(leer en español)
Hello friends,
the day began with Yüksel & Mustafa's arrival at home at 10:30 to takes us to the printing house where they will print the Book in order to choose the color, the quality of the paper and some other details.
We went with Mustafa's car, Eduardo, Yüksel, Judit & Peter. We spent some time crossing Ankara to finally reach this place where the publishing house was. We didn't even know in what part of Ankara we were at. After trying a little bit, Yüksel managed to pinpoint where the office of the publishing house was and we reached it after various turns in a kind of road inside the building. We were well received and Mustafa organized the space, moving a couch so that we could all sit in front of the desk of the person attending us.
It was not so easy explaining what we wanted but in the end it was OK and very clear. The books they showed as examples of their production were very well done and precise, and this makes us trustful that the Book will come out very well.
We arrived home at 13:30 and Juli and Tamas were prepairing some nice food. But... Bülent called and was waiting for us at the poets' event for Woman's Day which had already begun. So, Eduardo and Peter, had to leave again to keep a promise we had given. We arrived an hour later to the library where the event was taking place and we entered a room full of people, women, youngsters, men, and the male and female poets were behind a table where the poets were reciting, while Bülent sitting behind them, accompanied their recitals with guitar music (very beautiful). Of course, we applauded a lot even though we didn't understand anything.
Yusuf was sitting next us and at a certain moment he wrote something on a piece of paper and went to the poets' table given the piece of paper to one of them and whispering something in her ear.
A while later, after one of the woman poets had finished reciting, another one stands up and announces to the room that they were honored to receive in their event two foreign friends, indicating us with a smile. Immediately, everyone was clapping and Eduardo and Peter, taken by surprise, stood up timidly and tried to make thanksgiving gestures. Soon after, a woman arrives and warmly greets us and pins a beautiful little medal, as a gesture of honor, of the association of modern poets. We thanked her and the event continued with more poetry always accompanied by Bülent. Olcaytug was also there acting as sound engineer.
At a certain point Bulent gets up with a paper in his hand, always behind the poets' table and beautifully reads a poem, we later found out was by our friend Aydan, who was also in the big table.
A while later, the event ended and Yusuf took us to the table to greet the poets and others. We also met the library director who speaks some English and after some conversations we asded if it was possible to present a book in his library. He answered yes and we decided to talk more about it in another moment. He invited us to present the book during the book presentation week which will begin on March 27th. We explained that we wouldn't be here in Ankara anymore but we could talk to our friends so that they could do the presentation. So we agreed on that. Very amaible and distinguished mister.
After a series of family pictures with all the poets we said good-bye and went with Bülent & Olcaytug & Yusuf to Yusuf's office where we had chai and Turkish coffe. In the meantime, Eduardo explained to Yusuf we need a professional translating office for a quick translation into Turkish of the contract between the editor (Yuksel) and the author of the book of Silo's Message translated from Spanish to Turkish. Yusuf looked for a place in Kizilay, a building where there is more than one translations' office. We tried two and managed that one of them agree to have the translation ready by 11:00 a.m. tomorrow. The cost was 175 Lt. By now it was 17h, more or less. We went home and on the way Bülent & Olcaytug said good-bye to visit a friend who called. them.
At home, Judit was waiting for us, Juli and Tamas had gone to the Roman museum accompanied by Yüksel.
We tried to rest a little and eat something.
But at 17:30 Mustafa was back. An hour and a half later, Juli, Tamas and Yüksel were back and we had chai and sweets and chatted about all sorts of things.
At 20h Eduardo, Juli, Judit and Tamas went to buy their bus tickets back to Instanbul tomorrow and Peter and Yüksel went shopping for food.
The day ended with a good meal and Hungarian palachintas (pancakes) lots of laughter and a Service ceremony, with request, guided by Yuksel. He guided it really well and in the end there was a very charged and luminous atmosphere and reciprocal transmission of the same in hugs. After Yüksel went home, after an intense good-bye to Juli, Tamas and Judit since they are leaving tomorrow morning.
Tomorrow Peter and Eduardo will pick up the translation of the contract since they called saying it would be ready by not by 11h but at 13:30-
We hope to finish everything regarding the book tomorrow morning.
Os mandan un fuerte abrazo,
Eduardo, Juli, Tamas, Judit y Peter
