Wedding Day in Kirazli

We awoke to the sound of gunfire this morning. This, a mere hour after our predawn awakening to the call to prayer blast sung by a tone-deaf imam. We heard the first shots and Jason wondered if it was gunfire. Surely not, I said. Then, unmistakably...gunfire. We didn't panic (well, I did a little, but only thinking my mom would KILL me if I got myself shot in Turkey). Jason went out of the room to check it out and he ran into the hotel owner, a darling Welshman who said, "Not to worry, we haven't gone to war. There's a wedding in the village and that's how they celebrate." Here comes the bride...heralded in a hail of gunfire.

We are near the South Aegean staying in a gorgeous little hotel. The village, Kirazli, is remote at best. If I asked a movie scout to find me the quintessential rural Turkish village, this is what they'd come up with. Goats, donkey and toothless old neighbor lady included.