Doğuhan Torun

He took the train from Ankara.
This is his first time in Istanbul!

Doing Rejection therapy.
Even asked a local bagel shop to make square bagels.

Pushes himself maybe too hard.
Like a robot with perfect diet, perfect behavior, 10,000 rejections.

Talked about language, and grammar and where the verbs come.
Learning Dutch and Italian because those would cover the cousins of other European languages.

Our pretty waitress is from Turkmenistan.
And the table of good-looking 20-somethings, he helped translate to pass on my compliment.
We shared a pink strawberry cake.

Birthday of women at table behind me so we all started clapping rhythmically.
Nice that the owner waited until the call to prayer was done before turning on music and doing the cake.

Turks flexible so saw Christians baptizing baby and adopted that too.
The local version of Ra/Zeus/Odin was female: Cybele/Kybele, the great mother goddess of ancient Anatolia.

Parents religious but open minded.
They feel that Dutch people are the warmest, most welcoming, even more than Italians.

Staying safe and laying low the next 5 years to survive with everything changing, AI, wars, etc.