Kalecik Şarap!

Yesterday we made it to the Wine festival in Kalecik, Turkey about an hour outside of Ankara.
We arrived and were ushered up a few flights of stairs to the mayor of the district's office. On leather couches with a few of the farm lands surrounding the building, they gave us çay and cherries from their fields. Also, since Kalecik is famous for their wine, they passed around a few glasses of the special kalecik karası wine for us to taste. İt was interesting, tried to understand bits and peices of the turkish speaking, and learned that Atatürk started the clothing reform(change to modern dress) in that town.
After the mayors office we went on to the şarap(wine) factory. There we went up to the roof and could look out on all the fields of grapes. Apparently they grown 10 different kinds there. İt was beautiful.
You never realize how much beauty is around u. Everyone talks about how Ankara is dry and dead, but the sky and mountains around here are really something to see.
The tour then took us to the wine room, and they make a million+ bottles of wine a year there. İt looked pretty new and they talked of plans to expand and produce more things than just wine there too. Upstairs from the factory was the wine tasting room!
Of course everyone tried at least one small glass of each of the 5 wines--and the noise level of the group definitely went up a notch. But it was fun...what everyone had been waiting for.
Then after the factory we went to a park next to kızıl ırmak and ate gözleme made by ladies from the village. They were so nice and let everyone that wanted to try to make some.(pics coming soon)
There were also a number of kids and families around and we played volleyball and then jumped rope with them and our classmates. Funny how games like that are universal.
Then we headed home-- after we got back my host father picked me up and brought me to the sünnet düğün (circumcision wedding for lil boys) that i was very late to. But it was cool. İn turkish culture parents spend as much as they would on their daughters weddings on their sons sunnets so it was in a beautiful wedding salon with a dj and live music. And of course everyone dancing up a storm!
Fun time--gotta keep beign thankful for this great opportunity!