The Post-Turkey Blog-Post

Turkey. What an amazing country. What an amazing trip. And how lazy I was about blogging. I journaled a fair bit though, which for my past two trips I didn't do because of the blogging. So there you go. I don't pick the method - it seems to choose me.

I won't bore you with chronological details. Rough itenerary was Istanbul, Goreme in Cappadocia, Pamukkale, Selcuk and Ephesus, Canakkale/Eceabat, and back to Istanbul. 40 hours total on buses. Three nights accommodation saved on night travel. Seven nights total in one of the coolest cities I've ever been to: Istanbul. 8 nights elsewhere.

Two visits to ancient city ruins (Heirapolis and Efes - I skipped Troy). One hike up a hill to watch 30 hotair balloons. One hike up a mountain barefoot over calcium carbonate deposits. Two plus nights spent smoking nargile (flavored water pipe). Three American travel companions. One BBQ on a rooftop terrace in Istanbul. One night of major Raki drinking (Turkish anise alcohol). Countless tuvka sis (chicken shish) eaten. One series of backgammon with a skeevy Turkish dude in Selcuk and one with a good friend in Istanbul. Visits to 4 or 5 mosques. Approximately 80 calls to prayer heard in 5 cities and towns. Two pieces of local jewelry purchased. Countless flirtatous Turkish men - one of whom got the flirting returned.

Five bodies of water (Bosphorus Strait, Sea of Mamaras, Black Sea, Golden Horn and the Dardenelles). One pair of shoes packed that I never wore! One lost article of clothing - my favorite brown sweater/jacket/duster thingy - left on the bus in Denzili when changing for Pamukkale at 5:15 in the morning. 5 books read. Many Efes (the local beer named after the most famous ancient city) drunk. About 200 YTL (Turkish Lira) (about $130) spent getting into sites, attractions and museums. One load of laundry done. Two pair of underwear bought to avoid having to do laundry again!

Countless cups of cay (tea) drunk with two sugar cubes each time (more refined sugar than I've had in probably two years!). One slightly hungover day spent sightseeing. One Turkish daylight savings time observed. 45 minutes spent humoring the carpet-salesman guy explaining the history and making of kilims to me without buying anything (I told him I wasn't going to from the start). Approximately 42,000 older Europeans and Americans paths' crossed in Topaki Palace and Ephesus combined from cruise ship trips. One motorbike ridden on while wearing my pack because I didn't understand the hotel owner and was randomly standing in the street when I really belonged 100 yards down at the bus company place! Repeatedly awakened on the trip from Istanbul to Goreme by the woman next to me trying to ask me questions in Turkish and offer me food - nice, but I'm sleeping here!

Many jetons bought (small blue plastic tokens used for the metro system). Repeated amazement of the systems in Turkey: buy your ticket at any site, stick it in the turnstile reader, an automated voice says "Please Pass" and you walk through the turnstile. This was especially interesting when the turnstile was outdoors and after walking through you're in some holy ruin. EZPass on the highways and one of the most clean, efficient city lite rail tram systems I've ever seen.

178 YTL ($120) spent on bus fare. Approximately 20 YTL spent going to the bathroom. Most places you must pay between 50 kurus and 1 YTL to use the toilet. At least there's always paper and soap! A few Turkish words learned: merhaba-hello; teshakur ederim-thank you; bay/bayan-man/woman; tavuk-chicken; tuvalet-toilet; cay (said chi)-tea; tamam-okay/no worries; checheve-cheers!

Zero times my life was at risk (this is unusual as I usually think I might die at least once while travelling, usually transport related). One fresh squeezed pomegranate juice drunk (too bitter!), a few grapefruit juices drunk (delish!). Two nights spent sleeping in a fairy chimney, which come to find out is an ancient term because people from afar saw candlelight flickering and thought that humans couldn't be living in these stone turrets so it must be fairies. One scraped elbow suffered when stumbling out of aforementioned fairy chimney to descend the 14 steps to my shared bath in the middle of the night. Approximately 580 photos taken. Doner (schwarma) sandwiches eaten for only 1.5 YTL. Delish! 15 free Turkish breakfasts eaten (all rooms/hostels come with breakfast) consisting of cukes, feta cheese, tomatoes, boiled egg, bread, jam, honey, olives with tea or coffee. Way to many clothes packed! The comfort of sneakers as travelling shoes re-realized. Buses that serve drinks and snacks like on a plane!

Totally overwhelmedness in a bazaar like I've never been before. Two hellacious days of pouring down rain. One of the best dates of my life. More Christian/Jesus/Mary depicting mosaics and frescoes than I can count. Successful and mostly hassle-free shopping. Being known by name and I them, at one little bar/restaurant in Istanbul. Free towels, soap, breakfast and internet at every hotel/hostel I stayed at. Being in Istanbul on 29 October - Republic Day - celebrating the founding of modern Turkey (and modern it is)! Turkish yogurt (better than Greek).

Tons learned about WWI and Turkey. Left with a bag that weighed 27 lbs and am returning with 33 lbs. Not bad! One city bus trip navigated in a downpour - totally sucessfully! One trip up a tower to see the city from on high - one of my favorite things to do everywhere I go. Two obscene pastries eaten (one day after the other) as a rainy-day-in-Istanbul activity. One ancient hill-carved monastary visited. Orange tights purchased for 4 YTL. One very early shuttle bus to the airport to begin the journey home. 6 hour layover in London.

SUCH A GOOD TRIP.

Other thoughts that I think are important:

When I travel, I am a different person than I am at home. I'm calmer, I worry less. I go with the flow. I'm open and friendlier. I'm less opinionated. I listen better.

I need to adopt some of these things for my regular life, which it seems to me now is a misnomer anyway. For am I not a traveller in my life? Am I not discovering and learning every day? Should I not be as open in my day to day as I am when I am a foreigner? Should I not take in stride whatever happens in the way I am so willing to when I am away? Yes. The answer is a big yes.

Living in Thailand taught me to relax. Before my years of mai pen rai (no worries!) I didn't know how. I failed at relaxing, but now I do it well. It is time to take another lesson from the world and make it mine all the time. Because why do I travel if not to learn more and then integrate the lessons? Just to say I've been places? Not I. I want more.

And so, I will try to be more open at home. To look around more, not hurry to no where so much, to smile at people and be friendlier. I will try to worry less. I will attempt to stop living so comfortably with annoyance (one of my favorite defaults) and instead will take a moment to determine if energy could be better spent another way (my guess is yes). I will attempt to be more free of myself - of my own self-constraints that keep me from feeling all the time the way I feel when I travel.

Turkey's So Great, No Tıme to Blog

Just a little post to say that İ've obvıously decıded not to post from Turkey. I'll do a bıg trıp-roundup post when İ'm back statesıde.

Update about Missing Pants

It's here! The blog about missing pants. It's called Find Your Pants and it's the brainchild of one of my illustrious Boston Cares co-workers.

She's collecting photos, so start snapping those missing pants chicks on the street and submit! Click here to check out her blog, called Find Your Pants!

You Forgot Your Pants

There is a disturbing phenomenon happening at the moment in fashion. People keep forgetting their pants.

I started noticing this last spring. Women on the streets of the city with what appeared to be shirts, with no pants or skirts. Some were button downs, like they stole them from their boyfriends or their dads, belted. Some were what looked like long t-shirts. Sometimes they were dresses that were shirt-sized. But each and every time, legs up to here and more often than not, a piece of butt now and then peeking out.

This summer, my parents and I were walking through the city and I pointed one out to my mom: "See that girl, she forgot her pants." My mother looked at the woman, looked at me and said, horrified "Oh my god, she did!" I laughed and explained the phenomenon. She was doubtful. But then the next one and the next one and the next one walked by. Each time, my mother pointed and stared. By the time she was getting on the T to go home, she was as disturbed as I was.

Let me clarify on age and size of these women. Varied. All over the map. Young and cute and small. Not-so-young, not so cute, not so small. Sometimes one would have tried to have sense by putting on tights or nylons (not leggings, mind you). This, while a valiant effort, often makes it worse. Now your ass cheek is peeking at me through purple nylon? This is supposed to be better?

Sitting down is always a challenge. On the T, crotch shots abound. What are these women thinking? Do I want to see your underwear? No, not really. And especially not at 7:30 a.m. And where are you going? To work or school? This hardly seems appropriate attire for either. If you want a bare ass at the club, fine, but I think your teachers and co-workers would appreciate a fully clothed person to show up.

Now, I'm a pretty conservative dresser, I'll admit. Not as conservative as some people (I'm considered in my family to be a little on the trendy side in comparison). But I cover up my bits. Fully. Maybe I'll show a little cleavage now and then, but boobs are not orifices. Stuff does not accidentally come out of them. (Graphic, I know, but seriously people!) I realize that I am not the best judge of what's hip or appropriate. I came of age during grunge, where we wore flannel and 4 layers and jeans with tights and big boots and long underwear under skirts. All our clothes were 2 sizes too big. I borrowed my dad's jeans in high school (he is 6'4" and weighed 215 at his skinniest) and his sweaters whenever he wasn't looking. I understand this. But this swing so far in the other direction is problematic, I think.

Boys aren't dressing like this. I don't ever see a guy out walking around with short shorts on. Or a dude with his package somehow highlighted for the world to check out. There is no equivalent to this for men. Women are expected to leave nothing to the imagination and walk around half naked (literally), but men are allowed to continue to wear cargo shorts hanging down to their mid-calves that are so baggy I can't even tell if they are fit or not. Let's not turn this into a feminism argument, but women continue to be objectified and objectify themselves through fashion. It's a problem.

My female co-workers, who are all far younger than I, agree with me. None of them would be caught in an outfit like this. They joke that they want to get stickers made up that say "This is where your pants should be" and then stick them on people's legs as a public service. I am pleased that there is this group I know who show me that it is not every woman who is willing to bear her ass in public. Because I'm certainly not going to any time soon (even though my ass is much smaller than it used to be these days).

So, women of the world. Put on some pants. Or a skirt. Anything on the bottom that covers up that half of you somewhat. Be risque if you like. I had a long, black, see-through skirt in college. I wore it with black tights. You could see my legs right through it. It was sexy and fun. But it wasn't obscene. There's a difference. The man who is checking you out on the street should be wondering what you look like under that cute dress you're wearing. He should be striving towards getting you out of it to enjoy his first look. But he doesn't have to do any of that, because he can see it all already, right there on the street. And then he goes home and masturbates to the vision. Hardly romantic.

Start a movement. Get some pants.

Homelessness Awareness Month

Feeding America is asking bloggers to post in the month of September about Homelessness Awareness Month. Since I am on the board of a soup kitchen in Boston, I thought I'd write about that.

The Friday Night Supper Program is in its 25th year of serving hungry and homeless people every Friday night in the basement of the Arlington Street Church. It was founded by the Church and Dignity Boston, a group of GLBT Catholics. It then became its own 501C3 nonprofit organization and has operated that way ever since. It has only two part-time employees and relies on volunteers to serve a nutritious meal to approximately 130 people each week. A Friday night has never been missed or cancelled, ever, in 25 years. Come rain, snow, hurricanes, holidays, power outages and more, Friday Night Supper is there.

The meal is served restaurant style. Guests begin with bread and butter and water on their tables and can go up to get coffee and juice and soup during the first hour. At 6 p.m., volunteers serve the meal to the guests at their tables, accommodating special requests for vegetarian options and other requests. As soon as the meal is served to everyone in the hall, the door is opened again to late comers, who receive a meal at the door as they come in. Dessert is also served to guests at their table at 6:30. Guests are welcome to spend time in the hall until 7 and then the hall closes so volunteers can clean up, sweep, mop, breakdown all the tables and chairs and do all the dishes. Without fail, all the volunteers leave by 7:30. It's like clockwork.

We serve guests who are homeless and those who live in subsidized housing or low-income housing. Some work, but many cannot for varied reasons. Some live only on disability or on social security. At the beginning of the month, our numbers are often lower, but come the end of the month, it can get very busy. On cold or rainy days, folks tend to stay longer in the hall, protected from the weather.

We also have a "Clothing Closet" which provides whatever we can to guests when we can. Clothes, shoes, socks, underwear, toiletries, and more are given out each week to folks with requests. Often, we cannot meet all the requests we get, and are constantly looking for donations. We always need men's things - we get about 90% male guests at the Program. If you have things to donate, let me know! Or, adopt FNSP for the holidays or for your birthday, and do a drive for us!

Homelessness is pretty horrible. Sleeping on the streets, on a bench, in an ATM vestibule are all risky, cold, and uncomfortable. People are homeless for lots of different reasons - many of them their own responsibilities, but many that are more luck of the draw than anything else. Undereducated, under resourced, under supported people struggle across the United States every day to be sure they can keep a roof over their heads.

Is running a soup kitchen solving the problem? Nope. It's not. We aren't doing any work at the root of the problem. We aren't working to change the source of the problem. But, for only $70,000 a year, we can serve about 7000 meals to people who can't wait for the system to catch up - because they are hungry right now.

Want to come volunteer with me? Let me know. You can come anytime! It's easy, fun, and rewarding.

And this month, when you walk past a homeless person, say hello. Or give the dude on the corner a dollar, even if you usually wouldn't. Or get your extras wrapped up at a meal and give it to someone who's asking on the street. Or, make a donation to a homelessness serving agency (FNSP!). Or volunteer. Before I served my first meal at FNSP in 2007, I had never worked in a soup kitchen or homeless shelter. I had no idea I would care so much. But I do. And you might too.

An Okay Spreadsheet

Life was not supposed to be this way. I'm not exactly certain what way it was supposed to be, but this isn't it.

I was looking forward to this weekend as I always look forward to a weekend during which I have nothing or almost nothing planned. My life is so busy and days or whole weekends with nothing in them are a blessing. These past few weeks have had me running, so knowing I had three whole days with nothing much to do had kept me going. And, as usual, this afternoon, seemingly from nowhere, I was hit with a bout of extreme loneliness, as I often am on three-day weekends during which I have nothing or almost nothing planned. A hideous Catch-22.

I have no idea how I have wound up in my late thirties and single. Absolutely no idea. It's as if it is calculus. That is how little idea I have about it. I don't know why this is my path, I don't know if I did something or a series of somethings to wind up here, I don't know if perhaps it is just fate.

I've learned quite a bit about Microsoft Excel over the past couple of weeks. (How did I get along this long without knowing the simplicity of formulas or that dragging a row that starts with "Monday" and "Tuesday" will autofill days of the week to infinity?) Tonight I was picturing my life like a spreadsheet with the bottom right "Total" cell being empty where "marriage" should be. All the experiences that supposedly lead to that are effected by some formula that adds up to it - in this spreadsheet. And then I am able to play around with scenarios, changing out a cell that says "Thailand" with a cell that says "staying put" or retyping a cell that says "Simmons" with a cell that says "URI" to see if the word "marriage" magically appears in that bottom right cell. But, even if I could have that grid on the screen, it's too late to change any of the cells. Time passed cannot be changed. It's wasted energy and wasted fantasy to even wonder about it.

It's been a good while since I thought about he-who-shall-not-be-named, and tonight I was besieged. A symptom of the loneliness of the three-day weekend, no doubt. I remembered, all of a sudden, that he knew he was being sent away on Army mobilization before he kissed me the first time. That he wooed me with great vigor, knowing all along that when he had me hooked he would then tell me he was leaving, pretending that he'd just learned it himself. How horrible. How really really horrible. The feeling of horror isn't as strong now as it was when I first came to know this nearly 8 months ago, but my disbelief is. It just sits on top of the pile of other disbelief I have. There are so many things I just cannot believe.

I cannot believe that I sleep alone each night. I cannot believe how long it has been since I had sex. I cannot believe that I am not allowed to care for someone as deeply as I wish to and have the capacity for. I cannot believe that nobody cares for me. (Friends and family do not enter into this equation.) I cannot believe that I wasted some number of years not caring about finding a partner. I cannot believe that still, today, I am very very shy and have a hard time engaging in conversations with men in many situations. I cannot believe that about half the time, I am rejected when I reach out to someone new and ask if they'd like to get a beer sometime. I cannot believe that more than half the time, when I do get a beer with someone, I find that I'd rather be talking to my roommate or reading a book than carrying on the conversation I am in. I cannot believe some of the people who I am connected to on FaceBook have found partners and I have not. I also cannot believe how rude that last statement is or how vehemently I feel it. I cannot believe how embarrassed I am sometimes to be like a broken record about my singleness to some of those around me. I cannot believe that both my siblings are married and both of my in-laws' siblings are either married or engaged. I just simply cannot believe any of it.

This disbelief is new. For a long while now, I've been actively engaged in looking for a partner. For him. Wherever he is. (I've always thought there are many "hims" who would be great for me, I use the singular for simplicity sake.) All these years that it hasn't worked, I've just thought I wasn't trying hard enough. Or perhaps I wasn't being forgiving enough. Or maybe I wasn't being charming enough. I always thought it was something fixable or make-able. Now I don't think that. I only know one other person who has tried this hard to find her partner, and she's now in a new relationship that I hope will work out for her. But everyone else? Not so much effort. (Don't get me wrong - the RELATIONSHIPS are effort - I know some folks with what I would consider an inordinate amount of relationship effort - but I mean the meeting part.) Why haven't I ridden up the chairlift with a guy who asks me out for a beer apres ski? Why didn't the guy in line at Chacarero that day - the one who I talked to the entire time about the Mango Mash soda I had chosen - ask me for my number? Why did the friend of a friend who I worked up the guts to email and ask out for a beer reject me so swiftly with a "no offense, but I'm not interested" response? I'm just not sure. Perhaps it IS me. Perhaps I'm like those people who audition on American Idol, whose family and friends should definitely have told them they cannot sing for shit. Maybe I am really not attractive and not good company and nobody ever tells me. It's possible. There's things I don't tell those in my life. Maybe everyone's been sparing my feelings for years.

All I know is that other people meet. And I seem not to meet anyone. I go through my days and nights, and I don't come across interesting people who are single. I am actively engaged in lots of things, and none of them bring me closer to anyone who I might end up loving. And so I go back to the disbelief.

Occasionally, I make a comment about how thankful I am to be single. Usually cheekily, in the wake of some idiocy someone's partner has done or said. And yes, it's nice to not have to ask anyone before I make plans or negotiate someone else's family on top of my own. But none of that, for me, is worth what it means I don't get. There are those who don't care about marriage; who see the single-person benefits as outweighing what one might get from a partner. I am not one of those people. I'm pretty sure all that compromise is most likely worth it in the end. Watching my parents for 36 years has led me to be this sure.

I've been very very scared for a while now that if I do end up alone for the long term, that it'll change me drastically in some way I cannot predict just yet. I cannot help but think that change will be negative. I work, though, to put support beams in place in the foundation of my life so that won't happen. I maintain friendships, I strive to be a very good aunt, I reach out to those who need help. I do all this because I care, but I also do it shore up my own dunes. To make sure that if I need the favor in reverse, it'll most likely be there. Because I might not have that person who HAS to be there for me, I need to fill up with people who would WANT to.

We singletons are not taken seriously sometimes. We don't have partners to drag us away, we don't have children to take up our time, some of us don't have houses to maintain. And so we are considered less than actually grown up. I feel this regularly. It is another thing I just cannot believe. How is it that someone who has been financially independent for 14 years, who put herself through graduate school, who travelled across the planet and back - how can this person not be fully adult? And yet, I am not. Now and then, I even treat myself that way.

As it often is when these kinds of thoughts enter my head, it is late right now. I cannot sleep. I am, 99% of the time, a very good sleeper. Yet, every six months or so the doubt-tapes begin playing and I can't make them stop. And tonight the result is this post. Perhaps before I make it go live, I should go back and re-read the few other posts about my alone-ness and make sure the broken-record tracks at least have a few different chords. I won't though. This is my story tonight, and so it shall be recorded. With a tiny bit of luck (and perhaps some more effort on my part), I'll re-read this the night before I am going to walk down the aisle and I'll laugh. Or I'll re-read it when I'm 66 and off to my brother's for Sunday dinner with his kids and his wife because I am the fun, single aunt who the kids can't wait to talk to, even though they are already graduated from college and one is engaged and I'll sigh for a moment, but of course, I'll be okay.

Because if there's one thing I always am, somehow, no matter what, it's okay. And that is what I assume is in that bottom right corner of the life spreadsheet right now, rather than it being empty - "okay".

Summer 2009

Me, Kelly, Ashley, Nikki, Becca, Allie and Youngmi during our AmeriCorps celebration trip to the Boston Harbor Islands, 2009.

Now a tradition, here is my 2009 "What I Did Over My Summer Vacation" Post.

-Went white water rafting in Maine - did my 2nd, 3rd, and 4th months of FitCamp (had to stop wearing my contacts in August because the sweat running into them was burning too much!) - trained to be a Civic Reflection Facilitator by the Project on Civic Reflection in Chicago - saw Away We Go with Maya Rudolph, John Krasinski, and Dave Eggers at the showing! - ran three 5Ks and one two-miler! - saw Kathy Griffin live - launched Never Cease Photography - met a cousin I'd never met before - was in the same room (albeit a giant conference center room) with Michelle Obama - visited San Francisco - ate lots of CSA veggies - grew zucchini, beans, radishes, cukes, basil, and lettuce - donated double red cells - spent another 4th of July at Cobbetts Pond - saw Michael Franti & Spearhead, twice - saw Goonies on the big screen at midnight - had an overnight in JP with the Clinton kids - said goodbye to 4 AmeriCorps staff members - and hello to 5 new ones - finally visited Burlington, Vermont - camped on the shore of Lake Champlain - went canoe/kayaking with mom and dad after getting rained out twice - presented a writing workshop to 6 little kids at 826Boston - went to a wedding in Kennebunkport, Maine, in which the groom promised during his vows to always love the bride, even if she was disfigured in a tragic shark attack - visited with the Dailey family - hosted my sister and niece for a sleepover at my house - went to 2 Sox games - got brand new $500 brakes - made 56 ounces of homemade pesto with the basil from my garden - was a First Thursdays artist in JP - thoroughly enjoyed myself as always!

Happy Labor Day Weekend!