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| Murat clearing leaves from the pool - look at the palm tree being blown about |
The poyraz wind which comes at this
time every year blowing hot air off the land (unlike our normal breeze which
brings cooler air off the sea) started yesterday morning. It is roasting – over 50 in the sun today – some of
the lads were keen to try cooking an egg on the marble round the pool! I feel especially sorry for anybody who is
trying to fast for Ramazan; I am not usually very good at drinking water – I
mean I can’t drink it very cold or very fast and I have to really push myself
to make sure I drink the minimum requirements but in current conditions even I
am drinking continuously. Those fasting
are not allowed to eat or drink (or smoke cigarettes – this being the hardest
for many turks) from sunrise to sunset – approximately 16 hours at the moment.
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| visiting family members |
It was Emre’s birthday last week –
seventeen. Scary to think that in the UK he could now
be in charge of a car! Luckily here the
minimum age is 18. We didn’t make a lot
of his birthday. I made a cake and iced
it (at 7 o’clock one morning) but we didn’t even find time to cut it until the
next day! He wants to do his PADI
advanced diving course so we are going to arrange this for his present.
He also decided last week not to
make applications to uni this year but to have another go at the exam next year. Hopefully he will find something he wants to
do and be a bit more motivated to get the points necessary for it. He won’t have the ‘distraction’ of school –
funny as it sounds the university entrance exams happen here rather separate to
school things. He will be going again to
a crammer college where they focus just on these exams. At the moment he is busy trying to learn to
juggle with five balls – he is good at 3 and 4 but finding 5 harder. In London
he wanted me to buy him a unicycle.
Perhaps we should just send him off to the circus?!
They had a few good nights in the
bar last week. This week is a little
quieter but we also seem to have a lot of ‘youngsters’ around – some on their
own some with families but after initially eyeing each other up they are now
all getting along! Yesterday evening
they were delighted to learn that Burger King out here delivers…Emre had to
order in for about ten of them (all the lovely Turkish food and I am enabling
people to eat fast food rubbish – it hurts me!!)
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| OK - I know what the ones on the floor are doing but what are the other two twits up to? |
I have done very little work today –
I admit it. I expressed an interest in
researching my family history a little to one of my guests last week and she
very kindly showed me the site she has used and got me started. And it’s addictive – I went on this morning
and I haven’t quite managed to close it yet.
I know more about my father’s family – grandparents and great
grandparents already than I ever did before (it should be stressed that I
started from a VERY low level). Being
able to see the census information and the actual marriage register from the
church brings it all alive – though it does make some things hard to read. But I’m going to have to make myself leave it
until winter time or I will be neglecting my duties….
