Chilling with a Turk

I was excited to do the home stay part of the trip. I was especially exited that we were going to be staying with a woman our age. I didn’t really know what to expect. It was Election Day; So, I guess I expected to watch the elections a bit. Here, they have a law against selling alcohol on Election Day, if only that could prevent all poor judgment.

We met our host outside her house at about 5 pm. She lived in the same area as the boys’ host.

My first impression of her was she was cute. She was wearing a dress that looked like a man’s shirt. It fell at her upper thighs, where it tapered in a bit. She had long brown hair pulled up and olive skin. She was 5-foot-4 with brown eyes.

She looked about 25. Later, I learned that she was 26. She wasn’t very talkative, but she had a way of anticipating your needs. We opened the door to her basement apartment and rolled our bags in. The bottom portion of the doorframe was covered in evil eyes. She flipped off her shoes into a basket next to the door and asked us to do the same.

After directing us to our rooms, she asked the three greatest questions: Were we hungry? Did we need a shower? Did we need to do laundry? We jumped at the laundry offer and decided to wait on the other offers. After starting the laundry, we went into the living room and started to watch TV.

She apologized right away that her attention would be focused on the elections tonight. We all said it was OK. I was interested in seeing the results and reactions to the results. However, after an hour or two it was evident who had won: AKP. I tried to chitchat with her while we flipped back and forth between American television and the elections, but she was very quiet.

She was pretty disappointed to see AKP win. In fact, she didn’t really believe it was possible. However, this seemed to be the result everyone expected. I

think some of her idealism sprouts from the fact that she is young and surrounded by like minded individuals. However, she didn’t like hearing this.

Of course, I would have like to have a more talkative host. Or, to have a larger family to see how they all interact with one another. However, in the end it just goes to show how similar humans are no matter where you go.