HELLO SUNNY CANADIAN STUDENTS

Hey guys,

This week I don't have anything new to tell you about Istanbul, but I was very impressed with how well you answered my questions.  I did see something very interesting in the newspaper the other day, though.  I was reading a very famous American newspaper.  It's called the New York Times, and they had an article that made me think of you guys.  Follow the links below to see the article and a slideshow of pictures from the article.

CLICK HERE FOR THE ARTICLE

CLICK HERE FOR SOME GREAT PICTURES FROM THE ARTICLE


Have you ever been to any of these places?  What did you think?

Have a great week, guys!

Mr. T

HELLO SUNNY CANADIAN STUDENTS!

Hello everybody (especially 3.B)!

I hope you guys are having a great school year.  Are you being good for Miss Pien?  Of course you are!  I want to tell you a little bit about my school and my new classes.  I teach at a place called Terakki Vakfı Okulları.  You can click here to see their website.  It's written in Turkish though, so it might be hard to read.  It is a very big school.  I teach in the kindergarten and I have about 200 students.  I know, that's a lot of students, but they are all very nice and very fun.  I miss you guys a lot, and I'll be using this blog to teach you about Turkey and Istanbul.  Can you find Istanbul and Turkey on this map?  Can you find the Czech Republic?  Is Istanbul the capitol city of Turkey?  Post your answers in the comments section.

PS -- Can you send me some of your summer writing stories?  I would really love to read them!

My 180 Students

Ya know, I was really bummed out that I wasn't able to come back for the wedding.  I did see a lot of pictures (and some pictures of the honeymoon) and it looked really great.  Everybody looked wonderful, and I could tell from the photos that everybody was having a great time (even the ones where Steve puts on the serious face).  I guess I'll just have to wait until January to see everybody...

But!  I wasn't bummed out for too long.  As it turns out, my job is really physically exhausting.  I have 180 kindergarten students that I teach twice a week.  It's only 24 teaching hours, but man, I never realized how physical teaching is when the kids can barely speak.  What I mean is that it's all dancing, singing, running around and shouting the dozen or so words that they know in English.  It's really nice though, having all of the kids yell "Hello Mr. Matt!" when they see you in the hallway.  It's also kinda nice being salaried, because even though my classes finish at 3:30, I have to stay there until 5:00, so I'm forced to get stuff done ahead of time.  I like it.

Anyway, after the first week, we decided to celebrate by going down to the Galata fish market and eating some fresh fish and smoking a nargile (I know, bad for your health, but.. whatever) by the Golden Horn, the waterway that separates Beyoglu from Sultanahmet.  While we didn't take any pictures of the awesome view, I was able to find a picture on the internet that accurately depicts our setting...

(from http://istanbulstreets.wordpress.com/, so credit's given where credit's due)

So yeah, this is where I live now.  No castles in sight, but the view's alright just the same.

Claire's Here!

Claire finally made it!  After much deliberating on the issue, she just decided to fly in, rather than take the long way via train, so she got in on Monday evening.  I don't really have any pictures to show you guys of that.. but I'm sure we'll be doing something noteworthy soon.  We've just been eating really good food. I've been working, she's been getting job stuff sorted out... it's been great, but ya know, everyday life.

 Varna, Bulgaria

I know... I didn't get to come home last week on my holiday, thanks to the Storm That Wasn't Really As Bad For New York City As They Thought It Would Be But Was Really Bad For The Catskills, but I still had to take a trip out of the country for visa purposes.  I decided to go to Varna, Bulgaria, a small beach/resort town on the Black Sea coast.  It was about a 7 hour bus ride from Istanbul.  It was kind of like Prague 2.0... They had beer and beer gardens...

... but they also have awesome seafood that you can each at a beachfront restaurant...

 ... There's one drawback, though.  The Cyrillic alphabet (which, apparently, the Bulgarians invented).

I had a great time on the trip, but it definitely wasn't as nice as taking a trip home.  I've got a long break in January and a lot of credit with Delta, so I'll see all you guys then!

New Apartment

This is our new kitchen.  As you can see... we went from really big to kinda small (cozy, I'd say).

I'm not going to mention the Situation That Cannot Be Named, but I will post some pictures of our new apartment.  Much like our place in Prague, it's located on a giant hill near a small football stadium.  As you can see from the pictures, it's "sparsely" furnished, so I'm sure we'll be taking a trip to Ikea to get some more Stuff for it.  Oh, and it's dirty (but I've been cleaning!).

The kitchen (pictured above) opens up into this small dining room area.  We have a little balcony outside, which is really nice for watching neighborhood kids, drinking coffee, and hanging laundry.

This is the living room... messy.  Oh, we've got a TV though, and we have like 300 channels (a few which are even in English)!

Bedroom.  It looks small because it is small.  But, I mean, it's a bedroom.

And a bathroom.  Also small.  But ya know what?  All the furnishing are new, the landlords are awesome, and the price is right.  And I'm close to the metro and close to the bar/restaurant/gringo part of town, so speaking little to no Turkish isn't a huge problem.

Oh yeah, I also finally got my bike from DHL, which required no less that 5 hours of traveling around in DHL trucks/taxis/helpful peoples' cars.  But it's done! And I've discovered that it's possible to ride all the way to the black sea(!).  I'll post more this coming week.  I miss you guys a lot, and really wish I could be home.

The World's Most Expensive Used Bicycle

The bike finally made it.  I won't go into too many details, mostly because I don't know where to even begin, but the process involved 3 days of going out to the airport to go to different customs offices, DHL offices, and DHL warehouses.  Once I finally got the box, it was really satisfying to take the who thing out of the box, put it together in front of a crowd of DHL employees, and ride off into the sunset.  A lot of bizarre things happened over the course of getting the bike out of the customs, too many to recount here, so you'll just have to wait 'til I get home... Which I'll be doing NEXT SATURDAY!

Also, I think I'll be updating the blog on Sundays from now on, so that way everybody knows when they can check it to get some news on my trip.

The first week of school was good.  I was moved up to the high school program, but then moved right back down to Kindergarten.  So yes, Uncle Pete, I guess I was laterally promoted and demoted in the course of a couple of days.  I had my first true, Turkish made Lahmacun on Friday.  It was delicious, it's kind of like a flatbread pizza with minced meat and spices... very good.  They drink Ayran with it, a weird watered down yogurt drink.  I haven't tried that yet, though.  Okay... see you guys soon!

New School, New Job

This is my new school, Terakki Vakfi Okulları. Terakki means "progress" in Turkish.  Founded in the late 19th century, the school is one of the oldest (and most prestigious) in Istanbul.  The picture below is the front of the main building of the school.  I'll post some more pictures when I get a chance.  It's a huge and impressive building with an impressive staff.  Basically, it's intimidating, but I think it'll be great experience for me. 

I was originally slated to teach Kindergarten at this fine school, but today they offered me a spot teaching their high school prep class.  I guess one of their other new hires from America fell through and I'm one of the only people with experience teaching 14-16 year old students and an educational background in pedagogy.  Long story short, I agreed.  Long live the lateral promotion.  I'll post more info about and pictures of the school in the coming weeks.  See you guys in about two weeks!