So although I learned the bare minimum amount of Turkish I could while living in Istanbul for 2 months, all those words were absolutely vital for getting around. I want to preserve the amount that I did learn. So I'm writing all the words I learned just in case I one day make it back there!
First word I learned was 'merhaba' which means 'hello' and the second was teşekkürler (te-shek-yu-lar) which means 'thank you.' So obviously it's like my third day
there and I think 'yeah, cool. I'm a pro at this' so all of school mates go down to this local corner store to check
it out and buy snacks and I'm the last person to purchase anything(standard). And as I'm pick up my bag I say
'hello' to the cashier rather than 'thank you' and I try to correct myself and apologize (in English like he knew
what I was saying)before anyone notice except the whole family that owned the store heard my blunder even
the baby and my schoolmates and everyone busted out laughing. Humiliated, I booked it out of there, so that
was cool.
Hmm other words that came in handy? 'yok,' pronounced 'yoke' which means 'no,' used that a lot to ward
off creepy men. 'Evet' (ev-vet) which is 'yes.' And random but we ate a whole lot of bread with is a huge com-
ponent of Turkish meals and I couldn't get enough especially with oil and ground pepper and my kids loved me
for whenever I got it for them for lunch, is 'ekmek.' Water, which I'm not a huge fan of but had to get in special
places since their tap water is not very clean is called 'su'(sood). And then 'food' is 'yemek' and whenever we order
online which saved our lives we would have to call down to the gate and say 'yemek geliş' (gili-yosh, s' with tildaes
make the 'sh' sound) which means 'food is coming' to the security guards and then we would feign like we knew wh
-at they were saying back and say 'EVET' and then hang up the phone. 'çok' means 'very' which we use from time to time especially when they didn't think you understand Turkish like 'çok sexy' they ate that up, thought it was hilarious. Also, I learned the word 'öldü' which I figured out the translation without much help , it means 'died,' can guess how I figured that one out? Two words, Amy Winehouse. I was eating in a mall and it was turned to their Turkish CNN and it kept flashing her face on the news and the word 'öldü' and I turned to my friend and said 'I think Amy Winehouse is dead' which she didn't believe until we got back to campus. Oh and soup was 'çorba' (chorba) which is the same as in Arabic but with a 'sh' sound and that was always served with dinner, I don't know if that was the school tradition or a Turkish one either way, I liked it. And chicken was 'tavuk,' and 'fried' was 'kızarmış' (ku-zarmish, the Turks have to 'I's in their language one with a dot and one with it and the 'i' with the dot is pronounced like the English but the one without sounds more like a 'u.')
Also, the Turks speak in non-verbal ways which is normal in a guess in Eastern traditions especially in the Middle East. The kids would do this a lot instead of saying 'yes' or 'no,' they use their movement of their eyes, head and tongue. For instance, if you ask them a question like if they want something to eat, in response they might blink their eyes very quickly which means 'yes.' Or, if they don't want anything to eat they will nod their head up very quickly and cluck their tongue like their sucking their teeth which is taken as rude in the U.S. but just means 'no' and is a culture norm. After a while the kids had me doing too, thought it was awesome like a secret language but at the same time it confused the shit out of me at times.
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