The Marathon Breakfast

I went on my second official all family outing today. We had been invited to Kahvalti at the home of Sebnem's good friend Aylin who is a successful Photographer and has published several books including a collection of photographs of the sea and sea going vessels called "VapurIstanbul". Aylin and her husband have only recently moved from their home in the most densly populated part of Istanbul to a new home in the country near the Black Sea, so this was also a House Warming party.
    As we pulled out of Beykoz Konaklari and headed north, the thousands of stacked toy block homes that is Istanbul quickly--and I mean surprisingly so--gave way to green hillsides and open country. And my heart leapt inside my chest as my soul sang in delight to be reunited with Mother Nature, so long denied. For a while I felt I could have been on any road in Wyoming or even Idaho until suddenly a cami (mosque) suddenly winked at me from between two hills as we passed. Then I remembered where I was and a delighted laugh bubbled to my lips. The mother turned back to look at me from the front seat and all I could do was smile and point out to window to the nothing all around us.
    15 minutes later I was silently marveling that we hadn't passed a farm of any sort yet when it happened. Suddenly we were passing a field which contained of all things, a herd of geese (yes I know that groups of geese are called flocks--but what would you call a group of domestic fowl which are lounging about a carefully kept pasture and are, to all appearances, grazing?) Next was a flock of sheep....then cows...and finally, like Allah had decided to grant my every wish today, horses.
     I took what felt like my first deep breath in a month. To quote the blog of another American nanny in Istanbul: "City I love you; but Nature, I need you"

The wonders were not through.

We crested a rise, and there it was. My mouth refused to say it. My face failed to show it. But my heart knew what it was. After years....nay, an entire decade, I was finally seeing with my own eyes what I had only read about. The Black Sea. Something about this mysterious and dark body of water has fascinated me from a child. Had it been a sunny day with skies of blue I probably would have been disappointed. But no, today was shrouded in a heavy blanket grey, casting the sea and remote, grey shadows. In short: exactly as I imagined it.
     Though on the opposite side of the sea from the particulate peninsula which was the setting for the books which began it all, still the ancient geography of the land resonates. Only last night I was admitting to my brother online that an entire year was beginning to sound like a terribly long time. This brief glimpse reminded me that a lifetime will not be time enough to see every site my soul craves--many of which are in close proximity to the room in which I sit now.

*     *     *

Ignoring my desperate protests he sets a second gozleme, this time filled with cheese on my plate. I am already full having had two small domates (tomatoes), some zeytin (olives), bread with tomato paste, a peice of what I think was raw/dried beef, a glass of fresh squeezed blood orange juice, a cup of tea, and a kofteli gozleme (meat filled crepe)...all on top of the 2 crepes I ate at home with the girls before we came. He wouldn't be dissuaded. To I grudginly allowed him to place the folded and fried pastry on my plate and took two bites in the name of courtesy and gourmet curiosity before excusing myself from the table to join the girls on the couch.
     I was a lovely home. Not opulant in the manner of Baba-anne's house, not pale and modern in a suburby-way like ours. But rich not-overly-polished woods, wide corridors, and inviting artistic book shelves. I'm not sure whether it was the country setting, the friendly but laid back manner of our hosts, or the house itself, but I was more comfortable sprawled on the couch watching Johnny Bravo in Turkish then any place I have been yet in Turkey.
     I loved them. They even spoke french in the most beautifully clear accent to me. I wish they had children. I would beg to live with them. Maybe they need an underqualified graduate with a Bachelors in Psychology. Wishful thinking.