I had a lovely weekend. On Friday night we had a barbecue at Poppy to which about about 35 people came. Our lovely friends Marja and Saadettin and their son Sami, who live in Finland, are over for a holiday and they came along. After everyone had eaten, it turned into a bit of a disco with 70’s and 80’s music (played by DJ Cem…did you know he really used to be a DJ, both on the local radio and at the local disco?!)
We all ‘let our hair down’ and had a good bop, even Libby who is four, seen here dancing with her mum.
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| Do you know this man??* |
On Saturday night, we had been invited to a wedding. I have been in e-mail contact with Pınar since last year when I started sending articles to Todays Zaman, one of the English language newspapers in Turkey, as she edits the expat page. Her brother was getting married and it was a really international wedding as he has lived in Canada, the States and now lives in Austria. Although I felt as though I knew them both from e-mails, I was really looking forward to meeting them properly.
The wedding was on a boat and we boarded in Fethiye at about 7 o’clock. A bit later, the boat set off and we travelled round to one of the bays, where the bride and groom boarded from a small boat. Their friends had organized some lovely surprises for them, including dance routines and a video where they asked each of the guests to record a message for them. We also let off about 30 Chinese lanterns and some of our guests, who were eating on the beach at Çalış, saw the lanterns going up!
It was a lovely night and we really enjoyed meeting them and sharing their special occasion. We wish Yılmaz and Bahanur all the best or, as they say in Turkish, ‘bir yastıkta kocasınlar’…..‘may they grow old on one pillow’!
The restaurants in Çalış are having very mixed reviews this year. Some that have always been reliable, have been disappointing and in one amazing case, a group of five arriving at a restaurant they had thought they would try for the first time, were met by a waiter who sighed and looked as if it would be such hard work to find a table for them that they changed their minds and went elsewhere! Yet many restaurant owners are complaining that business is poor?!
We have a private boat trip going out from Poppy tomorrow which is always fun…and I get another day off. Hooray!
