I'm taking a break from politics and trying to switch myself into holiday mode: I'm refreshing what little I know of Turkish - as well as what little I know of Arabic (my friend's girlfriend has been studying Arabic for a year now and her handwriting is getting more and more beautiful every time I see her, and I guess I'm slightly jealous, so I've spent part of the evening re-learning to write a few phrases that I used to know how to write, and I've also learned one new phrase tonight).

Anyway, I keep dreaming about the slightly warmer place we'll soon be heading to, Istanbul, and when I looked out of the window, I was really shocked to see that it was snowing. Again. I wasn't prepared at all - the last time we were in Istanbul it was the beginning of May, and everything was blooming then, and it was lovely and warm, and that's the image I had in my mind throughout the evening, until I saw the snow. Also, there's a huge construction site right outside our window - and what I noticed besides the snow were the Christmas lights all around the pit - kind of funny, considering how gruesome it all looks during the day.

The post-revolutionary politics depresses me: Yushchenko isn't excluding the possibility of the election getting cancelled, and there's nothing left to do but wait, ten more days and then some more. If they cancel the election and set a new one for March, I'll probably be voting against them all - to protest the shameless waste of money and other such bullshit. Enough is enough. But, hopefully, it'll all go smoothly.

The opposition is planning a pre-Christmas celebration on Sunday, with Christmas trees and a concert for kids at Maidan. It'll definitely make some people feel less tense about it all - which is good, I guess.

Here's another Istanbul picture, from May 2004: