The Magic of Ordinary Days: Hello Baby!


Yes, he is sitting on a giant cabbage.

This week was the first week of school, which means I am no longer a lady of leisure (hah!). But I did steal away for an hour or so on Thursday to visit the market with my friend Karen. Behind one stall we saw three little boys eating their lunch - a chopped up mess of vegetables with a loaf of bread and some hunks of cheese. They were very confused as to why we wanted to take their picture and kept getting up to pose. But we finally convinced the younger two to sit back down at their meal.

I love that they are eating this wonderful fresh food for their lunch. I love that one of the boys is sitting on the hugest cabbage I have ever seen.


Here are some of those big cabbages. Karen assures me they will get even bigger.

Because I know just what my mother is thinking I have to point out a couple of things.
1) The produce here tastes SOOOO much better than it does in the U.S. You just wouldn't believe how flavorful everything is and its cheap! You don't have to pay extra for 'organic' produce. If we fed these kids US produce, they probably wouldn't eat it.
2) These kids, as adorable as they are - were chubby. It might not look like it from the picture but they were. So don't talkto me about curing America's child obesity problem. But yes, kids in the US should eat more like these kids. We all should.

Here is the best part. After we had finished our shopping and were walking back to car we passed this stall again. The oldest boy, who is not in the picture and was only maybe 10 or 11, runs up to the edge of the stall and calls out, "Hello Baby!" to me. His friends all think this is hilarious and giggle like teenage girls. No idea where he learned that English phrase but he was very excited to have a chance to use it.

We also got some AMAZING peaches (sheftali)! Sooo good!

There is cereal under there but its just the vehicle. I wish I had my canning stuff so I could can up a bunch of these.

That night we had our first power outage. Apparently all of Adana was down for a bit. We had no flashlights or candles but all of us have a flashlight app on our ipods so we were good. Thank you technology. Rory was pretty freaked out so we went on a walk to try and find the hedgehog that Geoffrey and I had seen on our walk earlier in the week. We walked back to the place where we had seen him which happened to be near a guard tower. Seeing the silhouette of a Turkish guard with his gun didn't help Rory's anxiety level much. And the hedgehog was a no-show. But on the way home Delaney did catch a frog which cheered up Rory. Frog hunting is something of an obsession with the neighborhood kids.

Most of the neighborhood was outside so we visited a bit until the lights came back on. I guess that happens pretty frequently here so we will have to get some candles and such (or just make sure our ipods are charged up.)

Geoffrey has been working so hard all week. He spent last Friday, a down day, at work all day and has worked late several nights this week. Today is Saturday and he is at work at a meeting. But last night he and I went to dinner near the lake in Adana. The lake is huge and all along the shore there are restaurants and parks. We went to a very nice restaurant. The maitre 'd or head waiter spoke passable English. (I never criticize anybody's English as its always better than my Turkish and I think English would be a bugger of a language to learn.) He liked to say Bon Appetite a lot. So I guess he is tri-lingual!!

They brought out a Turkish salad which is tomatoes and red peppers and cucumbers and herbs, bread, hummus, and several vegetable condiments like spiced onions and finely chopped tomatoes in olive oil. There was no menu. He said, "I am menu. Man Menu." So Geoffrey ordered lamb and I ordered grilled chicken. Both were simply prepared and excellently seasoned. For dessert they brought us a fruit plate. "Fruit plate house-ling" which meant it was on the house. And this other dish that was like shredded wheat soaked in honey with sliced pistachios and served with a small scoop of vanilla ice cream. Very good. I have seen the shredded wheat bread at the Turkish commissary. Maybe I can get Ayten to teach me how to make it.