Today marks exactly three years since I landed in Istanbul with far too much luggage, two cats, and absolutely no idea what the next chapter of my life would look like. The next day, September 29, 2023, I made my way to Ankara and began settling into my new apartment and a city that, at the time, felt very unfamiliar to me.
Three years later, looking back on everything feels a little surreal.
When you move somewhere new, everything feels interesting. Signs posted on the streets and at building entrances are different, the language is different, and even going to the grocery store can feel like a minor international expedition. For a while, ordinary life isn’t ordinary at all because nearly everything requires a little more attention than it used to.
Then, eventually, life becomes… well, life. You figure out which bus to take. You stop staring at every Turkish tea glass like it belongs in a museum. You learn where your favorite grocery store keeps the tofu, and you know exactly which hills will make you question every life decision that led you to that particular sidewalk.
And yet, three years after arriving in Türkiye and beginning my life in Ankara, tiny things still make me stop and think, Oh, I really love it here.
Not the big things, necessarily. Not monuments or museums or dramatic travel moments. I mean the little, completely ordinary things Ankara probably doesn’t even realize it’s doing—the details that have quietly become part of my everyday life and still, somehow, make me swoon.
Here are 13 of them.
1. The Cats. Obviously.
Of course we must begin here. This is not negotiable.
Ankara has cats everywhere, and I remain completely incapable of behaving normally around them. I can be late, carrying groceries, and halfway up one of Ankara’s approximately 14 million hills, sweating and questioning my life choices, and then I see a cat. Whatever I was doing immediately becomes less important.
There might be a fluffy orange cat sleeping in a shop window, a tiny tabby stretched across a park bench as though the municipality personally installed it for his afternoon nap, or a cat sitting beside the entrance of a business that looks suspiciously like middle management. Sometimes there is a food dish nearby. Sometimes there is a water bowl or a little shelter. And sometimes the cat has simply decided, “This is my chair now,” and everyone around it has accepted the terms.
I love how normal that feels here. I love watching people stop to pet them, seeing shopkeepers put out food and water, and spotting tiny cat houses tucked into neighborhoods. Most of all, I love the completely unquestioned assumption that yes, of course the cat belongs here.
Stormy and Smokey would like me to clarify that they remain the most important cats in Ankara. They asked me to issue this correction before publication, and frankly, I live in their apartment, so I know better than to argue.
2. Tea Arrives Like Punctuation
In Türkiye, tea can feel less like a beverage and more like punctuation. Conversation happening? Tea. Work being done? Tea. Waiting for something? Tea. Just finished drinking tea? Apparently, that means it is time to discuss whether you would like more tea.
I still love seeing those little tulip-shaped glasses everywhere. I love the clink of the tiny spoon against the glass and the way something so simple can turn an ordinary moment into a small pause in the day.
I will always have a very deep and committed relationship with coffee, but I have developed tremendous respect for a culture that appears to believe almost any situation can be improved by putting a warm drink in your hand. Frankly, I think they may be onto something.
3. People-Watching in the Parks
One of my favorite things to do in Ankara requires absolutely no itinerary. Give me a park bench, decent weather, and a little time, and I can happily sit and watch the city go by.
Ankara’s parks are full of tiny snapshots of everyday life. Friends sit together over a hot beverage. Families spread out snacks. Children chase each other around while exhausted-looking adults attempt to keep up. Students gather on the grass. Older couples stroll side by side. Someone is inevitably having a very animated phone conversation, and somewhere nearby there is probably a cat asleep in a position that looks anatomically impossible.
What I love most is that none of this is especially remarkable. These aren’t tourist moments. They’re just people living their lives.
When I first moved here, I spent so much time noticing what was different about Türkiye. Now I find myself noticing what is wonderfully familiar—the friendships, the family rituals, the laughter, the quiet afternoons, and all those tiny human routines that look remarkably similar no matter where you are.
And yes, occasionally my people-watching turns into cat-watching. I will never apologize for this.
4. The Neighborhood Cats Who Clearly Have Jobs
Yes, we are discussing cats again. I warned you.
Some are ordinary neighborhood cats; others are Ankara cats who clearly have careers. There is the pharmacy cat, the café cat, the university cat, the apartment-building cat, and the cat who sits beside the cashier looking as though it is auditing the day’s receipts.
Then there is always the cat occupying a chair outside a restaurant while actual paying customers arrange themselves around it. Nobody asks the cat to move because, honestly, why would they? The cat was clearly there first and may, in fact, own the establishment.
One of my favorite things is how quickly I start recognizing them. I walk the same route a few times, and suddenly I have acquaintances. I’ll see one lounging in its usual spot and think, “Oh, hello! You’re still here.”
The cat rarely appears equally invested in our relationship, but that’s okay. I am willing to carry most of the emotional labor.
5. People Saying “Kolay Gelsin”
There are Turkish expressions that I wish English had better equivalents for, and kolay gelsin is one of them. It is said to someone who is working—to a cashier, a delivery person, someone cleaning, someone fixing something, or really anyone who is clearly in the middle of doing their job.
The literal translation doesn’t quite capture it, but the feeling is something like, “May your work come easily.” It’s such a simple phrase, but when someone wishes you kolay gelsin, there is always a kind intention behind it.
You are acknowledging someone’s effort. When you use this common phrase, you are telling someone, “I see you’re working, and I hope things go smoothly for you.”
We often think about kindness as something big or deliberate, but I think a lot of it lives in little habits like this. A few common words exchanged between strangers can make an ordinary interaction feel more genuine and kind.
I wrote more about why little pieces of language like this have come to mean so much to me in Language as a Love Letter: Turkish Expressions That Made Me Fall for Türkiye.
6. Ankara’s Completely Unreasonable Sidewalks
Last week I wrote more about exploring this city on foot in Walking Through Ankara: Hills, Hidden Corners, and Everyday Adventures, and I would be dishonest if I didn’t include the sidewalks among the things that somehow make me smile.
This is not because they are always convenient. They most certainly are not.
Sometimes walking in Ankara feels less like transportation and more like entering a low-budget obstacle course. There are trees, poles, unexpected changes in elevation, cars parked where they perhaps shouldn’t be, and sidewalks that occasionally seem to whisper, Good luck, Tiffles. We believe in you.
But one thing I genuinely love is the way so many sidewalks have simply been built around existing trees. The tree stays, and the pedestrians adapt. This can result in some absolutely ridiculous walking situations, and I have squeezed around trunks, ducked under branches, and performed maneuvers that probably qualify me for very low-level gymnastics.
Still, whenever it happens, part of me thinks, I’m glad the tree won. I may need to turn sideways to get past it, but I love that the default answer wasn’t simply to cut it down.
7. Hills I Love—Once I’m at the Top
My relationship with Ankara’s hills is complicated. While walking uphill, I tend to think, “Why does anyone live here?” and “Surely there must have been a flatter capital city available.”
Then I reach the top, turn around, and immediately forgive Ankara for everything.
The street drops away behind me. Buildings stretch across the surrounding hills, the sky seems enormous, and suddenly the whole city opens up. For a moment, the climb feels worth it.
Almost.
But let’s not get carried away.
8. Tiny Exchanges in Turkish
My Turkish is still very much a work in progress, and I suspect it will remain that way for quite some time. The upside is that even the smallest successful interactions can feel weirdly satisfying.
Understanding what someone says without translating it in my head is still a win. Ordering something correctly is a win. Answering a question before panic has time to arrive is definitely a win.
Sometimes it is as simple as hearing Hoş geldiniz and automatically responding Hoş bulduk, or saying Teşekkür ederim without mentally rehearsing it first. Nobody else involved in the interaction has any idea something exciting just happened. Whoever I am speaking with simply continues their day while, internally, I give myself a high-five.
I think that is one of the strange joys of learning a language while living in it. Progress often happens in moments so small that nobody else even notices them.
But I do.
9. Ankara’s Greenspaces
For a large capital city, Ankara continually surprises me with its pockets of green. There are trees, flowers, shaded benches, cats sleeping under bushes, people sitting with tea, children playing, and older couples taking slow walks together.
One minute I can be surrounded by traffic and apartment buildings, and a few minutes later I am sitting in a park having a picnic with friends. Honestly, perfection.
I have visited plenty of Ankara’s parks and keep discovering new ones. Some are grand and sprawling, while others are little neighborhood spaces that you might walk past without noticing unless you happen to need a bench, some shade, or a few quiet minutes. I wrote more about the role these smaller green spaces play in daily life in Pocket Parks and Bus Passes: Navigating the Heart of Turkish Social Connection.
And next week’s post will be about ten of my favorite parks to explore in Ankara. Apparently, I now have strong opinions about parks. This is who I have become.
10. The Sound of the City
Ankara is not quiet. There are car horns, buses, construction, vendors, conversations spilling out of cafés, and the occasional neighborhood disagreement conducted at a volume generous enough to include several surrounding apartment buildings.
Five times a day, though, another sound rises above the rest: the call to prayer, or ezan.
When I first moved to Türkiye, hearing the ezan drift across the city was an unmistakable reminder that I was somewhere very different from the place I had left behind. Now it’s part of the rhythm of my days. Sometimes I stop and listen; other times, it blends into whatever I’m doing—making dinner, working at my desk, walking through the neighborhood, or any number of other activities.
I especially love the moments when calls from several nearby mosques overlap slightly, carrying across the rooftops from different directions. Three years ago, that sound made me feel far from home. Today, it has become one of the sounds that makes Ankara feel like home.
Alongside those familiar sounds are the other noises I now associate with daily life here: people greeting one another, cats yelling for reasons known only to cats, café chatter, and suitcase wheels bravely attempting to survive sidewalks never designed with rolling luggage in mind. None of it is peaceful in the traditional sense, but it is familiar—and I have learned that familiarity has its own kind of peace.
11. Tiny Acts of Everyday Kindness
Some of my favorite moments in Ankara would sound completely unimpressive if I tried to turn them into dramatic stories.
Someone helps me figure something out when my Turkish fails. A stranger points me toward the correct bus. Someone holds a door. A shopkeeper waits patiently while I search my brain for a Turkish word that was absolutely there ten seconds ago and has now vanished.
Someone puts food out for a cat. Someone offers tea. Someone notices that another person is struggling and quietly helps.
These are small moments, but they’re often the ones I find myself thinking about at the end of the day. I think a city becomes lovable not only because of what it looks like, but because of all the tiny ways people move through it together.
12. The Light at the End of the Day
There are evenings when Ankara catches me completely off guard. I’ll be walking home thinking about groceries, work, bills, or whatever ordinary thing has occupied my brain that day, and then I look up.
The buildings are glowing. The hills are catching the last bit of sunlight. The sky has turned pink or orange or that soft blue that arrives just before darkness.
For a few seconds, whatever I had been thinking about disappears.
Three years later, Ankara can still do that to me.
13. The Magic of Ankara Is Part of My Everyday Life
Maybe this is the part that makes me swoon most. The things that once required thought and effort have gradually become part of the rhythm of my days. I know which buses will get me where I need to go, which grocery stores have what I’m looking for, and which streets I can navigate without pulling out my phone. The hills, the parks, the tea, the cats, and even the occasionally ridiculous sidewalks no longer feel like features of a city I moved to. They are simply pieces of the life I have built here.
Somewhere along the way, without one grand moment announcing that it had happened, Ankara became home.
Three Years Later
That feels especially meaningful today. Three years ago, I had just landed in Istanbul and was preparing to make my way to a city where I knew almost no one. I would have to figure out nearly everything—from the language and the buses to something as ordinary as buying groceries—as I went.
I couldn’t have known then which streets would become familiar, which parks I would return to again and again, which people would become part of my life, or how many neighborhood cats I would eventually consider personal acquaintances.
Maybe that is what belonging actually looks like. It doesn’t necessarily arrive in one dramatic moment when you suddenly declare, I belong here. More often, I think it happens quietly, while you are busy living your life.
One bus route, one favorite park, one familiar cashier, one ridiculous sidewalk, and one neighborhood cat at a time.
Three years ago today, I landed in Türkiye to begin a completely new chapter of my life. The following day, I arrived in Ankara. Looking back now, I realize that all those small moments of figuring things out, finding my way, and slowly building a life here added up to something much bigger than I understood at the time.
Of course, Ankara will probably celebrate our anniversary by making me walk uphill. This city likes to keep me humble.
Over the next few weeks, I’ll share more of the city I’ve come to love, including ten of my favorite parks to explore in Ankara and a closer look at how I use Ankara’s great public transportation system to get around. I’ll also be heading to Cappadocia for a guided weekend trip with my Toastmasters friends, and I’m already looking forward to sharing that adventure with you.
Whatever I find myself up to, though, there will undoubtedly be buses, probably a few hills, and statistically speaking, almost certainly cats.
Wishing you the courage to keep building a life that feels like your own, people and places that make you feel at home, and tiny moments of joy that remind you just how far you’ve come.
With love from Ankara,
Tiffles, Stormy, and Smokey 🐾