Camera-less

After an unsuccessful attempt to repair our digital camera, it is in tiny pieces all over the desk. So, for the time being, we have no lens through which to show you our experience here. Hopefully we can still get some pictures from others to share with you!

I guess we will have to sharpen our use of word pictures.

9:30 am. I got on the dolmus (bus) to the center for our English camp. A woman in head to tow black covering sat next to her husband. Another woman had a bleached-blond pony tail. A child stood and pressed her face to the window, steadying herself against the lurching bus. A friendly Turkish man with a dark mustache leaned across the aisle and tapped me on the shoulder to make sure I knew when to get off. I crossed the street and found the alley marked with the sign for the Oscar Hotel and followed it, sided by rambling stucco walls and sun-scorched wooden shutters. Out at the main boulevard I walked on a sidewalk of polished marble tile, along the tram line and a row of palm trees dividing traffic. With the ruins of an ancient city wall on the other side of the street, to my right Western music pulsed out of hipster boutiques and cell phone stores. A man with half his front teeth smiled at me, rang his bell and said "Ice cream!" I passed a bread vendor with white hair and rolled-up sleeves methodically sweeping crumbs out of his display case. A yellow lab lay in the sun, chained to a mountain bike. Almost to the destination now, into the old city, over cobblestones, as the sun grew higher and hotter. Ten o'clock.