ilk haftasında kursları (first week of classes)

Sorry I'm not very good at this blogging business. For one, I'm just a terrible writer, as we know. And for two, I'm having such an incredible time here that sometimes I forget to let you all know about it! I'm busy busy busy (: Let's see... first of all, I guess I should mention my bags came!! Iştabu!! Friday night we went to a house party with Arican & Emre to celebrate Kaya's birthday. It was a fun party with Maddy (Kaya's cousin from England who also lives in the Superdorm!) & mainly Koc University students (even some more Americans!) etc. I also met Cem & Saim who are going to invite me to play soccer whenever they organize matches. (: (: Can't wait! We ate Chinese food (from a box!) and Allie enjoyed some lovely birdwatching - without forgetting to wear the appropriate equipment of course (: When we got back to the Superdorm, I knew my bags were coming because I had called the airline earlier that day. I was so excited!! I ran into the lobby & ran over to my bags ready to hug them when OH NO my feet slip out from under me and I crash backwards onto the floor & slide into my bags. hahahhaha! it was hilarious (: Hakan (our security guard friend) also thought it was hilarious and was laughing so hard. He pointed to the security camera & the security TVs and pretended to rewind & watch me fall over & over - pantomiming of course because he speaks no english & we speak no turkish - yet! But alas, my stuff was finally here!

The rest of the weekend was pretty relaxing. On Saturday we went to the neighborhood market for el cheapo produce!! We're talking 5 oranges for a lyra (60 cents) total. & a free tomato. That night we enjoyed a dinner with our other American girlfriends at "Populer Pizza" - tough to ask Hakan for directions to because he thought we wanted to know what were some popular pizza places. "Pizza Hut? Domino's" he'd say... Sunday was pretty gross but we tried walking around campus & finding out where our classrooms would be. & don't worry, we're finally decked out in our Boğaziçi gear! That night we (A, E, J, me) cooked pasta again & veggies @ Julia's. mmmmm! It was really really nice just sitting around chatting for a long time that night. I love these girls! Then Erin & I watched 13 Going on 30 (dubbed in Turkish!) with my roommates & I stayed up really late talking with them - that was lots of fun!

Monday began the first week of classes - Numerical Analysis @ 11am. My classmates only speak & ask questions in Turkish. That's fun! That night, Julia's friend Luke from London came to town & we ate at Ecvator in Taksim - delicious mexifood. Oh, also I met my husband - Peter, a carpenter from Sweden. You're all invited. Then I came back & skyped paps for a while (:

Tuesday was Operations Research @ 9-10 - incredibly boring. unbelievably boring. more boring than professor Katz @ washU! (is that possible?) Irem's boyfriend, Bathouan is in our class & he met up with us after & gave Allie & I lots of info on sailing club & aviation club (paragliding!) Then Facilities Design & Planning @ 12-2 - more interesting than OR. Then Turkish for Foreigners @ 3-5. Should be a fun class, but the four of us are already so far ahead! psshhh "Merhaba"?? that's for beginners! That night was Ufram Ocakbeşi again... mmm... and then Emily & I dominated Luke, Caitlin, & Katie at some tavla (backgammon). (:

Wednesday was Num.Anal. @11-1, Turkish @1-3. Our campus is so pretty! & after that we went into Taksim, picked up Luke, and walked to the Galata Tower... çok güzel!! (so pretty!!) just check out the pics (: Unbelievable. Then we found dinner at "The Liver Corner" of course, we don't speak Turkish so we didn't know that's what it was called. We drank oğranç (orahnch - disgusting) beet juice!! yuck! But ate delicious kebaps & free baklava dessert!! Then we went to a nargile (hookah) place and sat on big comfy cushions on the ground & Allie & I shared a rice pudding... Such a fun place (:

Thursday was Operations Research @9-11, Facilities @11-1. Then I was the only person done with class so I met up with Luke & we were going to go to the Grand Bazaar. Sadly, I was completely distracted by a lamp/chandelier store & really hit it off with the guys who worked there. I talked them down to a reasonable lamp price & they made me a whole chandelier!! They were hilarious & much better prices than inside the Bazaar. Unfortunately for Luke, the affair took two & a half hours because I was having so much fun while they made my chandelier hahaha. Oh well, it's so beautiful & I can't wait to show it off! That night was the Sportsclub Disco Spring Semester Kickoff party at Airport Dance Club & it was insane!!! Such fun dancing music & we stayed so late (: haha. One guy actually lived in fairfax county for 2 years & knew my high school! Strange?? Yeah!! He bought me a drink & I rudely declined on accident & felt really bad about it... so I tried my first cranberry vodka cocktail, actually pretty yummy. Luckily All the Single Ladies came on & I ditched him (kinda creepy) for the dance floor!

Friday was simply Facilites @12-1. Then Allie & I had a weird experience at the American Internship Center where they needed help for a weekend job fair. It was a sketchy ordeal & we ended up backing out... We spent the afternoon just gezmek-ing (wandering) and I bought a $2 tee from a fun store (: We also tried kumpire (basically a stuffed baked potato) and walked along the Bosphorus some more until we caught a bus back to Bebek & walked home. We had more pasta & salad with J, E, & Luke and that was nice (:

Yesterday was hilarious! Allie & I woke up late & went on a run together. (My first run this semester! It felt so good!) However, it started raining then icing then snowing on us & we came back after maybe 2 or 3 miles... There's a track right next to the Superdorm that we run on so that's nice. We then went to Kanyon Mall to meet Arican & Ege for dinner. We went early & walked around - it was insane! A half outdoor - half indoor mall with a skating rink inside & really cool architecture. It was fun to explore (: and dinner was delicious. Then Maddy & Kaya joined and all of us (minus Ege) took a cab to Cem's party by Koc. It was at his house and was again a lot of fun! Minus too much playstation with Iyit... and minus the huuuuge smelly guy who wanted to dance with me over & over & over! The gang all pitched in to save me multiple times & Livyo dubbed it "Saving Private Ryan" bahaha çakal! (clever!) Plus they had delicious raspberry cake - I think that's three birthday parties we've been to already & we're already planning Allie & Arican's joint 21st! Saim also taught me how to conjugate all turkish verbs - give me a verb, any verb & i can tell you the past present & future tense of that verb! (: dang Türkçe seviyorum!! (i love turkish!)

Today Allie & I went on a HUUUGE gezmek! We just decided to have a wander and see where we ended up... turns out we went really far - even a muddy hike under the freeway haha (: and found a cool part of the city that felt much more foreign and exciting. It was freezing though so we didn't even shop - we have nothing to show for the 5 hours we walked around. Oh, except Allie found the best simit ever! (seemeet - our fave bagel like bread with sesame seeds. mmmm) & i found the lamest ice cream ever! hahaha. Pasta with Erin Julia & Tim again plus some more Turkish tv tonight pretty much wraps up the week (: I'll try to put pictures up tomorrow.... it's 2:34am here & it's a school night! You see what I mean about time here? Where does it all go??

Enjoy the pics on facebook for now (: Miss you all!

Gule Gule!