I'm back from the dead!
I joined a German Research group (three engineers: Dominik, Lars, and Tobias, and a sociologist: Elke) in Antakya for two weeks and it was great. With the help of the local university (Mustafa Kemal Universitesi) professors and students we mapped all the buildings in the city. Antakya is a city of about 140,000 people and 28,000 buildings located in the SE of Turkey near the border with Syria. The town was great, the engineers/professors/students/sociologist were great, the food was great, and the weather was even warm and steamy - the way I like it.
In fact the people were so nice that while mapping the buildings we were constantly meet with invitations for tea and coffee. If we had accepted them all, we would have gotten nothing accomplished. When we began mapping the old section of the city, the people started to bring us bread, coffee, and tea into the streets. There is no way you can turn down a Turkish woman carrying a tray of tea!!! I think it was one of these food items that got me sick. It was the worst case of food poisoning I have ever had! That night I skipped dinner to sleep and I must have had a fever because I couldn't get warm. I turned off the A/C and then slept in pajamas, two pairs of socks, and a sweater, all under the covers.
I was so sick I didn't even want to get up to answer the door. I gave the other engineers the key to my room and let them check on me every once in a while. I must have looked pretty bad, because they brought a doctor to my room the next day. She was a wonderful doctor and the wife of one of the professors. Unfortunately she only spoke Turkish. Her husband spoke Turkish and German and then Dominik translated from German to English. So it required 4 people in the room to translate all the details of my diarrhea.
After a day and a half of only eating bananas and boiled potatoes I thought I was strong enough to go to a restaurant and get some real food. I was wrong! We arrived at the ground floor of the restaurant where you pick out your food. Then you go up-stairs (better breeze and view) and they bring the food up to you. We were picking out our meals when I started to feel weak. Tobias saw that I wasn't feeling well, and we decided to go upstairs and sit down. We were upstairs and I could see the table. Then the distance to the table grew and my vision started to go black.
The next thing I knew, I woke up starring at my feet which were in the air. I was downstairs laying on a table and everyone was around me with cold rags and such. Apparently Tobias caught me before I hit the ground and Dominik carried me downstairs. Then Lars retrieved the car and withing 4 minutes I was back in my hotel bed.
I have made a near full recovery since then. I stayed an extra day in Antakya after the other engineers returned home, to make sure my digestive track was ready for a 10 hour bus ride. I spent the day with Elke, who is staying a week longer. We shopped for scarves and drove along the coast.
I'm back in Ankara now and two weeks behind in my Turkish homework. I will post some pictures of Antakya but many of the pictures I took are mixed in with the pictures of the buildings we were mapping. When the guys in Germany sort them, they will send them to me and then I'll post them.
In fact the people were so nice that while mapping the buildings we were constantly meet with invitations for tea and coffee. If we had accepted them all, we would have gotten nothing accomplished. When we began mapping the old section of the city, the people started to bring us bread, coffee, and tea into the streets. There is no way you can turn down a Turkish woman carrying a tray of tea!!! I think it was one of these food items that got me sick. It was the worst case of food poisoning I have ever had! That night I skipped dinner to sleep and I must have had a fever because I couldn't get warm. I turned off the A/C and then slept in pajamas, two pairs of socks, and a sweater, all under the covers.
I was so sick I didn't even want to get up to answer the door. I gave the other engineers the key to my room and let them check on me every once in a while. I must have looked pretty bad, because they brought a doctor to my room the next day. She was a wonderful doctor and the wife of one of the professors. Unfortunately she only spoke Turkish. Her husband spoke Turkish and German and then Dominik translated from German to English. So it required 4 people in the room to translate all the details of my diarrhea.
After a day and a half of only eating bananas and boiled potatoes I thought I was strong enough to go to a restaurant and get some real food. I was wrong! We arrived at the ground floor of the restaurant where you pick out your food. Then you go up-stairs (better breeze and view) and they bring the food up to you. We were picking out our meals when I started to feel weak. Tobias saw that I wasn't feeling well, and we decided to go upstairs and sit down. We were upstairs and I could see the table. Then the distance to the table grew and my vision started to go black.
The next thing I knew, I woke up starring at my feet which were in the air. I was downstairs laying on a table and everyone was around me with cold rags and such. Apparently Tobias caught me before I hit the ground and Dominik carried me downstairs. Then Lars retrieved the car and withing 4 minutes I was back in my hotel bed.
I have made a near full recovery since then. I stayed an extra day in Antakya after the other engineers returned home, to make sure my digestive track was ready for a 10 hour bus ride. I spent the day with Elke, who is staying a week longer. We shopped for scarves and drove along the coast.
I'm back in Ankara now and two weeks behind in my Turkish homework. I will post some pictures of Antakya but many of the pictures I took are mixed in with the pictures of the buildings we were mapping. When the guys in Germany sort them, they will send them to me and then I'll post them.
posted by Lisa at 10:47 AM
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