Sharing is Loving

During my childhood İstanbul was a different city. With a population of less than a million, neighborhoods felt especially close-knit. Practically everyone knew each other; if a new tenant moved to our apartment building, we kids watched our mothers bringing home-cooked meals to the newcomers, sharing because they had no opportunity to cook for themselves during the tiresome task of settling into a new home. During the week, people from our apartment building would stop by to welcome the new residents, bringing along some sort of treat to go with coffee. I remember those times as happy days, our mothers sharing parts of their own history with new arrivals.