The above pictures are in Kastamonu. One picture of me and my class, the other our resident crazy man that plays a horn and sings in the park everyday and the last is a celebration in town for teacher's day.
In the title, I have used the word zenci, which is"black person" in Turkish. Being a person of color and one of the 2 foreigners in Kastamonu has been entertaining at times and at other times a little scary. I have had little ladies on the street yell, "Arab" at me and I have had one woman stop and squeal with delight at the sight of me and kiss my cheeks. The latter lady kept me standing taking pictures and trying to understand what she was talking about for about 20 minutes. Its seemed to be a highlight of her life to be able to see and kiss the cheeks of a zenci. I later learned that there is a myth floating around the Eurasian continent that kissing a black person is good luck.
I expected the stares, but we have seemed to reach Pop star status.....kind of. Three months later and we still get stares from everyone old and young. We still get special treatment like getting an official car complete with driver when we told the director of the health department that we were hungry one evening. Oddly enough though, people seem to have a hard time accepting the fact that I am from America. They seem to only think blonde hair and blue eyes make up America. I can't blame them because they have been influenced by Hollywood that often excludes diversity and/or portrays America's ethnic citizens in an unfavorable light. For instance, another Fulbrighter told me that one of her students asked her if they should be "afraid of black people". This is in fact one of the reasons why I went on this journey. I wanted to show the world that african-americans are not something mythical or people to be afraid of . We are civilized and educated......thank you very much.
I also haven't said much about my teaching experience here. I co-teach an English Conversation class along with the other Fulbrighter at my university, Tory. Our class consists of mostly university faculty with Ph.D's in various subjects from physics to elementary education. They primarily need practice in using English so that they can be proficient enough for conferences in Europe. They have all been studying English for at least 10 years and do not want grammar help, but only practical usage.
We have been flying by the seat of our pants with the class. There are no textbooks or curriculum. Its been interesting and surprisingly fun. We have talked about American holidays, Wikileaks debate, education systems, healthcare, traveling etc. We love hearing what they have to say about various topics and I am always surprised with their questions. They have really increased their vocabulary and I have seen a great improvement in their pronunciation and fluency. We are not sure what we will teach next semester, but it should start in February.
As for Kastamonu itself, it is a cute little town that is more conservative than more western cities. There are some beautiful mosques in town that make the call to prayer 5 times a day. We have met the director of the Health department, who owns the local handball team......fyi he asked me to join the team. I replied, "what is handball". Apparently, he wanted to gain more popularity by having an African American on his team. :) Hey, thats what he said!
We have also met the owner of the "best doner resturant in town". He is an great chef that has been featured in international media. Doner is meat (chicken, beef or lamb) that is cooked on a spit and then sliced to make sandwiches. It is one of my favorite dishes here in Turkey! We have also met the mayor of the city who often rides around in an official car with lights blinking, waving at he people of the town.
Of course, there is our best and most helpful friend Hayati. He has helped us since day one and we will be forever grateful to him. He has translated for us at the bank, Rector's office, resturants, stores etc.... He has helped us to open bank accounts, use the Post office and buy bus tickets. He has been there for us all the time so that we would not ever be lonely or bored.
