Our Turkish Class

We have started a Beginning Turkish class at Tömer, a part of Ankara University. It is only a 10 or 15-minute walk from our apartment. Our class is small and lively. It includes two Americans besides us, a diplomat (in tie) and a young man who is preparing to teach English here. The other students are from Saudi Arabia, Russia and Japan. They are all married to diplomats. English is our common language, and we all speak better English than our teacher, Eren Hamım (Ms. Eren), who is a Turk. She is on the back row in the picture. She teaches us in a wide variety of fun ways.

Our classes are 4 hours on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday. Some of the students have been in Turkey quite a while and speak the language pretty well, so our class moves along at sometimes frightening speed. All the teaching is done in Turkish, and when we have been away from class for a while, it is very hard to attune our ears again and understand everything that is going on. But we are enjoying it greatly, and we find we’re able to figure out a lot more of what’s going on around us. (The words on the oven and the instruction booklet on the washing machine at home are still complete mysteries, though, and will probably remain so.)

The Saudi Arabian woman often has her driver stop by the bakery to buy treats for the class, so last night I made oatmeal/chocolate chip cookies to take to class. They were a big hit, and everyone wants the recipe. We got the chocolate chips at the commissary at the small US military base in Ankara, but oatmeal is available here.

We have homework every night. At first it looked like first grade work, with pictures and blanks, but it’s less juvenile now. The class is hard work but lots of fun.

We have visited many public schools, and they are terribly overcrowded. This is a third grade class which has 56 students in the morning and another 56 students in the afternoon. Private education is expensive. We are planning a project with this school; we hope to provide them with new desks. The students were all very eager to practice their English on us--but they didn't get past, "Hello, my name is ...."

Now I can say goodbye several ways: İyı günler, güle güle, Allah ısmarladık, görüşürüs! Bye bye!