Yesterday, an emergency prompted me to call one of our principals to come down "immediately." He arrived a few minutes later with Nazli in tow, not sure what to expect. Fortunately, it wasn't a fire (though Nazli was prepared to blow it out), but a conflagration of a different sort: two teachers fighting over access to the children's room (which has children's books and a DVD player/TV). It turned out no translation was necessary after all, but it sure was nice to have a language expert available.
(BTW, I don't think there should be a DVD player/TV for children, actually, and am going to try to get it removed completely—and fill that space with books. That's one way to solve the problem!)
Language is quite fascinating here (everywhere!). People don't generally speak
Arabic, but there are quite a few words that appear in both languages. For example, tamam, which means maybe in Arabic, is instead okay in Turkish. I still have to think a few seconds to decide if someone is telling me okay or not. The Turkish word harem, which us English speakers think of as the concubine's quarters in a palace, has the meaning of forbidden (with a slightly different pronunciation) in Arabic. Interestingly, the call to prayer here at the mosques is in Arabic, because Arabic is the language of Allah.
At our gym, the Pilates class, besides making me cranky and exhausted, is also teaching me some interesting words: suk (squeeze), bas (press) and nefisir and nefisvar (breathe in, breathe out). I'm learning to count (but only to 10!) but also to dread when she says, "Iketane" (two more).
Back at our school, Nazli & Arjlan do their best to ensure cross-cultural relations are smooth and pleasant for all involved. That's worth a lot, of course, and we're really lucky to have them as colleagues.
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