Spring Is Here! Sort of.

      We have been having a good time in Turkey lately. Kendall's class has been celebrating springtime. A student brought it some ducks and they had a little tub of water for the ducklings to swim in while all her kids stared and yelled. She had a class "zoo" where the kids all made masks and dressed up as animals. To be honest, it sounds cuter than it was. In fact, it was the stuff of nightmares. Evidence:

We're not just willing ourselves to believe it is spring.The weather has improved from 0 - 15 degrees Fahrenheit to somewhere between 30 and 50. It feels like summer comparatively. On Saturday afternoon I went outside and chilled on one of our balconies in the sun for a few hours. I read a book I picked up at the new bookstore (which rules), and sat in a little ikea recliner that I drug out there. It was excellent.

         Speaking of which, I am reading a really good book titled The Cove by Ron Rash. I have had a bizarre experience with this author over the past few years, and it has gotten super weird here. I read his book One Foot In Eden for a Appalachian Lit. course at UTK (if you don't know, southern and appalachian lit are my jam). Then I started reading his poetry, and then another book. I decided I liked the guy, but he was less well known (aka his books were hard to procure and therefore expensive) ...so it was tough on my college wallet. I hadn't really read any of his stuff in the last few years and had meant since he was becoming more widely known. Oddly, the school had a used book sale and I found a hardback copy of one of his books for 1TL (50 cents) and immediately gobbled it up and read that bad boy. This experience was more meaningful to me than one would think: I felt a connection to home, the south, and knoxville that was really invigorating. Well, the other day I go check out this new bookstore, and there in the small English section among literary giants like Dickens and Shakespeare is a lone Ron Rash book, his brand new novel. I bought it immediately, paying a hefty chunk for it this time, but it was worth it. Rash is haunting me here, but in the best possible way.

       Well, I read outside and finally experienced that feeling of sun-baked tiredness. So, I decided to take a little walk, and to my surprise a true marker of spring was right outside our front door. New life! Yay! More dogs! Crud!



Kendall and I topped off a great Saturday with a trip to the mall. We both saw The Hunger Games, which came out here in English on opening weekend (awesome). Then we just did mall stuff.

"Kindo" got some coffee and found a really great skillet.

We went through some shops, and I wanted this comfy desk but Kendall said it was dumb.

How can it be dumb? I mean, look how comfortable and practical it is! 

He is looking at that screen with such ease!

We decided to eat some "American" Food while out, so we went to the mall where you can get fast food which has the intent of being Burger King / McDonalds / KFC but fails somewhere in execution. Regardless, we are so glad we decided to eat there since it enabled us to see one of the oddest things I have yet to experience in Turkey. We were eating and all the sudden loud music came on and there were kids everywhere doing crazy stuff. Just watch.



I was complaining towards the end about my itouch freezing. I was just afraid that this video might be lost, and it is far too precious to lose.

Stuff has been pretty good lately. We are both tired and ready for a break. This Friday is the end of the 3rd quarter, which is nuts because it means we are 3/4 of the way through this year. It is kind of surreal to even think about that. Luckily, Friday also marks the beginning of Spring Break. We can't wait to have some time off. Our kids need a break from us and vice versa. Hopefully we will have a week full of sunshine. Unfortunately, today this happened:



Oh well...