turkish kids do and nor will Mummy be thinking of hiring a live in Nanny and full time cleaner not because she doesn't want to or that she doesn't agree with it, its just not how we do it "back home."
It takes time to find that equilibrium of bringing your own culture into a country which has a very different (yet wonderful) outlook on life but we are getting there and learning to enjoy the best of both worlds.