My first APAGON in Montevideo!

Last couple of days were amazingly hot and sunny and beautiful. And as Spring likes to play with us human beings so much, she decided to start a rain storm today! A really strong one too. It looked gray all morning, telling us to either get home early as we can, or not leave the house at all. When I was leaving my apartment to go to the gym I knew I was going to get wet on the way back, but I did not care because what is better than to get wet when it is hot out? and you know it is not winter anymore, it is Spring!

Two and a half hours later, I left the building that houses my women-only gym (that is a whole other funny story I need to post later) where most girls decided to stay and wait for their husbands, boyfriends, or mothers; with a smile on my face, alone and fabulous.

The streets of Montevideo was already empty! One thing about montevideans: they do not go out when it rains. And as it rains a lot in winter, you see very very very few people on the street. I started to believe after my second year here that they firmly believed they were made of sugar and they would melt in case of wetness! First year I was confused. Not because I did not understand where they were I did not understand if they live through winter every year—this place is almost on the exact opposite of North Caroline on the South Cone—why did not they got accustomed to live through it?

I don’t remember knowing anyone in Istanbul or New York that would not leave the house almost all winter unless they absolutely have to. We all go out, and we go out even more in winter because it is fun to be indoors with calor humano and enjoy it. We go to movies, art galleries, coffee shops, book stores, you name it. It’s just rain!

So I walked. There were not even cars around—that blows my mind!—and I felt like I was the owner of the city: I was listening to Yerba Buena’s Caribbean rythms and enjoying the rain drops tickling my face. Knowing that I will come to an empty house and work all night long and finish what I need to finish in order to move on with my life.

I needed to make a phone call so I stopped by my german neighbor’s place; she was studying for an important exam, so we chit chated. Then I made the call, while downloading some information of the net to my laptop. Went up to my place to get something and Bum!

The light of the thunder was so strong I did not realize that it caused a blackout for seconds and as soon as it was gone I found myself in dark! I reached for my cell and used it as a flash light until I found a candle—one of decorative small shitty ones I have—and tried to light it but it was dead! Since I left cuba I have not had the blackout experience—we almost had one in New York this summer though, that was worrying—and I did not even think about having “just in case” good thick candles or a flashlight!

I heard Justine’s voice calling me saying she had a candle and that I should go get that an my computer. As soon as I went down, our other neighbor was entering her apartment telling us how much it sucked to go up to stairs (6-floors) with no light! I asked Justine if they ever had a blackout like this since she moved here because from my place I could see that the whole Montevideo was out, it was not only our adjacent to semi-ghetto neighborhood. She said no. I told them to unplug their electro domestics as we used to do in Habana when there was a apagon.

I came back to my apartment, lit the candle. Unplugged everything, and started to watch the-now-really-empty looking city, in dark. I felt like I was living in on of the gothic towers of Gotham City. I thought of all the “bad things” that could happen if these people dared moving their noses out of the window. I am sure even the thieves stayed home and that is why this is still a safe place to live in Latin America! I locked my door, just in case. Then for a moment, I fantasized that my phone will ring and he will be calling to see whether or not I was ok; it did not. I did not make a big deal because soon after I discovered that the system was down! Damn, the city was really out!

I put my headphones. Yerba Buena again! Flip open my Mac, she was fully charged so I had 6 hours! And started working in the dark. I wished I had a landline and friends to call and speculate about the situation just for the sake speculating. I wished all my neighbors came to my apartment and started chatting, having coffee, or something, some kind of interaction. I wished my cell rang. None of those happened. I finally understood and accepted that this is really a lonely city. And they like it this way.

Then I started typing and forgot about the whole thing. I was ok without them, without the light. I had everything I needed with me in my apartment.

The Day after...

Burnt cookies. So embarrassing to produce ugly cookies with so much love! All I wanted to do is to celebrate the end of the summit with a homage a mon amie Chantal who makes great cookies and thinks she taught me too! Picture says she taught me nothing about cookies. The whole experience is, everything she taught me and I am so grateful for them.

So what happened to the cookies? I think to get to that I am about to write the longest story, before!

Yeah, so, the Iberamerican Leader’s Summit has ended! I could not interview Hugo Chavez as I hoped—deep down I had the feeling that this was not the time and in retrospective I am glad he did not come. Now that he is drowned in the elections he would not be fun to interview—but I have met great people thanks to the summit, and even get to be interviewed as a “personality” on the national radio! So good to finally understand what “enjoy the process” means!

Thanks to my nervous breakdown at the Press center a day before the Summit, I met one of Uruguay’s most famous TV journalists and all her banda, who not only managed to get someone to find my lost credential but also introduced me to many other colleagues who helped me a lot during the summit. There were good ideas that came out from the summit for the Latin Americans and I hope President’s keep their commitment to that.

I love running around, getting quotes, writing news, sending them over, and giving live phone interviews. For three solid days I did it, and hope the results are satisfactory for those who hired me to do this great job. I wish CNN Turk was more interested in what I do here and send me more feedback, but they don’t. Watcha gonna da.

I felt a bit Latino machismo inside the press center, which bothered me at first but I did not fight back. Like veteran female journalist told me “you have to pay your dues. They will respect you as a journalist over the years, now they don’t know you, so that is why they treat you like a little girl.”

One of the best parts was preparing a feature story for WBAI’s free speech radio news. I decided to create a story that reflected both what summit is about and who it really should be about. The Bolivian President Evo Morales’s anecdotal speech was undoubtedly the best speech I have heard in a long time. He seems and sounds like an honest leader of a group of people who elected him because they really believe in him. In order to reflect that I worked all day with my radio show partner Leo to produce a good 3-minute story. By the time I sent it, I was drained.


And today is my first day off after 10 days of non-stop preparing and working. I did not even set the alarm, because I needed to listen what my body was telling me. She woke up at 7 and I got out of bed by 8! Had breakfast, read, did laundry, read more. Then I walked for an hour to have lunch with friends. 3 hours of joy! I walked back home carrying a couple of bottles of wine and organic veggies to prepare a great meal, for a deserving audience back home. All this thanks to my friend Chantal.

If I did not spend, I wish it was more, so much time with her this past summer (northern hem) I might have been far from feeling like this.


When I landed in Miami 6 months ago, I was depressed. I was depressed from everything that happened last year and that I was still over weight, and I was probably overweight for so long it was depressing me. The month I spend living with Chantal I realized that I was not moving forward because I was fighting in my head with the past. So instead of doing that now I live today, like I used to, again, and enjoy every moment of it. I understood that the body is a temple but not to worship it from outside just buy looking at it, one needs to try to understand its philosophy and listens. It is so comfortable to have a relationship with your own body.

She was worried about me because the person she was looking at was not her friend she knows almost for 10 years now. My downer attitude was a shock to her. She could not believe when I told her I was not cooking for a long time and that I was not even enjoying my meals—except at hot-owner-of-the-restaurant’s place, those were great meals and were the happiest days of last year—So she started curing me by cooking with me. First I was reluctant but she opened me up in a few days. Then I cooked almost everyday. Or we cooked together, inventing new dishes. After almost a year (on and off I cooked for different occasions but I was not enjoying it) I started cooking again and it was such a joy! We invited over my brother and his friends and her brother and other people. Food is festivity. I am so thankful to her that she reminded me of that.

The she told me I should go back to doing yoga and almost dragged me with her to all of her classes. I finally started to see a glimpse of what yoga meant for our souls and bodies—in that order. My body started to feel great and look great. It is so interesting to understand this new relationship, from inside out, instead of outside in. And one can see that in many other examples, i.e. if you don’t have physical balance, because you lack the balance within you. Or you need guts not only abs to believe and do something.
Those days brought me here again, to do what I believe in. I am in peace and I am happy. I can focus, I can balance. I work, I function and I cook!

So I decided to celebrate this great feeling I have today by making cookies to Chanti’s honor—I bought a little electric oven—and share them with my neighbors! Well, they happened to sit on top of the kitchen table right now, un-edible. They look like little burnt cup cakes that did not rise! The sad part is that: I could not even make cookies that look like cookies! I don’t remember what but I messed up somewhere between trying to chat with mom with the computer on top of the fridge and whisking the butter with sugar—did I put eggs? Who knows! I am going to observe the remaining dough and wait for cookie master (chanti)’s email within the next few days and save them! I am sure she will teach me how to make cookies in a heartbeat!

"Asli Pelit, for CNN Turk, from Montevideo, Uruguay"

I have started my first real reporting assignment as the "correspondant of CNN Turk" in Latin America, today! I have made other stories via telephone from here, but this time I am accreditted--though I should mention the big fuck-up organizers have made: I am not from Turkey for this even, but from the US as they did not expect a Turkish journalist in this summit their computers were not programmed for my country!--sitting next to Larry Rohter from NY Times and Lucia Newman (she used to work for CNN but now works for Al Jazeera!) and other important reporters! I have made official requests to interview a couple of state heads, of which I hope I can manage to get one in front of my camera this weekend.

So far there is nothing super important happening, but I am sure over the next 48 hours, I will have more anecdotes to share!

Remembering mom on her (Almost) birthday!

There are some days, nights, or even moments, that reminds me of her in weirdess ways. One of those happened two weeks ago, when my radio show partner Leo gave me a new CD with a lot of Funk and disco classics in it. I came home to the cupula later that day and as I started listening to some of the songs, I was a little girl again, dancing with her in our living room to the same tracks! Music has been very important to me because of her, becase she filled our life with music almost 24 hours a day!

Bee Gees always remind me of our days at home and dancing! Even dad is in those memories! I remember the first movie she took me with her: we saw HAIR (the musical) at a huge 1950’s movie theater in our then-neighborhood (now that beautiful movie theater is a gas station!). I did not even know how to read and write and did not understand a thing during the movie, I just remember thinking how cool were these people who say sang and kissed and said NO! to bad soldiers! I did not know much about kissing but I knew what WAR meant: the thing Iran and Iraq were involved and it was bad. (Those days, all we heard in the news was who was going to nuke the other one and what would happen to us, Turks, who were bordering these crazy arabs! My family never made a big deal about it though, mom used to say, “nothing is going to happen to us.”)

We danced to the Age of Aquarius in the house, for a while, and when I was a year older, she took me to see Grease (which I guess resulted in me falling in love with John Travolta and my obsession with cool guys/unattachable but who also are able to fall in love deeply when they see a girl who is worth it!). After they closed the movie theater, she bought a video: first movie i remember seeing on video was Saturday Night Fever! I cried when the boy fell down from Verrazano Bridge (she said, "see, even if your friends say come lets jump together, dont do it!") That movie brought the Bee Gees era to our household. She would spin Barbara Streisand singing with Barry Gibb—lovers at the time-- “I am a woman in love and could do anything!” And me, an illiterate 6 year old punk, singing it as much as I can and knew exactly what the song said because she explained to me. She said “Don’t let anybody break your heart, and know that I will always love you, no matter what” And I knew she did, and she still does.

Sometimes, on Sundays if she did not work, she would stay home and do some home duties and wanted me to help her. She loves ironing for some reason. Instead of the lady we have at home, she does that unnerving domestic activity by herself. She tried to teach me a couple of times but I never wanted to learn so I never did. I love dry cleaning. I really never cared for house duties, except cooking which she never thought me. I liked other things we did as mother and daughter: talking, dancing, travelling, being friends, shopping together for anything really! I loved more going to her construction sites and watch it become something. Also I love watching my mother, she always has her act together, never too cold but keeps a distance. Everybody respects her, and not only as a woman but also as a hardworking architect.

I never doubted I was going to stay with her when my parents told me—my granma was the one who told me what was happening--they were getting a divorce. I dont remember anything but the conversation with Annemo; and one day to another we moved to a different apartment. Maybe I erased the painful parts of that time, who knows. I manage to keep only good memories in my head. Granma came to my room and asked me if I had to live with one of them, which one would I have chosen? I said without a doubt: mom. Because mom meant also granma, and great-granma, and their love. Dad was always absent from my life, he was never home. I only remember him from parties he threw and the Sunday brunches. He was fun to hang out with but honestly I did not know him at all. I was 7 years old.

When they got divorced, mom stayed with the LPs but the music has changed. The long plays they listened back when we were a family—and I was not allowed to touch them because everytime I tried to change a song usually when I wanted to repeat one I’d broken a needle--we did not listen too much of them. Not because of the divorce, 80's came and the music changed! Disco died and pop arised. Things were getting uglier around: the big hair, the trashy make-up tones, even the music. Thank god she listened to the Beatles. And classical music in the mornings! She would wake up almost as early as a work day and come and tickle us and wake us up, on my favorite, Sunday mornings! I did not have anything to do those days and I wanted to sleep late! I always hated waking up early! So when she would come and tickle me and say: “good morning my beautiful princess, wakey wakey!” I knew it was from pure love but could not get up as fast as she wanted me to and be yelled at from the breakfast table: “do you want to eat like servants in the kitchen or can you join the family right now?” She was not fully serious but I got the point. When I think about those years, from the late 80’s to 90’s, me becoming a Beatles loving hippy—wearing mom’s old clothes and sing with my friends all the songs we could copy from the radio stations to cassettes and then listen at the walkman I had! But the classical music gave me the chills for a long time as it reminded me of waking up early!

The wakey wakey business got serious when I started to go out and party. I was 15! It was my best friend’s birthday in a hot summer day. We asked her parents to take us to a discotheque we heard from older kids from school. They said yes, but they were going to join us as chaperones! What an horror, we both thought! Imagine if someone sees us and tells everyone in school that we “went out with Asli G.’s dad!” Anyways, we later rationalized going with them, thinking we would lose them inside and visit them every once in a while to make them happy. We were big enough—can’t believe I thought that, I thought I was an adult back then!—and do whatever we want! (another concept mom taught me: If I wanted, I could do anything in the world!”) Then we had to convince mom because according to her, those days, I was too young to go out. I should wait my 16th birthday to go out like she did! I was like, MOMMMMM, nooo. Please don’t embarrass me like that. I looked at her, and with my eyes said: you can trust me, it is going to be ok, I am a big girl. And she did. Since that outing, I have never done anything when I went out that she would be scared or ashamed of. I never took any drugs that I did not know what they were—yes, I always consciously drugged myself when I felt like it was the time to try something new!—I never got arrested, I never got pulled over, and I almost never vomited in front of her!

Just once, once, I came home thinking I am not even “buzzed”, but according to her I “stank” like alcohol, after a 7 hour dinner with my best guy friends, drinking a whole bottle of Raki by myself—can I even drink half of that bottle today? I don’t think so!-- I opened the door, she was having a party! They were listening to some Brazilian music, or caribean, I remember saying hi to many people, who were looking at me as I was a stranger. I thought, pah, I am great. I just need to go to my bed and sleep. I closed my eyes for a minute! Big mistake, I vomited the next 5 hours. That was my first time, and I hated it, I hated it so much that I swore I would never get that drunk—well, that did not happen, I vomited many times after that! Hated each one of them—The next day when I woke to opera, blasting in the house. My head felt as heavy as an acquarium, when I finally opened my eyes as much as I could with a nebula headache she said: "you are so grounded young lady! I told you not to get drunk!" And she made me run so many errands that day, I had to do it because I was, duh, guilty, and did all those things I hated back then: going to the market and help her with veggies, supermarket shopping, maybe movies or theater, something. I wanted to die with my head ache getting worst every minute of the day. I really disliked opera for a long time.

At the end of 1997, I was an unhappy teenager, who wanted to graduate from Lycee already but did not know what she wanted to study. Everybody was so sure I was going to pass the test and go to Turkey’s best university. They did not care what career I would get in, the school mattered to them. Dad told me that I could go and live with him in the US if I wanted to. I did not care for that so much. So I took the test, got into a writer’s block for 30 minutes, then did not finish the whole thing like I was supposed to and did not get into the best university. I got into third best school in the country, but for a shitty major I don’t even know why I had it marked, I did not even know what people who finished that degree did for a living—I must have been daydreaming while filling the forms I guess—It sucked. I never felt so bad in my life that day. I knew I did not do my best at the test but I had hope that I would enter into the shittiest major of the best school. And it did not happen. What a reason to be here, today, writing these lines. I am so thankful for not doing my best! Mom told me it did not matter what I did, I could shine shoes if that was my path, but I shall than be the best shoe shiner I could be.


I was listening to this band, Take That, whose only claim to fame was to re-start the boy band era and gave us Robbie Williams! She had a British boyfriend, who I adored as a person. He gave me the cd as a present for my birthday and the only song I liked was “Could this be Magic?”, and mom told me that it was a classic from the 70s, and that is why I loved it because I heard it before. Then we opened the boxes and listened a couple of those LPs together. Le Freak, Copacabana and of course Bee Gees. No shame on listening to them every once in a while in order to feel alive!( thanks to Leo I have been doing it in the luxury of my ipod these days!)

Later came my late adolescent years, first loves, first doubts about staying at the volleyball team, first vacations without her, etc. Dark and fun years at the same time. I would go out every weekend, dance until the break of the dawn with my friends, but I did not like to be taken as “fresh meat” so much. I tried to dress down and sometimes it was making me very sad, maybe because I wanted to be taken seriously as a person instead of a little girl. I listened a lot of Cure, Depeche Mode, Nirvana! She would not understand why I liked this music and would put something cheerful, and tried to dance with me as I if I was 5 years old again! She told me whatever was bothering me would be ok. Everything always happened as she told me they would.

After High school came the hardest time. My best friend left for the US. It hit me hard, as I was the one who stayed in Turkey, for being confused. I was supposedly going to school: I was not going to school full time, because I was hired as a writer/assistant editor for the Turkish edition of Cosmopolitan. I could not believe my luck! Even though the office was not fabulous, and my editor and co workers did not look like Helen Hurley and her team in NYC, and most of the time we were translating articles from the US edition into Turkish, only changing names, but at the end of the day I liked doing what I was doing. Especially when I actually wrote something! I hated the magazine when I started seeing that it did not matter to the editor or even to the lector what we did, as long as they bought what we sold. I never read Cosmopolitan or similar magazines with respect—Vogue and Elle are out of this because they don’t give women advice in life, they only give advice for clothes and they do a great job—I was shocked when I was assigned to write a piece about “how to make my men happy in bed”, me, a 19 year old virgin! They told me to make it up and/or look it up from other editions! Mom helped me a lot, telling me how things were! I kept having fun with my friends aside from working, but really I was burning with the guilt of not knowing what I needed to do.

That was the last year I listened to her music, and she mine. We went to visit the US together, she decided “a trip would heal” me and organized it. When we were coming back, I was convinced I was going to study the US, in a good school, instead of that shit back in Istanbul where the teacher’s were idiots, students did not care, it was a total joke! I could not insult my own intelligence and stay there, I told her that I, too, needed to go somewhere where I can learn new things. She looked so sad, but did not say a word. She asked me why I wanted that, and I gave her my reasons. She listened, questioned a couple of things and then said: ok, we shall prepare for you to leave by july!

Summer vacation! I did not get to go to the US in July like I should have. Mom told me to research the entry process and I did and realized that it was already too late for me to start university in September, I was going to lose a semester no matter what. So I went to Bodrum with my friends, spend my “last summer” shaking to awesome house music from Europe, drinking Sex on the Beach, skinny dipping when the sun rises after hours of dancing—without any drugs! It was an amazing vacation and I still listen to the songs from back then and feel that happiness and the summer’s heat.

The summer soon was over. She helped me pack, and told me if I did not like it, I shall come back without a shame. She did not show any emotions until the airport. I was crying, I was scared shitless of going to an unknown land where the only person I knew was my dad. I went through the passport check, crying, she was still holding up. As I turned one last time before walking to my gate, and I saw her from a distance, hugging granma while sobbing like a baby. Granma told me later that she felt sad when my brother left for US a year ago, but when I told her that I was going to leave, she really felt bad because I was like a friend to her, not only a daughter. I felt so proud that day.

We have been living apart for 10 years now. First years were difficult, we spoke every Friday for an hour though, it was our ritual to keep in touch. I did not care what time it was in the morning, I was happy to hear her voice and her love. Every summer I would visit them and sometimes she would make surprise visits to New York! We would go and see Saturday Night Fever, in Broadway! We would swap music each time, we believed that if we listened the same music maybe we would not feel so apart? I don’t know if she shares this with me: everytime I listen to a song that I remember from our times, I though of her, and visualize what she was doing when I heard the song! Sometimes I put the songs we would listen together when I miss her.

It has been a couple of years we are not communicating as promptly as we used to. That is very difficult for me because even though I am a big girl now, I get heart broken or sad, and I need her love and consolation and it is becoming harder and harder. This makes me stronger, and thought me a lot about myself, I even know she is doing it because she knows now it is time to do that! She is also different, she is less conventional now as she used to be when I was younger. She used to be more rigid, and I think I also taught her something: being less rigid about life! She still would not get stoned or get drunk but at least now she drinks until she gets a good buzz and dances with me! Even now, this past summer, we were home listening to the radio and we heard Phil Collins’s “you cant hurry love” and run towards each other and lipsang the song! She would sing that to me every time I was getting anxious with love or lovers!

Here in the Cupula I am all by myself, but I am closer to her than I could ever be if we lived together in a sense. Me loving plants, my knitting, my critical thinking, me going to the the market and hand pick fruits and vegetables, the music I listen, my being independent—as much as I can—me being me. I still hate ironing and cleaning though!

I know if she was here she would tell me what to do. And that would be probably, “do what your heart says." I know what my heart says but now that I am almost as logical as she is, and recently being hurt so much that I am scared. Maybe I even think I should not call him. Maybe this one last time I would do wrong for the best to happen to me in the future. Maybe it is the brasilian music I am listening thinking of mom and dad at Club Med in the late 70s and think to myself, “i want to call him because he is the only person i have ever met that makes me think he can do that with me," but I am not hundred percent sure if he wants to. What would mom tell me? “you can do whatever you think you can, darling!” Maria Callas in the background.

So I called; while listening to song by Paulinho Moska, a song that I have no idea what it says. It sounded to me like mom’s words.

We spend a great night together, listening to no music but each other's words. I am glad I did call, as my heart wanted--which is what mom would tell me anyways, to listen to my heart.

Since that night, I have been listening my heart and classical music, opera especially.

A beautiful Montevidean September!

There is nothing more beautiful than walking aimlessly on a wonderful spring day, here, there or anywhere. Luckily, unlike last year, the weather in Montevideo has been amazing this spring, so far, showing us incredibly sunny and warm days starting early September (think of it as early March if you live in the Northern Hemisphere).

Since last Tuesday—after a busy Monday at my old office, I realized that I work better in my time when there is noone around, rather than “do less work in more time all day long” habit that most offices create unintentionally I decided not to work one day a week during the week—I called the hot restaurant owner and he invited me to have lunch at Plaza Cagancha, in the Old City.

Unfortunately, there is not one really good restaurant there, I wished his little restaurant’s usual menu could be our oferta del dia (the daily special) but our only option was eating at La Passiva –this little restaurant is a Montevidean classic, famous for its chivito (a steak sandwich similar to any steak sandwich in the world but don’t say that to Uruguayans, you may offend them) and cold litre-beer on the side. Which self-employed bon vivant say no to this offer? I certainly could not resist!

I left the Cupula (my home-office, a.k.a lo de la turka—turkish girl’s crib—dressed in bermudas and my favorite black boots, with a t-shirt. Days like this are perfect to walk through Centro (where I live) towards the old town. It was around 11 in the morning, so strolling through the enormous Palacio Legislativo (it’s the parliament building, which is definetely out of proportion with the city’s size and country’s total population) listening to Shantel and Buconiva Orkestar who made it impossible for me not to dance a little bit while walking, knowing people might think I am a bit off because Montevideans in general are very quiet people, they don’t dance on the streets. Yet, I was so happy I can’t help moving. Spring in Montevideo gives me that feeling. Springtime anywhere gives me a natural high and a neverending smile, but this day was particularly nice.

The threes that decorate the plaza around the Palacio started to re-leaf slowly, sky was blue instead of grey, telling us those cold and humid winter days were over. People who worked in the parliament were sitting on the steps smoking, dringking mate and enjoying the heat. There were more people on the streets than a day ago! Even waking up earlier that day, with the sunlight hitting my face did not piss me off. I could even stay home all day—as I often do—and watch the day go by from the Cupula until the sun sets inside my little apartment leaving everything inside dark orange!

Walking from point A (my house) to B (anywhere) by means of my feet is something I look in the cities I pick to live. Every time I go back to Istanbul, I curse the big fire of 1920’s, which took our family house in the old city. Since then we have been living in our once-summer house on the Asian Side and unfortunately in that suburban area, one has to get into some kind of transportation in order to get to somewhere, walking is not an option! So boring.

Maybe one of the reason’s why I left Istanbul ten years ago was my urge to live in a walking city. Montevideo is a walking city, especially on nice days. Walking there can be very entertaining, and everybody walks. I turned my back on the parliament and climbed the Libertador Boulevard, a hefty walk up a 40 degree angle, thanking my earlier decision on wearing the boots with no heels.

When the Boulevard meet Galicia Street, ten blocks uphill, I looked back and remembered my first day there. It was the day Tabare Vazquez spoke to Uruguayans from the Dorian stairs of that huge building. March 1st 2005, the day I moved here, I was lucky enough to see a President taking power in front of the majority of its people. Probably half of Uruguay was packed in the streets that open to the plaza and to the Palace listening to their long-awaited President. Today he is about to sign a trade agreement with the US and told women of Uruguay that he would veto the law that will approve abortion if they bring it to discussion. Que cagada! (shit happens). It was such a nice day that I did not make a big deal, kept walking.

I reached 18 de Julio Avenue soon after and met with working Montevideans at their lunch hour. One may assume Montevideo is a small and quiet city but has a commercial zone that between the hours of 9 am to 5 pm you can spot some action. With the rest of the crowd I soon reached my destination, Plaza Matriz, the old town square of the city once surrounded by walls. Artisans took their places on the side walks circling the plaza where as the diagonal walk way inside the plaza were invaded by the antique sellers who are negotiating with –mostly—tourists who are amazed with the prices and oldness of the stuff they see in these tables covered with 20th century memorabilia—European and some contemporary American articles can be found here, and prices are amazingly cheap for foreigners.

As an antique junkie I wandered among them and saw a 1950’s egg beater that I was hoping to find for sometime now (another trait I created while living in South America, patience and not rushing into anything, not even home décor!) and there it was! The nice seller lady told me that it was $100 pesos (Uruguay). I am far from cashing big checks from the North but $4 dollars as I calculated the cost of the beater, was acceptable but I was eager to go meet my date, so I told her I will be back later.

I approached a table at La Passiva as four yuppies left and almost as I was jumping from the boat to the port in Istanbul I landed on it, leaving a group of people hanging there aimlessly behind! There was a lot of demand for a table under the burning southern cone sun.

Situated myself towards the sun like a tournesol and hoped my lunch date would not take forever to get here—30 minutes is considered fashionably late and almost everybody does it—because I was unfashionable early due to the fact that I could not calculate how long the walk would have taken from the Cupula to the Plaza without rushing and missing on sightseeing! I started reading the book that I got him from New York, an illustrated version of the Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, assuming he would treasure and enjoy it as much as I would have done. He has given me a couple of thoughtful gifts, right on the dot and I only hoped my gift would do the same effect (in retrospective giving books to a dislexic person was not a great idea!)

My slow waitress (usually all of them are because they don’t work for tips) came only once, 15 minutes into my sitting down, threw me a menu and left even before I tried to tell her that I was waiting for someone. It felt great waiting for someone because it was such a beautiful day I had to share it with someone else. And as a caballero he even send me a text message warning me of his delay. And he arrived soon after.

We caught the waitress's attention and ordered two chopps (half a liter of beer) , and he ordered a chivito for me, assuming that is what I would want. I like them but when one is eating chivito one is not as attractive as they rather be, so eating it became impossible after cutting little pieces with my fork and knife, and maybe because I was already full when it came given that we had three chopps I had to leave most of it on my plate. I was inspired by this montevidean who was so happy to be back to his hometown after years of living outside, and was filling me with information, its corkiest corners, I was moved. We only stopped talking for a moment when a young street kid came and asked for the left over chivito, which we happily packed and gave it to him.

Two long hours and some more chopps later I asked if he could take me to this famous Montevideo landmark, Café Brasilero, to get a shot of real espresso before doing some work at the rest of the day. He happily accepted and we walked two blocks south of the plaza and entered this cozy café inaugurated in 1877. Its coffee was not too good, or maybe we have not chosen wisely and greedily asked for a double which unfortunately these days of post-crisis means one shot of coffee plus water to make it double. He recognized our error and proposed grappa! The boy was getting me drunk before 4 pm. I never considered myself a cognac lover but I have to accept: last winter I drank grappa miel (grappa mixed with honey) while freezing my tootsies at home, and it worked! The hot owner of the restaurant said, he prefers grappa, straight up, and I wanted to try it too but they did not have it. I settled for the honeyed version, I don’t remember what he had, at that point we were both very buzzed, with everything.

As the sun lost its heat, announcing time to split up, we took a bus in front of Teatro Solis (Solis Theater), another splendid building—every time I pass by, I make up fantasies about secret illuminati gals meeting in one of its basement. The old bus floated on 18 de Julio all the way back to the Centro, where I left him, with butterflies in my stomach and a tiny kiss that warmed my lips and heart.

I have a feeling Montevideo part III is going to be a good one!


PS: Beginning my week with such Tuesday, was only followed by similarly fun events with other Montevideans.
-Wednesday: dinner with friends
-Thursday: dinner with friends—and outing in the city from Thursday night on!
-Friday: a well prepared report about Uruguay and US for the CNN
-Saturday morning:cruising our neighborhood’s fresh fruit and vegetable market
-Saturday afternoon:lunch (pork with apple sauce on the side, mmm yummy!)
-Saturday night: dinner then another dinner and a movie with friends
-Sunday: walking around the antique flea market with friends all morning, with my mate, lunch, and more city tour before coming home to write.

Montevideo Part III

After an incredibly long flight--I had to sit for 5 hours at the airport in CHile waiting for my connecting flight to Montevideo--I arrived safe and sound to sunny Montevideo, last friday. It was a bitch climbing up to my apartment with two overloaded bags, shlepped from half around the world. I dream of traveling light, with elegance: tiny little hand bag in my arm and matching luggage checked in! Maybe one day, when I dont have to bring so much with me anymore!--books and shoes, I can't live without them!

Anyways, after a quick clean-up and unpacking as much as I could, came first visitors to welcome me: Juana and Javier. She is huge, she almost did not fit into the princess outfit I got her last month for her bday! Chit chat and a drink with Javi, then came Titi home! Juana stayed with me that night, she did not want to leave with her dad! It was an experience to have a sleep over with a 5-year old! When she wrapped her arms around me, and fell asleep immediately I understood a little bit why people want to have kids! They are really cute, I can only imagine if she was mine she'd probably be even cuter!

Saturday morning, as planned we met with my friends at the Mercado! Mauro, Mauricio, Mercedes, Nico met with Titi and I, it was an amazing day outside, with sun and fun. Couple of bottles of Medio Medio and some asado (my first in 4 months!), as usual we did not stop (they did not stop actually because I could not drink not even half as much as I used to) until 8 pm, drinking beer in different bars. The last place we sat in the old city happened to be one of the branches of the restaurant where Juan told me he was working! Quiet bored of the drunken conversations, I called him up to see how he was doing.

We drove to Pocitos, the shishy neighborhood of Montevideo, and sat at Juan's new joint. Little bit of chit chat and a great cup of coffee later, I was ready to go home and crash, and sleep for a long time! It took me a while to convince them to leave but finally I was driven home, and slept till noon next day. I must have been really really tired.

Sunday was another great day in Montevideo. We did not make it to Tristan Narvaja flea market as I hoped to but instead walked all around the city and watched the sunset at la Rambla, had churros, almost made the line for the amusement park together with the rest of the montevideans who were celebrating the first days of the spring after--what I was told--horribly cold days of July and August! I only hope the heat won't go down again because sleeping alone in the Cupula without proper heating won't be too much fun, would it?

As the people started to leave beautiful Rambla and the absence of the sun was making a difference in our bones, we also head home, had a quick dinner and get ready for my first day at work as the Latin America correspondant of CNN Turk!

Even if I dont want to admit: I am in a NY State of Mind

It is hard to believe that it has been almost 2 years since my last visit to NYC, my then-"if you have a great apt-good friends-and-a-real cool-job" favorite city in the world. NYC rarely dissapoints her visitors. I left NY because I wanted see things that I may not have time-energy-opportunity to see if I settled once in NY. Unfortunately my plan of going back there very very soon, just completed her 4th anniversary (it was today 4 years ago that I left NY, telling my friends that I will be back in 6 moths!).

While living in Havana, I have visited NY for a couple of times, mostly to see my friends I was missing a lot or to pick up something from Christine to whom I left almost everything I owned back then--tv, dishes, house furnishings, etc.-- and I was so happy and was in love that I did not feel like I was missing out on anything by not being there. So much that I did not even see Big Apple for 2 years! When I came back to the States, I stayed with my brother in Miami--the city that I don't feel bad about doing absolutely anything! A visit to Jewish recycling center--and other great trift stores-- and Target; beach until I get that reddish bronze (ok sometimes just red, I admit that i have been sunburnt more than one time in my life) tan, hang out with Chanti and my brother Feyzi--and Chantis brother Ray-- recently though, since my last trip to MIA--, take yoga classes and eat well. I mean a real vacation. In NY, I never have time for any of that. Time goes so fast in NY, at least for me, I don't know where time goes really. Three hours go by as if an hour. Awesome!

My last two visits have been for a week each, one in summer and the other one in winter. The summer one was exactly a year after I left NY. All my friends were waiting for me to find out who was this amazing guy that I decided to finish the Master's program there instead of from NY as I told them before leaving. Of course my reasons were deeper than that, yet I hate to admit this but I, then, believed I met the man of my life, the one that I deserved after all these years of dating emotionally unavailable & immature, etc --yet they are great guys, as friends--. Jenry was in control of his life and within the very firts weeks in our relationship he was calling me, Hevita,--my girl!! after the first month living adjacent to my padrino, Orhan, but in my private suite, he had a fight with him--actually I was having a loud chat with Orhan, Jenry got himselved involved: I almost drooled when I see him getting mad at my uncle for screaming at me and telling me to pick up my stuff and that we were leaving this place immediately and that HE Would take care of everything! You have no idea how sexy and comforting those words to a girl who had to take care of herself all by herself up until that point!

And yes, I stayed in Havana longer than what I promised my friends because I was happy there. I loved the fact that I was in a Masters program with 7 other people, with Phds teaching. It was a great opportunity then,a hands on latin american reserach opportunity, learning spanish and learing about cuba! I met Evo Morales when he was just an indegenous leader, saw Fidel Castro speak to a milion people, participated in conferences and events where I met some of the smartest and most knowledgable social scientists in the region. I thought that was it," I am gonna stay and maybe be away from my loved ones for a while but, I gotta do this." And I had a scholarship and time to write and have a house--not a tiny studio like what i rented in East Village--garden, plants, very bohemian countrysideish--. I only wore flip flops back than.

I wish I could dwell on longer about those 2.5 years in Havana! A roller coastal! The worst day of your life can be followed by the funniest moment of the century-it was perfect: I learned so much, and boy, things happened! I discovered that I am even stronger that I thought I was (I know sounds arrogant but I am, I prooved myself, I overcame so many fears and desires) and at the same time, actually I had a heart and could love something non-selfishly. I think Havana made me a better person in many ways and I am grateful to her for this.

One of the saddests moments of the last couple of years (the saddest was when I found out that mom was sick) was when I learned that W was elected again and I knew he was not gonna change his cuba policy and I was not gonna be able to stay and work with a university teaching about cuba to students, living in Havana for six months and living in NY for the other six. While writing my books! Great hubby-great house-great job in progress- What else can I wanted? Nothing and I lost it, just like that.

So what did I do, I accepted a job in Uruguay, instead of going back to NY. A good friend, an Uruguayan, called me and asked me to work with them at a radio station, internationally transmitted, free and uncensored. Awesome job!!!! Independent journalism! And dbf could live there because they spoke spanish (you would think, after being with me for 3 years, he could never live without me and he loved me so much and he did openly say that he would do anything to get a permit and leave and live somewhere other than cuba for a while until I find something to do there) and it was a small country where he would feel like fish out of water and freak out on me. I waited for him for 4 months. He broke up with me over the MSN. 6 months after that he got married, to whom I have no idea.

I dont want this to sound like a regret entry. It is not. What does all got to do with New York? Isn't this the blog where the reader discovers the city as the writer discoveres it for herself? Sometime gofy and sometimes fabolous! Recently she even went through a short depression period--I love being selfish and narcissitic: I never blame myself and can easily getrid of depression caused by ??? This time I was mature enough to see my own mistakes. Not fun!

I am glad I did live outside of NY as much as I did; I can appreciate her but at the same time I can see her flows. I used to think that NYC was perfect. And I dont feel like I had to have all that (great apt-good friends-and-a-real cool-job-awesome boyfriend) in order to live there, well. I felt like NY was overrated this time. Brooklyn looked like Miami beach, construction everywhere. Meat Packing district, I was actually disturbed, I thought I was at Disneyworld, NYC! Things looked too movie like--much more fake tits, this time women got them. East village and Williamsburg Hipsters looked like losers to me who had way too much time in their hands and they used it to look the part! Food, was great but with all these ingredients, hey, anyone can cook something eadible! Better man? hmm, I think overall NY has the most cute guy-and girl--per capita! I love walking around that city and people watching. even though I think some are very superficial but there are many people in NY they are a certain way because they feel like it. Trendsetters: if they dont already live in NY, they visit, at least once a year.
Design and decoration. 10 points. Infrastructre: Subway! Living arrangements: they sucked back then and certainly suck even more now! $1200 per square feet in FLatbush? Crazyyy. My old description of the city has officially changed to: the best place to live if you have a great job and a rent-controlled flat in Manhattan!

These lines explain my first two weeks back in the city. Third week I started seeing people I knew, they recognized me--even though noone likes to accept this in NY but we all like to be recognized in the city where 3 million people live--and many were happy that I was sort of, back, or considering. When I mentioned I was gonna go to Miami, they were kind of sad yet they seemed like they knew I was not going to--unless I had an amazing job at least.

Right now I am in Miami, I exiled myself from inifinity of social activities in NYC. I cant work there as a free-lance writer, I am not that self diciplined! So, here I am, in South Florida, it's summertime. It is raining and Chantal and Feyzi are both at work. I am working (I decided to finish one project at a time) on the Buenos aires guide book. Be done in a week. Then? Cross my fingers for this new job oportunity.


*This billboard is actually a Court TV ad. Their adds are better than their programming for sure.

From Istanbul with?

I have not written a word since may! I am not doing my work either, it seems like I am going through a long*ass writer's block or I am just not inspired to do anything at the moment. I am kind a confused about what I want to do next and so many things have changed in my life that I could not control; all that unables me to move forward.

Life definetely does not go easy on me right now.

Yet there has been some actividades, which I enjoyed a lot: hanging out with my friends and family, barbecue parties at Alper's terazza, jazz fest and working with Gilberto Gil (that rocked), watching Yerba Buena live at Babylon, hanging out with Akasya and other Turkish 30-something stars, my book party, my 10 HS graduation anniversary, other house parties, cruising with Elcin and Melih in Marmara Sea, and last weekend's trip to Buyukada (the biggest of the Prince Islands)! Even when I realized that I had bird caca in my hair, I did not regret doing that trip!

Summer of the Doors

Since I came to Miami, 90% of the time I found myself listening to the Doors! It is surreal! I mean my brother is going through his "the Doors" stage and all but they are also all around me (like tonight, we were watching Bertollucci's movie Dreamers, and what do I hear, again! the Doors!), I hear them all the time (I have to admit it is sort of like my subconcious is picking it up more, because it is aware of its existence.

Anyways. Unanimously we (we: the jury: chanti, feyzi and I) decided that this summer's hit (last summer as you remember around this time I was only listening to Track 9 of the Bersuit CD, called Hijos de Culo) is definetly have to be a Doors song! To me, it could have been "She lives on Love Street" but it is not. Not this summer at least. So it is "People are Strange". I think this song perfectly reflects the most this summer's state of mind.

PS: Later that week we also chose a FUn song, Bob Sinclair's "Love generation". Who says we can only have one song every summer?

Welcome to Miami!

Will Smith's legendry song --a slightly different version of it--sums up my time in the New World:

"Here I am in the place where I come let go
Miami the base and the sunset glow
Everyday like a mardi gras, everybody party all day
No work, all play, okay
So we sip a little something, lay to rest the spill
Me and Chanti at the yoga center or in a bar
Nothin less than ill, when we dress to kill
Everytime the hoties pass, they be like (hi there)
Can y'all feel me, all ages and races
Real sweet faces
Every different nation, Spanish, Hatian, Indian, Jamaican
Black, White, Cuban, and Asian
I only came for two days of playing
But everytime I come I always wind up staying
This the type of town I could spend a few days in
Miami the city that keeps the roof blazing"


PS: Chanti, Feyzi and I went to this cool event at the Sagamore Hotel. Aside from the horrid woman who we think is a super star at the WWF's female league, beautiful people were everywhere, including Ingrid Casares (the 90's Miami-it Girl, also Madonna's girlfriend, and the owner of legandry Liquid club before it was closed) who looked even better than she looked those days, telling us that doing drugs and having a messed up lifestyle does not really ruin you, if you can afford the best of it! JK..

Last Days, Decisions, Travels to North

These last days in Buenos Aires have been amazing. Maybe starting from last week on I should say because I felt like I was finally feeling like a part of the city for the first time, after many visits, long ones and short ones.

As my week usually starts on Saturday so that is where I rather start telling my story. After a long night out with Orhan—Friday we dined, and then bar hopped until five am, and I did not even had a sip of alcohol, I am very determined this time to keep my diet healthy as it can be—I woke up around noon, showered and fixed us breakfast before leaving for an afternoon trip to Palermo Viejo with a historian, accompanied with other argentines who are interested in knowing their city better.

The tour lasted about two hours, from Plaza Italia to Plaza Serrano (in my next book you some of you will get to read the dirty secrets of Buenos Aires, so I spare you from redundancy by not telling you right now what they are. I know I am mean!). I had a cup of coffee all by myself at a cute bookstore, where I found a book about Buenos Aires that I was looking for a while now then shlep my tired self home to Boedo.

Boedo is one of the oldest neighborhoods of Buenos Aires and has a corky charm which comes from mom and pop stores instead of chains and olderly residents mixed with students who are moving to this ‘hood because of its cheap rents and convenient location. It is 6 subway stops from San Telmo and a $5 cab ride away from hip Palermo SoHo, yet it is a neighborhood that is not all touristy or degenerated. It has a long history of Tango, many important tangos were composed in bars of Boedo and the original lyrics pay many tributes to the neighborhood.

During my first visit to Buenos Aires two years ago, my granma’s friends who have been living in Baires for the last 30 years took us out to a live tango show in the corner of Boedo and San Juan avenues, know as the Homero Manzi corner, named after this important musician/composer. I pass by tourist groups who were waiting to get in to see that “show” later that afternoon, as I got out of subway and entered Corina’s cozy apartment accross the street.

I spend most of my time between taking pictures, notes, making maps, writing as well as redundant things like going to the gym, cooking, hanging out with friends, having mates,; and it started to feel real the first time, my presence I mean.

28 days passed so quickly, in retrospect, making me want to live there for a longer period of time, yet confusing me at the same time. I question my desire to live there. If I live in a big city, isn't it better to live in a big city that I already know? Where I have friends and family? I will think about what I am going to do next while travelling, first to Montevideo, from there to Miami and finally in Istanbul. Those who think I am having a blast travelling, please dont fool yourself. I am really sick of it, and in deep need of establishment.

I realized how much I wanted that when I came home to Montevideo, when I slept in my own bed, when I knew exactly where everything was and once again I appreciated how special living in a cupula meant. there is one thing that is certain, I will never let that place go, I hope Titi will never kick me out or sell that place to another person! We had a great party, for el Guate's birthday (second from left) my last night, for this season, in the cupula.



I was really sad leaving the cupula on wednesday....after a ten hour trip I was in my brother's arms, in his ACd cute apartment by the ocean, taking a cat nap with his cat Jasmin before going to the ocean and taking a dip. My sorrow faded a little bit i have to admit, but a piece of me is definetely is dying to go back to my cupula-- of course as soon as it is hot again in Uruguay!

Champagne and Pizza vs. Whisky and Cig Kofte!

It was two weeks ago me and Gunes had a nice morning walk in the Eco Reserva, and later when we were almost starving went to Sr. Telmo, a famous pizza place in San Telmo. He told me about the famous porteño saying "Hope that we can go back to those pizza and champagne days!" I was like that is disgusting who would want such a nauseating combination, and denied ordering champagne (it is by the way cheap and almost every restaurant offers it in Buenos Aires) and stick to wine.

Curious as I am, I started to ask around where this insolite tradition came from. I found out that it is nothing more than a "trend" which started with Menem, their famously corrupt President, also known as El Turco, annonced that he ate pizza with Champagne! So all the nouveau riche tag along, as they did with Wisky and kibbe in Turkey around the same time. As neoliberalist and corrupt government started to rule our third world countries, they also created a class of people that I personally cannot stand, and these abnoxious and disgusting fusions into our daily lives.

The champagne is still on the menu of most pizzarias in Buenos Aires, but less people order it, seems to me! Thank god for that!

Buenos Aires Again

It has been a week. I am in Buenos Aires and I realized that have not written a word about it. I have been so un-inspired, it is not even funny.

Let's see what happened since then:

April 4th, 12 pm: Corina's massagist Susana gave me an hour and a half long massage, an ayurvedic one:unfuckingbeleievable. She cured me from tip to toe, literally. I recommend it to all of you, it not only relaxes your muscles, it relaxes your (my) thought-infected mind as well.

10 pm: Dinner with friends at Rodney Bar. Rodney is a hole in the wall bar in a neighborhood called Chacaritas, famous for its huge cemetary as far as I know. I discovered this place back in march, the photographer Javier introduced us to this weird place one night. It is in front of the cemetary--you don't see the tumbs, there is a huge wall that seperates us from the dead people. It was a fun dinner.

I worked on discovering Buenos Aires pretty much the whole day on wednesday and that night, Orhan Abi, Pablo (a friend we met in Pedrera, who owns a cool bar in Las Canitas) and I went to a speak easy in Palermo. Speak easy s are big in Baires, as was this one, nominated as the "Best Bar" by their version of New York Magazine that week. We took a cab and got out in front of a house, number 878 on Thames street. It is a colonial house from the outside, we rang the bell and someone opened it, and voila! An incredibly cool bar! We sat at the bar, and ordered drinks, I asked for the Black Saketini (made with sake, black vodka, cucumber juice and tabasco sauce), it was somehing. Then we ordered food, but I was not impressed with anything. It was the best bar afterwards, not the best restaurant. It reminded me of Casa Antonio, though it lacked the coolness and the delicious food of their cozy restaurant. The backdrop of the 878, which made all three of us very curious was: where were the cool people who should have crowded this place? I quote Pablo on why there were so many ugly people at the bar that night: "I think they come to hide here!" he said, we almost fell off our chairs and left 878 soon after that comment.

Thursday we rested.

Friday was the last part of my birthday celebrations, a party was organized by Pablo, Anita and Orhan for both me and Orhan. Needless to say we had an amazing time, many people came, some old friends and many new ones were made. We partied until 6 am, I slept on Orhan's couch, so saturday started late for both of us.

We made brunch with bacon and fried eggs, later in the afternoon and went to see Spike Lee's latest movie, the Inside Man. It was really good. We thought of eating turkish food at the Armenian restauran Sarkis later that night, but there was a huge line outside, we left that for another night, went to our homes and slept.

I met with Gunes, my other turkish friend who lives here on Sunday, and had a wonderful Sunday walk in the Ecoreserva park in front of Puerto Madero, the Battery Park of Buenos Aires. We walked under the warm sun for hours, then walk to San Telmo, and luckily found a place to eat there--the best pizza I had so far-- among all the tourist who crowded this cozy neighborhood as they do every Sunday.

I have been working on discovering the city again since Monday, in a more local way, starting from going to a gym, then taking the city buses (the public transportation system is ample but confusing if you don't have a Guia T and know how to read it), a lot of walking. Titi's arrival made Tuesday a blast, as we walked for 8 hours, window shopping in Palermo SoHo!

Leaving is not easy

After missing all possible cheap options that could take me to Buenos Aires—it was my actual birthday and I had a perfect day—I am in the direct boat, comfy, not miserable and sleepy, and hoping that the massage therapist Cori suggested is available this afternoon (supposedly she massages you according to your meridians and fixing your inner problems as well as tight muscles) !

After Juan left (I invited him to have tea and bizcochos at my place and we had a nice and long conversation, I really enjoy his company and I hope he reciprocates) and I finished absolutely everything I needed to do before leaving Montevideo, except buying a ticket, Mauro came to visit me and brought me a super nice mate, with a quote from Benedetti on it, then Titi came, with a bottle of French wine, I made Peter Gordon style dolmas with ricotta filling (not because I am oh-so-sophisticated, that was the only thing I had home!, and I served those with the chutney I bought in San Francisco last time I was there. Result was a total success) and she started singing Happy Birthday to me exactly at 12! I love her, she is so cute and really knows how to make others happy.

Back in Cupula, after way too much wine and chats, I went to bed at 2 , and put the alarm for 4:45 to take the semi-miserable ride to Baires with a bus that leaves Montevideo at 6 am, then transfer to a boat in Colonia around 8 am; I barely opened my eyes and said: “it is your birthday, you deserve the most civilized ride today!” went back to sleep, hours later woke up, had coffee with one of my neighbors, Justine, Guate’s girlfriend, before saying goodbye to my house and cabbed my fabulous self to Buquebus station down at the port.

It is a grey morning in Montevideo, my grey city, and as its “ciudadana ilustre” I feel saudade leaving her, especially now, I was just starting to have fun here.

Dear Mom;

we are approaching the very hours you haven given birth to me, and your little Aslancik is going to turn 29. Only a year to the big-3 ! I hope you are happy with how i lived it so far if I deserved being given light to, I sure try to use my time here as well as I can do.

I am also about to take a trip, a short one this time at least distance wise, to Buenos Aires and as Juan put it today, I will also enter the "5th stage" of my life. The last four, in retrospective have been great. This time I am a bit scared tough, this is the first time I am entering alone--and without any concreted projects, without even being sure I want to do it.

Anyways, let me tell you how the festivities are going so far!

I had a very cool saturday: which started with coffee at the cupula with cori, getting our nails done, a long and happy lunch at the mercado de puerto--ali abi filmed it we will edit a bit then show you! we came back to cupula took a short nap, say good-bye to ali abi, drank mate, woke up and left for Herb´s house, to prepare the super party (we: cori, javier´s friend surfer lorena who came from punta del este, alicia my friend who works at a publishing house). While me and cori re-decorated-shopped-and I even baked a cake which is a story to tell you in person for you to ask me how come i did not have a nervous breakdown-, lore and alicia left with alicia´s beagle for pinar to bring me juana and javi´s music equipment for the party.

I had planed on going shopping and buying me this awesome dress by an argentinean designer but with all the corre-corre I ran out of time, but thank god it was hot enough to ware my furstenberg dress--over my jeans, yes, just like "a doorman´s wife--with snake skin stillettoes, no time for make up, ding dong, first guests arrive!

I had invited all my friends in this town: titi of course and her brother and her best friend who lives in paris, alicia and the chicks from the gym, Juana and her father, mauro-mechi-mauricio-Mattiolis and the DJ Irish from the radio team, Eldin the carpinter, Alex and George, my neighbors from the cupula, friends from Pedrera. Plus other good friends and everybody´s significant others.

Slowly but surely around 23:30 almost everyone was there. We had made sangria and ice tea, pizzas that my neighbor guate did, some dips and chips, and the cake! DJs irish and davich were in charge of the music and we were dancing, chatting, and opening the door mostly. I was nervous, all night long I thought something was going to go wrong ---and it did, my phone got stolen--and as I decided I was not going to be drunk in my birthday party, I did not even had a glass of sangria, I was totally aware of everything (mid-day drunkeness was way gone by that time)




It was great untill later, people had a good time I think, my invitee´s arrival made me super happy, I got great presents, and most of all I realized that they all liked me and are going to miss me when I am not around, as much as I am going to miss them and that is a great feeling.

The deal with the phone is very weird and I still cannot imagine who is "low enough to rob the birthday girl?" I have sime ideas but no proof, and 48 hours later I dont care. I already cursed the individual in all the languages I can speak!

Sunday we walked in the antique fair and found a great tile for my collection! Then had lunch with corina at some sort of yacht club. I left corina with mauro and cabbed javier´s equipment to his house in pinar, got there, said hi, and thought would offer me to have mate with him or something, instead, he told me that he was with someone! I was like, I quote "even that dork is able to find someone to be with, and it is my birthday and after cleaning and all, losing my phone, being sad for leaving, etc i dont have anyone even to take me back home!" I was mad/sad, I am not sure. I took my last trip in a bus from pinar crying, which up until that point, I was being so good, I held my tears when I blow the candles at my party, when i could not find my phone, when you called me sunday morning, but that goodbye was too cold to bare. (ok fine, you were right, he does not have any common courtesy or education)

I love crying though, makes me feel so much better, and I used the opportunity and cried for everything that made me sad...for 56 minutes exactly! When I got out of the bus, I felt better, but in the cab when I saw my cupula I shed a couple more for her. Mauro and Cori came quickly and I was much better, chatting with them, cooking whatever I had home, listening to bossanova. Cori left with the buque of 1 am, I slept.

I woke up to a great first unemployed day! It is a new feeling, it does not feel like you are vacationing because you know you are not, but you dont really have to do anything either and feels empty, yet attractive. I thought of catching some sun and reading, but I felt guilty for being abnoxioustly bon-vivant and prepared my suitcase, cleaned up a bit and left to say goodbye to last group, buying something for orhan, etc. I did all that, and called Juan as he told me while leaving my party that we should see each other before I go.

We met later when I finished all my arrands, and ready to relax. I walked to his house, picked him up (literally ;) ) and we went to cupula so that he would see a great sunset from there. I like talking to him, because he is very wise and i really want to know him better (which I hope to get to soon)because he also has a very interesting life. Over greentea we talked for, I dont know how much time, looked at pictures, listen to music, talked more, then his alarm sounded--I felt as I was in therapy, "time is up lady, gotta go!"-- and he left. He had to go and babysit. The sunset was horrible too, non existant.

I did not check email all day and had to write to you so here I am, in my ´hoods ciber cafe. Before I started my letter, I was not sure, I was considering whether or not I want to leave tonight or tomorrow. I decided. I am leaving tonight, it is stupid to pull the bandaid slowly!

The festivities will continue in Buenos Aires as planned. Tomorrow night dinner with Orhan abi, and coricim. Wedneday: a short rest, maybe! Thursday work work work. Friday is the big party he is planing already for both of us! Will write you more on friday!

All i wanted to tell you really was to thank you for this great first 4 stages of my life. I hope you enjoyed the show as much as I did, and are ready for a fantastic fifth one! Seni cok cok cok seviyorum.


opucuks,


asli

PS: Surprise: Jenry wrote me for my birthday?
PS 2: That chocolate cake on the picture was made by me with cacoa from your favorite store--Ghirardelli's--, all from scratch, against all the odds--making it was a mess and my friend Fernanda sat on it minutes before we served it to everybody! it was so funny!

End of an Era

I started to dislike “sex and the city.” Yes, I admit it, I watched all the episodes, probably a couple of times already and I decided that it does not entertain me as much as depressing me.

The show not only makes me depressed when I see that three 30-something women—plus one that pushes fifty—still dress and act as if they were 20, and despite being smart and educated professionals, the only goal of their lives seem to get married to a “Mr. Big.” And unfortunately they are the female role models of our generation!

I used to love watching the show, I was living in Havana then, in a super sane relationship with a great guy, and boring Havana nights were brightened with couple of episodes of SATC in our bedroom, projected to our 18 feet tall walls. To me the show meant a lot, not for its content but what it made me remember: watching it every Sunday night with my girl friends in New York City, thinking—all of us—hope we won’t end up like these women!

I left Havana, where the concept of Sex and the city existed in a different way, people had (are having) sex all the time in Havana and do not make a big deal with whom, or where, or why. People cheat, fall in love, break up, but there are no complications. Cuban do not complicate their personal lives, but they are quiet dramatic! (you have to live there to understand that). And the idea of finding a Mr. Big only means one thing in Cuba, and that is not necessarily a rich/have it all/stud.

Life outside Havana, i.e Istanbul, New York, or like right now South Cone (Buenos Aires/Montevideo) changed since I left 4 years ago. I meet people, women mostly, and I recognize the talk, the attitude, the clothes. Almost all of them want to be Carries, or Charlottes…few Samanthas--of course now I meet more people who are married, with kids, or about to go that way comparing to 4 years ago-- Living their lives to be appreciated, physically, by men, receiving a diamond, accepting the “happily ever after”—as Orhan puts it.

Women, almost kill each other –and themselves—to be “loved.” They sacrifice everyday for a good fuck, or a perfect boyfriend, sometimes it does not matter. They sweat at gyms, get waxed, spend thousands of dollars in outfits, move around, cook, give birth, etc. all for men it seems, there are not a lot of us who do all that stuff just to be happy by ourselves.

Is it SATC’s fault to put it in our faces? No, for the skeptics at least, the show tell us the truth. If you are pretty enough, and know to finish a sentence, you are going to end up with a “Mr. Big” who sooner or later will enter your life and sweep your feet off the ground—and therefore we have to be ready for that moment, and try our best to be chosen as soon as possible, preferably before we hit 35.

Why there are not any tv shows that has a protogonist who is an unmarried/divorced 40 something professional woman, who is surrounded by younger/older men who do anything to be acknowledged by her? Maybe if we had these tv shows, the world would be a totally different place, as we all know that most of the children learn from tv not their families or schools.

I am fed up with going out with a mediocre jerk, listening to his stupid stories, or going out and being introduced to someone who could be “perfect” for me to be honest with you. I am also fed up with listening or telling stories about men, boyfriends, husbands, lovers, everytime there is a group of us (girls) doing something. (this is going to sound way to reactionary but why can’t we talk about global warming? A subject that is much more important than our vaginas. We can also talk about the pharmaceutical companies and how they control our health, the street kids in our corner (did we every pay them as much attention as how our asses look in jeans? I seriously doubt it).

I don’t want to be introduced to anymore overly arrogant dorks, or self-conscious geniuses, emotionally paralyzed hysterics, coming-out-of-age-mommy’s-little-latin-boys, sexually confused middle class kids!

I don’t want to give or be given advice either about how I should treat men so that they stick around, how skinny I should be so that they think I am beautiful, not talk too much so that they don’t feel “threatened by my intelligence” (I love this one)! I cannot stand this double standard, after so much that we have to endure, we also have to make sure they feel comfortable, instead of them learning how to have bigger balls, and take life as the was we do.

Maybe these perfect men do not exist because we do not demand as much as we should. Something to think about!

Almost time to leave....Saudade Sinks in

Since my life came back to its normal (i.e. no more parties, trips to the beach and/or Brazil, friends from other parts of the world) and redundant state once again, even though it is not preferable for a long time, I have to say it makes me feel more as one of the rest than when I am distracted with great priveleges of being a foreigner.

What is really sad is that I am divided in half, one part said it is time to move on, leave your not-so-great job, this not-so-great city; the other part keeps confronting with realities: I got used to this place, I have great friends, I know its streets, its culture, its traditions, even a little bit of its slang. When I mentioned to my friends that I was going to leave, they seemed sincerely sad! So did I.

I am also a bit tired of this life style already. It was a lot of fun at the begining, and maybe I was younger than, had more energy to move around, air travel, shlepping my belongings from one end of the world to the other. Not anymore. That is why I decided to keep my one and only place, my cupula, intact, until I settle somewhere else, for good (and if that day does not come for some reason, cupula can always be my base, especially in summer time!)

This morning I woke up, made expresso, watered my plants and washed my face meanwhile, got dressed, listened to samba to wake-up (loud), clean up the living room, left what I need to do tonight on my kitchen table, took the trash out, as I was walking out the door I saw my newspaper (Damian's daily newspaper, La Diaria, came out yesterday) waiting for me! Picked it up, got in a bus, read my paper while in it, got out, stop by at my Almacen (grocery store around the corner from my office) where I bought fresh plums, chit chat with the guys who work there....I am going to miss that so much... I am going to miss my friends at the gym, my cosmotologist Marlene, the women at the Eco Tienda, the staff at the laundromat, needless to say Titi, Mauro, Daniel, Fernanda, Lorena, Mattiolis, my collegueges, my neighbors....

I don't want this place to dissapear and become a memoir, I don't want it to be far from me basically.

*I took this picture recently during one of those incredible sunsets that leaves my apartment orange...the cute baby is me with my annemo when I was 1 year old!

Buenos Aires after Rio...with a French twist (a bitter one)

I have not written about what we have done in Buenos Aires with Peggy, Ali and Orhan Abi.
The funniest part of those days was definetely staying in Boedo, in a "boutique hotel" owned by a bitchy french guy, Thibaud, who happened to have a baby while we were there and the hotel stayed without a boss, which caused many misunderstandings. He was a total asshole but we being very demanding did not help either, I admit it. We acted as the hotel was our house (for the price he charged, cold croissants and bad coffee was unacceptable) and he did not like that so much.

We did all the tourist things, and because I have written about them before I am not going to mentioned those. Cori took us to a Milonga one night, and Peggy found a whole in the wall parillada in San Telmo (the food was awesome), Ali spend hours at the cd and dvd stores, and Orhan enjoyed being in a big city after being in la Pedrera for months! I went out with him to Van Koening, Pablo's beer bar and had a lot of beer, his own called OtroMundo!

Aside from discovering the new stuff in Palermo, strolling in San Telmo, eating good food; there were also instances that these roadtrippers had to survive, such as airlines being in greve, different point of views about what is the best way of doing things, how to get to where,etc. We did not kill or hurt each other though, we survived!

Viva Corcovado!

As my annemo (granma) told me before I left for Rio, I visited the super-toursity attraction of this beautiful town, el Corcovado, a.k.a. the biggest jesus statue in the world. And as you see from the picture, it is quite big and powerful.

I don't particularly like places with a lot of tourists, but hung out there for an hour or so, watching the sunset, and later the beautiful Rio to lighten up for the night. (The strong lights you see on the right side of the photo is Sambodromo)

Later that night we went to eat at Ali Abi's favorite restaurant, la Churrascaria, a brazilian grill where they serve you all you can eat meat and salad for a mere $20 US! I was stuffed with sushi even before the meat arrived, and believe me, it was hard to swallow after the third round of charcoal grilled prime beef, and all sorts of other delicious specialties of the house. Ali insisted that we share the chocolate souffle at the end of our dinner, thank god I went out dancing afterwards, and did not stop until the early hours of the morning, in order to digest all that food!

Day after Sambodromo!

Here is me with my "fantasia" (costume). When I arrived in my hotel around 8 am, instead of sleeping, I decided that I should just go on with my day, and take a long nap later during the day.

After breakfast, Ali Abi and I left our hotel and toured the Central part of town, then we decided to visit one of the coolest neighborhoods in Rio called, Santa Tereza.

Santa Tereza was built at the end of the 19th century, when Rio was struck with Yellow Fever. The rich left the old city and built a new neighborhood on the hills, which later lost its glamour. Now it is an artsy neighborhood, with beautiful veiws and very nice old buildings.

Live from Sambodromo

Sambodromo was definitely the highlight of my trip. I did not take my camera with me to this amazing event—even the cariocas scared me talking about thieves all the time—but everything is in my memory and will stay there until I die. I have not been to Olympic games ever but I imagine this was if not better, similar to the size and grandeur of it.

I met up with Stephen’s friend Ricardo again at the Batafago Bar in Ipanema, he was there with his cousin and some other friends. It was around 1 am, we left the bar and “pegamos” a bus to the center of town where the famous Sambodromo is located. Sambodromo is a 2 km long street, with tribunes and many entrances. Ticket prices differ from $200 US to 10 reales (approx $20 dolars), or even free (there is a popular tribune where people line up to get there super early and I don’t recommend it just because it is actually outside sambodromo, not inside, where schools line up before parading). Usually cheapest ticket options are sold months in advance and the free seats fill in the early hours of the day before the show.

The official parade of the Samba schools, there are 13 or 14 of them is divided in two. Sunday and Monday night, depending on their general ratings from previous years line up, seven schools the first night, and other seven the second night. Most samba schools if not all are located in favelas—shanty towns of Rio all around its periphery. Any individual can go and take classes, or join the parade by buying the costume from the school and meeting them hours before the parade, (at the concentraçao) where they are given basic instructions by the Apoai (group leaders). Each school has a theme and have up to 10 Alas (ailes), and 5 carts which reflect this theme. The participation price to the parade depend on what ala you want to be—or can be—and school. You may have to go to Rio a couple of days before or find an agency on the internet that would love to arrange it all for you for a wholesome price. Before entering Sambodromo I thought it was an overrated tourist trap to pay so much money to walk in the parade as if you were a real dancer, but now that I saw what it is, and how much passion and joy it brings to the participant, as well as the school’s regulars, it is definitely something I would do when I go back. I also recommend a good read, a book called Samba by Alma Guillermoprieto, a great writer who wrote about her one year learning samba in one of these schools.

Anyways, we got out of the bus, around the famous Central Station (the famous Walter Salles movie). Almost 10 block-radius around the stadium was already closed to traffic and there was an immense street party going on all around it. Aside from bars who had tables and chairs, there were people selling cheaper drinks, food, and weird Walking towards the ticket office, a dancer from one of the schools (which I am yet to find what is called), who had an amazing costume and a hat, when saw me looking with admiration to his outfit, said I could have his hat if I wanted to, so within the first 15mins I was there, I had a wonderful original costume! I put it on and started dancing immediatlely!

As we approached one of the 13 entrances to Suipacha (the name of the Sambodromo) ticket re-sellers approached us. They started off with 50 reales, but we managed to take their price down to 20, me being turk helped, I have to say, not only for my bargaining skills but also the seller and I got into futball talk, Tafarel, etc then we were friends, and also he said he was amazed with my eyes and that Sambodromo deserved such a "beleza" during carnival!

We got tickets for section 6, which was, of course, all the way other side of this outrageously big stadium. Started walking towards our entrance, half lost, some guy who spoke spanish perefectly told us to follow him, he was a guide working for a samba school, The famous Mangueira. I dont remember his name but we talked all the way, he was the son of a "turkish" family and he was very nice and invited me to go to his samba school next year and do the parade, which I decided I will do it, hopefully, no matter what!

We bought some beers, and walk up to the tribune, and after that, we partied until the early hours of the morning, dancing, watching the parade, drinking, talking with strangers. There were no fights, no disrespect, no crime. PLease if you ever go to Rio, be careful as you would in any big city, but I think it is not much more dangerous than the streets of Istanbul these days.

We were lucky enough to enter just in time to watch Vila Isabel's defile, the school that one this year, and needless to say it did deserve it, there was not one mistake at their parade, as my knowledgeable carioca friends explain.

The show ended around 7 am, and we all walked back from our tribune all the way to the bus stop, around 45 mins, by the time I came to the hotel, I was still so excited from what I have witnessed that could not sleep.

PS: This year's champs: Vila Isabel, their theme was a tribute to America's, funded with a huge contribution from Venezuela's Hugo Chavez. Smaller map is Sambodromo.

From Cidade Maravilhosa, with love!

I am in Rio de Janeiro, a.k.a the marvellous city! It is carnival time, and yes, it does worth being here.

I cannot sit tight and write everything I have done here in two days, you need to wait until I go back to boring Montevideo! Just to give you an idea:

-I am staying with my dear friend Conner´s friend Stephen´s awesome beachfront penthouse in Copacabana Beach. Hanging out with him and his friend Ricardo, a great carioca who knows everyting--and as Stephen puts it, "whatever he does not know, he makes up!" (the above picture is the view from his terrace)

-An 8 hour walking tour of the center of the town, seeing all the cultural centers, museums, tiny streets, even Carmen Miranda´s house, etc.

- Getting a brazilian bikini wax (the best waxing experience in my life!)

- Shopping for shoes! (they are so cheap and kitch/tacky, everybody wears platforms in this city)

- Admiring the mosaic sidewalks--they had it for more than a hundred years! and beautiful euro-latin architecture, happy, helpful and beautiful people, amazing beaches, flora and fauna, etc etc etc

I think by far this is the most beauitful Latin American city I have visited!

Unbreakable?

I finally gave in. I stopped denying the fact that I am heart broken. Yes, I am sad, because Jenry and I broke up. I have been denying it and try to keep myself busy with things, entertainment, friends, etc. it was part of my denial. And I recognize that my relationship with Javier, from the beginning, started in order to forget the fact that I was really really hurt when me and Jenry got separated, back in may, after years of (mostly) a great relationship, comfort, appreciation and admiration, pure love. I tried to replace Jenry with him and probably built the most unhealthy relationship that one can built, again denying all the signs that Javier did not even come closer to love me the way Jenry did, I made myself believe that there was some kind of happy ending to my affair with this emotionally unavailable person.

How did I finally see it? Two weeks ago I was hanging out with Juan, he was getting ready to close the restaurant, and let me read some of his writings, one of which was written after a break-up. He said his heart was broken then. I, arrogantly replied, “really, I don’t know how that feels, because my heart is never been broken!” As I was saying that,
I don’t remember it word by word but he put his pain into words in such way, I said to myself, “this is exactly how I feel,” maybe not as intense, but very similar. That was the moment I understood and accepted that my heart was broken too, first time since May.

Following this awakening, as many of my friends who previously had their hearts broken who told me to take my time and heal, finish the rebound, I am going to live and enjoy the process of being heart broken, and let it go. Concentrating in my projects, especially when one has a deadline to finish a book which can be much more difficult to write this time!

I feel great though, I am not confused anymore, it is all so clear. I also feel a bit more mature, and brave.

An Impulsive Weekend or Weekend of Impulsivity

Friday again: this time there was a slight hesitation in me whether or not going to Pedrera this that day or stay and watch Uruguay´s famous Llamadas (a preview of the carnival). Around 20 pm, I said, my heart says go to Pedre, there will be another opportunity for the llamadas, next year or after that, no?

Anyways arrived around eleven o´clock, and we went to dinner with Orhan immediately. We had delish asados at this new place we have not tried before--called Baraka, followed by, now becoming a habit, drinks at casa antonio. That is how the weekend of impulsivity started! That night I have learned so much about the attractive owner of the restaurant--Orhan have been convincing me that the guy was definetely interested in me, so I started paying attention to him as well--that I could not react, I guess, I was too shocked to act normal let´s say--I hate that about me, I can get unnecesarily neurotic and say whatever comes to my mind! I discovered that we are a lot alike; I should say that he is a cynical version of me, someone who is a bit more introverted then I am, I guess that is what makes him so cool. (plus he gave me the nicest gift I have received in a loooong time, which is a marble morter I was dying to buy at remates for more than a year now!)

After an amazing friday night, sky full of stars, Saturday was one of the shittiest days of this summer. Not only it was cold and rainy, our plans of having an intimate dinner with only good friends has dissapeared, when some folks Orhan´s friend invaded our house, they guy brought his clan with him, and we prepared a "welcome to Pedrera" party for the jerk. I planned a classic turkish dinner for ten, I ended up cooking for 18. Thank god I had help, my --supposedly-- "cosmic twin" came and took over that tiny kitchen and helped me create a delish dinner for them.

The night did not end up at all as we planned with Orhan Abi, both of us were alone and pissed off at the end of the night, went to bed early to forget.

I woke up early on Sunday, went to the beach, suntan and walked around, waiting for Orhan Abi to wake up, then together we spend the afternoon drinking, in order not to feel (like that Bersuit song: tomo para no enamorarme, me enamoro para no tomar). I swam and swam, fought with the waves that got stronger by the minute. As Orhan Abi´s day started to brighten up, with the arrival of his lovely girlfriend, mine became darker when I did not feel like I was getting as much attention that I am used to getting--I am spoiled I know!

Later, around sunset, I could not help, my curiosity overcame my pride, and I made my move to find out what happened in the last 24 hours so that I was being ignored. It took me a good hour to decide whether or not I could maintain my cool talking to someone that I barely know about something deep involving speaking about my feelings, but the other option was escrutiating pain caused by curiousity!

When two people are a lot alike, at least one can tell whether or not the other one speaks the truth or not, so our brief conversation was fruitful in some ways, but I was further confused thinking what have I done or said so that he thinks the way he thinks about a possible "us" which as far as I am concerned seems far from a possibility under the circumstances--I am afraid I freak people out! Went home as a storm was forming in the horizon.

I started to believe what President Tabare Vazquez said in his most recent speech on paper pulp mill dilemma between Uruguay and Argentina: "this is like a famous tango song; man hits his woman, beats her up, even breaks a bone or two, in case she cheats on him in the future!" This way of thinking that I cannot understand that is probably why I cannot dance to tango. Why so negative? Why not think something can come out beautifully just because? People complicate their lives much more than they should and therefore live pathetic lives, with cheap or easy choices, they don´t pay attention in details that makes us wake up most of the time.

Anyways, we left our house around 12 after my nightly nap, to meet with Javier (a friend of ours, from Baires, he is this amazing photographer, smart, very talented and very funny, and very good looking) to have dirnks at the LPSC (La Pedrera Social Club). I need to talk about Javier in a special chapter because a paragraph does not do him justice. Briefly: he is involved in a project in Argentina that is called ART 39, and constantly creates another project, and of course with me an Orhan he has a lot of space for creativity, we love his stories. That night we had the honor to listen his latest project to save Pedrera from the nightclubs and crime (which does not exist but anyways) by creating a center, like Las Vegas, in the middle of the province, where all the "bad habits" (gambling, prostitution and clubs) will be together and the rest of the province will be free of these things. The place is going to be called El centro de Vicios Controlados (Center of controlled bad habits). In essence it worked in Nevada but I am not so sure it will work in rocha, in uruguay, and we are not mafia guys to begin with.

Over drinks, and laughs, the time for my return to Montevideo was approaching, and we decided that we were going to throw a coin to decide whether or not I was going to take the last bus out of there. The coin said yes to my departure, but Orhan insisted, in his very subtle way, that I stay one more day. So I did. The storm was continuing and we tought, my inner emotional storm created that out of ordinary situation, maybe punishing all of us for being so jaded.

Monday was devine, though sand storm and crazy water made it impossible to hang out at the beach. We sun bathed in Mariana´s tiki bar a bit far from he shore and he sand storm with one of the cutest caracters of Pedrera, Ms. Perla. She is in her 60s i believe and her father is a turkish jew who moved to Montevideo when he was 14. she is the director of the Posada del Barco (cutest inn in Pedrera) and we love her.

That night was my first night alone in Pedrera as Orhan Abi had other plans. I read a shitty novel I bought at San Francisco Airport which made me sleep and almost puke, around midnight, I was hearing voices and was scared in the house so I left. I have no friends there, other than the attractive owner of the restaurant, so I went there, even tough I did not want to be around him all that much. I had fun though, read his short stories, eat falafels, drink wine and watch him work. I left Pedrera once again, 4 am in the morning, my eyes closed before the driver turn the engine on, I was exhausted.

It was an impulsive weekend from the beggining to the end.


PS: Javier (the photographer) beat me 5-1 in backgammon--hence my angry mona lisa smile at the picture!