"Tesekkur ederim" !!

An eye catching view of what appear to be sea food restaurants at the ferry terminal!
Below is the ferry terminal where we went looking for ferry to our dinner destination!

The taxi dropped us at a junction with this 'Budak' kebab restaurant. A landmark we used to described our location to our host who kindly came to greet us there!

The picture above was captured at ATM machines at the ferry terminal. Four customers and four banks ~ noticed that none was at the international brand. Is this patriotism on display?

Haziq fell in love with Pakide ~ The cat of the house.

Istanbul. 6th December.

"Can we go again to their house ?" Luqman asked LiL as soon as we arrived at our hotel after coming back from dinner.
"Why....?" Lil asked spontaneously. My instinct told me something......
"I found a new friend and I like her!" Luqman answered. My instinct was correct! He has found a new friend in Nur Hatice!

The dinner we had was not an ordinary dinner in an ordinary cafe in Istanbul. It was not even a high end fine dining restaurant to be found lining the alleys off the Taksim mainstreet. We were guests in a very special home belonging to a very special family friend ~ Simah.

Simah is married to a local Turk, Dr. Halil Zaim, from a respectable family in Istanbul. Please read HERE. Their romance went back to the student days in UIA and from what I can see their romance was still very much in the air filling every space in their welcoming and cosy home on the fifth floor of an apartment tower which took after the husband's family name! Indeed, upon enquiry, the family owned a significant number of shares in the two block towers.

Simah speaks Turkish Language like a local. I simply love listening to the effortless flow of Turkish words everytime I heard her in conversation with her lovely daughter and adorable son. Her husband acknowledged that she is indeed gifted with laguage skills. Perhaps it is the same talent which has taken her through to succeed with a degree in English language ~ being a graduate of TESL. She writes regularly in the local English newspaper. Her published articles can be found HERE.

Simah carries her Melayuness to Turkey. She is a wonderful host and her friendliness belies the fact she has not met members of my family and I have met with her and her family only once before. I felt her warmth even before we left for Istanbul ~ with her invitations and welcoming messages. When we finally wanted to find our way to her home, she was extra helpful with her advise and directional tips. The taxi wanted to charge us Euro 150 for a round trip, but we followed Simah's advise and took the ferry instead. Not only we spent much less on fares, we also enjoyed the ferry ride and arrived in half the time it would have taken to crawl through the traffic jam crossing the bridge from the European side to the Asian side.

Her husband, Dr. Halil came down to meet us. When he extended his hands for a welcoming handshake, I felt like he was also extending his warm heart of hospitality. Everyone of us felt at home ~ away from home~!

When we were seated in their living room, we briefly introduced ourselves. Soon after, we were invited to the dining table which was fully covered with dishes of home cooked food of all kinds.

I could not remember all the names of the foods but I do remember how delicious they were~!The starters!

The host!
The Desert!
The desert admirers!

The starters were amazing, we nearly filled ourselves with them. Then for the main course, we were served with their family signature dish normally prepared for Eid. It was delicious!
Just as we were saying Syukur and Thanking her and her family for treating us to a wonderful dinner, she brought out the desert! Walala, what a desert it was ~~ A combination of warm dark chocolate cake, with chocolate syrup melting over and topped with smooth vanilla flavoured ice-cream with cutlets of banana decoratively placed! Luqman had his desert with his new found friend, Simah's daughter.

We bid farewell to Simah and her family that night. We couldn't thank them enough ~ no words could ever do justice to what we wanted to say. But the English language taught me to say, "Thank You!" whenever we want to express gratitude and I hope our host who graduated with TESL degree could see beyond the words and know that those words come from our hearts!

"To Simah, Dr. Halil and your lovely daughter Nur Hatice and Adorable son, Sabahaddin! ~ Tesekkur ederim!!"All of us ~ together! I stood behind Haziq to hide my filled tummy. hehehe

Our hosts, husband and wife in red ~ sehati sejiwa tentunya *and both have the sweetest of smiles*

Simah's blog, HERE.
Blogging introduced us as bloggers, and transformed us into friends. Amazing ~ isn't it?!!