Celebrating the Winter Holiday in Turkey

(Joni) As I mentioned in my previous post, the vast majority of Turks don't celebrate Christmas. However, many of them do celebrate the New Year, and they do it very similarly to the way Americans celebrate Christmas - tree with lights and decorations, giving presents, even Santa (Noel Baba, which means Father Christmas in Turkish) comes on New Year's Eve here! This is why I said Winter Holiday in my post title... Even though in our house, we were very much celebrating Christmas, a lot of the lights/decorations/festivities we are seeing around us are because of New Year!

Karum Mall in the town center has some beautiful star/snowflake decorations.

Since we believe in celebrating Christmas as the birth of Christ and not just a winter holiday, we tried to maintain our family traditions that would help us keep that in mind. So we did our Advent Tree (where we read a short Bible story and put up an ornament every day of December) again this year, and we enjoyed that a lot!

Elias next to our tree in his Phineas & Ferb Christmas jammies that Grandma & Grandpa brought when they visited in the Fall. It's Christmas Eve, so there's only one spot left at the top of the tree for the Christmas Day ornament!

We also threw our own little birthday party for Jesus on Christmas Day, which I unfortunately didn't take any pictures of. But we had a yummy dinner and birthday cake!

Since the postal system between the US and Turkey is expensive and unreliable, rather than mailing gifts to us, our family just gave us money and we did our own shopping for gifts... Elias got so many trains - he's a happy camper! We also had one gift that Grandma & Grandpa had brought when they were here, and it had been sitting in my closet since September! So that was fun for Elias to finally open it!

It was the Toy Story movie and some Toy Story figures. He loved them!

Since Elias had so many days off school, I tried to fill them with fun Christmas-y things like watching Christmas movies (His favorite is the old claymation Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer!) and making Christmas cookies!

My favorite Christmas cookies - peanut butter blossoms! Elias liked the melted Kisses more than the cookie part - he definitely comes by his love of chocolate honestly. :)

We were also able to Skype with our families on Christmas, which was a blessing. Thanks to modern technology, we were able to watch all of them open the Turkish gifts we had sent, which was so much fun! :) So we had a nice first Christmas in Turkey, and we get to keep celebrating since the holiday the Turks are celebrating is yet to come! We're looking forward to seeing how they celebrate the New Year!

Preschool Christmas Party

(Joni) As a general rule, people in Turkey don't celebrate Christmas. Because of this, we've been surprised and pleased to learn that Elias' international preschool in fact makes a HUGE deal of Christmas! They've been learning Christmas songs all month, doing Christmas crafts, having one day when everyone wore red and green, and then Friday was their huge Christmas party. (It was the same format as the one they threw for Halloween.)

Unfortunately, Justin had to work, but I was able to attend the Christmas presentation from Elias' class. The class filed in wearing adorable Rudolph hats they had made from their handprints.

Then they sang a series of songs in English. We had been hearing Elias sing them at home for weeks, so I knew he knew the words, but he must just not like performing with a group because he just sat in his chair rather than participating in the singing. Here are a few of the songs (Elias is seated on the far left.):
Then the highlight of the party was that Santa came!! He made his big entrance, and then one by one each child sat on his lap and answered the questions "What is your name? How old are you? What do you want from Santa?" The kids had varying levels of proficiency in English, but I could see a great improvement in the ability of the kids to answer those questions since the Halloween party. Elias still wouldn't answer them even though he obviously knows English. :) Here is Santa's entrance and Elias on Santa's lap. The lady helping him is Ms. Olga, the school's phonics teacher. Elias LOVES her, and you can see him answer her questions (He said "Yeah." to all her questions.) rather than Santa's.
One funny note about his class is that the boys in his class almost all said they wanted Angry Birds from Santa! Who knew Angry Birds was so popular among 4- & 5-year-olds in Turkey?! Although Santa asked them what they wanted, he gave them all the same gift, which was a small Santa that dances and sings Jingle Bells. (See it pictured below.)

Then they had a spread of Christmas cookies, which Elias enjoyed immensely.

And they sent him home with a huge bag of fun things.

Clockwise from top: Paper bag with wreath craft, dancing Santa, cookie on a stick, bag of cookies/candy from his teacher, stocking craft with bag of popcorn/cookie/candy/winter rubber duckie, and gingerbread man/Christmas tree/snowman crafts.

So it was a fun Christmas celebration! And now Elias is off school for 10 days, which is practically unheard-of in Turkey. Since they don't celebrate Christmas, they don't have a school holiday. But I'm sure the International Preschool teachers enjoy the break! :)

Long-Distance Family Photo

(Joni) My family traditionally takes a large group photo every Christmas, but this year we're in Turkey and my family is in two different US states, so that makes taking a photo together rather difficult. However, my sister ran across this cute idea on Pinterest, and she tweaked the idea to work for us. So we made letters to spell out the word FAMILY, and we took different photos to fit, then patched them together into what turned out to be an ADORABLE group photo! (Click to enlarge.)

F-Us
A-Our son, Elias
M-My parents
I-My nephew
L-My other nephew
Y-My sister and her family

A really funny thing about this photo is that my sister and her family live in Georgia, so it was 70 degrees (F) the day they took their photos... They were sweating in their long sleeves! On the other hand, it was absolutely freezing in Ankara when we took ours - we stripped off our hats and coats just to quickly snap our photos before putting them back on! In fact, the morning after we took ours, we woke up to a layer of snow!

But it was fun to be able to collaborate on this "family photo" together, and it helps me still feel connected to them even from far away.

Aşure

Aşure (Ashure) is a Muslim holiday commemorating several events in Islamic history. It is traditionally the day Noah's ark settled on dry land. Tradition holds that Noah's family made a Thanksgiving-like meal with what they had left after so long on the ark--namely some beans, dried fruit, and a bit of meat from the animals they sacrificed. This was made into a stew called aşure, or Noah's Pudding. Muslims celebrate this event over a season, making aşure pudding and giving it out to neighbors as a symbol of friendship and goodwill.

Three neighbors brought us some aşure as a treat. All of them had nuts, pomegranate, and figs which made it quite sweet. Two of them also had beans and chickpeas, which contrasted with the sweetness. All of them were very high in calories, which is why it's traditionally a cold-weather treat. 

The first bowl we received - it was beanless and the one we liked best.

The beans made this one a little iffy for us!

Turkish culture says that when someone gives you a food item, you return their dish with another food item in it, so Joni returned the bowls to the neighbors with some homemade pumpkin bread. It coincided with our own Thanksgiving, so we enjoyed the parallels. Justin attempted to explain the parallel to one of the neighbors and it was met with an "Okay." :-) We were very thankful that we had several neighbors wanting to reach out to us in this cultural way, regardless of whether we loved the dish or not!

Celebrating Thanksgiving

(Joni) Holidays can be a difficult time of year for people who live far from their families, so we weren't sure exactly what to expect from Thanksgiving this year. However, we were blessed with lots of opportunities to celebrate with dear friends, so we didn't have much opportunity to be too homesick. Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures at any of our gatherings, so I'll just have to tell you about them instead.

Since Turkey doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving, Justin had school that day, so he didn't get to celebrate as much as the rest of us. Elias and I, however, went over to some friends' house at noon and had a very enjoyable lunch! There were 4 American families and 1 Canadian couple there, and one of the highlights for me was that my Turkish tutor also came and brought her sister! For both of these Turkish girls, it was the first time eating American food, and they were bowled over at all of it! They said, "This is delicious, but I'm going to be so fat after it's over!" I told them that was how it was supposed to be. :) Elias was SO EXCITED about getting pumpkin pie... He is his father's son in that regard!

Then we went home and Elias got a rest while I baked some dishes for our evening party! I was so pleased that a friend had given me some cream of mushroom soup and fried onions (neither of which are available locally) so I could make green bean casserole - a necessity of Thanksgiving in my book. We can't get canned green beans here either, but I found this Paula Deen recipe that used fresh ones, and it was delicious. I doubled the recipe, and there were no leftovers! I also baked my old standby macaroni & cheese recipe, and that was a hit as well. After Justin got off work, we went to another friend's house with 6 American families, and we had a great time celebrating with them as well. One of them thought to bring the game Catch Phrase, and it was fun enjoying a game together! (Although we did have to make the rule "No Turkish Allowed!" - some spoke better than others!) Elias got another piece of pumpkin pie, so he was happy.

Then Elias had a THIRD Thanksgiving party at preschool on Friday! They had been working all week to make adorable costumes:

Elias was so proud of his turkey costume and his feathered headdress!

Then they had a somewhat American lunch: turkey sandwiches, popcorn, pumpkin pie, and apple juice! What's really hilarious is that Elias absolutely refuses to eat school food, but he chowed down on this Thanksgiving feast! He apparently ate not just one turkey sandwich, but two! His (American) teacher laughed and said now we know it's just that he doesn't like the Turkish food they usually serve for lunch!

So we are incredibly thankful for the friends (who feel like family) we have here that allowed us to have a very enjoyable Thanksgiving, and for the precious school that gives Elias such great experiences! Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Commemorating 10th of November in Ankara

(Justin) A couple weeks ago I wrote about how Turkey would celebrate its Republic Day holiday just after Kurban Bayram. I unfortunately forgot to take my camera to school to take pictures of that morning's ceremony. Just a short time after Republic Day, Turkey annually commemorates the death of Atatürk, which took place on 10 November, 1938. (This travel blog post gives a brief overview on Atatürk for more info.)

10 November is much less appropriate for amateur picture taking; it's more like a funeral, so I grabbed these pics from the school's Facebook page. Even though the holiday fell on a Saturday, all students and faculty were required to be at the school gym by 8:30am for a ceremony. Students first filed solemnly by a stage with a bust of Atatürk, guarded by two high schoolers with mock flames.

Many students brought flowers to lay on the stage and there were funeral wreaths around as well. Here are the 3rd graders posing with their flowers in front of a larger bust of Atatürk in the school's foyer.

Then everyone formed lines with their classes and stood at attention. There were speeches, a Powerpoint of Atatürk's life and honors, poems read by students, and we joined the entire nation in a moment of silence at exactly 9:05am, the moment of Atatürk's death.  All students and faculty (except K and 1st grade) stood at attention for the entire ceremony, which lasted about an hour.

I would say most Americans can't fathom dressing up and then loading kids onto school buses in the pouring rain for an early Saturday morning ceremony that will only last an hour, and then everyone goes home. But everyone does it with pride and contentment. This ceremony was much more silent and solemn than other holidays. 

Much of Ankara's population braved the pouring rain to visit Anıtkabir, the mausoleum where Atatürk is buried.There was an official ceremony there at the same time as ours.

Below is what it would look like on a sunnier day.

There were similar ceremonies all over the country. At the 9:05 moment of silence, sirens wail, people park their cars, and most everyone stands at attention. This picture got my attention via Twitter. It shows a man getting a shoeshine at 9:04. The captain is "A photograph that explains many things."

It is difficult to describe to people the love and devotion that Türks have for Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. He is, in a word, everywhere.

Bayram Vacation, Part 4: Waterpark & Beach

(Read Part 1, Part 2, & Part 3.)

The Aqua Fantasy resort had an unbelievable waterpark! It is one of the biggest in Europe and also the biggest and safest in Turkey. (Even so, there were still a few slides we would never see in the States!) However, as mentioned previously, the water was too cold for us to enjoy it much. We only spent about an hour there.

Justin & Elias standing in front of some of the big slides as soon as we entered. I've never seen a water slide like that yellow one before! People would drop down on a raft and then just slide back and forth until they came to a stop!

Elias overlooking the kids' section of the waterpark, which included that cool pirate ship!

Justin rode a few of the big slides, some of which had features you'd likely never see in the U.S. One was a snake-like tunnel that you rode in a raft, easy except it was pitch black. Elias and I enjoyed watching him go down this racer one from the bridge!

There was also a beautiful private beach that was part of the resort, but the waters of the Mediterranean were also a bit chilly. We did, however, have quite a bit of fun enjoying the various parts of the beach!

Elias loves playing in sand, and we had brought his bucket & shovel for that very purpose. The sand here was interesting - it was very fine and powdery, and it had glitter in it (apparently caused by mica)! So when we went to wash off, we were muddy & glittery! We had fun building sand castles and looking for shells, though!

The resort had this long pier we could walk out on. This was taken at sunset, which is why it's kind of dark.

Elias chillin' on a deck chair out on the pier.

The resort also had paddleboats we were able to take out in the sea. The water was only a little higher than my knees, so I just jumped out to take a picture of the boys in the boat.

It was so beautiful and so fun!

Click to read Part 5.

A Tale of Two Holidays

(Justin) The neat thing about Turkey is the co-existence of religious reverence and secular democracy. We experienced it firsthand this week: 

A local supermarket advertises options for your sacrifice holiday.

The Muslim world was geared up for Eid al-Adha, the Feast of Sacrifice, where Muslims celebrate Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Ishmael. (FYI-- Abraham's birthplace is located in modern southern Turkey.) Schools, banks, and other institutions were closed last week from Wednesday to Sunday (plus Monday, see below). To celebrate, families typically gather together from all over for a large meal. There is often a live animal slaughtered for the meal and also for ritual sacrifice. For example, there is a large place on the western outskirts of Ankara (and other parts of town) where cattle and sheep are sold for slaughter and you can either take the cow up to the hillside to be sacrificed or pay for someone to do it for you. Other people will simply buy meat for the meals from their local butcher. Families distribute some of the meat to the less-fortunate, and there are charities that collect money for the poor if you aren't distributing anything yourself. Children may get candy and other sweets. Here's a good post by an ex-pat woman who has often taken part in the holiday rituals. Those who don't have family obligations seem to travel to the beach or elsewhere for a nice vacation, which is what we did.

Because Muslim holidays revolve around the lunar calendar, the holiday moves around and this year buttresses October 29th, Turkey's Cumhuriyet Bayramı or "Republic Day," which commemorates Atatürk's declaration in 1923 that Turkey was officially a republic. This is one of the biggest secular holidays in Turkey and an important day for Kemalists, those who want to preserve the legacy of Atatürk and his principles to guide the country. There are typically ceremonies honoring Atatürk at all the schools (even though they are closed, students and faculty attend a ceremony in the morning), a ceremony at his grave with air force flyovers, and banks and such are closed.

Banners of Atatürk like this one and Turkish flags will be flown all over town on Monday.

However, this year there was some clash of political ideologies. The current ruling government is not the party of Atatürk and is more religious conservative. They have made some changes to how Turkish national holidays are celebrated. This has led to some restrictions on marches and other demonstrations were planned for Monday. Ankara's mayor sent out a notice for schools to remain closed on October 29th and not to celebrate Republic Day until October 30th (as part of their normal school day). However, the school I work at is very Kemalist and held Monday's ceremonies as planned (after all, everyone had already made their travel plans around being back at school for the 29th).

In any case, it was interesting to experience two of the biggest holidays in Turkey together over the course of six days.

Bayram Vacation, Part 1: Aqua Fantasy

Justin mentioned in a previous post that although his job is difficult, it also has some amazing perks. Last week we received the ultimate of all perks - the school sent their faculty and families on a 5-day vacation to the Western coast of Turkey (a place called Kuşadası, near the large city of Izmir) over the holiday! All we had to do was purchase our airfare, and EVERYTHING else was covered for us. What a blessing!

Like father like son on the flight from Ankara to Izmir (both reading the in-flight magazine). It was just a 1-hour flight, then there was a 1-hour bus ride to get to the resort. Not bad at all!

We weren't sure exactly what to expect, but it turns out that this place was called Aqua Fantasy, and that is an apt name for it. This place really was beyond our wildest dreams! It's an all-inclusive resort where you wear a wristband that enables you access to everything the resort offers: hotel room, all-you-can-eat-and-drink buffet for all three meals and snacks, 10 pools (indoor, outdoor, kiddie, etc.) with water slides, one of the largest waterparks in Europe, a beach (on the Mediterranean Sea), live entertainment, and much more. This resort is obviously geared toward foreigners - all the signage was in English, and almost all of the staff there spoke English as well.

There will be a long series of blog posts showing our vacation, so I thought I'd start with the accommodations.

Our hotel. (Image borrowed from here.) We actually never swam in this pool because the water was COLD and there were plenty of other options.

The place was just massive. It was a fair hike to get from one end to the other, and you can see in the photo above that there was a handy bridge across the center of the pool that took us from our building into the dining hall.

Justin & Elias on the bridge

We were given a Family Room, which means there was an extra bed for Elias, and his part of the room had rolling screens that could close and give privacy between the two sections. That was great!

View from the hall door. You can see the brown sliding doors in the middle.

Elias' section of the room also had a little couch that could've folded out to make another bed to accommodate more people. He just enjoyed playing on it. And there was a little table and cabinet that were perfect for his toys!

You can't see it in the photo, but the bathroom had a full tub, which is actually kind of rare in Turkey. A lot of places (our apartment included) only have showers. So this was a huge treat for Elias to get full baths!

They even had a complimentary fruit plate waiting for us! That's the kind of place this was!

Click to read more: Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5

Halloween Party at Elias' School

(Joni) Although Halloween isn't celebrated in Turkey, Elias' school teaches American holidays. So they'll celebrate Christmas, Easter, Valentine's Day, Columbus Day, etc., and they've also been learning about Halloween - things like pumpkins, ghosts, bats, and saying "Boo!" Next week is a huge Muslim holiday, and Elias' school will be closed all week, so they chose to celebrate Halloween a little early with a party on Friday. The parents were invited to come see the kiddos dressed in costume and having a little presentation. It was fun! Each class had their own party, so this is just Elias' Pre-K class.

First the kids paraded out and showed off their costumes (Elias borrowed a Thomas costume from some friends.), and then their teacher, Ms. Janet (an American), made a little introduction.

Ms. Janet is the one in green. The other lady in the witch hat is Ms. Olga, the school psychologist and phonics teacher. Elias really likes both of these ladies! Elias is seated on the far right.

Then each child came up to the microphone and introduced themselves in English by saying "Hello, my name is ____. I am __ years old." Only a couple of the kids actually seemed to know what they were saying. My child is the only native English speaker in the class - I think the rest are Turkish - and he didn't speak clearly into the microphone either!

Standing on the far left is Ms. Ebru, the school principal/owner. Also notice the father in front using his iPad as a camera. I laughed at the number of smartphones and tablets being used as cameras there! I was the dinosaur using a real camera!

Then they sang a few songs in English, some about Halloween and some just kids' songs. Below you'll hear parts of a song about feelings - I make a happy face, I make a grumpy face, etc. - and Farmer in the Dell. Elias doesn't like to sing along, but he obviously enjoyed watching his friends' performance! Some of them were quite enthusiastic! You can hear the parents laughing. :)

School Halloween party from Joni Tapp on Vimeo.

Then there was a big spread of snacks and treats, which was enjoyed by all.

Elias loved the marshmallow pops on a stick! He also loved wearing the Thomas costume - he didn't want to take it off to go home! (But I insisted - no way I'm taking him on public transportation wearing that costume.)

And they sent each child home with a great bag of Halloween-themed crafts they had made at school and lots of candy.

Counter-clockwise from top: Monster bag, bat, and jack-o-lantern crafts made at school; Hershey bar ghost from Ms. Janet & Ms. Olga; Pumpkin cookie on a stick; Pumpkin bag of candy from Ms. Ebru; Fruit by the Foot

Fun!

Big Fun Day, Part 1: Bike Riding

Today was another holiday in Turkey! Honestly, to me the holidays here seem to have no rhyme or reason, but maybe I'll get used to them the longer we live here! I already wrote about Children's Day, which was in April, and now Youth Day is in May. Why? I don't really know. We had a really fun family day today, but it wasn't really in celebration of the holiday. It was just Saturday and we were glad for the weekend! So I'll post about our big fun day together in several parts.

The first big fun thing is Justin took Elias out bike riding this morning! As I've said before, our apartment came furnished with some great toys for Elias to play with, and one of them was a bike! This is a real bike with training wheels, not a tricycle. So that's a step up for my big boy! But he's getting the hang of it and he's definitely big enough for it.

These pictures are from last month, but I never got around to posting them. And since I wasn't with Justin & Elias this morning to take pictures, I'll post these ones instead to commemorate our big fun day. Imagine this but with them in short sleeves and riding at a park instead of on the patio! :)

Turkish Mother's Day

Today is Mother's Day, and Turkey celebrates Mother's Day on the same day we do. So we have been seeing signs everywhere about appreciating mothers, and we saw a LOT of people buying flowers for their mothers today! Elias' school had the kids make some really cute things to send home for their mothers on Friday.

There was a card that Elias (I'm sure with LOTS of help from his teachers) glued the beans and ribbons on to make flowers. Then he glued together the paper butterfly. And he painted the gold ceramic angel. I know he did this one himself because I remember the day a couple weeks ago he came home covered in gold paint! I didn't know what it was for then! It's still in it's cellophane because the gold paint comes off when you touch it - I need to figure out some way to either shellac it or find a clear case to display it in. The printed card in the back is a Happy Mother's Day card from the school itself. So that was neat to get so many goodies from the school for Mother's Day!

But even more special is the card Justin and Elias made for me this morning. Justin wrote and Elias illustrated. Justin says Elias chose the colors himself and even helped Daddy spell the words on the card! :) Proud and thankful to be my boy's mommy!

 

This afternoon we went to the mall to do some shopping and eat out for dinner. Sunday is the one true weekend day in Turkey, since many people work on Saturday too. So we rarely go out on Sundays because everyplace is PACKED! The mall indeed was packed, but we still enjoyed our time out and I enjoyed my Mother's Day with my family!

23 Nisan

The 23rd of April (23 Nisan in Turkish) is a national holiday in Turkey called The Holiday of National Sovereignty and Children. It's a really big deal, and Elias' school will be closed, so they celebrated today with a costume party! Elias was SO. EXCITED. this morning to be able to wear this Thomas costume we borrowed from some friends.

Isn't he the cutest thing you've ever seen?! I don't even have to ask, because I know he is. He's wearing two Thomas shirts and his Thomas socks to complete the ensemble!

But then when I picked him up from school, he looked like this!

Toting a Turkish flag and a sucker, and with face paint! I was shocked he let them paint his face, but he was totally excited about that too. Not that you can tell from this picture, but he was. (He was just more interested in consuming the sucker.)

Best as I can tell, he's a mouse. White ears over his eyes, red nose, and yellow/white whiskers. HE says it's a mouse!

So this will be our first big holiday in Turkey, and we're looking forward to seeing how they celebrate!