my turn with the liver doctor...

So today A took me to the dr. I've developed a cough after having a tickle in my throat for 10 days, and some lung pain for the past 2 days. We decided it was best to take me to the dr. before my trip to CHI-15 hours of travel and going to a much colder climate would definitely make this worse. Since I don't have health insurance and dr's & meds are cheaper here, best to go today.

I figure its my yearly deep chest cold with hints of bronchitis.

So we go to the dr. He does the usual, look in the throat, listen to breathing, feel my tummy area...Then orders bloodwork. I get pricked. Then I get an x-ray of my lungs. At this point I'm a little worried...

The diagnosis: blood is fine. My lungs are being hurt by my liver. Bronchitis. Prescribes: an effervescent, a pill 2x a day, a syrup 3x a day.
The cost: meds total 11 Turkish Lira.
The dr.: 85 Turkish Lira.

I knew it was bronchial all along. Never before have I heard of bronchitis requiring blood work and an xray.

We've determined he is the Liver Doctor. He was absent for the rest of med school. All problems for him originate from the liver.
Bronchitis: liver.
Stress: liver.
Depression: liver.
Psychopathy: liver.
Marriage problems: liver.
Infertility: liver.
Erectile function: liver.
Miscarriage: liver.

After looking up A's "cold liver" diagnosis, yeah liver shit makes sense. Its hot or cold or not a problem. But for this man, everything revolves around the liver. Yes, its an important organ. It filters your blood. It regulates sugars. Its vital, I get it. I have a bronchial problem because I've been an avid smoker for over 10 years and weather changes from warm to cold make me a bit sick.

Next time I need a doctor here, I'm going somewhere else. At least he gave me the xray so I have a new picture to put on the wall in my computer room.

a little better

Yeah so today is a little better....

Super-A has been super-ill. We went to the doctor this week and he's on the road to feeling better. What we thought was a cold/flu last week is more serious than we thought. I'm not 100% clear on the diagnosis, but I understand the problem. A "cold liver". Don't even ask me to explain it. It will take a week of rest and injections for him to recover.

I'm feeling a bit better about it. This is the first time I've had to take care of someone who's sick all the time. I tend to be over-attentive. Its been really crazy to me to see how much him being sick affects me emotionally. I can't be an island...not that being an island was all that much fun either.

I'm taking a short break from paper writing at the moment. I feel much better now that I'm actually in the writing process. I just have to get this shit done. I think my words will flow a bit easier after this break, after this beer.

I'm really excited to come home next week. Super A mentioned that if he would have gotten the visa we both would be leaving tomorrow. I asked him not to talk about it. I can't put any more energy into thinking about that. I'm just really praying that things work out to bring him to the US on a spouse visa in a year...

I will be signing my contract for work in January. And then I will look for a better job. I made 1 teacher friend who is leaving the company in a month, she offered to introduce me to people she knows. We talked a bit about the company and unfortunately it isn't run as well as I hoped. Hopefully landing a decent job with a decent company won't be an insurmountable task. I can see how it could negatively impact my attitude towards being here, which directly impacts my relationship. I hate that nationality plays so much in personal relationships, especially being a student in Nationalism.

My lesson last night went well. It was a little rough though, we usually start at 7:15. At that time last night only 2 out of 7 students were there. 3 more came much later, 2 of which missed last week. So it was quite a task in changing the lesson plan momentarily and catching them up and keeping the others occupied and interested. We went over uses of "will" and "would " and "IF clauses" which is called something else in their book...discussing grammar and nit-picking it confuses the hell out of me, some of the students want a solid explanation for WHY it is as it is, and a formula. How the hell do I know??? Its friggin English, which doesn't make sense! I much prefer languages such as Japanese (written in Latin script), Serbo-Croat or Turkish that are 'newer' in the modern world. They make more sense. The way you see it is the way you say it. The letters don't change sounds. They also don't use personal pronouns.

I let them know that we are getting into particular grammatical details of the language, and 50% or more of native speakers say these things wrong. Good excuse, eh?

Tomorrow's lesson won't be so bad, and my private lesson on Saturday should go smoothly, considering this student wasn't there last night. So I can just catch him up.

I am hoping I can keep this class in January, at that time they will be on Level 7 of Business English. They're a great group, correcting each other and very willing and eager to speak. Regardless of my feelings about being a teacher, this should be very good for my CV. Impromptu teaching and presentations...

I guess I should go back to writing...

for dinner...

Tonight for dinner I made Cream of Tomato Soup from scratch, mmmmmmm yum! Canned soups are not found in these parts. The closest you get is a packet of powder that you add water to, and still no cream of tomato. I was proud of this accomplishment, Cream of Tomato Soup is probably my favorite, and I've been in a deficit for it for 3 months now. It wasn't appreciated by my dinner partner though.

I also made chicken in a mushroom sauce with rice. I think it turned out rather good, especially considering I didn't have a recipe and made it up as I went.

I spent 3 hours on Skype with Mom tonight, yay!!! So that's all you get tonight, my dinner update.

Double bonus!

So tonight was day #2 of teaching. It went well. I was a little nervous about teaching grammar though, since I don't really know it myself. Present Unreal Conditionals. HA! What the hell are those??? Luckily the teachers manual is well written, and my students are very familiar with English so I just kind of guided them along.

And they like me. They are very enthusiastic and easy to teach. They tend to ask a lot of personal questions though...

Starting Sunday I will be giving private lessons to one of the men. He's from Germany, here with his wife for his job. He requested me, he likes me so much. So that starts Sunday for 2 hours.

One of the other students said the class likes me because I smile :) and they like my teaching style. Kind of makes me chuckle, my teaching style...what is my teaching style? I just follow the manual...

The eldest person in the group is a Turkish man who has been retired for 2 years but is still working. He is the least talkative and I was worried on Tuesday about how to get him to participate. But he really opened up to me today, telling me about his sons (about to start college) and the jobs he's had, etc.

During the break he offered me a cigarette (a normal occurence in Turkey, even if you have them you take one when offered), and told me about the text message his wife sent him. When he found out that I am engaged to marry a Turkish man, he was very happy for me and told me of an expression said here,"You are our bride!"

Very sweet.

I was starving by the time we got home, Super-A really is super! He took me to work again today and waited for me to finish. The electricity was out when we came home, so we made dinner and ate by candlelight.

We were sitting on our new sofas, when he said I can store clothes under the sofa. I had no idea what he was talking about. Then he went over to the sofa and lifted up the bottom-WALAA! storage!
AND THEN showed me how each sofa folds out to a twin sized bed! WHAT???? I HAD NO IDEA!!!!
He thought I knew about it. Nope. Double-bonus, I knew we got a great deal on the sofas, and its even better that they are each a bed too!

So all in all, things are good. Since I'll be making $200 this month we weren't planning on having, we may go to the D.I.Y. store and buy a few decoration items to perk up the living room. Candle holders, a few small throw pillows, a plant....nice.

And tonight we have a new pirated DVD to watch he bought for 2 YTL (hopefully the whole movie is there and it really is in English).

I'm going to buy a few chocolate bars now and cuddle with my sweetie.

"Goal Driven Unsavoury Bitch" on the path (to my happy destiny)

I told work I'd be there at 10am. I got there at 10:35. No one noticed or cared. I watched videos for a few hours. I was sort of trained. I prepared a lesson plan. I practiced the lesson plan. The 36 hour training was cut down to 5. The training guy told me it was easier than he thought it would be to train me. I left at 4:50pm and A met me outside work. I ate a kebab. We went to the other center after being on the bus for over an hour. I taught 3 lessons to 6 students who are high level intermediate business English. I made it through all 3 lesson plans, as planned.

It was funny because one of the units was about marriage.
Of course at the end it comes up,"Are you married Rebecca?"
"No."
"But you're wearing a ring."
"I'm engaged."
Questions ensue. I laugh and say all of you who are married shouldn't scare me now!

Just a little ironic, since I told work when they interviewed me that I am not married or engaged. (I took off my ring.) I'm just not used to this "status" and definitely not used to being asked by employers about my status. I don't know this culture and the etiquette, but from what I've found not much is off limits when it comes to personal questions. I'm used to my business being just that-MY business. If I don't wanna tell you, then I won't.

We got on well and they like me (I heard them talking in the hallway after they left.
One student said,"She's great! Neomi, who's Neomi? ."
I don't think they could tell it was my first EVER class.

I'm tired. Super A took me to work today, walked around and met a friend, then took me to the next center and waited for me. Poor thing has a sore throat and the beginning of a cold from being outside so much today.

When I came home I heated up soup and made some pasta and then drank a beer.

So teaching 3 units at 40 minutes each, I made $33 today. OK, so the pay isn't great, but comparing it to my last real job making $14 an hour with HIGH stress, its a cake walk.

So I guess all of my language courses have paid off, hahaha.

Its a little bogus though because you don't get to take home any of the materials, which means you have to prepare lessons in the center. I think the center is a little disorganised in function, but whatever. I do tend to be a stickler for those things after having been an Admin Assistant for years. I want efficiency and flow.

Somehow this is on the path to my happy destiny. Hindsight is 20/20, the pieces fall into place when you look back on it all, right Mom????

I'm still not calling myself an English Teacher. God it sounds depressing. Call me a Consultant, an Analyst or an Expert. "Goal Driven Unsavoury Bitch" even sounds better than "English Teacher".

SURPRISE! work tomorrow!

I just got a call from the English school that I am due to start teaching at in January. He asked if I am still planning on working for them in January and when I am taking my holiday. I answered yes and gave him my trip dates. He then asked if I could start teaching 2 nights a week until I leave, Tuesdays and Thursdays. I replied yes. I go in tomorrow for a crash training day and then start tomorrow night! WHOA!

Its obvious one of their teachers quit unexpectedly and they're desperate. Well it will give me something to do to ease the boredom, that's for sure. Looks like the sleep schedule will have to work itself out now, haha. Having something else to do will also give me more motivation to get my thesis done.

So tomorrow will be a busy day! I go in at 10am for training then teach from 7-9:15pm. (Do you feel sorry for these students or what??) The lesson plans are prepared for each lesson, I just have to teach it. Although I have to travel to Taksim (1 hour by bus) for the morning, I will be teaching in the school branch that's a half hour (2 bs rides) from my house.

Well at least I come to the company's rescue, so I probably can't do all that bad...

saviour in computerland

Yesterday morning I had a not-so-fun-surprise with my computer. I turned it on and my entire Windows profile (desktop background, everything in My Docs) was gone. Yes, just gone. It looked like my computer had been hacked through the DSL port. I ran a few anti-virus and spyware programs. Didn't find anything. I defragmented the machine. I deleted unused programs. I spent hours tuning up the machine, and not really pissed off, but not happy about the situation. It seemed like a 'worm'-it gets in, does damage, and then destroys itself. The reason? To be mailicious.

Later A turned on the computer to watch a movie, and it was FINE! WHOA!

He just looks at me and says,"I have the magic touch."

what a headache

So LSE didn't post my exam results yet. Doesn't surprise me. I think its due to my extension. I'll just wait and find out, I'm not itchin' to know.

I had a killer headache for most of the day. It was so bad I couldn't read on the computer. I took some Tylenol and stayed in bed. Its kind of coming back now.

We went to an expat party last night. Super-A did not have a good time, which didn't surprise me. We was pretty good for it though, but did get a little bitchy once. I told him to shut up, it was the first time I've been here that there was something I really wanted to do. He doesn't have to go next time. I did see his jealous streak though . Told him to shove that too. The party wasn't that great, what a disappointment-drinks were way overpriced and we spent too much on the whole thing. It wasn't all too easy to talk to people either. Expat groups are really hard to find here. I just wanna make friends, not pay monthly dues!!!

Our living room furniture came on Friday, thanks Mom and Dad! I'll take pics of it soon and post.