1. You automatically take off your shoes when entering a house.
2. Friends don’t invite you to their homes for dinner, but for breakfast.
3. You know the name of the guy at the bakkal (corner store) on your street.
4. Everything is çok (very): çok güzel, çok iyi, çok ayıp...
5. You have started to answer questions by repeating the answer (evet, evet; var, var; hayır, hayır; yok, yok).
6. You’ve forgotten what it means to recycle.
7. You no longer hear the honking of car horns.
8. You know there is always traffic in Istanbul: the question is whether there is traffic or A LOT of traffic.
9. You know you’ll find a portrait of Atatürk everywhere you go.
10. You have learned to accept yogurt as something salty you drink with your food rather than something sweet you eat for dessert.
11. You hardly hear it anymore when the mosques issue the call to prayer. Five times a day. Starting at 05.30.
12. You have drunk çay when it’s 35 degrees Celsius outside.
13. You know the only way to cross the street is kamikaze-style, with the cars passing just a few centimetres away. Traffic lights? What are those?
14. You know the first rule about Atatürk is: you do not say anything bad about Atatürk.
15. And the second rule about Atatürk is: you do not say anything bad about Atatürk.
16. You ask for a student discount or try to bargain for almost everything.
17. Remember when you used to notice how there was always a joker jumping the queue without anyone complaining? Now you’re that joker.
18. You’re still looking for the cheapest kebab in the city.
19. You do not say "ok"; you say "tamam."
20. You kiss both cheeks with your close friends.
21. It doesn’t surprise you anymore to see two macho guys walking together with linked arms.
22. The entrance to your house looks like a shoe store.
23. You have accepted olives and cheese as part of your breakfast.
24. You have accepted that there will always be soup and yogurt with your food.
25. You have accepted yogurt as a sauce.
26. You think it’s normal to "drink a cigarette," "close the phone" or having it be "raining snow."
27. You call older neighbours "aunt" and "uncle."
28. You don’t get surprised when some people still give prices in millions of liras.
29. You now expect to get a wet-wipe soaked in lemon scent at the end of a restaurant meal (and sometimes will take extra to stick in your bag for the kids -- added by Diana)
30. When you need groceries, you call the shop on the corner and have them sent up to you in a basket.
31. You know that kahvaltı means "under or after the coffee" – and that there is never coffee after breakfast.
32. You know you’ll always find the sugar served in cubes
33. You’ve stopped expecting sauce in your döner kebab and know it is normal to find French fries in it instead (I expect it in Greg's durums)
34. You only go to the historic part of the city when your friends visit you.
35. You think it’s normal for motorcyclists to ride in the wrong direction, without a helmet, and sometimes on the sidewalk.
36. You know every building has a name of a person on it, and usually two numbers: the old one and the new one.
I would add a few more:
37. You now know all the hand gestures and head movements and eyebrow raises; they are surprisingly numerous, intricate, and subtle.
38. You think nothing of taking several modes of transportation in one trip in the city, which includes a taxi, ferry, metro, bus, minibus, metrobus, dolmus, and tram.
39. You shop at pazars which are the cheapest places to buy produce.
40. You hardly notice the profuse attention and gifts lavished on your children.
41. You drive and lay on the horn like a native.
42. You don't notice the metal detectors and lack of trashcans at the malls anymore, and because of the lack of trashcans, you're accustomed to leaving your mess on the table in the food court.
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