Hungry planet; Turkey

 I had a presentation of a chapter of Turkish Family in Hungry Planet in English class.

First of all, I will show some Turkish food culture.

General cuisine culture;

Food in Turkey is embedded deep in the fabric of  society.

Mealtime in Turkey is a social occasion relished by everyone involved.

Today, most families eat three meals a day; breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

The breakfasts are delicious but quick and basic during the weekdays.

On weekends, however, breakfast is an occasion for the whole family to come together and enjoy many different foods.

As a result, weekend breakfasts generally last longer than weekday ones.

Lunches are heavier than breakfasts but less elaborate than dinners.

Finally, there is “yatsilik”.

This unofficial meal is taken around 10 pm and consists of nuts like almonds, roasted pumpkin seeds, walnuts, hazelnuts, roasted chickpeas, and pistachios.

There are also fresh and dried fruits, including figs, dried plums, and dried figs.

These are served with black Turkish tea.

This time, I focused on one Turkish family.

Family members;

• Mehmet; husband, factory worker
• Melahat; wife, clean other people’s home
• Habibe; Melahat’s mother
• Aykut; 8-year-old son
• Metin; 16-year-old son
• Semra; 15-year-old daughter

Melahat prepared sigara boregi, a favorite family dish, crispy Turkish cheese rolls.

It took about two hours to prepare this dish and she always cook these same foods after she had a long day at work.

When Melaht is away, her sister Done or Habibe prepare the dish.

The list of menu;

• Homemade lentil or tomato soup
• Rice soup
• Dolma (chopped spiced meat wrapped in grape leaves)
• Spinach
• Eggplant
• Zucchini
• Rice
• Black cabbage
• Occasionally a fish or meat dish like yahni (lamb with onions and potato)

Sigara boregi

Dolma

Yahni

And their one week’s food in January;

• Grains & other starchy foods (bread, potatoes, rice and etc.)
• Dairy (yogurt, feta cheese, milk and etc.)
• Meat, fish & eggs 
• Fruits, vegetables & nuts
• Condiments (sunflower, jam, honey and etc.)
• Snacks & desserts
• Prepared food
• Homemade food
• Beverages
• Miscellaneous (cigarettes and bird food)

World Food Day; Ukraine

 In our English class, I searched what happening in Ukraine for World Food Day presentation.

The Russian-Ukraine war has prompted workplace closures, and restrictions on production and trade thus having cascading effects on economic activity, food prices, and employment.

In addition, Ukrainians suffer from challenges such as limited access to fresh water, poor sanitation, and disruption of stable food supply.

The scarcity of food in some parts of Ukraine greatly affects the livelihood of Ukrainians.

Most of the energy for agricultural production including fuels, electricity, fertilizers, pesticides, and lubricants is reallocated into military use, thus rendering the people unable to produce enough food and thus subjecting people to malnutrition.

The World Food Program (WFP) started implementing the plan to assist with food insecurity in Ukraine.

Following the official request from Ukraine, WFP has launched an operation aimed at providing food to the ones that flee from conflicts inside Ukraine.

Priority actions intended at averting the food security crises include conducting a rapid food security assessment to better estimate needs; mobilizing food security assistance; providing hot meals in collective centers; distributing emergency food kits; and delivering agricultural inputs including vegetable garden seeds.

However, challenges arise in the implementation of the program.

To begin with, the fact that Ukraine has been one of the bigger global food suppliers and Ukraine’s nearby countries depend on the wheat supply from. Ukraine.

The conflict has then put these countries at food insecurity that could otherwise help fleeing individuals.

Second, there has been a global increase in acute food insecurity, that raised from 135 to 276 million since 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The pandemic has been mentioned to be among the causes of food insecurity among western Ukraines in 2021.

It is a recommendation that, in the implementation of the WFP wonderful operation, paying attention to the global details on food insecurity. 

Poetry presentation; The Emperor of Ice-Cream

 Last week, I had a second poetry presentation in our English class.

This time I chose “The Emperor of Ice-Cream” by Wallace Stevens.

  

He was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, on October2, 1879.

He attended Harvard University as an undergraduate from 1897 to 1900.

After working briefly as a reporter for the New York Herald Times, he decided to study law.

He graduated with a degree from New York Law School in 1903 and was admitted to the bar the following year.

He practiced law in New York City until 1916 and he was also. Part of New York’s literary community.

Steven’s moved to Connecticut in 1916, having found employment at the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Co., where he became vice president in 1934.

He died in Hartford, Connecticut, on August 2, 1955.

Here is the poem

 

I will introduce the setting of the poem.

The time is early 20th century and the place is the residence of a deceased woman in American city.

I think the speaker is not in the wake, he is more like omniscient perspective.

In the poem,  the speaker tells what will happen before and after the wake.

An old woman has died, and in the first stanza the speaker issues instructions to others for the wake.

In the second stanza, the speaker appears to be in a quieter room with the woman’s cold and dead body.

The visitors will occupy themselves mainly with socializing and having fun, not with mourning her death.

I found two poetry expressions.

First, I found alliteration in this poem.

Alliteration is the repetition of the same or similar sounds at the beginning of words.

• In Kitchen cups concupiscent curds
• Dresser of deal
• Her horny
• Let the lamp

I also found couplet which is a pair of lines with end rhyme.

The meter of the poem varies.

The last two lines of stanzas 1 and 2 each form a couplet, and the last line of second stanza repeats the last line of the first.

Analysis;

In this poem, the speaker seems to tell us that everyone shouldn’t do anything that would obscure reality and goon acting as they always have.

The woman will near everyday clothes and the boys will bring flowers wrapped in old newspapers.

Even though it is a wake, people will use the occasion to socialize and enjoy “concupiscent curds”, not pretending to mourn.

As for the deceased woman, let her be as she is now, not cover her cold feet with a sheet.

“Let the lamp affix its beam” means focus on life not death.

I think that “the emperor of Ice-Cream”is a symbol of death.

It’s said the only emperor is the emperor of  ice cream, it means only he is a ruler of the world.

We can’t hide away or avoid death in our life.

So the theme of this poem is about life and death.