Sunday, December 5th, 2004

Well, the past few days have been very boring. I’ve hung around the dorm a lot. The weather has been bad, my friends have exams or extra weekend classes, and no one likes to go out drinking very much. So what else is there? It’s enough to get me to go to a bookstore and spend $20 on a book I could get for $7 in the US. Hmmm… maybe I will…

No, probably not. I’m going to England and it will be expensive there. It’s even getting more expensive here! Inflation combined with our plummeting dollar has made a notable difference on my bank account. Each time I get money out of the ATM its a few dollars more expensive. What a stinker.

I can’t figure out if I’m bored just because of the really fast-paced schedule I had with my dad here. Perhaps now the normal life in Turkey feels extra slow. I don’t know what to make of it. I’m also looking forward very much to going to England for Christmas, and that doesn’t help any.

So what have I been doing to pass the time? Well… let’s see…

One particularly geeky thing I’ve been doing is downloading a weekly podcast from BoardGameGeek and getting my nerdery fix by listening to it. It’s actually really neat. For those that don’t know, podcasting is a recent internet fad that is basically DIY radio. The people hosting a show record a radio-style presentation and make it available to the public. However, instead of streaming it over the internet or broadcasting it on the radio, they make it available as an mp3 download. So, you can subscribe to these shows, get them automatically download each week and then listening to them on your iPod or computer or whatever.

The podcast I’ve been listening to, GeekSpeak, is all about board games. It’s quite well done although very silly at times. Each week they do different things, such as interview board game designers, publishing companies, review huge game fairs in Germany, talk to people who are using board games in education, etc. It’s a very informative show, and a good way for me to feel involved in this hobby even though I’m not really playing anything other than tavla and Battle Line.

What else… I drink tea in my dormitory’s café. Many students come and talk with me, so it’s a good way to pass time and sometimes meet some new friends. The other day two girls from the Ukraine showed up. They had just moved in and will be students at AU starting next semester. They are nice enough, and were surprised that an American was here in Turkey. The only problem is that after I talked to them, now every Turkish guy with any amount of sexual drive is coming up to me and wanting to know all about the “Russian girls”. They are really good at stereotyping. And also very afraid to actually talk to girls on their own. Oh, the irony. The Turkish guys are horny and can’t work up the nerve to speak with these females. I, on the other hand, have no problems conversing but am not interested in relationships right now.

That’s life, I guess.