In Ankara

The past three days I ve only slept for 10 hours. I flew to Ankara to sell my piano A musical group "Company" has been using my piano for their practice at the University I was graduated from. I left my piano there when I left for Sydney, and did not have a chance to go back and have a look at it for the last 4 years. Yeah it s quite a long time for not seeing someone I like. I say someone cause I believe my piano had a personality. It sounds weird but each piano has one. Some have strong, some have weak personalities. I only get to know it if I spend more than couple of months playing a piano. Anyway I always appreciated my piano's personality and patiently tried to work with it until we became friends. I tried to sell my piano to someone who will love it, but I couldn't. It felt awful when I left it behind. Then this group of University students who sing musicals took my piano to their practice room and looked after it for a long time. I thought this year I have to say goodbye to my piano, and arranged selling it to them for a symbolic price, really less than half of the original price. I went to Ankara, and signed the papers and took the money, knowing that my piano has been and will be loved and looked after.

It was a bit emotional to go back to my University and remember lots of memories while I walked in the big and leafy campus. Students looked similar to me, smart and modest, many of them who do not care about their looks, because they are hard working students. It is the METU culture: reactions to americanization (although the education is in English), a bit of protest, altenative and anti-commercialist, although each year the Campus becomes more commercialized and americanized.

I stayed with Yusuf, a gay friend of mine in Ankara. He had a crash on me two years ago when we first met, and then we decided to stay as friends-although he often mentioned moving to Sydney and getting married (he s a bit funny). He started living with Sami his best (gay) friend in Ankara, and he started dating with a guy who works for a bank, a non-scene, good looking and attentive guy. I stayed with Yusuf and Sami but did not meet the new boyfriend. Yusuf said that we should not meet because his BF can become jelaous. The BF was calling him every 2 hours, checking out where we were, what we were doing etc., but he did not make an effort to join us either. I like Yusuf's company a lot, and I was glad that I did not have to meet the BF and deal with jelaousy issues.

I spend Friday whole day in Ankara, and met up with some Uni friends for dinner. We talked about careers, relationships and memories. The most surprising event was that Faruk, an old friend recently came out, he told me that he is gay at this dinner. I always thought that he could be gay and shared this with other friends, so I was not shocked when I ve heard this. I asked about his love life, and learned that he had a 9 month relationship with a cute mexican ambassador. It was good to hear that he eventually started establishing his gay life at his 30s. I remembered how stressful it was when I came out, because of the pressure in Turkey created by family, culture, religion and tradition. I did not have a chance to hear his coming out story but I m sure his adventure had been difficult too.

My Uni friends, me, Yusuf and Sami went to a bar and drank till midnight. Yusuf showed me a guy at the other table and mentioned that he s such a nice guy and gay. I looked at him and thought he s cute: dark hair, dark eyes, muscly and sexy. Yusuf invited him to our table, and I ve learned that he s been doing his masters European Union topic. Wow handsome, attractive and smart Turkish guy, the type you can only find in the boring capital cities not in crazy metropolitans. He was sitting next to me and I was touching his legs with my knees, and he did not pull back his legs for a long time. Well it was almost 2 in the morning and my hands were touching his legs under the table. He was talking to the other at the table and I was only touching him. He grabbed my hand and held it for while and then our hands were making love. It is so exciting to start touching someone you know for 5 minutes during a semi-serious conversation. Obviously we ended up liking each other. I had a bus ticket to Istanbul, at 5 am in the morning. I told Yusuf that I wanted to be with this guy for my last 3 hours in Ankara, and he said fine, and invited him to is place. We went there together, kissed in the car, chatted in Yusuf's house and then slept together. we were so comfortable with each other, a lot of kissing and cuddling, so much passion and touching, I realized I missed sleeping with a Turkish guy. that feeling of intimacy, even I did not know him very well.

I had to leave him too early, I had to get ready and catch the bus to Istanbul. He asked me to cancel it and stay with him, I said I planned this trip long time ago. He asked me if I was sure. Of course I was sure - I did not want any complex emotions during this holiday, just fun. I said bye to my cute Turkish boy, and Yusuf took me to the bus terminal.