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Sunday, June 6th, 2004

Time:6:41 pm.
In which I rant and rave like a true TESOL teacher )


In other and happier news...

Realised I may well be able to afford my CELTA and my holiday after all, because I wasn't factoring into my calculations the fact that I'll have my entire last month's salary in hand.

This means...

Savings: At least two billion lira, or around two thousand dollars Canadian.
Salary: One billion two hundred million or around twelve hundred dollars more.
Maybe two weeks extra on top of that (?) as salary is paid two weeks in arrears: six hundred million or six hundred Canadian more...

For a total of, deducting some to be safe, say thirty five hundred Canadian dollars.

The CELTA I want to take is nine hundred pounds, or around twenty two hundred Canadian dollars. Add rent for two months, that's twenty five hundred. That leaves me one thousand dollars to holiday on. That's doable! As long as I find cheap fares...

Oh yeah, and I get a travel bonus of one hundred and fifty pounds on successful completion of my contract... so put that towards a flight, and it's all eminently possible.

Yippee!
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Friday, June 4th, 2004

Subject:And now for something completely different!
Time:11:30 am.
Mood: amused, yet disturbed.
In which I receive a proxy proposal )
2 cuddles| hug me

Monday, May 31st, 2004

Subject:"Being the mother of the world isn't easy" (--Brody)
Time:2:42 pm.
Mood: sad.
In which I try and fail to save a kitten's life )
5 cuddles| hug me

Wednesday, May 26th, 2004

Time:11:02 am.
Graham has been made our new Director of Studies! It's been an open secret since it got out in his apartment (Alex kept mum for weeks but as soon as Jo was told it crept around the teachers' circle...) besides the fact that he's been running around actually sorting out the schedules over the weekend... miracle of miracles it is, to have someone looking after that. So the "announcement" yesterday was really quite hilarious.

Liz: So, I've a bit of an announcement...
Us: (Looking at each other shiftily and grinning knowingly)
Liz, amused: You all know what I'm going to say, don't you?
Us: Well, um... (yes)... mumble mumble... (bit of an open secret)... mumble mumble....
Liz: Well, alright, anyway, I'd just like to present to you... your new Director of Studies! (Indicates Graham)
Us: Yay! Wow, that's amazing, I would never have guessed, congratulations, man!

And of course we all applauded. Then Ömer (grammar teacher) came in.

Us: Ack, Ömer missed the announcement! Ömer, we have a new DOS!
Ömer (pretends to look surprised): Really? And who would this person be? (Someone points to Graham) Oh! Well! (Ömer turns to Graham and shakes his hand) Congratulations, what a surprise!

I'm really happy. Graham's a super person, and he really seems to be taking this on board. He's already quietly sorted our schedules just about completely out and says he'll be having individual conversations with us about our various classes. And he's signed for a year, so he'll be here all through my second contract. Yay!
3 cuddles| hug me

Monday, May 24th, 2004

Subject:Luck, damn luck
Time:4:32 pm.
Mood: miserable.
I should have known the week would go badly when hotmail deleted all my emails.

I went off to Taksim to do my volunteering this morning. The stuffy dolmuş made me very sleepy and so I snoozed all the way and got off still half asleep. I went to the open-air newspaper and magazine stand near where the tram comes to take you to the other end of Istiklal Cadessi... it's a half hour walk which I'm normally up for but I had to be at Christ Church in fifteen minutes, so the tram was my best option. At the newspaper stand I bought water and gum, getting my wallet out of my purse to do so. I then walked ten metres over to the tram stop and bought a ticket. Then I went to put my wallet back in my purse. It wasn't with me. Even though I knew I'd only left it at the magazine stand I was worried it had been nicked even in that short time because Taksim is busy and anonymous.

I walked back and my purse was not where I left it. I began panicking immediately. The magazine stand guy started saying something about an "arkadaş" ("friend" but also a general term for "person) which I took to mean someone had taken my purse claiming to be my friend. Or just be someone. I couldn't communicate with him properly but finally managed to blurt out... "Kim... vermek...?" (who... take?...) At which point he just said, "Polis, polis!" I said "Polis?" and then "Nerede?" (where)....

And so began a nightmarish hour and a half of chasing around police stations trying to find officers who spoke English and trying to find any information at all out about my purse. In vain. It was the one that Nana sent me, with matching wallet. My new mobile telephone was in it, and my keys, and my makeup. Thankfully my passport, bankcard and all money were in my wallet. But goddammit. Another phone bites the dust.

And that stupid, stupid magazine stand guy. Either he took the purse himself and lied about it both to me and to the police officers I went back with, or else he is the stupidest person in the world to give a purse left one minute previously to some random person CLAIMING they were going to take it to the police, rather than putting it behind the counter. I just want to hit him. And I want to hit the person who stole my purse. And I want my purse back, complete with keys with the little wooden heart on the keychain that I got in Bursa and my SECOND telephone with 1,000 kontors on it. Sixty million worth of kontors! I should have known I was tempting fate when I bought them.

And I missed my last day of volunteering. And it was Jo's birthday today so I've been out to lunch and socialising and not planned for my evening class yet let alone for tomorrow morning. Gah. Why can't I just go back to bed and start this day over again?
3 cuddles| hug me

Friday, May 21st, 2004

Subject:Boo sucks
Time:6:22 pm.
Mood: grumpy.
My day -- hell, my WEEKEND -- has been hijacked.

I planned to get up, go to the gym, clean the house, maybe go see Troy, cook a nice batch of pasta for dinner tonight and prepare for a weekend of mondo advanced planning for next week and researching grad schools.

Well, just about the first thing that happened this morning were messages from Alex and Jo about lunch in Taksim at 1:00 and (from Alex) shopping for Jo's birthday present beforehand. She wanted to meet at the school at 11:30. It was 10:00. The gym was out. But... that's ok, I thought, I can't be truculent about shopping for Jo's birthday present, so off I dashed to be at school for 11:30 so we could have a good hour's shopping either in Bakırköy or in Taksim (the dolmuş between the two takes about half an hour). I did insist on cleaning the kitchen before I left, which means I only got into the shower at 11 and had to get a taxi to the meydan to be on time. Shared with another woman so it only cost one million, though.

Well, just as I got out of my taxi, I got a message from Alex saying meet at 11:45. I was a bit annoyed already as I could see we didn't have enough time to buy something before lunch and therefore the shopping expedition would carry on till mid-afternoon at least.

I was right. Lunch took forever, for one thing, because we went to the Chinese all-you-can-eat buffet and everyone except me and Hille (probably spelled wrong... Graham's girlfriend, anyway) had two plates, and Alex is the slowest eater in the world.

So shopping started at about two thirty and took us a good hour and a half. By this time, resigned to my fate, I went along for tavla with Alex and Hille. That took us till five. All was not lost. I had a whole weekend in front of me. Clean this evening, then cook, gym tomorrow morning, plan tomorrow afternoon, Alex's birthday dinner Saturday evening, church Sunday morning, research grad schools Sunday afternoon, good to go. Except.

Except, except, except that Liz called while I was in the dolmuş and gave me a new weekend afternoon class. I have to plan a four hour Elementary lesson both for tomorrow and Sunday. I knew my holiday had to end eventually but this is twenty hours notice and I am contractually entitled to forty-eight. But I can't say no because that would look incredibly bitchy after I've benefited so much from this fuck up in the schedule. But really. I told Sinan FOUR WEEKS AGO and have mentioned at least once a week since that the class they have me as teaching on weekend afternoons on the schedule does not exist. That my Upper Intermediates finished in late April. That I ought to have a new class. And it's his damn fault that he never paid proper attention, wrote it down, remembered it, and got this sorted. I would be perfectly happy to take on a new class... WITH THE PROPER AMOUNT OF NOTICE.

This sucks. I am so angry. There's really nothing else to say.
1 cuddle| hug me

Wednesday, May 19th, 2004

Time:5:13 pm.
A whole buncha new entries have been added about my Sofia trip, but I backdated them all so if you want to see them you have to actually go to my journal page.

Cheers and hugs to all!
1 cuddle| hug me

Sunday, May 16th, 2004

Time:9:20 pm.
Mood: happy.
...and just entering İstanbul. I wish my phone was working. Jules probably tried to texty me and who knows who else. Hope they're not worried about me. About half-planned for Beginners, and marked their homework. Toll booth... waiting....

9:30

That sign actually said "Otogar"! Hurrah, almost there!
hug me

Time:5:35 pm.
Mood: content.
At border now... must get off.

10 minutes later.

OK, that was the grottiest squatty I've ever been in. *trying very hard to prise look of extreme disgust off of face* Ewwwwwwwwwwww. OK, on to nicer subjects.

Successfully visited the Museum of Ethnography this morning after visiting and internet cafe and catching up on people's journals for half an hour or so, as well as grabbing some Bulgarian burek for breakfast. It was a lovely little place, housed in (consults guide) the former Royal Palace, which was gorgeous in and of itself. It was mostly folk costumes, display after display of casual, festive and bridal costumes, because each village had different ones. Because they dated from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, some came from Macedonia and villages that are now part of Turkey. Although, as I say, all were different, there were some commonalities. All looked incredibly heavy -- comprising layers and layers of thick, stiff garments. Almost all were multi-coloured and the majority were extremely colourful. Most were intricately, fabulously decorated with coloured embroidery and included a lot of silver "adornments" -- many had silver belts linked at the front with large spheres of silver. Several of the women's headdresses were decorated with beads and silver coins in long chains or geometrical patterns and I saw one virtual breastplate of silver coins that covered the mannequin from above the collar-bone to below armpit level in a V-shape. These, on top of the layers of blouses and underskirts, bodices and overskirts, aprons, shawls, belts and who knows what else and, while the effect is marvellous, you wonder how these people lived through the summers! Another thought that struck me is how very private a thing the uncovered body once was. One period photograph of a woman in bridal dress really drove this home to me. She was wearing so many layers that her body and arms were practically cylindrical. How much of a moment, how incredibly intense must it have been when all of that was stripped away to nothing but paleness, soft curves of flesh and straggling hair? Such things were much more sacred and respected once, perhaps.

There were also displays of woven carpets and household items like cushion covers and towels. Very beautiful in colourful geometric shapes with spindles, wool samples and looms beside them to show what a process it all was. So much time, energy, and skill. And I think *lowers voice to a whisper* that I may like Bulgarian carpets better than their opulent Turkish counterparts!

Finally, there were displays of household silver and copper items scattered among the rest, which were quite interesting, especially the ones that were intricately engraved. There was one vessel for holy water that I lingered over for awhile. And there were several water colour illustrations of traditional wooden houses which were very pretty... spare, plain wooden structures, a few with funny rounded hoods over the fireplaces in big open rooms inside. All seemed spacious rather than cluttered with possessions (although tools and household objects apparently lined the walls) and the more affluent included intricate woodwork/carvings/latticework around the roofs.


[Üff ya! Am in seriously bad mood now. Was charged almost double the proper price for my visa because I was carrying Turkish lira instead of pounds sterling. I insisted that I know the exchange rate and it is NOT 3.5 million lira to the pound, thank you very much, but no-o-o-o-o-o-o, Mr. Visa Semi-Important I-Have-the-Power-so-You-Pay-the-Money official was not to be budged and in the end I had to hand over 35 million. I hate backing down when I know I'm right, AND I now only have 10 million lira to my name. Allahallah!]

Anyway... on the whole the Museum of Ethnography was well worth the 5 levas and I succumbed in the store to two handpainted eggs, some postcards and a pair of dangly silver earrings shaped like roses hanging from their stems. Yay, retail therapy!

I got back to the hotel just about noon on the nose, got my stuff together and got a taxi to the bus station. The taxi driver spoke French! Harrumph, Mum was right... I could never have foreseen when my French would come in handy when I started learning it. Never in a million yeras would I have guessed, "Sofia, Bulgaria"!

Well, we're in the last stages of the border process and I'm well ready to get "home." I really ought to get started on planning tomorrow night's lesson. I'm going to have a busy day tomorrow what with my volunteering in the morning and going to the gym afterwards. And the way I've been eating this holiday, going to the gym is ABSOLUTE priority! (she says, as she accepts a free cake from the bus conductor dude).
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Time:8:50 am.
Mood: refreshed.
Changed my alarm to 8:30 this morning having decided last night to do the Museum of Ethnology today, not the National History Museum, which looks quite a trek. 10 1/2 hours sleep!
hug me

Saturday, May 15th, 2004

Subject:Sofia at ease... sort of
Time:8:15 pm.
Mood: accomplished.
Huh. Just got kicked out of reception. "Will it please you to go in your room, because you cannot stay here." Well, what are the couches for, then? I wanted to stay and watch Harry Potter. Granted, it's a small area and people were tripping over my feet to get through but, hey, I'm paying 40 levas a night to be here! Plbt.

It's been a busy day, and sometimes a frustrating one. I've never been in a city with such an underdeveloped tourist industry, which is refreshing in a way but it means you have to dig... and dig... and DIG to find what you want. Bulgarians generally really aren't interested in helping. It took me an hour of wandering busy(!) streets to find something for breakfast... and finding a tourist information centre proved impossible. Finally I took the directions given me by the sweet English-speaking girl at the coffee shop and went to a place that basically appeared to be a travel agency -- car rentals and airline/train tickets -- where they did in fact procure me a brochure on Sofia that came with a map.

Luckily my hotel really is right downtown so I was able to walk to every venue I've visited. I started with Sveta Nedelya Church, which I just about walked into even before I started looking. Was big church on end of street. Said I to myself, "I bet that's important." Went and looked at name on church and, "Hey, look at that. It's the one the Lonely Planet says to visit." There seemed to be a service on... however, Orthodox Christians tend to wander in and out of services at will, crossing themselves repeatedly and walking around the church to kiss various different icons, so I wasn't very conspicuous; and there was a men's voices choir singing beautifully from belfrey -- liturgical chants in harmony.

I was accosted outside the church by some Roma women; one woman with a baby slung around her tried first, holding onto my arm and following along as I walked towards the church, talking fast. When she gave up a younger woman -- very young, a teenager probably -- took her place, also grabbing my arm and very much surprising me by slapping me on the bum as she did so! However, my determined stride took me safely into the church despite them, so no harm done.

I then tried to go to the much smaller 14th century church of St. Petka Samardjiska, which is set below street level, surrounded by a square full of swish-ish stores (reminded me of Robson Square) and reputed to have beautiful frescoes, but it was closed, so I had a Bulgarian salad at the restaurant beside it while I pured over my map. I decided to walk down to Alexander Nevski Cathedral, stopping if possible at the museums of ethnography and archaeology on the way.

I couldn't find the museum of ethnography, but the museum of archaeology was a good find at five levas. It had artifacts from the paleolithic period up to well into the establishment of the Orthodox church -- sadly, none of the religious iconography-type artifacts on the top floor were labelled. I did find several things interesting. One was the huge stone columns from around the ninth century that were apparently erected for the sole purpose of having details of peace agreements carved into them -- for example, one from 851 CE detailed a 30-year peace treaty between Bulgaria and Byzantium. Another was the new-to-me information that paleolithic peoples made their way from Africa to Europe via Turkey and Bulgaria/the Balkans. Finally, in a display of cult artifacts from the Copper Age, alongside altars and zoomorphic and anthropomorphic figures (read: fat mother goddesses!) were depictions of households and, specifically, hearths -- fireplaces. This reminds me of the hearth-related rites of Vedic India... I wonder if there's a connection. There might be more of one to the Graeco-Roman goddess of the hearth, Vesta. Or maybe both! Vesta was an early goddess, I think. Anyway.

With a bit of help, and having learned to say "Excuse me" and "Where is...?" in Bulgarian, I found the Alexander Nevski Cathedral, passing the Russian church on the way and having a lovely wander through a little maze of vendors' tables leading up to it. Some were selling jewelry, some carved wooden items, and some religious kitsch. In front of the cathedral itself a stage was set up with lithe young things dancing on it. The banner above the stage read, "Culture: a force for stability in Southeastern Europe," but neither the costumes not the English lyric-ked music seemed particularly representative of Balkan culture... but hell, what do I know?

The Alexander Nevski Cathedral was built as a memorial to the 200,000 Russian soldiers who gave their lives delivering Bulgaria from the Ottoman "yoke" in the late 19th century. It's gold-roofed and quite impressive on the outside, but inside was dark and -- in my opinion -- dull. Orthodox churches really aren't my cuppa, I'm afraid. The most interesting part of my visit to the cathedral was when I was leaving and a drove of young dancers in what amounted to miniskirted cheerleading outfits sauntered calmly past a sign admonishing visitors to behave with decorum and dress modestly... crossing themselves as they went!

Well, I got caught in the snares of the vendors after that. I have a new ring (10 levas), a tiny amber pendant (4 levas), and hand-crafted silver and butter amber earrings (16 levas). Then the lady who sold me the earrings, who was very sweet, told me the name of the bus loop from which I could get a bus to Mt. Vitosha... although not until after a bit of back and forth as to whether it was too late for me to go. It was 2:00. They decided I could make it.

An hour later would have been too late. At perhaps a quarter after three I was ensconced in a cable car on my way up the mountain. The trip, which took until five there and back, was very pretty, but very no frills. There was a dingy cafe at the top and at the bottom of the mountain, and I had a cup of tea in each. At the bottom you rode first over huge, beautiful green fields where people were horse-back riding, then over a pretty little red-roofed hamlet with plots of land laid out for crops beside it and then thick, varied foliage. Coming down you get a view of Sofia laid out below the mountain.

When I got back to the centre of Sofia I decided to try and find a Bulgarian restaurant that my mini-guide said was "near the Sheraton hotel." To get help finding the street I took the bull by the horns and went into the Sheraton itself which was very posh and grand and full of well-dressed people including one gorgeously voluptuous young Indian woman in a fabulous red sari. However, I was not cowed and approached the security guards for help. They told me to ask the bellhop but then joined in anyway. They got me a very good map (Me: "I've been looking for something like this all day!") and showed me how to get to the street my restaurant was on.

Well, I set off, but before I got to Vitosha Bulevard, the route I needed to take, I passed the church of St. Petka again -- and it was open! I paid 5 levas to go in and was a bit disappointed as the frescoes were sadly quite badly faded and damaged. I was able to identify the crucifixion (duh), the footwashing scene, and I believe a scene of mourning over the body... or perhaps over Lazarus or someone, who knows... but that was all, and it wasn't very clear. Before I left I assuaged my disappointment by dropping five and a half more levas on a pretty silver and blue enamel cross. ;)

I then failed miserably at finding my Bulgarian restaurant but at least had a nice wander and window shop up Vitosha Bulevard, which is the "fashionable avenue of modern Sofia" according to the Lonely Planet, and looks it.

I settled for a Chinese (!) restaurant near my hotel. This was a mistake on the whole, I think. The food tasted suspiciously of MSG and I shouldn't have ordered a tofu dish and chow mein. The plates were huge and I barely finished half of it. Couldn't take away as no refrigerator in hotel. Didn't want to anyway as I wasn't mad keen on the tofu at all. And it was priced for its size so I paid much more than I needed to. Oh, well!

Then it was back to the hotel, the aforementioned being-kicked-out-of-reception incident and now I'm watching BBC World and... um... doing this! And my pen doesn't want to do this anymore, so.
hug me

Time:8:30 am.
Well, that was quite a weak shower but at least it got hot eventually; and I think I may have just washed my hair with body wash but it doesn't seem to be showing terribly adverse affects.

Alright, B. Time to switch off BBC World and get out there.
I had difficulty waking up at 8 this morning despite nine hours sleep. Good thing I decided against trying for a 7 o'clock wake-up!

Hmmmmm... HUNGRY. Alright, am going.
hug me

Friday, May 14th, 2004

Time:10:05 pm.
Well, I'm comfortably established in a small but attractive and scrupulously clean room in the city centre. It's a bit steep at 40 levas (twenty Euros) per night, but I guess I can afford it.

Bulgarians don't seem very effusive but the woman at the front desk and the taxi driver are both pleasant. I'm still at a bit of a loss as to where to start my sight-seeing... the woman at the front gave me two books that are meant to help me, but they seem only to list hotels, spas, resorts, tour operators and other such businesses rather than the attractions and notable sights of different places, what to see and do and how to get there.

The Lonely Planet Guide info that I got off the internet mentions a few churches, a cathedral, a national history museum, a fashionable street, some historical squares... and that's about it, really, except for the possibility of a/n day/afternoon(?) trip to nearby Mt. Vitosha where I can ride a cable car to the top... this intrigues me rather, although obviously I need to inquire about travel, cost and time. I keep reminding myself that this city is only one third the size of Vancouver (1.1 million people) which perhaps goes a fair way towards explaining the dirth of Grand and Impressive Things To Do. In fact, maybe it would be most sensible to just stick to my Lonely Planet suggestions and feel satisfied. I have less than a day and a half, after all.

Now, if only I could get my hands on an elementary Bulgarian phrasebook. Just please, thank you, yes, no, how much, excuse me, hello, goodbye... it's only polite to make an attempt. Thank goodness the money seems fairly straightforward, although I suppose I should look again at the coins.
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Time:8:15 pm.
Mood: anxious.
Music:"Silence" -- Delerium feat. Sarah McLachlan.
We are driving through beautiful green wooded mountains. I have a feeling that we are at least two hours from Sofia, though, and we were supposed to have arrived fifteen minutes ago. Oh well, not much to be done other than wait and read. The state of the roads is making writing too difficult.

8:55....

I was wrong... we are in Sofia now. I am very apprehensive about this weekend. However, after a string of pop lite crap the radio is now playing me the dance remix of Delerium's "Silence" featuring Sarah McLachlan, which is surely a good sign.
hug me

Time:7:20 pm.
I finished my chips in a rush in Plovdiv thinking we were in Sofia; and my cell phone is demanding the PIN which is currently lying on my bedroom floor in İstanbul before it will turn on. Otherwise things are going smoothly. Bulgaria is very, very green and it's raining currently.

Luckily this bus was half-empty and I've got two seats to myself on which I snoozed away the first three hours of the journey -- until the border, in other words. This and the gallons of water I downed this a.m. seems to have more or less appeased my hangover, although the water came back to haunt me -- I've been forced to use grotty squatties both at the metro station and at the border.
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Wednesday, May 12th, 2004

Subject:Oh, and, for all interested
Time:8:44 pm.
Have new phone. Complete with new phone number. Is 536 358 3678. Country code for Turkey is 90. Do not have voice mail (or if I do, I don't know how to use it), but should have phone on and with me at all times except when sleeping, showering, and... erm... at the gym, basically.
2 cuddles| hug me

Subject:The best laid plans...
Time:4:56 pm.
Looks like my Macedonia trip is hitting la poubelle. Apparently the bus ride is longer than I thought... 12 hours according to the company, 15 according to Brody, and buses leave once a day and are all overnighters leaving in the late afternoon or early evening (ie, too early for me to go on Thursday night because my evening class goes until ten). This results in two possible scenarios.

One: Overnight bus Friday night, arrive sleep-deprived in Skopje Saturday morning, sightsee for a day and take another overnight bus Saturday night, arriving in İstanbul Sunday morning and sleeping for the best part of the day. Çok güzel.

Two: Overnight bus Friday night, arrive sleep-deprived in Skopje Saturday morning, find a hotel, nap for an hour or two, sightsee, stay in hotel overnight, sightsee for part of another day (go to another city called Ohrid where there are Orthodox churches and monastaries if possible), get a four o'clock bus, arrive back in İstanbul on Monday morning and either miss my volunteer work at Christ Church or spend the entire day horrifically tired. Daha güzel? I think not.

So I think I'll just go to Sofia. Bus service is more frequent and the journey is only eight hours, and cheaper. I'll save Macedonia for a Bayram, because I really want to go now, it sounds like such a cool cute little country, besides very, very, very poor (twenty five percent unemployment. Yikes) so I should go and boost their economy. Just... not this time.
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Tuesday, May 11th, 2004

Subject:It's the Brody and Bronwen (and Percy) show!
Time:2:37 pm.
Mood: highly amused.
Funny adventure Friday night.

I cooked chili, first off, and it was good. I was surprised and pleased that it was good because I basically trolled the net looking at a million different veggie chili recipes and taking what sounded most interesting from each of them. As a result, my chili had beer, chocolate and chopped apricots in it. And dijon mustard. And various spices of course. And it was good.

We didn't eat until close till after 10:30 because Brody taught till ten and then obligingly stopped on the way home for a bottle of wine per my request. He also put Percy out on the balcony at the beginning of the meal to stop the little scavenger from trying to eat off our plates. Weeeeeeellllll, a plateful of food and a couple of glasses of wine each later, we decided we should let Percy back in. Balcony door opened... wait... no Percy. What? No Percy? "Did we already let him in?" queried Brody. Nope, we had not. Percy had managed, somehow, to lower his small form from our balcony to the windowsill of the apartment below. Needing extra food in my time of stress, I fled to the kitchen and had a few spoonfuls of chili with bread. This confused Brody, who thought I'd gone outside to rescue Percy, who he now discovered was cornered by our neighbourhood male bully cat, a big black beast with a bad temper. "Bronwen?" "Yes?" I answered through the kitchen window. "Can you see him?" "No..." (swallowing more bread). "Where ARE you??" "In the kitchen...." I reappeared in the living room with my bread. Brody gave me the Look of Death. "What are you doing stuffing your face now? I thought you'd gone outside to rescue Piercy! [his permanent deliberate mispronunciation of Percy's name]" "Well, never mind that," I said, "we'll go now."

Well, we went out of the apartment, and Brody, on the way out, grabbed the ironing board. I was as mystified as you are. Turns out his plan was to open the thing out, then extend it upwards so the top was a foot or so below Percy as a "platform" for him to jump onto. Needless to say, Percy wasn't buying, but at least I was treated to an amusing fifteen minutes or so of Brody spread-eagled against the building, holding the ironing board above his head with a leg in each hand, drawling "C'mon Piercy, c'mon boy, c'mon Pierce, now, c'mon..." at which point I put my foot down. "Brody, this is ridiculous. There are lights on in that apartment, let's just go upstairs, I'll look up window in the dictionary and we'll go ask for Percy back."

Brody handed me his keys and up we went. When we got inside I put the keys on the bookcase, looked up window (perceme or something) and walked out. Brody put the ironing board away and walked out. The door shut behind us and instantly we both looked at each other and went "Uh... oh." The keys were locked inside the apartment.

Well, we decided first things first... try and get Percy back. So down we went to the lady below us. She took a while to answer, and when she did I think I did a very bad job of explaining the situation. Instead of saying "my cat is on your window" as I intended (windowsill wasn't in the dictionary), I think I said "My cat... there's a window." Oops. She didn't understand, we couldn't understand her reply, and after awhile she closed the door.

Then, Brody decided he was going to try to scale the wall to get back into our apartment. This really was the best idea of the night (sarcasm. Drips. Drips). He got up to the second floor and stayed there standing on a set of bars outside of the lady's window for at least five minutes while I ran around below going "What are you doing? What's wrong? What's happening? DON'T try to get Percy. You're not, are you? What are you doing?...." etc, etc, and desperately hoping no one would catch him in the act and call the police. Then he came down again and said he couldn't go any further up because his arms were shaking. Oh, really comforting.

So, we did the only thing left to do... we walked to the other side of Bakırköy to Stephen, Corina and Julia's house. When we arrived Stephen was out and Corina and Julia were running around in their pyjamas on a Grand Spider Hunt (TM) and were really quite amused to see us and hear our story... although Julia was also worried to hear about Percy's predicament... and although it took them awhile to figure out who the heck we were. (Knock knock knock... "Who is it?" "It's us..." "Who IS that?" Brody, helpfully: "Can we borrow some sugar?" Me: "It's the Bs from Marmara..." Brody: "Or some flour? Maybe some eggs? Do you have a little bit of milk... bread...?") Anyway, in short order we phoned Daniel who said he was going home right away, so we turned around and left Julia and Corina to their quest.

We got back to find the lights off in our target apartment, and that Percy had managed to get himself from the windowsill to the woman's balcony. Whereupon Brody decided to try scaling the wall again to get him. Percy was allowing himself to be stroked over the balcony railing and Brody was just about to grab him when Daniel shone the flashlight down from our balcony to see what was going on and Percy bolted. Then he got comfortable on the balcony and curled up on a dustpan and brush so Brody decided to give up that tactic. Then he decided to try his ironing board trick again because every time we called his name Percy would come to the edge of the balcony and cry. The ironing board trick again failed to work and finally we just had to give up and go to bed.

The next morning Daniel and I went down to get him. In much better Turkish than my botched attempt, Daniel explained "Sizin balkon benim kedde var... bir kuçuk kedde...." (On your balcony is my cat... a little cat....). The woman looked quite amused and asked me hadn't I come last night (I understood this because I heard the words "dun akşam" -- last night -- but couldn't possibly produce the whole sentence). I said yes, yes, and she said well, go on through and get him. So I did. She told us that he'd cried a lot and she'd given him milk (Daniel translated this for me). We figured they'd taken to each other, especially when Percy ran away from me back into her apartment and had to be collected again. "Oh, sizin seviyor!" Daniel cried (he loves you!). The woman said that she likes cats, she's had seventeen (I'm assuming not all at once), but she's fed up with them now. Daniel said Percy had been naughty -- "yaramaz kedde," and I said, yes, very naughty, "çok yaramaz!" "Hayır!" she responded, "yaramaz değil" (literally, "No, naughty nothing," but obviously it means something the effect of, no, he's not naughty, he was no trouble).

And that was that, really. She was a very nice lady. I hope Percy doesn't attempt any more flying leaps, though. Especially not when Brody and I have been drinking wine.

Things to be grateful for: Big mean bully cat didn't hurt Percy. We got Percy back. Daniel was easily reachable to so we got back into the apartment. Nobody looked out their windows while Brody was scaling the walls. Brody didn't splat on the pavement... or my head, for that matter.

So it wasn't an entirely unlucky evening.
7 cuddles| hug me

Thursday, May 6th, 2004

Subject:Çok stupid!
Time:7:05 pm.
Brody is home safely. He went to Macedonia by accident. I have to teach now. But he really is a dolt!
6 cuddles| hug me

Subject:MIA
Time:8:37 am.
Mood: worried.
Brody left for his border run on Tuesday night. When he left I was angry at him for going five days early when if he'd gone on the correct day I could have gone early and gone with him.

Border runs last a night. He should have been back yesterday (Wednesday) by nine or ten a.m. It's now Thursday, twenty to nine. He still doesn't have a working mobile phone, and hasn't been (hasn't been able to be?) in contact with anyone. He's supposed to teach this morning. He is absolutely not still missing of his own volition.
5 cuddles| hug me

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