Acar Household

This is the story of how I found a new family. I did a number of exciting things today, including visiting the Grand Bazaar in İstanbul, where I bartered (and still likely paid too much) for a number of pretty but unnecessary items. I also took a ferry across a small gulf to eventually reach my new home of Bursa. But none of those are the interesting bits of my story.

We arrived via bus at Tömer Institute in Bursa. Since my host dad words at the institute, he and his entire family were already there waiting for me. Eyüp, his wife Gönül, nine-year-old Günce, and four-year-old Nehir. It was clear from the moment I walked into the door the little girls knew who I was. Apparently Eyüp had shown them photos of me from facebook, and they picked me out of the crowd immediately. Nehir buried her face in her mom’s legs, and Günce just stared at me with big brown eyes, smiling only when I smiled at her first.

Introductions were decidedly short. Since my Turkish is still limited to the few phrases I’ve learned to get me by, and since only Eyüp can speak English, there wasn’t much communication to be had.

“Nasılsın?” I asked, after saying merhaba to each of them. Luckily they answered in the only way I could understand – iyi, or çok iyi, (“How are you?” “good,” or “very good”). Nehir still wouldn’t unbury herself from her mother.

Eyüp had to help my fellow students find their respective families, leaving me in his office with the rest of the family, none of whom I can communicate with. They ended up teaching me how to say my age in Turksish, and it took a good solid two minutes for me to deduce what Gönül was trying to tell me, which was that there are thirteen years between our ages. There was a lot of nervous laughter, and me shaking my head and mumbling “Oh, God” under my breath while still maintaining a smile.

Nehir and Günce are adorable in the best sense of the word. They both have straight brown hair and dark, almost black eyes. I squeezed in between them in the back seat on the way to Gemlik. Nehir immediately started poking my arm, and when I’d poke her back she’d giggle and squeal. We also practiced our counting together – bir, ikı, uç, dırt, beş, altı, yedi, sekiz, dokuz, on. But, in a cruel twist of irony, the four-year-old could count much higher and much faster, my talents dwindling around twelve or thirteen and hers shooting well into the eighties and nineties. I bet she thinks she’s a genius.

Günce was relatively quiet, until she reached up and touched my hair. Oh yes, the blonde. Right. So I leaned in, and she took a handful and ran her fingers through it. Then a strand of it fell in my face, as per usual, and she immediately brushed it out of my eyes. As Nehir leaned over and rested her head on my arm, pretending to sleep, I started quizzing Günce in order to build my vocabulary.

I pointed to my tooth. “Diş,” she replied.

I pointed to my lip. “Dudak.”

She took the initiative and circled her finger around her mouth. “Ağız.” I had to repeat that one a few times (the accented G is silent, the undotted i is a whole other beast I have yet to tackle).

Then she was on a roll. Nose, cheek, chin, ear, eye…burun, yanak, çene, kulak, ilik. And then she helped me spell all of them using the Turkish alphabet, not the slightest hint of frustration or impatience in her demeanor. It is a bizarre notion that these two children can simultaneously accept the fact that I do not speak their language, and yet never once grow perturbed or ever tire of helping me learn. If you want to learn a language, hire a kid. They have infinite patience, and you could probably pay them in gummy bears or something.

After a few more games of poke-the-girl-who-speaks-English in the car, we pulled up to the Acar family’s flat in Gemlik. Their flat overlooks the Sea of Marmara, so when you open the living room curtains you look out over a gleaming blue sea with a backdrop of hilltop homes and buildings. I mean damn, that’s awesome. A few people emerged from surrounding flats, staring at us. Two elderly women sat on a bench outside the building. “Merhaba!” I said, and they replied in kind with big toothy smiles. Eyüp showed me to my room (complete with TV and my own desktop computer) and showed me around the flat. It’s a lovely place, decorated very modern with a sleek flatscreen TV in the living room and angular white/brown furniture. Immediately I got a taste of the legendary Turkish hospitality. I sat on the couch while Nehir played intently with my hair, pulling it up on top of my head then letting it fall back down, squealing a number of things in Turkish, while Eyüp asked me a series of questions. “You want to eat now? You want to shower first? Maybe you go unpack your things? You want some cola? Chai? Coffee?” Oh God. Uh, let me think. Well food’s probably a given. I’m always hungry. Ok, let’s do that. Shrek was on the TV at the time, dubbed into Turkish. I watched the little birdie explode after the Princess sang that really high note and realized the part where she’s singing is probably the only part of the movie they didn’t have to dub the voices into.

But first, Gönül asked Eyüp to ask me (you can see where this gets frustrating) how tall I am.

“I don’t know, 5’9 or 5’10?” I answered.

“No no no, in metric!” He replied. Great. Another thing I don’t know.

Eyüp guessed I was about 180 centimeters, then Günce took my hand and led me into her and Nehir’s bedroom. She pointed at the side of the bureau where a height measurement sticker thingy had been attached. She pointed at it. I shook my head, stood next to it, and then moved my hand from the top of my head to the bureau to show her I was much taller than the chart reached. She laughed, and then Gönül got the tape measure. She had me stand up against the bureau, and marked my height with a pencil. 176, it turns out – Eyüp was only four centimeters off in his estimation. So let me just reiterate – the absolute first thing that happened the first night in my host family house was I got measured. How awesome is that?

Then Gönül, an absolutely lovely woman, served all of us dinner. DINNER. HOME MADE TURKISH FOOD. I can’t even talk about it. So good. Oh so good. Çok guzel, people. “Do you want more? Have you had enough? Would you like more rice?” Who am I to say no to food? Eyüp took out a digital camera and took a photo of me and Günce on one side of the table. He said something in Turkish, and I asked him to translate. “I said, I’m taking a photo of Günce and Nehir eating dinner with their older sister!”

After I unpacked my bags and distributed my Nebraska-themed gifts (including, but not limited, to Dorothy Lynch dressing, corn cob jelly, and two stuffed animals – a cow and an ear of corn) Eyüp initiated some very enlightening conversation. We had all been warned from day one to tread lightly on topics like government and religion, but I didn’t even have to say anything while Eyüp explained in detail how he felt about a number of things. “I have two little girls! How could I expect them to wear a head covering? Maybe the man should wear the head covering.”

My brain became too fried to function, so here I am in bed, contemplating the true extent of the last thing Eyüp said to me before I went to bed. “Iyi geceler,” I said, good night, and I apologized again for being so tired and out-of-it. “It is ok,” he replied. “You are not a guest in this home, you are our family.”

Having as deep a chasm as language barrier between you and most of the people you share a home with is easily the most exhausting thing in the world you could experience. But I guess if I ever get too stressed I could just ask Nehir to play with my hair some more.