Category Archives: Cross-cultural learning moments

Taş gibi: Of language mis-steps, traffic jams and hot Turkish women

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Taş means stone in Turkish (Image from www.resimler.co)

Taş means stone in Turkish (Image from http://www.resimler.co)

“Taş gibi.”  I heard this phrase a lot while two young Turkish American men were living in our house.  I never could quite get the context, as their voices would lower to decibels my old ears couldn’t decipher well.  This usually took place as these young men were checking out their possible future dates on Facebook, for example.

During these episodes, Kenne, the Queen of Manners and Maintenance of Ladylike Behavior would “hurumph!” her way out of the room – dragging her handmaiden Zenne (the nervous Nellie like a bowl of quivering jelly) out of the room at breakneck pace.  It reminded me of the goat-bleating sound of horror my grandmother made when I was in the unfortunate position of explaining to her the OTHER purpose for dental dams back in the days when I did HIV/AIDS prevention work with women.  I will not elaborate further.

But in any case, back to the term taş gibi.  I had learned early on that taş referred to “stone” and I remembered this as I knew someone with Taş in their last name.  It  had also been early on in my time with M. that I learned the term buz gibi,  which when translated directly means “as cold as ice.”  So, as I sat at the dining room table with these young men, I finally put it together – something is like stone.  “Horrible,” I though sadly, “that they are referring to these young women as being like stone – they should give them a chance – maybe they are just shy!” I never shared these views as I didn’t want to interfere with the brotherly good time that was going on at the table.  Boys will be boys and all – they got enough feminist propaganda from me anyway, I thought.  As I was thinking this to myself, pretty much the ENTIRE puppet troupe was cackling and howling, slapping their knees and falling all over themselves with a case of the contagious giggles.

Istanbul's Fatih Sultan Mehmet Bridge in traffic (Image from Today's Zaman)

Istanbul’s Fatih Sultan Mehmet Bridge in traffic (Image from Today’s Zaman)

After months and months of watchful attempts for moments in which the use of my newly understood phrase did not appear – I found my moment.  Gülay was very kindly going out of her way to give us a ride.  There we were, sitting in the thick, stalled Istanbul traffic, trying to get onto the Fatih Sultan Mehmet bridge (a.k.a. the “second bridge”) to cross the Bosphorus on the way to Sabiha Gökçen Havaalanı for our trip to Dalyan to visit the Archers of Okçular for the first time.  We were stuck, nothing was moving, minutes and minutes had gone by and the three young men and my husband in the back of the car had entirely demolished the sesame-covered simit that Gülay had bought from the vendor out of the window.  Feeling very proud of myself – I gestured around at the traffic with my right hand, and said with beaming pride “Taş gibi!”

Silence hit the car – and I began to blush.  I thought, perhaps my accent is bad, although M. tells me that it is not as do others, so, I said it again “Taş gibi! No?”.  Gülay looked at me with a sidelong glance.  “What is it you are trying to say?” she asked calmly, always gentle with me as she is (and for which I am grateful).

I explained through the blushing “the traffic….it’s, well, it’s stuck – you know – like stone!”  At this point the entire human and puppet population of the car began to guffaw as if there was no tomorrow. I didn’t know what to do with my face or hands – I knew that the horrible truth would be out in moments but that I just had to wait.

“Taş gibi!” Gülay giggled, “M. you need to explain this term to your wife.”  Before M. could get there – one of Gülay‘s sons snorted out an explanation “it means a hot chick – you know – not super skinny – but with some meat on her bones – a real lady – not a thinspiration type!”

Here is what we are talking about:

This is what taş gibi is all about! (Image from galeri.uludagsozluk.com)

This is what taş gibi is all about! (Image from galeri.uludagsozluk.com)

Finally, I had the freedom to laugh along with them.  And all agreed that indeed, the traffic could be described as Taş gibi as well!

The Karagöz puppets return…with a kabak and some çapak for my Turkish lesson

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Kabakler - a number of squash (Image by Liz Cameron)

Kabakler – a number of squash (Image by Liz Cameron)

Early yesterday morning as I lay sprawled out in bed, I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was the learned Hacivad Bey Puppet who for once, oddly enough, was standing right next to the Karagöz puppet himself. These two usually do not get along – so their presence together made me sit up and take notice.

“Bey efendiler, what are you up to so early in the morning,” I managed, my voice horse with sleep.

“Well, M’lady,” Hacivad Bey began, “we have come to determine two things, that you need to lighten up a bit and move away from this fear-related writing for now and also that you need to kick it up a few notches on your Turkish learning – your friend over at Turklish has some great ideas about infusing Turkish into your everyday life. This, of course, will help you feel less afraid to walk around the city – and probably will help M. as well.”

“Hell,” Karagöz inserted, pushing Hacivad Bey out of the way rather rudely, “and you just need to have some more fun! Enough with the deep conversations on gender, class, culture and violence against women – get up, go out with your husband and have fun with him – and work on your Turkish!!!”

“Fun,” I thought, rubbing the çapak out of my eyes, “how am I going to be FUN when I’m not feeling very FUN these days? And FUN in TURKISH? Sigh” And as I took the tissue from my bedside to remove the çapak from my eyes – or what my Mother referred to as “the sleep” and yet others referred to as “eye boogers,” it hit me. My relationship with speaking Turkish began with this very word – çapak. If I am to re-invigorate my attention to learning more Turkish, let’s start there.

This was the first word I learned in Turkish, oddly enough. Way back in 2004, M. met me for coffee early in our courtship and said “Oh, you have some çapak in your eye,” and gently brushed the crusty nugget of sand-sized material out of my left eye socket.

Here is a çapak - or a common bream fish

Here is a çapak – or a common bream fish

“Hmmm,” I reflected, “çapak. That’s an interesting sounding word.” After reciting the Turkish alphabet to me, began to rhyme in Turkish – you know – çapak, tabak, kabak…in other words, eye booger, table and squash. At this moment, Mercan Bey, the Arabian Spice Trader Puppet called out from somewhere, likely the kitchen, as he is re-arranging our spice shelf these days. “don’t forget that çapak also refers to sea bream – a fish!”

Later that night, I sat on the couch with M. to watch our secret, guilty pleasure – “The Bachelor.” This is a television show in which one man or one woman takes his/her time in assessing 25 marriage candidates only to eventually choose one with whom to tie the not. Aside from the obvious gender commentary that runs rampant on our couch as we scream at the television, we are obsessed with what this television puts people through from a group psychology perspective – forget even getting as far as problematic gender imagery. And as we sat there, along with the Karagoz puppet troupe lined up on the couch behind us, M. cracked and munched, cracked and munched his favorite roasted pumpkin seeds – aka the ones from the kabak mentioned above.

As I had been working on my Turkish the whole day, I turned to him, jubilant, and exclaimed “Kabak!” I, of course, thought I was showing my ever-increasing knowledge of Turkish. M., on the other hand, nearly spit his kabak seeds in my face as he laughed out loud. After a kiss on the cheek, he explained his intense mirth – “Canım (dear),” he explained, “to say KABAK to someone means – well – they are a simple minded, not-too-rich-in-the-brains-department kind of person, um, in other words, an idiot!”

And so goes another day in the life of a Turkish American couple where the vernacular is usually the devil in the details.

 

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Eggs and Ottoman music: On cultural responsivity gone wrong in one Turkish American marital moment

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Syrian music band from Ottoman Aleppo, mid 18t...

Syrian music band from Ottoman Aleppo, mid 18th century (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Today, I really have to laugh at myself, along with Karagöz who is, of course, really howling at me (he tells me, “M’lady, I’m laughing WITH you, not at you.” Yeah right, Karagöz, I know you and your ways. Sigh. But in any case, maybe I am just too hyper-critical of myself this morning, but sometimes I think I may just try too hard in my work to be a culturally competent Turkish-American partner/wife.

I am reminded of when my sister and Italian brother-in-law, who were visiting Istanbul to see us, made fun of me for trying to get him to pronounce “Topkapı Palace” (pronounced “Top-kah-puh” forget even going to Sarayı (“sah-ray-yuh”), the Turkish word for it) vs. “Topkapeeeeee Palace.” I think language is important, and how you use it shows respect and allows for cross-cultural understanding even on minute levels. I also get riled up about tourists who don’t make an effort to pronounce things correctly, am I alone on that? Kenne, the Queen of Manners Puppet and Maven of the Maintenance of Etiquette and Ladylike Behavior, gives me a nod of approval at that.

Now, as you may recall, yesterday, I reflected on our annual Christmas tree argument, and how it was not, as a matter of fact, rooted in cultural and religious differences, but rather environmental and gendered ones. Karagöz in particular was the puppet yelling loudest about my need to “take it easy” on the cultural competence analytical thinking front. Well, never to be outdone (“or just DONE,” Karagöz snarks,) I did it again this morning. But this morning, the issue was not cultural competence – it was the effort towards the new hip phrase in my field – cultural responsivity. You can read more about this new term in my evolving page on the topic, but basically, I think this one is better than the latter.

Kenne, well known to be the self-imposed Queen of Manners, Etiquette and the Maintenance of Ladylike Behavior, and who re-arranges her title on at least a thrice-daily basis, sat atop a stove observation post this morning, making sure that I cooked the eggs properly.

So, as I cooked a special breakfast this morning, before M. headed off to his art studio, I overheard M. howling like a laughing lunatic over something on the Internet, I presumed. I figured it was just the latest Turkish futbol-related joke or scandal. Meanwhile, in order to honor something I know M. loves, I found the “Turkish classical music” station on Pandora. M. is often distraught that the Arabesque trend in Turkish music, and engages in a lot of recherché du temps perdu on this matter.

Thus the effort to feed him some classical Turkish favorites along with his egg whites. Of course, I have no idea if what Pandora considers classical Turkish music is indeed what it purports itself to be. Nonetheless, Kenne, the Queen of Manners Puppet and Maven of the Maintenance of Etiquette and Ladylike Behavior, gave me a nod of approval from her observation tower on top of the stove (I was not cooking eggs the Turkish way, she was telling me, and I was ignoring her with glee).

Staggering in the kitchen on the way to set the table, M. appeared before me in a teary fit of giggles. Pausing, M. pressed the giggle-pause button as he gave me a quizzical look. “What music this is? Why this, I don’t know, Arabic music maybe, canım? Sighing, as I nested my spatula before turning his way, I in a rather maudlin voice proclaimed “ I thought you loved Turkish classical music? I thought it would remind you of happy times at home?” “I am not sure this is Turkish classical music, canım,” he said gently, squinting into the iPhone to see the artist’s name. “Do you like it?” I questioned, with an overbright and hopeful look on my face. Ever blunt, M., the calls-it-as-he-sees-it type, just indicated “no, not really,” before quickly returning to the subject of his mirth.

SIlently, I remembered how my first attempt to bring Turkish music to our home included a CD of what I did not know he hated – Arabseque style. Zooks, thwarted again. I should know better, I thought, I see my students make dumb mistakes like this all the time. Not the end of the world, but…then tuned in to M.’s question to me “Now let me tell you – do you know of this, who’s on first, what’s on second thing, canım?” M.’s giggling and laughing continued, as the tinny sound of a ney slithered along in the background, replete with the little chorus of dancing lady puppets swooning on the chair below the phone – one of their rare appearances out of their self-built harem in my purse (other than the early morning çay delivery service they provide my slow-to-awaken mind).

“It is Abbott and this Costello who made this first time? Jerry Seinfeld re-does it – and I must watch it again.” After making a quick study at table setting – I heard the laughter continue with the recently remade version of the classic comic sketch including Martin Short, Jimmy Fallon and Jerry Seinfeld, among others. “Next time,” the academic over-thinker in me thought, “I’d better do more research on which aspect of Ottoman classical music M. likes. This was a cultural responsivity fail.”

I had to laugh at my attempt to be culturally responsive – to offer something of M.’s culture that I have learned that he loves – and M.’s absolute disinterest as he embraced an iconic American classic and its remake. The infamous Kenne, Queen of Manners, et alia, snapped me to attention so I would not burn the frittata – while simultaneously praising me for doing what a good American wife of a Turkish man should do, namely, in her words “make him feel at home!”

Zenne, the nervous nellie puppet, quivering with anxiety like a bowl of fresh quince jelly at her somewhat feminist assertion this morning…

And then something curious happened, Kenne’s handmaiden, Zenne, the nervous Nellie puppet who regularly jiggles with anxiety like a bowl of quince jelly, evidenced a new lead, saying “perhaps ‘home’ means many things in between and among Turkey and America? Maybe you don’t need to make such an effort to be culturally responsive – I mean – he isn’t asking for that at all!”

As she spoke, I saw that this little lady puppet was shaking, eyes down, afraid her mistress would overhear her blasphemy – it was the closest to a feminist statement that this traditionalist ruled by the ultimate traditionalist had ever uttered. I gave her a big hug (well as big a hug as you can give a tiny imaginary puppet) an changed Pandora over to the Flamenco station. That music reminds me of my Granny (Anane) and Mom (Anne) always listened to while ironing – go figure. And, true to form, Safiye Rakkase, the vainglorious dancing puppet is, after all, sashaying around the room with her castanuellas in hand!

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