Photos from a Turkish Passover Seder

After literally a day of preparation and feeling the same nervous pressure my mother must have felt for years, I successfully put on a passover seder here in Turkey, cleaning the house and making dinner for everyone as well as leading the readings and remembering everything that goes on the seder plate. I had to learn a few Turkish words - Horse radish doesn't exist here (acı turp) so I had to go with the much milder arugula (roka), plus I learned cinnamon (tarçın) for the charoset. I made three new recipes for the first time: Matzoh, charoset, and sweet quince (ayva tatlısı), plus I made dolmas and potato latkes. Only 4 people came, but that made it much easier to feed everyone. And there were no leftovers! Now I feel like I can do anything.


Calloway (Rosie's dad), Can, and Rosie with the food. Yes, Rosie's giving the cat bunny ears.


Here are some pictures of the event. Many of them were taken by the little girl, Rosie. It was a big day for her - today is also Children's Day in Turkey and there had been a big celebration at the school earlier, which I would've had to go to if it weren't for religious exception. Yippie!


Socrates's 4th glass of wine (photo by Rosie)



Too much wine for the cat!* (photo by Rosie)



Can and me (photo by Rosie)



A terribly ugly picture of me eating the afikomen with Can in the background (photo by Rosie)



Can holding Socrates while we open the door for Elijah (photo by Rosie)



Can holding Socrates, me partly off-camera eating the afikomen (photo by Rosie)



Rosie



Rosie and the cat



Rosie and Liza (her mother) reciting a poem about homes



The end of the seder with Can, me, and Liza (photo by Rosie)



Calloway (Rosie's dad) and Rosie next to the food tables. Calloway had hurt his back, so he sat on the couch. Check out how I packed the little tables I have with as much food as I possibly could! The afikomen is wrapped in a pillowcase... many of the dishes belong to my neighbor including all the wine glasses... I'm using the little ledge on my balcony as refrigeration space... but I think one of the most exciting things about passover is that you're not supposed to get everything perfect, but you do as much as you can with what you've got. That's the challenge of hosting a seder in a foreign land!



Rosie


P.S. As I've just discovered, my blog is no longer censored! I guess the government figured I wasn't attracting too much rebellious attention... Anyway, my site is back on the air for the Turkish people! Yet I still don't have internet at my apartment (I'm writing this from school), so I still won't be able to update regularly and enjoy my uncensored-ship. Maybe I should get an intern to do it for me...

*No cats were harmed in the making of these pictures. We didn't actually give him wine...