Since a new year is about to begin, I thought I would ask you the reader if there are any specific topics or questions you would like me to address. In the coming months, or if anyone would like to see specific things in and around Turkey.
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It’s snowing right now in Istanbul!
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Hello everyone,
My life has been getting busier and busier, and I have been getting more and more tired. With a week vacation in Morocco, followed by a visit from my brother and a friend from university, coming up, there is no break in sight. I therefore regret to inform you all that I am taking a break from keeping this blog. I need more time for other parts of my life. I want to exercise more, and I need to put more time in at work as things are growing here. Although I love keeping this blog, it is somewhat time consuming (coming up with fresh content all the time is not easy nor is resizing all those pictures). I will therefore take a one month break from writing (maybe you will see a few entries, but nothing near the frequency I have had). I will probably put one entry a week between now and January 12th.
On an unrelated note, today marks my ninth month of keeping this blog (and 145 entries - that’s more than an entry every two days).
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I am no stranger to doing my own laundry. Throughout university (in the US and in Switzerland) I had to do my own laundry. When I came to Turkey however, my house keeper was doing my laundry once a week. She kept doing things wrong like washing things I didn’t washed, or washing dry clean only thing. So I got annoyed and took washing into my own hands. Until two days ago, I was reasonably successful.
The first few weeks of doing laundry I would set the machine to some setting where the machine stays full of water and doesn’t unlock (it’s a side loading machine). I could understand if there was a soak setting where the machine would fill with water and sit, but this setting seemed to wash the clothes and then just never finish the cycle. The only way I could figure out how to get them out was change the setting and try again. Through trial and error, I found the one setting out of 8 or 10, that I can use on all clothes and doesn’t take too long.
Two nights ago I encountered a new problem. When I opened the washing machine, my clothes smelled really strange. Our original giant bag of detergent had run out so I had used something else I found under the sink. Suspicious I called a friend to consult. Very slowly I sounded out the words on the bag as the other end of the line began laughing. Apparently I had washed my clothes in some kind of chemical you run through the washing machine to protect it, and I had used a lot of it! It was too late to buy new detergent, so went to sleep.
Having learned my lesson, I went to the store the next night to buy detergent. Again I called a Turkish friend to consult on which one to buy. Eventually I found one and brought it to the front of the store. No wallet! I frantically began searching my pockets for my wallet. I needed this detergent. I hadn’t done laundry in three weeks and I literally had nothing left. I found 5 lyra, a far cry from the 23.50 it was for this detergent. Like an idiot I had to walk out of the store empty handed after having held up the line as I rummaged around in my pockets. I needed that detergent.
I thought about it for a bit then I thought why not borrow the money from someone else. So I called the guy in charge of our building, Ercan. He knows me well because I am always getting locked out of my apartment and he has to let me in. Using another friend to help translate, I managed to borrow 15 lyra. Not quite enough to cover the bag I wanted, but could just buy a cheaper bag; problem solved!
Back in the store, detergent found, waiting in line, paid for! It was 18.50 so I had only 1.50 lyra left. Just as I paid my friend called to check how things are going. I said I had to buy a different one because the other was too expensive. As I read the label, she informed that I had once again bought the wrong one. I had bought detergent for bleach. Not knowing what to do, I had her translate to the cashier my error. After laughing at me (I was laughing at myself too), she went and got the right detergent and gave me a new receipt.
Problem solved, laundry done.
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This past weekend we had a double party that we had been planning for over a week in advance! We celebrated Adnan’s birthday (his girl friend Amber organized it) and Selim being sent off to the military (I made sure this celebration happened). This entry is more or less a few pictures. The whole evening was great. My flight from the Ukraine was delayed so much that I went straight to the restaurant from the airport, which was a pain in the ass, but it was worth it.
A note about the Turkish military: military service is mandatory. This seems to be the one thing in Turkey that money cannot get you out of. Everyone goes. The service is one year. If you have a college education you can only serve six months as a soldier or one year as an officer. In general the military is described as boring, depressing and incredibly inefficient (I explained the oxymoron ‘military intelligence’ to my friends here and they all thought this was very funny and very true). The worst part about the military is getting sent to the east where the PKK (the Kurdish terrorist organization) is very active and has been fighting against the Turkish military for 30 years. Many people are afraid of being sent to this part of Turkey.
This was the group at the party. From the left starting with those people that are sitting down: I don’t know, I don’t know, Sedef (Ant’s girl friend), Ant, Izel, Tahsin, Erman, Me, Selim, Mieria (sp?)(Selim’s girl friend), don’t know, don’t know, Dilek (Ali Emre’s girl friend) and Ali Emre. Standing up from the left is Mehtin, Amber (Adnan’s girl friend), Adnan and Izzy. The place was perfect for a nice dinner party.
The men of the hour, Selim and Adnan at the center. Mehtin is on the right and Adnan’s girl friend Amber is on the left.
The top of this cake says something along the lines of “our great soldier Selim.†The bottom says “Happy birthday Adnan.†This cake was bought by Izel, Mehtin and Izzy, who have one thing in common; they are all Jewish. They were very proud of the fact that they were able to buy only one cake with both messages on it. It was pointed out to them that they should have stood one plate up in the middle with writing on both sides to save even more money. They love to joke about the Jewish stereotype.
After the dinner party we ditched the girls or they ditched us? Only Ant’s girl friend Sedef came with us. Tradition told us that we had to drive around honking our horns (didn’t actually do this), get Selim very drunk, sing “Em buyuk asker bizim asker†(Our great soldier is the best soldier?), and carry him on our shoulders. It was so much fun! (from the left, bottom row: Izel, Selim, Me, Izzy, top row: Ant, Erman, Tahsin).
From the left: Izel, Selim, Me, Erman and Izzy (Erman and Izzy are my usual running crew. They live really close to each other so I seem them all the time. Izel and Selim I met through gaming.
From the left, Izzy, Izel, Selim, Erman and Tahsin.
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Last week I attended an exhibition on industrial technologies with my company. Alper and I went, and we were joined by Ahmet Aral, the owner of one our distributors and the manufacturer of our high-pressure products. This is the first of many fairs we are planning to attend over the next year, and the first we have participated in since the Hannover Messe back in April. Overall it was fun and productive. I really enjoy going to fairs because you meet so many people and they are asking so many questions. Often I feel like I am playing a game and you have to think on your toes to answer the questions well, give a good impression of the company, and to learn as much as you can about them and their company, all while being likable at the same time. I always get very excited and energized before fair time. Since this entry is going up a little late, I will just outline some things for you.
First of all a comment on the Ukrainian women: It was difficult to tell the regular women from the prostitutes because of the way people dressed. It was freezing cold and women were still wearing short skirts. In general I thought the fashion there did not look good, but some of what they were wearing was borderline inappropriate. Furthermore, my hotel’s lounge and bar was full of prostitutes at night. They would come and just hang around waiting to pick up a customer. I now understand why Ukraine has the reputation it does here in Turkey.
In the airport while we were waiting for our bags I noticed they had a beer-dispensing machine. First time I have ever seen one outside of a fraternity house. I was very tired and a bit ill so I didn’t bother to buy anything.
Here is our stand before we unpacked anything. We took four compressors with us. Two were high pressure compressors from Ahmet’s company and two were compressors from my company.
This picture may be hard to see, but our stand is on the right. It is the only stand in this picture with a red banner. In our hall we were one of three stands with a red banner and a red carpet (all Turkish companies had this design). This definitely helped us draw attention.
The best things about our stand were the banners that I designed for it. All the stands at these industry trade shows look the same, which I thought was a bit stupid. Since we are a very different company – young company, young people, different business model – I decided we should have a stand that looks different. So I found some pictures on the Internet and created the stand you see here. Not bad right? My bosses liked it and our Bursa distributor is also using it in their fair.
Alper. Now that Alper is working with me he will be attending all the fairs with me. We had a really good time together. In the past two weeks I have begun to realize how much Alper’s English has improved since he has started working with me. It’s really impressive.
 That’s me. I have gained a bit of weight since I bought my suit so it doesn’t really fit too well anymore, that’s why I am wearing a jacket
 Ahmet is our distributor in Izmir and the manufacturer of our high-pressure products. We have an excellent relationship with his company and we are working very closely together in many different areas. Even though I did most of the talking, it was very helpful to have Ahmet there. He’s older and better dressed than us which gave Alper and I a confidence boost when talking with guys twice our age (three times my age).
This is the three of our plus our translator Helen. She was an excellent translator and a big help. She even brought us a bottle of homemade cognac as a gift (no one has gone blind yet).
This is Valentin, one of the Ukrainian guys we were negotiating with. His company was very big and very professional. He and a colleague took all three of us out for a traditional Ukrainian dinner, which was excellent (some of the same foods my Ukrainian grand mother makes). All throughout dinner we had to drink vodka in shots. One guy was driving and didn’t drink, and Ahmet and Alper limped through the shots hardly drinking. The end result was Valentin and I drank two bottles of Vodka. I was hung-over about 12 hours afterwards.
This is Valentin, one of the Ukrainian guys we were negotiating with. His company was very big and very professional. He and a colleague took all three of us out for a traditional Ukrainian dinner, which was excellent (some of the same foods my Ukrainian grand mother makes). All throughout dinner we had to drink vodka in shots. One guy was driving and didn’t drink, and Ahmet and Alper limped through the shots hardly drinking. The end result was Valentin and I drank two bottles of Vodka. I was hung-over about 12 hours afterwards.
Ahmet and Alper not too thrilled about having to do another double shot of vodka so soon.
This is the view from my hotel room. That is Kiev Dynamo playing AS Roma for the Champions League.
Towards the end of the show we got a bit silly and decided to pose the same way as our pictures.
Snow!
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In case you missed it, here is part one of this entry:
Pasha is gone. They tied him up for a bit two weeks ago. As soon as he got off the chain, he dissappeared.
Ahmet is very bored at work.
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