I had a bed.In the middle of the night, Mustafa's oldest son, who was in his late teens, returned to
find me in his bed. Embarrassed, he politely excused himself. They were all very polite.
To the right you see Mustafa in the 'courtyard' between the room and the street. Below that, you see the kitchen, which was basically a porch.
To the bottom-left you see Mehmet-Ali saluting me. He liked doing that a lot(strange kid)
while standing in front of my 'bedroom' as Mommy watches.
Then you see the
happy couple.
The amazing thing to me was the deplorable standard of living which was everyday life to this family, yet they made no apologies and no complaints. They seemed as happy as any middle-class family in the U.S. who lived in luxury by comparison. I was very impressed by the humility and hospitality of this family.
Mustafa and I packed into
the Del Mouche that morning and headed back to Incirlik where I welcomed my
cozy tent. I'd not brought any contact lens cleaning fluid to Mustafa's place, so I had to pry my dry contact lenses off my eyeballs. Then I worked on my puzzle ring for three hours and finally...finally figured how to take it apart and put it back together again! I ran out of my tent and told Mustafa (attending to his duties in tent city). He gave me a high-five!