Messin’ with Texas

My wrist has been bothering me so I haven’t been writing so much. So briefly I will cover some of the things I did over the last week. I am not sure what I did to my wrist, but it has been feeling better lately.

Windsurfing: I am a windsurfing prodigy. On my second day of wind surfing lessons, the instructor decided to give me a more narrow board. Coupled with the significantly stronger wind, I did not have such an easy time as my first day. After about five minutes of struggling, I got the hang of it, and proceeded to intentionally go outside of the range of the instructor’s calls and began zipping around the bay. The wind was quite good so i was going pretty fast. I am quite proud at how easily it comes to me. I think because of my experience sailing and wake boarding, it feels quite natural.

Murat of course was once again in disbelief. There are several people learning this summer, and I must say Murat is probably the second best, but, for whatever reason, I have no trouble with balancing what so ever.

Friday: Went to Taksim and spent all night out, as usual. It was great. Kutsal, Tahsin, Leyla, Leyla’s boy friend Patrick (I can never remember his name so I call him that), myself and some of Kutsal’s friends.

Saturday:We went indoor climbing: Leyla, Patrick, Tahsin and myself. Below are some pictures. It’s not a very good wall, but it’s good practice. I try to go at least once a week. Here are some pictures:

 That’s me belaying Leyla. This part of the wall was a little difficult so near the top I have to lean back to give Leyla a little bit of upward force so she can make it.

 Leyla taking a break on the harder section of the wall.

 That’s Patrick. He was the only other person who knew how to belay so he belayed me. Because of our weight difference however, he had to hook himself to the floor. Here you can see that his body is lifted a bit because of my weight.

 Tahsin…

Saturday Night: Saturday night was quite an experience. I went with a friend from CMU named Nail, whom I haven’t really seen since before I went to Switzerland. He, a bunch of his friends and their friends, and myself, all went to Sortie, one of the most exclusive clubs in Istanbul. It was very fancy, it was huge, it was right on the sea (people were arriving in 60 foot yachts to the club’s dock) and it was of course very expensive (by Turkish standards, so not so bad). We got there around midnight and got home at sunrise (not sure what time it was). The place was so cool. It was all house music, which I normally don’t like, but the energy of the place, of the people, of Nail’s friends and the atmosphere of being on the sea combined to make a really great place to go out at night to. I am looking forward to going again in two weeks or so, and/or when Izzy gets back. Since Izzy has a boat, I was hoping we could also arrive by boat.

I was very tired before the night even started. The night before I had only slept 4 hours after staying up all night, and had been climbing, so I was tired, but I managed to make it most of the night. My energy kind of died out towards the end of the evening. Although all younger than me (I was the oldest), Nail’s friends were are all nice, outgoing and attractive (the girls were at least :-). Many of them spoke third languages (French for example). It was a lot of fun meeting new people, although I think Leyla and Tahsin were a bit annoyed at me for not hanging out with them (sorry guys!).

Sunday: Nail and I had breakfast with his father who I found to be very well read and very scholarly person. It was a nice long meal of chatting about all kinds of things. Then in the evening I played soccer with my usual crew. It was hardly a game, I think we won 10-2. We may have scored even more than that.

Monday: Tonight I will go and meet with the Algerian guy from the air port a month ago. He is going to help us find distribution channels for our compressors in Algeria. I am really surprised he remembered and is following up enough to call me back.

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