Arriving

We have been here a week and so far nothing seems different because we come here every summer.  Our flight went much better than I expected.  The check-in line was crazy slow, and they charged me $80 because one of our bags was 4 pounds over (actually, all three were but they only charged me for one), but Nehir was very well behaved and that helped a lot.  Once we were on the plane Nehir was very sweet, although he only slept for four or five hours, and Taylan was sleeping the whole time.  There were two nice women nearby who helped me with Taylan when I needed to move him off my lap for various reasons.  Selcuk met us in the airport in Istanbul so everything was fine after that.

We were in Istanbul for a day before we flew to Izmir where a family friend picked us up and drove us to our summer house in Guzel Camli (pronounced Jahmly), it means beautiful pine trees.  I felt very happy to be back in Turkey.  The house is really pretty now, the trees have gotten bigger and the house is more organized, pretty, and comfortable.  Nehir was very happy to be back.  He was clearly awash in memories; he wanted BabaAnne to make him eggs and feed them to him on little pieces of bread just like she used to when he was a baby, he was thrilled to see the other kids who live here, and he spent quite a while going through the toys we keep for him here.  Taylan was more cranky than usual and kind of clingy, but still cute.  

The past three days have been a bit challenging.  Nehir was playing with a ten year-old who has a personal playstation.  He kept telling Nehir that he would let him play with it, and then making excuses not to.  Meanwhile, he would let his little cousin play with it, clearly to make Nehir upset.  He would also manipulate Nehir into doing things for him and Nehir would do them hoping he would get to play the $@#*! game.  Anyway, after two tearful breakdowns during which we tried to explain to Nehir why that kid is not a good friend and urged him to play with other kids, we finally had to make two rules: he can't play at that kid's house, and he can't play the PCP even if the kid offers it.  Nehir was a total wreck after this.  He clearly thought we were horrible parents because it seemed like he was being punished when he already felt terribly sad about the game.  Oh well.  I noticed (again) my tendency to crumble when Nehir seems sad.  I started feeling like maybe we should just get him one since "all the other kids have one."  I hate feeling like Nehir feels deprived even though he is not deprived in the slightest.  Selcuk is much less of a push-over so he was able to remind me of why we don't want that kind of game in our house.  Anyway, Nehir seems to have recovered from the game torment, although it is difficult because the other kid's house is joined to ours and so he sees and hears him all the time.  He has been pretty ornery and rude since then.  This makes me really frustrated and I feel very mad at him when he is rude.  I really struggle with Nehir sometimes, oh well, I just keep trying to do better.