Tracing Places in Stories
On this year’s Story Day, where we focused on observing the influence of space/place on people, we toured around the Adana Clock Tower, a region we had never visited before. After a 5-10 minute walk, we sat around a long table inside the warm and historic atmosphere of Ramazanoğlu Medresse, our first stop, and had conversations accompanied by a hot glass of tea and simit. We talked about life and people, with the central theme of place, sharing different thoughts while enjoying intellectual conversations. We were then seperated into small groups and started communicating with random people, making observations, trying to understand them. In this wide array of interactions with a marbling artist, a tailor, the owner of a toast shop, a mobile fruit vendor, what we heard from our elders sometimes entertained us, sometimes surprised, and sometimes made us sad. We saw that the tailor represented a now-disappearing profession, while the marbling artist complained about having to work in a tiny space and under insufficient light. What we felt was their desire to speak about all aspects of their profession, including the challenges and the misconceptions... Despite these, they all greeted us with a smile. The toast vendor offered us toast that he made, and the tailor served us tea that he had boiled on his burner. This delightful field trip, where Mr. Önder Şit, the chair of the Turkish Language and Literature Department guided us, was made more colorful with friends and ended with enjoyable conversations over lunch.