Funda.. please learn from me :0)

It was one Sapanca day... whenever there r kids, among the safest menu (among the BBQ meat/chicken or other normal menu) has been and will always be köfte (meatball)...

It was dinner time. As usual, the kids ate first...Upon seeing the köfte, the kids shrieked in happiness. They were saying something like,

*the köfte is so cute*...

Zeynep (selim n funda's daughter) in particular loved the taste and shape of the kofte.

She asked her mom...

*anne, bu köfte çok guzel. kim yaptı?*
(mom, this meatball is very good. who prepared it?)

Funda replied,

*simah teyze yaptı*
(auntie simah prepared it)

Zeynep continued...

*anne, simah teyze dan tarif alır mısın?*
(mother, can u get the recipe from auntie simah?)

Funda trying to hold a straight face, as i was holding my laughter,...funda calmly answered..

*tamam zeynep*
(i will zeynep)


coz the köfte in question was actually the ready made köfte in which all i needed to do was to just cook it on the pan! hahahahahahahaha...


Oh yeah funda... LEARN THE RECİPE PLS! *wink*

Pınar deep frozen köfte... the perfect köfte when u dont feel like preparing ur own köfte heheh..

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Last Weekend..

Oh dear.. it was not intention to let the sad entry (my previous entry) hanging like that for long. i was planning to update with a much happier note almost immediately.. but then, things just got in the way.. and before i knew it.. it was time to again pack our bags and start our journey to u know where :0)

Baby brother all ready to jump..

From the balcony..big brother all ready and excited as well...

and so..the JUMP! Splash!

Baba's new method of not getting tired while swimming..He is 80 plus u know :0)

Situation 1

There we were eating breakfast... and baba was saying...

*everytime u all enter the pool, u should read Al fatihah for ur dear anne (mother). She was the one who insisted that i built the pool at the Sapanca house.

Situation 2

As observed by funda

There we were at the Kırkpınar football field, Zeynep and hatice made friends with this one girl..and the girl was saying something like...

*i have seen a swimming pool but i have never been into one*

Hatice and Zeynep was shocked..it never crossed their mind that other people have never been into a swimming pool...

But then... that is the reality... i mean our children..and ourselves (myself included), we should count our blessings... whenever we feel like jumping into the pool, we go to the sapanca house.. and basically each family in the zaim family, every year, do go for a holiday somewhere to places with pools and beaches... the kids for example never stop to think that there r people who do not do as what they do.. or may have the opportunity...

Looking at myself... i grew up in islands (first penang n then langkawi).. true.. i went to the beaches... but did i ever learn to swim? No. when was the first time i entered a pool? that would be while i was in PPP doing my matriculation (tertiary education).. it was then i started to get used to a pool.. and when did i ever learn to swim? in sapanca!

Everything is a matter of the culture one live in...well at least in my family.. going to holidays or going into the pool is not something we do (come on..we already lived in holiday islands hehe).. and to try to learn swimming with all the waves in the sea? u have got to be kidding!! i would be scared :0) i wouldnt wanna learn even if my dad forced me..

My kids... if they had lived in Malaysia... they would have had the same fate as mine..unless of course if i marry a rich guy wth a pool in front of the house (which i doubt)..instead... living in another family culture...hatice and baddin have been into a pool year in and year out every summer...splashing themselves to their hearts' content......

Everybody in the family learns to swim... last year, hatice started to swim wonderfully...and this year baddin too... if the family culture is not into swimming, hatice wouldnt have been able to be motivated enough and dived from one end of the pool to the other end (22.5 metres in length).. and baddin wouldnt be able to touch the 2 metres depth of the pool...at such young age, they have learnt to swim..am i proud of them.. Alhamdulillah for their achievement.. and can bet i am proud of them :0)

it is interesting isnt it how a different family culture produces a different perspective in one child?

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And this weekend, selim and family and kerim (baba n mıstık of course) were in Sapanca... I dunno who enjoyed sapanca most really... was it the 4 truly young kids who had spent time with each other from the moment they woke up till the moment they sleep harmoniously (i mean come on.. 4 kids and a harmonious life for 3 days?? but they were harmonious!! it was a miracle!)....and they still couldnt get enough of each other hehehehe

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or was it the 3 siblings (not young at all) who chatted...all day long into late mornings....splashed themselves into the pool and played football till they sweated as if they just took a bath....??

The rest r still there in Sapanca but halil n i n the kidshave returned home last nite...and i.. from 10am till 3pm.. hatice, baddin and i were on our feet from one place to another..trying to finish some chores needed to be done outside! ...Penatt......Here r some of the photos i snapped... not much i am afraid.. i was lazy to play with my camera this time... after all... Funda, the zaim family photographer was there! *wink*

Zeynep's first büyük tür (funda.. kalan reimler emaile göndericeğim sonra)

3 siblings all hot n sweaty

Funda, selim n kerim

Halil n the kids

4 kids who had spent three days together with the most minimal fights (this time around)
(p.s.. hatice has got a new haircut )

Zeynep

Baddin n Elo

Hatice

Like i told Funda, i will put all the sapanca pictures this summer all in one go later whenever i have the time... i promise... i just dont have much breathing space right now...

Forgive me if i am as slow as a snail dalam blog hopping.. tak sempattt...off i go again to my chores (dah pukul 5pm..tak masak lagi! hahahah) kang laki kebuluran kang! muah! missed u guys! and for the unanswered emails... sori sori sori.. tak sempattttttt

Thank You for hopping by...Hope to see u again the next time..

Sapanca 3

Well... if u wanna see more pictures of these plump voluptious sweet black pearly wild berries... please... do hop to

http://www.haticeveokul.blogspot.com/

*hugs*

I really am glad to be home...i have missed u guys!

What happened after my last entry?? did i go to sapanca...??? Well... That friday, the hot news from Sapanca was the fridge was broken...it was not working.. the repairman would only come the next day (saturday)...so what to do?

I was in no mood to go definitely.. i mean come on.... no fridge???? all my life i cannot live without the luxury of a fridge (BUT HOW DO THE OLDER GENERATİON LİVE WİTHOUT FRİDGE::any idea?)..

Ok..ok..call me a spolit brat..but that is God's truth.. Sapanca without a fridge was not inviting at all...Furthermore, i had tons of things to do at home.. the clothes had not been ironed... the house needed to be tidied up vacuumed... I worked out all my energy that day till i was almost drop dead..still not in the mood to go to Sapanca..in fact wishing that by the time halil came back from his night lecture that nite (10.30pm) , he too would see my point...BUT MEşelar were already there...n hatice n baddin were looking at me pleadingly... saying that they had missed sapanca very much n the pool was inviting to the max in contrast to the istanbul heat....

And at 11 plus pm... after dinner...we all packed out bags n left our home...

Of course what we didnt know was... what meşe didnt tell us was... the other * better working tv* was dead as well.. the *old.. very hard to watch tv* was back on...huwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

Saturday was a gloomy day as well for me n meşe... we didnt know what to do... the thing is... if the fridge could not be fixed, we would all return to istanbul on Sunday... and well..well.. what do u know? we waited for the fridge repair man to come.... they said they would come in the morning... noon passed... still no news....

Meşe and i was in dilemma... what were we supposed to do? Bengong ja we all.. what do we cook? but no fridge... how much should we cook? should we go shopping for the veggies etc..etc..the supermarket etc..etc...

we were both at loss on what to do...

I for one didnt bring too many clothing for all of us.. i was very confident that we would all be returning to istanbul the next day.. i was hoping for it too coz frankly speaking... with no fridge.. and no halil (he was planning to return to istanbul on monday)... there was no point in staying... we couldnt keep the yogurt or the milk or cheeses in the *dead* fridge... it was not logical to stay..

it was after 3.30pm that a guy came... he told us that to fix the fridge would cost a lot of money and to buy a new fridge was a better choice...we all discussed the matter with baba... (i was hoping he would say get the fridge fixed... then we would be returning to istanbul heheheh)...

but of course, baba is brighter than i.. he wanted to stay in sapanca for that one week...(if he stayed, i have to stay as well)..and so in the end... he instructed all the children to go down to sapanca town n buy a new fridge! hehehehe and so this is the story of how i stayed in Sapanca for 10 days this third time around...

I melompat mcm budak budak tau bila fridge tu sampai hehehe memang rasa nak balik istanbul tapi bila sampai ja fridge baru tu seronok pulak rasa..so terubat jugak la hati sebab tak boleh balik istanbul ikut halil....shhhh.... jgn citer kat sesapa tau heheheh

The dead fridge with mıstık n safa

(av revoir)


the new fridge with some of baba's grandchildren posing with it...it is bigger of course... we had to move the new fridge to the living room instead of putting it inside the kitchen......

And guess what? my ginger (zencefil) plant is alive!! i thought it wouldnt be alive but it did!..


i just pray that it will be able to withstand the harsh sapanca winter...we will see... if it is alive next summer, i will get my own fresh ginger right from sapanca's garden :0)


weiiii.. mana ada pokok ginger kat turki oo... kalau mau carik halia kena pi beli kat carrefour...
tu pun dah lama..tak fresh..



A lot of interesting things had happened... i wont bore u all with them :0).. but i will bore u for sure with these pictures.... for the first time ever,my kids have abandoned being beautiful n handsome in front of the camera... and they have decided to ACT LİKE A KİD!


so here r my kids ...

ok..now that i am back home..time to do the laundry..ironing ..bills payment..etc...etc...etc... the house fridge is bare even! off i go!

Thank You for hopping by...Hope to see u again the next time..

The bee..

Staying in Sapanca meant having to co habit with nature.. to be able to enjoy the green life has to offer.. the birds chirping to different sounds.. the squirrels stealing the hazelnuts from the trees...the mosquitoes.. the bees...the lot..

It was the bees of Sapanca that actually caught my attention... they r no human shy definitely... i can still remember how many of them (as well as other flying insects) shared our swimming pool to cool down their body from the heat of the day (and most probably drowned themselves n it).. or how many times the bees flew above our heads while we were in the pool that more often than not, baddin or hatice or i kept having to shriek *duck into the water* in turkish....

but it was with great suprise that i discover that everytime it was lunchtime..everytime i tried to feed my kids... a bee would without fail fly around us.. not to bite as bees normally would.. but just to hang around...was it the fresh fruit cocktail that i always feed my kids attracted the bee? it is possible... in fact, that was what i thought until...as one day as i was feeding baddin soup... this one bee flew right into baddin's bowl of soup !! hahahahah

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