Noeliniz Kutlu Olsun!

Weirdest Christmas ever.

Although, considering I've spent all of my previous Christmases at home with my family, it's no surprise that my Christmas in a Muslim country was a little different.

I spent all day shopping with Lisa and Laura in Ulus around the Citadel. I am done Christmas shopping. I am done souvenir shopping. No more! I think I'll go broke!

Heck, I spent 40 YTL on nazar boncuk (evil eye) related junk.

I got my first "Christmas feeling" as we were sitting on the second floor of a half-timbered cafe in the Citadel. It was red-tinted inside with little nazar boncuks hanging from strings above the window and tealight candles on the tables. You could see people walking on the street below and the snow-covered roofs of the Citadel houses. Our çay came with little gingerbread cookies on the side. (And I had the most delicious muesli)

We returned, and I got ready for Torben's dinner party. I waited for Clement outside for 10 minutes, while he waited inside for me. Very productive.

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A blurry shot from the dinner
The common room floor was covered in pillows, with two short tables to eat at (eating a la Turca again). The "Christmas tree" was really pine tree branches cut off, stuck in a pot, and decorated with epilepsy-inducing Christmas lights.

Torben and his flatmates had prepared a very Turkish meal: onion soup, handmade mixed pide, cous cous-like rice, various salads, fried potato things, something drowning in yogurt, and chicken.

Clement had brought two bottles of wine from home/France, so that was nice. Anton was drinking cola mixed with orange Fanta. Weird.


Clement and Torben playing tavla/backgammon. Torben is lost in strategy...or completely miserable. One can never tell with him.
After dinner, we exchanged (our "unisex and uni-nation") pollyanna presents- German style, I guess. We all got a present, and then for 10 minutes we rolled a die and passed it to our neighbor. If you got a '6' you were allowed to exchange your present with someone else's present. When the 10 minutes were up, we could open the presents.


My fincanlar
For once, I actually did well! I mean, I bought a small tavla/backgammon board, and lots of people were playing it throughout the evening. And I got a set of two fincan (Turkish coffee cups) and saucers...in Christmas colors. Buysan, one of Torben's Turkish flatmates showed me how to make Turkish coffee. So my body was half drunk and ready to sleep, but my mind was wide awake.

Hannes read my fortune from the coffee remains. He said "It's dry." Michael determined that I "will go on a journey and cross a large body of water."

Other people didn't do so well with presents. Anton had run out of time and bought a neon pink beret and scarf. Clement ended up with it. Someone hadn't brought a present, so we wrapped up a bottle of gin that someone brought. Laura ended up with it (she and Marta were the ones who had brought it). Other gifts included a fake human skull, a dart board, two crazy hats, a normal winter hat, a bottle of red wine, a small box of chocolates,...

After gift exchanging we sat around, drank, and played tavla. I eventually fell asleep and woke up to find my two German neighbors playing backgammon on my head.

And...back to sleep it was.

The music for the evening went from some German music (the largest number of the dinner attendees were German, 6 of 16), to good 'ole hokey American music (the first time I've heard it in a year), to Santana (we all made fun of Jan for it), and then back to assorted Torben selections.

Oh, and I learned a new German word: "Yein." Slang for something in between Ya/Yes and Nein/No.

Dessert came. It was *delicious* ice cream, cookies, small pastries, and a box of chocolates. So much we couldn't eat it all.

Around 2am a bunch of us walked back to campus. Anton slid all the way down the icy hill. It was pretty funny.

So in conclusion, a Turkish Christmas includes lots of exchange students, tavla, dessert, and gin mixed with apricot nectar. Being the only American in attendance is not necessarily a requirement, but suggested when celebrating Christmas on the 24th instead of the 25th.