Also, what I did was displaying all my housewife skills. I washed the flat, I washed our clothes, towels and bed linens, I tidied (it seems like the people who lived there died and the relatives has not thrown out all their junk...I think I found a hundred ice cream sticks just thrown into a cuppord), I washed up, made dinner and cakes....and I absolutely loved doing all of it. I felt like the super house wife; doing housework while my man was working AND then come to his work studying myself, swimming in the ocean and even having a social life too! I am not that organized at home, well, in my other home, that is. I think, besides of me having less obligations on Turkey, it is because it is a fresh start. I hope it can inspire me to live a simpler life in Norway, too!
I noticed he was much busier and also more tired this time. I have come when he has been working before, but the other times it was less busy and he could attend to me more. This stay I actually caught myself getting envious of his guests! Of course, that is no way to go about things. It will do me no good to encaurage his to come to me when he is genuinly busy. I just have to get more busy myself; study harder, get friends to talk to, and consentrate on our time in the evenings (and possably mornings). I don't want to be the whiny gf with no understanding for his plights ... Next time I come (for 3 weeks in July), I imagine he will run around even more, and I must be prepared for that. If he has time, he will give me attention at the beach, but he is paid to work. What is cute, he likes to be the one to take my order, even if he sends other guys to deliver them. He wants to be sure I get my 30 % discount (they actually have a set girlfriend discount!), as well as sneaking in small orders I am not charged for. Also, he likes to take the ice buckets and splash icy water down my back - which is actually very pleasant, given the temperature that is already rising! When he does come by, I am so happy, especially when he flirts or sends proud messages to others that I am his gf
I got to know more of his friends and "family". I get along well with his best friend, and this time I also got to meet his pregnant fiance (who actually lives in my city in Norway, a 15 min bus ride from where I live). She was nice and I appreciated that she wanted to meet me even though she has some pregnancy pains. The other people I got to know, was the bartender and his Russian gf - they are getting married this September. The Russian gf is moving to Turkey after the wedding and I am slightly envious of her, about both the wedding and the moving. They are all very nice people. Also, I met one of his faviourite guests at the beach; a couple from my country. Middle-aged women tend to adore SO, and she was no exeption. She was really helpful in my two projects which is getting to learn Turkish and also getting to know the town and the people in in. I got lots of ideas of books to buy, movies to see and what to do. She liked me so much, she even took my picture, and I got a bit weary that we had not been explict about the polyamory part of our relationship. I am getting more and more like I want to tell people (and me and my husband start to do more and more back in Norway, and also SO is open with his colleagues).
There was a dispute at his work, one of his new co-workers did not like being teased with, and I got dragged into it. I have to figure out a way to make this guy not feel so bad, I regret my role in all of it, even though his annoys me a bit it is sad to see him like that. He really does not understand the joking relationship (and possably the pecking order) of the guys there (and in this, I am "the guys", but I think I also hurt his feelings because I am a girl and he possably was a bit interested in me). My idea about this is I will ask Neco to have him serve me, and that way I can try to compliment him a bit and then restore som faith between us without it turning into a big thing. *Don't want people to dislike me for no reason*
I FINALLY met his other best friend, a women from my country. There is nothing romantic between them, she is very protective of him like a big sister - and she does not like me at all. Rather, she does not like the nature of our relationship. I think she belives I should divorce my husband to be with Neco, which is about the same as he herself did. She is married to a Turk, not a former colleage of Neco, but he is from the service industry too. They live together in Norway and he is trying to learn Norwegian. Well, I sensed a bit of chill on her part (her husband was sweet enough, but she kept picking small fights with him, which I found odd), but we mangaged to stay civil the whole time, I even understood why he likes her, she is charming and smart. Actually, SO was the more agresssive, he was constantly teasing her for her smoking (which is odd since he is a smoker himself) and I ended up defending her! I was so happy he obviously took my/our side with everything. She did not say hi to me on the beach later on, which hurt a bit, but at least I met her and I was nice to her, which SO could see for himself. He kept repeating to me that she should respect our relationship and respect his choices. I think if I meet her another time, I will try to explain a bit more about our relationship, but this time if was enough just to meet her and get to know her a bit. It is hard to feel her hostility, too, when I am only trying to make her friend happy. I wish no bad on her. If I get SO to Norway, I will arrange so that we all can meet here. I mean, it is a bit like living with relatives - good friends ARE like family. I will never ask him to choose between us. But I can't describe how happy it makes me to hear SO describe how she angers him! I feel he is protecting us.
I am trying to get SO to reduce the smoking. I am buying him electronical cigarettes, which I think he replaced about half his cigarettes with. They send the filters to me in the mail, and I bring them when I go to see him. It is far easier than having it sent to Turkey. I hope he will manage to reduce his smoking. I sometimes worry for his health. He seems more tired than he did last year (as does his friend, by the way - I don't think they will last more than one or two seasons at the beach, as this is already their seventh year and they are the oldest ones working there). I want to help him to find ways to keep fit and relax. He stopped going to the gym, saying he did not really like it anyway, which is fine by me, but I want him to find something else to do.
I was very surprised to learn that his best friend has not learned any Turkish beyond what is useful to know in a bar - no wonder she does not like to hang with the in-laws! BTW the pregnant woman hardly knows any Turkish either. I was very surprised, I thought I was far behind in the language department. They have had Turkish boyfriends for 5-6 years. I don't know that much myself yet after 8 months, but I am slowly learning little by little. I have Babbel.com, I use an app to look up words, I will try out different books/cds, also in September I will attend a language course (my husband will perhaps join me)
SO has gotten the hang of making drinks with and without alcohol. He made me a strawberry daquarie, milkshake, the usual mojitoas (his signature drink) and some kind of wiskey drink I don't remember the name of. I hope when he is less tired we can cook together, too. Cooking with him is the best thing
You learn a lot about your partner when you live together. I found out some funny stuff, some neutral, some things that were not to my liking but I will not try to change them.... What I learned about the most, is how much he likes to stay at home. He is social, but like my husband in the past he is accustomed to make up lies to his friends... I told him, love, just tell them you are tired and we will go home early! The truth will go a long way. We originally agreed to take things slow, to not buy furniture (I brought almost nothing from my other flat), but now he bought a blender, he wants to buy a table, I get more and more the sense that he wants us to live together like this for a very long time, not just for the 6 months we signed up for with this flat. We seem so well suited for each other... We make each other laugh. I don't get tired of being with him. When small things annoy me, I just brush them away. I don't want to change him. I want him to have the freedom to be himself, and I can offer to help if he asks me for anything.
I have had so many "oh, is that how it is!" in regards to Turkey and the Turkish language. SO laughed so hard when he found out I hade eaten pieces of the Turkish sousage raw (like I would have done at home with our smoked or dried meat) - of course I tried to fry it like a normal Turk and it tasted so much better! I don't think I will ever get him or his family to like Norwegian smoked meat though, they will alway just try to fry it, haha! I learn so many new words, and I even dare to speak some of them. I bicycle all over town by myself, and go to all kinds of shops where I use a mix of English, Turkish and body language to get by. The last day (granted, I was pretty sun tanned by then) a woman in a souvinire shop even thought I was Turkish! I know because I understood her asking/implying in Turkish (now I am trying to learn how to say I am not Turkish, in Turkish!).
I went to a store that sold everything, looking for something for my hair, and I found that in between religious books for children, shampoo and copy paper, they were selling cheap, really good looking erotic garments (the stuff I seldom buy in Norway because they are expensive and only found in specialty stores). I found some stuff in my size, adding to my housewife skills with a little spice in the bedroom(s)! Nobody found my purchases any strange, but I felt funny and a bit embarressed buying them admist families with children. It is not even a tourist thing in a tourist town; I noticed even in his home town, you could get frilly red erotic garnments on the street corner, next to granny panties, olives and oranges. I find that even if commersials in my country are very sexualized, it is very much just a pose and people are kind of shy when it comes down to business, wheras here buying what even would be described as kinky stuff is more like just tending to your marriage (and the like).
I notice the longer I stay, the less I think like the independant Norwegian that has to fix all by herself. The longer I stay, the less I eat pork and the more I cover up, especially my shoulders (because of the sun, too, but also I feel too naked in a town where at least some women wear head scarves and most at least cover up a bit more than I am used to. I will gladly display skin in Norway, because at least in summer that is just "beeing one with nature". Here it is an uncomfortable sexual sign much more). I am delighted people drink herbal teas and eat herbs like the most natural thing (here it is more of a hippie choice to do so). The vegetables I love is commonplace here, like aubergine and mint. I can't find decent chocolate in Norway any more, it is like I don't bother if I can't have the Turkish ones.
It was my 2nd time of staying 7-8 days. Staying that long really is different! The other times I visited him, I have been aware the whole time of the number of days left. And when the time has come to leave, it has been so very sad. This time things were different for a number of reasons... First; a week feels like a "whole streatch of time", and we were able to find some routine (and discuss the things that did not work out so well). Second, he had no time whatsover to follow me to the airport and do the "goodbye" stuff. When I left, I got one kiss in the morning (still in bed) and one just before I went for my transfer bus, and that was it! I felt comforted that he had a lot to do, and that I left him behind in OUR flat, with my things beeing there with him in our bed. I know he will not change the bed linens until I come back, just to be able to smell me still... It was a good feeling to take my time considering what I would bring with me or leave behind there. My suitcase had olive body products (the local brand I love) and chocolate, but was 7 kilos lighter from the stuff I left behind. I find that I am sad in a different way - I am not sad to LEAVE him exctly, it is more a lingering sadness that we can't have longer stretches of everyday life together. I cried less on the plane. But today, when I stepped out of the tram on my way to my work, all of a sudden I heard in my head the familiar sound of INNA's "Endless" that I have heard many times on his cell phone's wake up alarm;
"Sometimes you go away
A million miles away
Sometimes you don't know where
Don't worry I'll be there..."
And I will just cry in the middle of the street, for like a minute, and then I will step inside the doors of work and just go on with my life here, with my boss, my husband, my friends and everything happening here, too