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An Evening’s Screening of Петя и волк for Baby Tragos.

Tonight, Baby Tragos, Mrs. Tragos, and I were listening to John Gielgud’s narration of Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf, when I began to wonder: what the hell does this sound like in Russian? (Not that I know Russian. I don’t.)

It turns out that in 1958, the Soviet animation studio Soyuzmultfilm produced a stop motion animation version of Peter and the Wolf.

We here at Tragos HQ (Baby Tragos watched the entire animation!) were entranced, as I think you will be. Cat lovers beware.

Over the weekend, Mrs. Tragos, Baby Tragos and I travelled to Istanbul. It was Baby Tragos’s first venture by plane. To her credit, she still prefers train and boat transportation. On Sunday, after a morning swim in a pool alongside the Bosphorus (very Tragos-endrosed), we lit out for a little nuclear family exploration of the coast. First a long walk with the Baby Bjorn, where I finally met other similarly accoutered fathers, and Baby Tragos got to chat with friends traveling at eye-level. Then, to the Sabancı Museum, where Baby Tragos got her first glimpses of Rembrandt paintings. She seemed to like the bright more than the dark. And then, to an Italian restaurant nearby. Midway through dinner, the restaurant was invaded by bagpipe players. In the photograph above, I believe you can detect that exact midpoint between amusement and bemusement on both our faces. More pictures of the day’s venture here.

Over the weekend, Mrs. Tragos, Baby Tragos and I travelled to Istanbul. It was Baby Tragos’s first venture by plane. To her credit, she still prefers train and boat transportation.

On Sunday, after a morning swim in a pool alongside the Bosphorus (very Tragos-endrosed), we lit out for a little nuclear family exploration of the coast. First a long walk with the Baby Bjorn, where I finally met other similarly accoutered fathers, and Baby Tragos got to chat with friends traveling at eye-level. Then, to the Sabancı Museum, where Baby Tragos got her first glimpses of Rembrandt paintings. She seemed to like the bright more than the dark.

And then, to an Italian restaurant nearby. Midway through dinner, the restaurant was invaded by bagpipe players. In the photograph above, I believe you can detect that exact midpoint between amusement and bemusement on both our faces.

More pictures of the day’s venture here.

Exposing Yourself to Foreign Experiences

This morning, Mrs. Tragos, Baby Tragos and I headed down to a big indoor mall in Ankara. It was time to get some more serious toys for Baby Tragos. It was also time for Mrs. Tragos to get a haircut.

While Mrs. Tragos sat down for the above-mentioned haircut, I took Baby Tragos for a walk around the mall. Normally, I would put her facing out in the Baby Bjorn, which she loves. She gets to encounter the world that way. Unfortunately, we forgot the Baby Bjorn. So instead, I just held her in my palm so she could still meet and greet the world.

Now, I am not a very strong man. I’m a normal guy. So the tax on my biceps was pretty severe. I had to keep switching hands to hold Baby Tragos so that I could give each arm a rest in turn. Baby Tragos was loving our venture, talking up a storm with whomever we’d come across. Toward the end of our little perambulation, we wandered into a home furnishings store. Why? Because they had a whole row of different colored bright candles that looked like a gigantic crayon box. Perfect for entertaining a four-month-old.

As we drew near this wall of candles, two older women — grandmother-aged — approached. They took to Baby Tragos immediately, telling her she was “çok tatlı” (really sweet) and “çok güzel” (really beautiful). It was a really nice moment. Except my right arm was just killing me.

[Brief interruption for a sartorial detail: I was wearing a long sleeve snap-down-the-middle collared shirt today.]

I needed to make an adjustment, but the women were nowhere near finished cooing over Baby Tragos. So I went for it. As Baby Tragos swiped across my chest from right to left, she took one side of my shirt with her, unsnapping me completely.

So there I was, in Ankara, Turkey, in a quaint home furnishing store, bare chested in front of two grandmothers.

I nodded, grunted a quick, “Afedersiniz,” (hopefully the appropriate “excuse me” for the occasion), turned around, and with my free right hand, snapped my shirt up while Baby Tragos yelled out at the shiny mirrors on the shelf in front of her.

I turned around. The grandmothers were gone.

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okimago:

Iona is 4m now! We were hanging out at this bookstore in Ankara yesterday and Chris was excited about the Turkish edition of Ulysses that he found. Iona was excited about touching all the surfaces in the bookstore including the giant Ulysses on the wall behind us. She couldn’t quite grasp it…There’s another pic of us on NYE, one of her taking a quick kip and another of her playing peek-a-boo. I’m biased and stuff but she really is the best thing ever…

The most recent report from Mrs. Tragos…

“Those first years when you can’t blow your own nose, when your father picked you up and rocked you and watched you speechlessly as you slept, are blank. Later, as you grow up, the relationship is muddled with practicality, with the resentment and the accidents, with the dull rigmarole of discipline and bedtimes and homework, inappropriate behavior, tantrums and tiredness. And that’s what you know of your childhood. You remember dodging through it. But there were four scant years when you slept in an ocean of love and your father never forgets and it never goes away and it will come to you.”

A.A. Gill, “Fatherhood” - from Is Further Away (via winesburgohio)