Small Meditations on Nilüfer and Language Learning

I have arrived in Bursa, and am at home with my host family after our third day of classes. We live in a suburban area of the Bursa district, a place called Dimirci in the area of Nilüfer. Every day, I have breakfast at seven and drive to school with my neighbors, who also are hosting a student from our program (N'aber, George!). I'll post more about the downtown area of Bursa later, I'm sure, but for now I want to talk to you about Dimirci and Nilüfer.

These güzel çiçekler greet us on the way to the car each morning.

Basically, we're in hardcore suburbia. The flats were all built in the past couple of decades, and throughout the area new buildings are being built constantly. The people are mostly middle class young families, many of whom commute into the city. When I ride the bus home through Dimirci, there are endlessly repeating color schemes and architecture styles dotted with weed-filled lots that are soon to be built upon.

New apartment buildings. (They're much nicer inside, in my opinion.)

There are convenient stores built on the first floor of many apartment buildings, and individual flats feature multiple balconies (which serve as spaces for interfamilial interaction), beautiful views, and spacious interiors. Other parts of Nilüfer have gated communities and bike paths, hipster coffee shops, and endless daycare options.

Blue skies, less noise, and distant views. It's the great promise of suburban life!

It's a beautiful place, and other than being pretty far from my classes, I'm glad I'm able to live here.

The minaret of our friendly neighborhood cami.

We've also had most of a week of classes so far, and I am learning something about the nature of the process of gaining Turkish skills. I am learning that the language learning process is in large part a matter of mediating my own mental state. When listening to people speak, if I am at all distracted I lose the entire meaning. I often have to ask people to repeat even though when they repeat exactly I can understand. Listening requires practiced, focused concentration. This also explains why I am often far more exhausted after talking to people in Turkish – the mental energy required is just so much greater than communicating in English.

When I'm speaking, too, it becomes much harder to think of words and phrase what I want to say if I get at all frustrated. Of course, if I do, it can be self-reinforcing – I'm frustrated so I can't think how to phrase what I know that I know how to say, and then the inability to communicate makes me more frustrated. That is compounded by having to explain what I'm trying to say in Turkish to someone who doesn't speak English well (like our teachers and Turkish language partners). The good news is that by recognizing this fact, I can also recognize that I already have relevant skills. I can take a step back, take a few breaths, let other people talk, and then try again.

I also can recognize that being far more frustrated and exhausted by ordinary mishaps (not having internet access, losing track of friend on the way to lunch, accidentally deleting the text I was writing on the flip phones) is in part a result of having less mental energy. I can acknowledge that the task I have set out to achieve – improving my ability to understand and speak in Turkish – is a difficult one. I can have compassion with myself when I feel I am less zen about everyday life here than in India, which by most measures was a considerably more difficult situation.