Weeks 11-12:
These weeks I learned how to say different countries in Turkish, as well as the languages associated with those countries and their respective nationalities. To say nationalities, you can usually add on the ending -li or -lı (matching with vowel harmony, of course) to the country to say a person's nationality. This ending indicates that you are "from" this country. Similarly, languages are usually the shorter version of the nationality with -ca, -ce, -ça or -çe added onto the end. I also learned how to say myself, yourself, etc. and all of us/you/them in Turkish using the words "kendi-"and "hep-" respectively and tacking on the appropriate suffixes. This was pretty difficult for me to keep straight, even though everything about these words just required the same grammar rules I've been using. At the end of these weeks, Merve and I went over the accusative case (this case allows us to tell the difference between saying I am reading a book and I am reading the book; it indicates specificity for objects in a sentence).
Weeks 13-15:
At the beginning of these weeks I talked to Merve about the culture and history of the Grand Bazaar to help plan my final presentation. It was interesting to hear what Merve had to say about the Grand Bazaar because a lot of the information I was able to research was more focused on its history or tailored to tourists.
Telling time in Turkish is a lot more complicated than in English. Parts of it remind me of how to tell time in French, but more difficult. Like French, minutes that are between 31 and 59 are subtracted from the closest hour, so an approximate translation of 4:43 in Turkish would be "17 minutes until 5." Depending on if the minutes are before or after the hour emphasized, different vowel harmonies of the hour value have to be used. There are also different words for conveying "it is ___ o'clock" versus "... at ___ o'clock" that must be included (and saying "at" for time does not always match the locative case rules). I also learned words for the days of the week, months, and seasons. Interestingly, spring (ilkbahar) and fall (sonbahar) are almost the same word. "Bahar" means spring and can be used to indicate the spring season, but the prefix "ilk-" means "before" and "son-" means "after," which suggests the similarities between spring and fall weather. In the last couple of weeks, I learned about different Turkish holidays (Ramadan, a holiday for children, the Republic Day of Turkey, etc.), as well as other holidays that we also celebrate in the U.S. (Mother's/Father's Day, anniversaries, birthdays, Valentine's Day, etc.). I also learned how to use the words "before/after" and "since/for (a time/time period)." To use the word "after," you have to use past tense for verbs, so Merve also gave me a glimpse of how to use the simple past tense in Turkish.
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