Category: Vetpats

School’s Out

Travel may well broaden the mind but upping sticks and relocating to a foreign field can blow it completely. The best laid plans may not prepare you for having the cultural rug pulled from under your feet, something that can throw the most balanced person off kilter. Becoming a novice expat is like the first day of school. All those childhood fears come flooding back. Will I fit in? Will people like me? Am I wearing the right kind of kit? Am I as good as them?

As the naïve new kids on the block, we made the classic mistake of chucking ourselves into the well-rooted and largely insular expat community that clung to the iridescent coast of Aegean Turkey. We didn’t dip our toes into the water to test the temperature. Oh no. We leapt in with eyes slammed shut, noses held and hopes raised. It was a salutary lesson in what not to do. The emigrey soap opera was, at times, a life-sapping experience and negativity stalked the smoky bars and over-crowded beaches. We spent the first six months trying to get to know people and the next six months trying to get rid of many of them. In retrospect, I don’t know why I expected a disparate group of people thrown together purely by chance to be our cup of tea. Four years down the line our burnt fingers had healed and we started to enjoy the sparkling company of a small cohort of like-minded people. As with many things in life, less is more. Ironically, just as we reserved our own corner of the playground with a hand-picked gang, we returned back to Blighty to be grown-ups again.

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Separating the Wheat from the Chavs

Emigrey Soap Opera

Hit the Road, Jack

Hit the Road, Jack

The show is over and the curtain has fallen on our final Anatolian performance. It’s been a long and successful run but they’ll be no ovation or encore. As we said goodbye to Gümbet, Liam and I reflected on our time in this ancient land of paradoxes and plenty. Turkey has provided a restful respite for our weary bones and taught us that we can live differently and work with less. This is a profound lesson that many would be wise to copy. We don’t regret a single second of it.

We’ve both enjoyed and endured some extraordinary exploits with some extraordinary people. From the outset I called our cast ‘the mad, the sad, the bad and the glad’. This epitaph was no less true in Bodrum than it was in Yalıkavak three years before. From our first encounter with the pretentious expat rat pack to the Bodrum Belles, the Gümbet Gals and the Bitez Babes all sorts – the ladies of this small corner of Asia Minor do what they can to live their lives in dignity and grace. Many succeed. Many don’t. Listen up, ladies. Take a little advice from an old pro. When your ship is holed beneath the waterline, head for the lifeboat. Don’t flounder about like flotsam just because the sea looks inviting.

We’re not looking forward to the downside of Blighty life – the unpredictable weather, the fretful recession or the endless whinging. Let’s face it, some of our compatriots, whatever shore they wash up on, have turned whinging into a class act. Nevertheless, our course is set and it is a step forward, not a step back. But, there’s a sadness in my soul. I shall greatly miss our entertaining encounters with the hopeless, the hapless and, yes, the happy go lucky. So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, adieu to the emigreys, vetpats, semigreys, VOMITs, MADs, Emiköys, and sexpats. You gave me an unexpected tale to tell and for this I thank you. The next instalment is on the story drawing board.

Chip Pan Alley

We closed the door on our little stone house in the heart of old Bodrum Town for the last time and said our fond farewells to our great neighbours. Tears rolled down Bubbly Beril’s cheeks and Vadim distributed rib-crushing bear hugs. We left Bodrum a week before returning to Blighty. We would have been homeless itinerants if two Gümbet gal-friends hadn’t come up trumps and offered us their holiday villa for a week, no strings attached. It was a fantastic parting gift. Lovely Lemon Tree Villa comes highly recommended. If you want to know more, contact Carole or Liza on info@turkuoise.co.uk.

Ironically, it was like taking a proper holiday, the first for four years. We planned to relax around a cool pool with a G&T, ice and a slice. We also planned one or two evenings getting down and dirty with the good, bad and the ugly along chip pan alley with its competing cacophony and naff neon. We were looking forward to witnessing the garrison of tattooed emigrey arms, pussy pelmets and pot-bellied Nike tops on proud display. It was not to be. Instead, our week became a fabulous fanfare of farewells as the Belles and the Gals sent us on our way in drunken style. I’ll be taking my liver back to Blighty in a jiffy bag.

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Drums and Drugs

Painting the Town Pink

The Beau Belles

When we decided to jump the good ship Blighty, we enjoyed an extraordinary run of good luck. Our neighbour bought our house and its contents. IKEA-chic (or is that shit?) was clearly to his liking. We hauled over just 17 boxes of our precious personal possessions (aka old crap we couldn’t give away). Our extraordinary run of good luck has continued. Thanks to a select group of Bodrum Belles, we’ve flogged off our house contents all over again. We’ve hauled back to Blighty just 17 boxes plus Liam’s beloved Roland keyboard and our marvellous Samsung flat screen TV (miraculously still working; most of our other electrical goodies have malfunctioned). I love this recycling lark. No need to re-flat-pack the flat pack. So, a massive hand to the Beau Belles of Bodrum.

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Are You Being Served?

In the Beginning

Time Out, Istanbul Top Billing

I’ve never had much difficulty finding something to say. In fact, sometimes Liam would rather I kept it buttoned once in a while. Today I received a copy of the April edition of Time Out, Istanbul, courtesy of Pat Yale which features a piece she’s  written about expat books. Pat is one of the (if not the) pre-eminent resident travel writers in Turkey. She gave Perking the Pansies top billing. It made me feel like a sexy centrefold without the need to take my kit off (believe me, these days Jack in the flesh would put anyone off their Adana Kebab).  Pat’s review is, well, see for yourself. I am speechless. Thank you, Pat. You managed to shut me up and Liam is at peace for once.

Time Out Instanbul April books

Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines

 

To rescue me from a life of drudgery and chores, delicious vetpat Vicky invited me to brunch at Musto’s Restaurant, our favourite Bodrum eatery. We were joined by a retired thespian and impresario (who shall remain nameless to save his blushes) and his Turkish partner. They’d jetted down from Istanbul for the weekend. We took our ringside seats to watch the spills and thrills of the Turkish Air Force Aerobatics Team – the Turkish Stars – who performed their madcap supersonic routine above our heads. The low-rise, high-octane precision performance was loud and fabulous. The ear-splitting gig wasn’t entirely a surprise since the boys with their toys had spent a few days practising beforehand – clipping mobile phone masts and setting off car alarms. Catching a snap proved difficult as the magnificent men in their flying machines criss-crossed the firmament. The romantic finale was a hazy heart etched into the sky, a fitting tribute to the Istanbul lovers. After feasting on a delicious Turkish breakfast banquet that just kept on coming, we spent the sunny afternoon chatting and drinking in the magical stories of a thesp’s days treading the boards. Perfect.

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Ringing the Belles

Icing and Slicing

What Maketh the Man?

The call came and I’m home alone once more. Liam dashed back to Blighty strapped to a Sleazyjet plane. My mother-in-law’s not well and the family is rallying round to provide the kind of TLC that this kindly lady needs and deserves. His departure was heralded by an impromptu and ear-splitting display by (presumably) the Turkish Air Force Aerobatic Team who flew ultra-low to strafe the unsuspecting town. The vibration set off car alarms. Boys with their toys.

While I’m home alone, I’ve got plenty to occupy myself, including preparations for our own homecoming in June. I’ll be clearing out my mucky drawers and chucking out the chintz. Besides, the weather’s on the up; I’m sure our select group of Bodrum Belles and Gümbet Gals will keep me from crying into the bottom of my glass. Liam went without hesitation or resentment and he went with my blessing. Liam’s love and loyalty is second to none. That’s what maketh the man.

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Left to My Own Devices

Home Alone

Turkey from the Inside

I’ve been scribbling like a lunatic getting the message out about the book. The days when an author just sits back and lets someone else do all the PR and promotion are long gone. Sometimes, though, things just happen without any intervention from me. Pat Yale is an extremely respected British vetpat travel writer living in Cappadocia. You could say she put the pat in expat. Pat wrote A Handbook for Living in Turkey which is the definitive guide for moving to and living in our fosterland. Pat also writes a Turkey travel blog called Turkey from the Inside. Liam stumbled across the page about Yalıkavak. This is the introduction:

On the northwest side of the Bodrum Peninsula, pretty Yalıkavak centres on a harbourful of gülets but also boasts several inviting getaway-from-it-all boutique hotels up on the hillside. It served as the setting for Jack Scott’s 2012 travel memoir Perking the Pansies which dished the dirt on goings-on in the expat community.

Thank you, Pat. I’m chuffed.

Fancy a Dip?

The benign spring weather allowed us to take tea and tittle tattle on our balcony with a few Bodrum Belles. It’s a sunny spot, though we often have to yell above the din of the harried street. This is more than compensated by the chance to observe busy Bodrum life passing by below. I was being mother and, as I poured the coffee, I gazed momentary across at the flat roof of our single storey kitchen at the other end of the courtyard. It glistened in the bright sunlight. Tiny waves rippled in the gentle breeze. Had we installed a roof-top plunge pool? No such luck. A few weeks earlier, a beefy covered lady with Popeye biceps and sprouting underarms had collected the olive crop from the over-hanging tree. She had beat the bush with Amazonian gusto and left a shag-pile of twiggy debris in her wake. Come the next deluge, the leaf litter plugged the drainage hole and created the shallow lake.

After the Belles departed, I climbed onto the roof, waded through the water and unblocked the hole with the handle of a wooden spatula. The undammed waters spewed like a mini Niagara onto the turned dirt of our neighbour’s bald vegetable patch. Their chained up dog, so used to barking at the slightest flutter of the tiniest sparrow, was taken totally by surprise. Rover didn’t know how to react so decided not to react at all. Now there’s a first.

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Black Gold

Bodrum Belles

A Brilliant New Book

Ayak is a splendid British emikoy living in a small village in Turkey with her doting Turkish husband. See, sometimes it can work! Ayak writes a refreshingly honest account of her rural life called Ayak’s Turkish Delight which she describes as:

“The ups and down, the trials and tribulations, the happy and the sad…not to mention the often disastrous adventures of Mr Ayak.”

Ayak has written a wonderful review of my book. I’m touched and really grateful. You can read it here.

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Til Death Us Do Part

VOMITs