Hello everyone!

My name is Nursel Kayisoglu and i am a high school teacher in Istanbul.

I have recently come across with Laura's quarantine days project  and i got excited about the whole thing.I have read some of the other teachers' reflections and feelings towards the pandemic'' Corona'' and how it affects our lives around Europe and globally indeed.Knowing that we all are going through the same thing at least make us feel stronger.We are all in this.Our doctors and nurses around the world is doing a great job!!!We are grateful!

Back then, in March until 11th we did not have any cases in Turkey.As school, we have an ongoing Erasmus+ Ka2 project and we had a planned exchange in Aguadulce,Spain.I can not believe that we did this exchange with our students between 2-8 March.Yes,we went to Spain and things were fine in that region.Our exchange was an unforgettable one.You can view it on instagram:

percussivesoundsineurope

and also our blog: www.percussivesounds.blogspot.com

After spending a week,we came back to Istanbul but we isolated ourselves at our homes for 14 days.

I started experiencing what was'' isolation'' before many other people in Turkey and from 16th March ,our government closed down schools,cafes,shopping centers and so on.The isolation period was difficult,everyday both teachers and students talked to each other if we had the symptoms or not.We felt nervous,worried as the death toll started to rise day by day.Thanks to God we finished this period successfully.

We all learnt many things through this period about the virus itself,social distance and how to protect ourselves and so on.But most importantly,we learnt that, we need our '' nature'' back.

I realised that i never noticed the precious little things and how important they are in our lives like;walking,breathing the fresh air, wind in our hair,drinking tea at our favorite cafe,having classes with our students,chats with our colleagues,simple things in life and how i missed those little things.

Like all my colleagues in Europe we did remote teaching and still doing it,at least we were in contact with our students and tried to catch up with our classes.

Since 11 th March,i never went out,it is been days and it started to effect me badly,i am thinking of going out but here in Turkey,people do not care about the social distances and they thing that we are going back to normal.I know that until they find the '' cure '' the illness ,we have to learn how to live with it.

i realised that i could live in my house doing things like cooking,reading,watching films and i would not have the luxury of saying'' i am bored'' when doctors and nurses were fighting/still fighting on the frontlines.I can not believe that i watched all the Tarkovsky films for example,i always wanted to watch them.

Maybe schools will be opened in June , but our schools are so crowded i am a bit worried.In Turkey,there are almost 30 million of students,the number is high and schools and classes are oversized.By the end of June,there will be an exam for entering the universities,and almost 2 million of students will take it in all citites of Turkey,it will be difficult and risky in these days.

The situation in Turkey is like big cities are effected,so far almost 4000 people died unfortunately,compared to other nations number of death seems low but maybe the number of young people are a lot,in Turkey there are 30-40 millions of people aged between 0-45.I am so sad and heart broken for those people died everywhere and being buried without a ceronomy,makes me really sad and down...

In this period,many doctors and nurses lost their lives unfortunately also globally.We will always remember them and will be grateful...finally i should say that we should respect their lives and we should try  stay homes for a while and follow rules as long as it takes..