Run, Forrest, Run!

This past Thursday I went on a real run (outside! at my own pace!) for the first time since I've been in Turkey. I had been going to a gym for the past three months, but I had gotten a bit bored of doing the same activities everyday, and in a dark basement, when the weather outside had blossomed into a beautiful spring. As I began my first run this past Thursday, I quickly realized that although I had been using the elliptical machine at my gym, it is not the same thing at all as being out in the open air, treading on pavement and dirt and rocks, and actually seeing something beyond my sweaty self in the opposing mirror. The evening weather was perfect. I took a route up a small hill past apartment buildings, around a bend, by one of the city's hippest cafes, and then I turned down a dusty road dotted with little shacks and sıkma stands, past cows grazing in the grass, and to the shore of the city's big lake. I stopped at the bottom to peer out over the lake. I squinted as the bulging sun, shouting its last hurrah before succumbing to the night, glinted across the clear water. I enjoyed my moment before heading back up the hill and taking a long route back home, back past the cafe, back into the city, along one of the major boulevards, through a beautiful, small park by a mosque, and finally back to my apartment.

Now I'm trying to make running back into a regular habit. One of the things that stopped me from running earlier is that it is not a common activity for people to run outside for exercise. I do, in fact, look even more out of place than usual in my jogging pants and sweaty t-shirt, running equally by farmers tending their herds and by people drinking coffee at fancy cafes; as families sit at picnic tables eating kebab and looking over the view of the lake or walk back from the fruit and vegetable market, their arms and backs laden with fresh produce.

For me, it's another viewpoint from which to observe my city and to newly appreciate the natural beauty and the urban life, both of which are literally just around the corner from me.