26 August 2012

26 August 2012

The commercials for orange juice where the soccer mom reaches through the grocery shelf to a fresh Floridian orange pasture to take orange juice right from the fruit growers always seemed stupid to me; little did I know I would one day be living such an existence. The days of looking at a menu at Eddie’s diner have gone, and instead breakfast is dictated by which branch I decide to shake and how long it takes my mom let the milk curd fully harden to salty cheese. My multi-course meal began with a fresh peach, seeming my only natural appetizer as a few peaches fell from the tree right ourside my window, as though they were waiting for me to wake up so that they could also start their day. A green apple came next, the satisfying crunch justification enough for the juice that covered my new cross necklace (thanks Jesus! – that story to follow) and the knowledge that soon my throat would be awash in hives and itch. Thank god my allergies fit in my carry on luggage. The only thing that could pull together such a fresh breakfast besides home-molded cheese and soft bread is, of course, coffee. Originally I thought the coffee beans grown by my host family’s Turkish in-laws and ground to a soft grain in a hand grinder could not get any better; little did I know that the trees across the street were hazelnut trees. Granted, the hazelnuts don’t dissolve as nicely as ground coffee,  but reduced to enough of a pulp and steeped in hot water gave it enough of an aroma and taste to transport me to a back porch in forty fort. It certainly was not Dunkin Donuts, and I finally mean that in a good way.

As mentioned above, I now wear a cross necklace. Nothing very flashy (I will be making the jump to spinning rim or giant clock neckware once my family can recover from staring at my mismatched socks every morning), just a simple wooden thing hand made by the nuns of some church so far up in the mountains they seemed to think their gates were the actual gates to heaven. I realize I should capitalize ‘heaven,’ but, frankly, I didn’t see St. Peter standing out front and they didn’t even have the decency to paint their gates a pearly shade of anything. Did I hide my sarcasm and slight disdain there? Anyhow, my host family and 16 other relatives/ neighbors/ assorted vagabonds went out on a relaxing marshutka ride to a river rafting tour for a 9 year old’s birthday. It was all well and good, even though we left 2 hours later than I was told we were going to, and I was told we were going to a party at an uncle’s house. There is no helping Georgia Maybe Time (GMT). After the boat ride and the picnic, I was then informed we were going to church, which I had not prepared myself for. It was actually a lovely church, perched on top of one of the largest hills I have ever ascended (which I mean to elicit gasps of praise and wonderment, as I am way up into the peaks of the mountains to begin with), and there was an amazing 270 degree view out into the valley below us. Little did I know the Eastern Orthodox Christians are wildly traditional, and so I walked smack into an ambush that began because my calves and ankles were showing (the heathen in me was coming out, I forgot what part of the world I am living in). This would not have been a big deal to me, I did not need to walk inside of an Orthodox Church for 15 minutes just to watch some Hassidic-rabbi looking padre have his head explode when I crossed myself left shoulder then right like the Catholic I was raised to be, rather than right shoulder to left. However, it was not enough that I was wearing shorts, but after 10 minutes of this priest yelling at me for wearing shorts (or asking me for the time, inviting me to dinner, asking for my stock portfolio, what have you), he was told I was an American and had no idea what he was saying. Rather than have this deter him from conversation, he pushed on with the assumption that since I’m an American I am a Catholic, and he decided it was time for me to be properly baptized because Catholics are terrible people and something about St. Matthew’s body being buried in his attic crawl space (I believe something was lost in translation and then exaggerated for this story). Naturally, I declined, which did not win me any favors with this man and his beard. He then demanded to see the cross that I was wearing, and when I came up empty handed he informed me that anyone who does not wear a cross at all times is not a true Christian. I bit back any smart ass remarks I had (despite this being the perfect time for a litany of them, seeing as how no one would have any clue what I was saying), and my annoyed silence was taken as my defeat, and towards the rebirthing/ baptizing pool we went. Well, he went. I laughed and walked into the church, thinking I was cheeky by blessing myself like a Catholic, only to be one-upped by these electricity-free charlatans and issued one of the shawl/ drapey sort of skirts that the females are forced to wear. The only thing to top of the experience was the fact that this hyper-traditional, ultra-conservative house of the Lord their God (I assume they even liked his Facebook page) was the gift shop that fillwed the small lobby and the gawdy, tacky donation boxes that stole your eyes away from the magnificence of the 400-500 year old paintings that covered the walls. It is good to know that I can bless my left shoulder first and wear shorts everywhere ago, just knowing that right before I die I can promptly apologize and drop 40 or 50 lira into a wooden box and pop through those gates scott-free and skirt-adorned .