I am in Ankara, Turkey!

I have arrived in Ankara, Turkey and as I write this blog entry, I am in my 4th floor lojman (apartment in Turkish) admiring the beautiful view of the city from atop a hill.  I live in a modern semi-suburban area called Bilkent because this area is dominated by the large, private university called Bilkent University.  I actually live on the campus because as a teacher at the University Laboratory School (Bilkent Laboratory and International School or BLIS), I am part of the university staff. The university is quite large--over 1500 acres-- and has 13,000 students.

I left Milwaukee on August 14th from the airport at 2 PM after meeting in the waiting area another teacher at BLIS.  Betty and her husband are from California but her extended family lives in Milwaukee.  She spent time visiting them before coming to Turkey.  After the very short flight to Chicago, I had a 3 hour layover and during that layover, I met 4 other teachers bound for BLIS.  On the 9 hour flight to Munich, I really lucked out because the two seats next to me were empty and I was able to lie down and sleep for about 3 hours or so.  United Airlines served 2 meals, dinner and breakfast, because I left Chicago at dinnertime and arrived in Munich in the morning on August 15th.  In Munich, I met even more teachers enroute to BLIS! The layover in Munich was 2 hours and then I boarded a flight to Ankara which took 2.5 hours.  The Lufthansa flight attendants were surprised there were so many English speakers on board until they figured out we're all going to the same place.  All in all there were 15 teachers and various other spouses and children who arrived bleary-eyed in Ankara on that flight.

The immigration procedures were superficial and after about 1 minute I was at the baggage carousel to pick up my luggage. I loaded my luggage trolley with my 4 pieces of luggage in which I packed the worldly goods I will use for the next two years and pushed the trolley through the door out into the main lobby of the airport.  The new teachers were met by officials from BLIS and a coach bus with porters to load our luggage onto the bus.  As we drove through Ankara to Bilkent, I was struck by the fact that the parts of Ankara in which the bus traveled were very modern.  We drove down a 6 lane freeway past malls, apartment buildings, mosques and businesses that do not see more than 25 years old.  As I rode on the bus, I saw signs for John Deere, Burger King, Starbucks, Case Tractors, and KFC.

When we got to BLIS, we were fed a light dinner meal of Turkish pizza, salad, and chicken wraps because it was about 4:30 PM and given our apartment assignments.  I took my luggage to my apartments and unpacked just a little and went to bed about 8 PM because I was sooo tired.

Ankara is located on a high desert plateau similar to Denver but a little drier.  There is no humidity but it gets hot (upper 80's or low 90's) during the day but quite cool (50's) at night.  The predominate natural plant life is a brown scrub grass unless landscaping has been done.  On campus, we have the brown grass and a lot of pine trees have been planted all over the place in rows.  Some places on campus have green grass and other plantings where drip hoses have been laid over the top so that the plantings can be irrigated.