Well! I noticed I haven't written since that move to Istanbul ages back. So here is the update.  I came here and sweated through the summer scantily clad in a steaming hot flat with 3 flatmates and my fan directly in front of me at night.  I was occasionally the salsa partner of my one male flatmate, Matt, as he learned latin dance moves from DVDs and Utube videos among other things.  I really hated my job there and ended up quitting after a month and a half. I was tired of begging for hours and being disrespected by the management.  Plus, everyone talks about everyone there so it was an extremely negative environment.

 

Anyway! My new friend, Kelly, and I decided to quit Berlitz so applied to a school at the start of September. I was given a job but Kelly was not. Luckily, she found a position at a nearby school and lives in the district next to mine on European side. We both moved away from Asia and now I live in the upper hills of Ortakoy, under the bridge that leads to Asia, 15 min. walk to the Bosphorus.  This is a definite improvement over my previous address.

 

The school moved me into their apartment building and I started on the 4th day of school in grades 2 and 4.  For the next 2 months, I flitted between the 2 grade levels helping out because they needed assistance in sooo many ways. This made me less than motivated because I had little say over teaching matters.  Finally in November I moved to grade 4 completely and was set free from babysitting the teacher in grade 2. They had wanted me to watch that teachr and make sure she didn't go crazy or something. Whatever...this is Turkey..

 

Grade 4 held a whole other series of problems involving a partner who had taught the program alone for 4 years and didn't want a partner. Aiyah!! It took us ages to find a middle ground of compromise and that was mainly only after uniting against the management making us do illegal nonsense that went against our teaching ethics.

 

I also had to do a border run to Greece and was sent to the most boring city in Greece, Thessaloniki, by bus. I was told to buy a ticket back once there. Oookay. I was really ill during that weekend but still managed to be creepily mildly groped by border police on the train ride home. Lovely.

 

I also went back to Shanghai over our November break. It was great to see my old friends, students, and, well, others. :) It confirmed yet again that Shanghai became more of a home than the US feels sometimes. People really do make the place. Istanbul is absolutely gorgeous and I have nooo desire to stay here while Shanghai has as many blue skied cloudy days as I could count on my hand and I prefer it.  I came back here and spent a week in Budapest freezing to death with my friend Theresa, who is vegetarian. Do NOT go to Budapest if poverty stricken and vegatarian!!  Hehee, we managed to have fun regardless, eating lots of Chinese and hanging out with hostelmates.

 

Over my next holiday, I had a week in Istanbul baking cookies with friends, visiting the palace and Hagia Sofia, going to the movies, etc.  This was before Iwan came to join me for an Egypt trip.  We flew out and spent a week in Giza, Cairo, and Dahab, Sinai.  I thankfully chose a great hostel in Cairo that held a big feast our first night, 20 of us sitting on pillows eating and drinking.  We went to the pyramids, ate a lot of street food like falafel, shwarma, and kushari, did a literary walking tour on our own, visited the museum and then went on to Dahab for the Red Sea and canyons.  We spent our last night there dancing outside, singing songs of our countries, hitting bongoes, and smoking sheesha with everyone else after yet another feast that the cook whipped up...followed by chocolate banana pancakes, of course!  Iwan came back to Turkey with me and chilled out for the week while I taught.  It was really good to see him again.

 

Anyway, I have decided to move back to Shanghai and have been trying to find a school that needs an English lit. or history teacher. Haven't found anything yet but keep me in your prayers! I am leaving Turkey at the beginning of July for a road trip across the states with Iwan and then it's back to Shanghai, job or not! Hehe

 

Ooooh, the things people do for love.

Hi, everyone! I know I've been horrible about keeping in touch this past year as I was working for the Singaporean school in Shanghai. They definitely kept me busy, I must say.

 

The year was spent traveling to Suzhou near Shanghai, around northern Vietnam, going to Yunnan province for 3 days of trekking over Xmas in the mountains and wandering through Old Town of Lijiang the rest of my days, drinking yak milk and bargaining for leather belts.  I then spent 2 weeks in the UK (London, surrounding areas, and Edinburgh in Scotland) visiting guards at Windsor Castle, seeing Ben Nevis, and walking around Loch Ness.  May holiday was spent in Bangkok and Koh Si Chang in Thailand and Vientiene, and Vang Vieng in Laos.  When I came back to work, I went on a weeklong excursion to Ningbo and Shaoxing with the 7th graders and finished off my trips with one final stop in Borneo for 10 days this past July.

 

PHEW!!

 

Now I spent a couple weeks in the States, Indiana and New Jersey, before flying to Istanbul, Turkey, where I am once again struggling to adjust to another country.  I have been here for a little over a week and it is definitely a change. I live on the Asian side which is beneficial since it will keep me from spending every cent I have on clubs and such, which are mostly on the European side.  It is REALLY hot here though so I am in a constant state of sweaty since they don't do AC.

 

I haven't seen much yet as it requires a minibus, ferry ride across the Bosphorus, and train ride to wherever I want to go, but I will surely see more as the year progresses. 

 

Wish me luck all in my 3rd year abroad in my 2nd country!

Hi, all! I know it's been ages but I've been gallivanting around the world yet again. For the month of July, I was all over the US. My first few days were spent in California and Mexico (getting my fried cheese and fresh salsa fix).  In Mexico, I got taken for $370 by the Mexican cops due to my driving a rental car into the country.  Oops. This payoff was at least better than what would have surely happened if we'd been driven all the way to the Tijuana jail (as we were already handcuffed together in the backseat of the police car). YIKES! We tried to shrug off the negative start to the trip and continued on to Rosarito for dinner and dancing. Even went under the foam at Iggys. Completely filthy but fun, nonetheless.

 

Back in Cali, we hit some BBQs and hung out till I flew to Indy. In Indiana, I visited with family and friends, going to Indy, Cincinatti, Evansville, and Bloomington till heading back to Cali once again.  Due to space conservation, I am going to glaze over this. Sorry!

 

In Cali, I went to Venice Beach, Sunset Strip, Melrose, Hollywood, saw Poncho Sanchez, a comedy show, went reggae dancing, drove down Pacific coast repeatedly, got all my favorite foods, cuddled with my sweetie, had a bonfire on the beach with old colleagues/friends, and so on. It was absolutely amazing. I spent my last night in the US watching the sunset in Jordan's backyard with a glass of wine and a whole lot of quiet (something very rare in Shanghai..as I currently am listening to car horns).

 

As soon as I arried back in Shanghai, and had been in my apt. for about an hour, my best bud cut out of work early to visit and gossip since we were long overdue. I spent the next 2 nights conked out on my couch till flying to Singapore for 10 days in Sgp/Malaysia.

 

I was pretty burnt out, possibly jetlagged, on this trip since it was pretty much as soon as I got back to an Asian time zone. I hung out in Sgp with my hostel roommates, bused to KL and walked around, bused to Penang, then ferried to Langkawi. Went horseback riding, island hopping, to the aquarium, etc. Was a VERY relaxing vacation, much needed to regroup from a month in my home country. Talk about culture shock to hop between those 2 places.

 

I've now been back to work for over 2 weeks. They are trying to kill me with work overload so if I appear to not be writing much, it's my work's fault!! swear!! I have only gone out 1 night in 2 weeks and it was my birthday dinner. Wah, poor me. Ok, i'll survive...but still!!

 

Talk to you soon, all!

OK! It's been a few weeks since my last entry.  I purchased a ticket the the US, reserved cars at the LA airport, booked a flight to Indiana, bought a flight to Singapore...woah. I am poor now.

 

It's been a fun month.  Isn't it always?  I enjoyed Children's Day on July 1st, watching fireworks on the Bund from the basement at my one of my fav bars, Number Five.  The next day I went for teppan with my friend Jean, in celebration of his 30th B-day, followed by a foam party at Zapatas, complete with bartenders shooting us with water guns as we sloshed through the bubbles and threw white fluffy globs at one another. Good times. This was followed by a local pub to dry off and 'breakfast' at McDonalds.  I took it easy the next day because this was going to be a 9 day work week. There was some major government activity scheduled in Shanghai and they wanted to clear up traffic while various countries visited..which means they moved rush hour traffic to the weekend, instead of Wed-Fri.  I was a good teacher and did almost nothing for 9 days, aside from Thai with Simon and dinner w/Jo at O'Malleys.  Go me. We had a big celebratory dinner at Moon River that Tuesday night to end off the year of teaching. Now students are simply taking exams. YEA!!

 

This weekend was nice as well. I hit the fake market one last time since it's closing for good June 30th. I also went to a marriage celebration dinner at a Hong Kong restaurant. My German colleague married his Chinese girlfriend so she can go back with him till he finishes his studies.  Saturday I went to a house party which involved bongos on the balcony, breakdancing in the living room, and some guy teaching people the matador dance...before the party moved up to the roof, sitting on the 40th floor on the ledge as the sun rose at 6am.  Crazy good times. I somehow managed to get up and go to brunch the next day AND a BBQ later that day!

 

Monday, I met an old friend for dinner at People's Square and we went to this Hong Kong based restaurant called Green Leaf Curry House...YUMMY! We had pad thai, satay, and a mango shrimp salad. Shane knew the band so they came in and played Bob Marley before going off into a round of Ricky Martin "La Vida Loca", making me get up, put my shoes on, and dance along with them. That was interesting. Heehee

 

We then went for bowling at a local hotel that only charged 10kuai a game. Good deal! Was a lovely Monday night. :)  That brings us pretty much up to date. I go home on the 29th so I don't know when I'll get the chance to write next. I have moving, a bunch of last minute dinners, and clubs to attend so that should keep me busy.  YIPPY!! Oh, how I shall miss Shanghai!!!

Ok, I'm not quite clear on this but I'll give it a shot. APPARENTLY, Wednesday is some special day to mark the passing of seasons or something like that.  There was a poem written a long time ago about this man falling down a mountain into the river.  All his friends were worried the fish would eat him so they sacrificed all their food, throwing it into the river in hopes of the fish eating the food and not the man.

 

With that said, I have NO idea what the connection is between these 2 events. Regardless, in celebration of this seasonal day, I now have a HUGE bag of leafwrapped rice (a symbol of what the people threw into the water), a special rice that is only at this time of year. I'm not sure what leaf it is but it's green with string wrapped around it to hold in the rice.  I'm not much for the leafy rice personally, but I may give it a shot tonight.  Dinner, anyone?  I've got about 15 of these suckers!