Happy Ramadan everyone!Turkey is a Muslim country and last Monday saw the start of the month of no eating, drinking (that means everything , including water) or smoking from sunrise to sunset.
They aren't allowed sex either (although I can't imagine that is such a problem for most people during daylight hours, especially if they are married).
Ramadan, or Ramazan as they call it here, is a time to purify the soul, refocus attention on God, and practise self-sacrifice.
I didn't really know much about Islam before this trip, but the more I see, the more I like.
Muslims (despite what you hear and see constantly in the media) are incredibly tolerant of other religions and do not force their beliefs on anyone else.
They are very gentle with people older/younger/weaker/poorer than themselves and while the church doesn't tithe them, there is an expectation that every Muslim will spend at least 2.5% of what they earn helping others.
Our crew has learnt the word "gentleman" this week.
They learnt it themselves after my darling insisted on helping a little yacht that had spent several hours trying to anchor next to us one night.
The passengers were two Turkish couples and their children.
One night, they arrived in a little yacht and spent over two hours fumbling with their anchor and ropes when it was dead calm and there were plenty of places to moor their boat.
The following night, they turned up in a different bay in much tougher conditions and one of the husbands was getting very cross with his wife.
My darling couldn't stand watching any more and insisted on helping.
As everyone who knows him knows, being helped out of a tricky boat situation by my darling is the lowest point in any boatie's boating career.
However, this time was different - he took our skipper with him.
Within minutes, they were sorted and the likelihood of the couple getting a divorce was back to nil.
We were their best friends and I think they must have told our skipper that my darling was a gentleman.
Two firsts in one night - actually helping in a boat situation and being called a gentleman.
Our boat is trying to be called Miranda, but the adhesive letters have not lived up to their reputation and bits have fallen off again, so now we are Miranda on one side and Panda on the other.
In my family, my mother made patchwork Christmas stockings out of her old silk and velvet cocktail dresses and embroidered our names on them.
Once we grew up and got married, she made new ones and embroidered the names of her new sons and daughters-in-law on them.
She got a bit miffed when the first couple of marriages tipped up and, faced with the prospect of having to make new stockings, simply put white sticky name tags over the previous owners' names.
Now the rule is that once the relationship has passed a certain time limit (variable according to my mother's mood), the lucky new spouse gets embroidered - a huge honour, and one which puts a sort of official seal on the relationship.
I am worried that the non-adhesive adhesive letters show a certain lack of commitment by my darling.
Is he planning to replace me and worrying that the new me will be Rebecca or Dolores and it may not be worth investing in metal letters spelling Miranda that screw on to the boat?
It's not just my name that causes problems; our everyday language problems continue unabated.
Even our lovely Italian cousin who speaks perfect English gets tripped up by difficult English.
My Dad is a picky eater at the best of times and she said he hadn't enjoyed the meal of toad stools she made him.
I am not surprised. I have emailed her back suggesting she makes it one word to see if that makes it more palatable.
One of our greatest pleasures is enjoying the strangeness of Turkey.
It is such a happy, weird place and so much surprises and delights us.
One of our favourite pastimes is watching Turks at the beach.
They are a very loud race and when the daytripper boats full of locals turn up in the bay, you always know they are there.
The ladies' outfits vary from the tiniest string bikinis that leave absolutely nothing to the imagination, to the full three piece "burkini" - trousers, tunic and a sort of balaclava thing for the head.
They all frolic together as happily as sandboys, giving no impression that anyone thinks the other's outfit is a little unusual.
I found a shop selling the burkinis the other day and they are made of really thick, sturdy stuff - it makes me feel itchy and scratchy just touching it in an air-conditioned shop, so I can't imagine what it is like to wear in the sun.
And on the subject of weirdness, do read The Weird Sisters, by Eleanor Brown.
Sarah-Kate Lynch was launching her latest book, Dolci di Love, in America and her birthday coincided with her first book launch in Colorado. I emailed the store that was holding the launch to ask them to recommend a fabulous book they could give her from our book club in Queenstown.
The Weird Sisters was their choice and they floored her completely by making a big birthday fuss of her at the launch when she thought she knew no-one.
And they were right - this book is marvellous.
Three adult sisters from an unconventional family come back to live with their parents in a small town at the same time - all failures in some way.
They are a bit bitter about having to return and as they start exploring where they went wrong, they start making things right again.
It is very, very funny, and with a father who quotes Shakespeare at every opportunity, the sisters could have been much weirder, but they are just like all of us and that is how the book charms the reader.
Everyone will recognise bits of themselves in the sisters, warts and all.
I'm starting to get ready to come home, too.
My darling is itching to get golfing again and I can't wait to see the Anne Frank exhibition at the Lakes District Museum.
I hear it is brilliant and only on until September 14 so get along and see it.
Thanks for all the emails and for next week I will try to finish the last Beryl Bainbridge novel, Girl in A Polka Dot Dress, although it is not gripping me at all.
I am only struggling through because so many people have asked what I think of it.
Is that a clue?
