Tuesday, August 28, 2012

A unexpected day


The morning was completely chaotic.  I went to sleep the night before having my morning completely planned out.  However, things did not go as smoothly as I expected.  I woke up totally disoriented and unaware of the events that were taking place.  I didn’t need an alarm to wake me up since Nerlin’s rustling back and forth along with Cidnee’s worried movements and words woke me up feeling concerned.  Something was definitely off, but I felt like I was completely in the dark.  

Everyone moved and talked quickly throughout the apartment.  Through the cryptic text messages and all the questions I was able to decipher that Alisha was in need of medical attention.  Dr. Mallery, Cidnee, Ron, and Alisha all took a cab and left for the hospital as the rest of us stayed and prayed for her health. 

Despite the unpredictable turn of events, we were still encouraged to go meet Dervish Earl who would give us an debriefing session of the sema we had experienced the night before.  I’ve always liked and admired his passion for his beliefs.  He exudes love and zeal every time he speaks.  What stood out to me the most of our time spent with him was his narrative of one of the dervishes during the sema the night before. 

I had noticed that there was one specific dervish that seemed to be in some sort of trance and he found himself in the middle at the beginning during the ceremony.  Dervish Earl explained to us that the dervish had some sort of vision in which he was somehow transported to a place where a girl was bitten by a snake and in need of medical attention.  The dervish took the girl to the hospital and was then transported back to his body in the sema when the Master slammed his foot on the ground.  He had experienced and remembered all of this. 

It was interesting hearing and learning about the beliefs of others especially of a mystical religion such as Sufism.  Learning about a different culture and religion is fascinating, especially in Turkey since religion surrounds the entire community and environment.  I am excited to continue learning about it more.  

Monday, August 27, 2012

New City, New People!



            Luckily, I get to blog the day that had so much going on! There’s so much culture, people, and traditions to absorb in Turkey, so today I felt truly productive and exhausted. First, our landlord, Hikmet, served us a wonderful breakfast! We had delicious scrambled eggs, several types of cheeses and sliced turkey and beef bologna. He and the housekeeper continued to serve us watermelon, bread and jelly, peaches, orange juice, and of course, chay tea. I have a strong feeling that he did this today to make up for having the guys move into the upstairs room. Anyways, I’m thankful that he even wanted to prepare and cook us breakfast. Our morning continued with our task to visit Zeytinburnu and find how nodes, landmarks, paths, boundaries, and edges define a neighborhood in the big city.
            Ron, Rachel, Cidnee, Alisha and I rode the train from to Kumkapi to Zeytinburnu. The train ride was quite interesting, because we could see the train from the inside swaying a lot. When we got off the train, its station was squished between stores. I don’t think the train station there tried to convey its importance, just because there wasn’t a big sign that screamed, “Hey! Look here! This is a train station!” Right when we climbed up the stairs, there was a medium-sized street, which is considered a path, which split into two streets. When we saw Burger King, which looked most familiar to us, we headed straight to it. There we met a man who spoke Turkish and English. He spoke kindly to us, but we wanted to finish our assignment on time, so we had to kind of rush his friendliness. Walking along, what seemed to be a large path, we noticed that this walkway was purposefully put there for people to look at the stores on both sides of it and for people to sit at tables located on the middle strip of the walkway. We reached a node, where men packed together sitting under a rectangular umbrella, and other people sitting around trees. There was a road that cut the previous pathway into a new area. This node area was kept clean compared to the Nuripasa neighborhood.
            We walked around for an hour, while I tried to make a map of the neighborhood. After getting a bit tired, Cidnee, Alisha, and Ron decided to people watch. Rachel and I went inside the pharmacy to check out the hair products there. It was a challenge trying to talk with the people there, but thank God for Google Translate. We used their computer to try explaining to them what we were looking for, and then it led to asking them for help with learning about the Nuripasa neighborhood. Rachel and I started to get some good information, such as how the neighborhood was a mixed with different nationalities. There were people from Kazakhstan, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Pakistan. We asked so many questions, that there were a few they couldn’t answer. Fortunately, a brother of theirs had arrived, so he and his sister led us to a person at a Kazakhstan foundation who could answer more questions about Nuripasa.  
            We met with the people at the foundation, and one of the men called his niece, who spoke English well to come over and talk with us as a translator. They were very hospitable! They brought out tea for everyone that just arrived and the president of the foundation even played a Kazakhstani guitar instrument for us. After a long time talking and getting a lot of information, the president suggested we go to the mayor. Our new friend, Recep, practically was our Nuripasa tour guide and led us to the Mayor’s simple office, his Primary School, and Town Hall, where he could easily just walk in and talk with the people there. The community here in general is very helpful. The mayor gave us a legitimate map of Nuripasa, and the lady at the Town Hall gave Rachel and me each two thick books: a historical book of Zeytinburnu and a Zeytinburnu guidebook. We were so thankful that Recep had helped us navigate around the neighborhood to people that he knew.
               The day ended with a Sema Service, which is a whirling dervish ceremony. The ceremony consisted of the members doing a kind of singing prayer/chant. First they moved their heads in a swaying side to side motion slowly, and then when the music picked up, their heads bobbed forward with intense motion. I was kind of scared, but if that is how they want to worship and as long as they aren’t hurting anyone then it’s all fine. The whirling dervishes, who are all men, wore white dresses and a black sheet-like coat. Their movements and same clothes made each person look equal, except for two. Their palms upward reflected on the idea of giving to Allah. Their spins are consistent and the ceremony took a long time to end.  Even though we have seen so much, there is still so much we have yet to discover!
Click to enlarge
cute baby on train

Cidnee and San Diego Shorts, representing!

 Office of Nuripasa's Mayor

Map of Nuripasa

Rachel and Recep in front of Mayor's office

Turkey's Flag

The only Primary school in Nuripasa (neighborhood in the big city of Zeytinburnu)


Inside school


K. Ataturk head sculpture

V.P of school

Nuripasa Streets

Nuripasa

2011 new towers for offices, housing, stores



Walking to Town hall

Train tracks of our ride to Nuripasa

Streets in front of Town Hall


Nuripasa's Town Hall

Nuripasa's Town Hall

Nuripasa's Town Hall

Our new friend Recep U. & Rachel

Pup! 

Wanted to follow us home!

Doy-Doy Restaurant with the Wisbeys
         

Saturday, August 25, 2012

Welcome to Turkey, Istanbul!!! & Turkey in Turkey

Some of you may have noticed that quite a few of us bloggers have said "Turkey, Istanbul" rather than "Istanbul, Turkey." I realized I might need to explain this for all of you. This realization was made apparent to me while having a conversation over Skype with my mother. She asked me why I kept doing that because she thought it was odd. She had hypothesized that maybe everyone in Turkey switched it that way. I laughed and explained that we actually have a nice landlord who is, well, I'll just use the psychology version of "interesting," meaning he is quite the character. Ever since the first day we arrived he has been very nice to us. Whenever we sit on the terrace of our apartments, he offers us tea and coffee. He also often offers us bread, fruit, salads, etc. Nearly every day that we have seen him he has said, "Welcome to Turkey, Istanbul!" We do not know why he says it this way. We have not heard anyone else say it this way, but that is what he does. Thus, it has kind of become an inside joke between us. So there you have it! For anyone who was wondering, now you know.


Oh! And by the way, I finally had turkey in Turkey yesterday! Ron, Alisha, and I made turkey and egg open-faced sandwichs. (In all honesty, Alisha made the sandwichs, which were amazing!) The turkey was a little pricey, but it was worth it. We also had tomatos, Ruffles chips, and Coca-Cola with our meal. It was very good. Not to mention, we can finally say that we had turkey in Turkey!

Welcome to Turkey Istanbul, Day 20. It's been a long trip so far, but it seems to be flying past quite quickly. It's been a couple days since our trip to Ephesus, during which we've all needed to rest up. I find one day trips to be quite draining, but I will admit that Ephesus was definitely worth it. Between the breathtaking view from the hotel and visiting the Ancient City where Paul walked and taught, the trip was a wonderful experience.
One thing (amongst many) that caught my attention was while staying in Kusadasi. While I knew I was still in Turkey, I noticed that I didn't feel like I was. A few people in our group, myself included, kept saying things like "when we get back to Turkey", meaning Istanbul. I found it peculiar how this city didn't feel like the same state we had been exposed to in Istanbul. People seemed to follow the rules and signs while driving, there were high end stores as well as thrift stores along the beach, everyone wore whatever fitted their fancy; the entirety of the city was very different from Istanbul. I feel it important to mention that while I think Kusadasi is a nice place to stay and have a little vacation, if you really want to experience Turkish culture, Istanbul is a better place to do so.
Yesterday, we visited what is believed to be the most beautiful mosque in Turkey. Of all the mosques I’ve seen, I must say that this one is so finely detailed, employed beautiful coloring and tones, and utilized textures to their utmost advantage that this mosque rivals the Aya Sofya. My favorite singular part of the mosque (having so many to choose from) would have to be the main dome. When looking up, all that can be seen is a golden colored dome with little painted windows inside. These windows appear to be looking out in to a rose garden. When coupled with the fact that the mosque had a light rose scent, it made everything much more enhanced. Again, the mosque is very finely and delicately detailed that there is no way to describe the beauty of it. Even pictures cannot aptly portray its grandeur.

Overall, the last few days have been extremely tiring, so on this Saturday rest, worship, and perhaps a Turkish bath are in order :) 

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Picnicking in the dark

On our way back to the apartments (home?  temporary home at least) we drove along the sea of Marmara.  As Ron mentioned in a previous post, there is a large strip of grass and recreation area along the coast.  The city has dotted this area with playground equipment and exercise equipment, and it's a popular place for Turks to go for a little bit of green in the midst of the city.  One thing that I found curious, though, was as we drove along next to this area at 11:45 pm, there were a LOT of families having picnics or relaxing on the lawn.  The lighting was inadequate in many areas, but this didn't seem to be a problem.  In the US one would immediately assume that anyone camped out in a park near midnight was homeless, but I really didn't get the feeling that this was the case.  They were all out in the open, sitting around in circles on picnic blankets, sometimes with kids playing on the adjacent playground equipment.  Some people had small fires (people here bring a small tank of propane to the park so they can heat their tea).

I was struck by several thoughts.  First, it was interesting that so many people were actively socializing that late at night (and not in bars or nightclubs, but by having a picnic) and that the kids were still up.  I've heard from Turks and have observed that kids often stay up very late.  This may just be a summer thing when kids are out of school or it may be that families are still adjusting their schedules from Ramadan, when people stay up very late to celebrate the breaking of the fast and then have breakfast before 4 am (Ramadan ended less than a week ago, so it wouldn't be surprising if a lot of people are still shifting from night waking to day waking).  I'm not sure how they do everything if they have to be at a day job during Ramadan.  I think a lot of the work during the days of Ramadan just accommodates the needs of the fast, since the large majority of people here are Muslims.  I've definitely known times when people were napping during the work day, and whoever was at work would call them in if they were needed.

Secondly, it was interesting to me to reflect on my own reactions to the picnics.  My first thought was that I can't imagine doing that in the US, because it would be too dangerous, and that instinct is so ingrained that I carry it with me wherever I go.  I immediately had an initial gut reaction that the people here were doing something dangerous, and was surprised so many people had brought their kids along.  I don't know if it would actually be that dangerous or not, but in the US I don't think most people would even consider having a picnic at midnight in an inadequately lit urban park unless they were homeless or trying to do something illicit or forbidden at home (e.g. teenagers drinking or making out).  I'm pretty sure that in many places in the US they would be kicked out if the police saw them, because the park is officially "closed."  There were so many people out there picnicking in Istanbul, though, that it seemed like people considered this a safe and normal thing to do.  Certainly late night picnics during Ramadan in Sultanahmet Square seem to be pretty normal, but the square is even more busy with Turks at night during Ramadan than it is during the day with tourists bused in from cruise ships.  Even so, Sutanahmet Square thins out and becomes a bit more surly around midnight during Ramadan, and I've always tried to be out of the square by that time.  These picnics on the shore genuinely looked like people just enjoying each others' company and chatting.  Certainly it's not usual for women to be out alone at midnight, but these looked like extended families.

In general, I have always felt more safe here than I do at home in the US.  I'm not sure everything that goes into this feeling, but the students have felt it too.  I think part of the sense of greater security here is that people genuinely will help you if you have a problem, and they don't wait for you to ask.  If someone is hurt or appears ill or seems to need help in some way, random strangers will approach not just to offer assistance, but genuinely willing to assist them.  Countless times I've seen people intervene in situations to help strangers.  This might feel invasive, but here it really feels more like a community where people consider everyone their neighbor.  Also, violent crime is very low here.  I suspect that even most of the police don't carry guns.  We see guns infrequently, and when you do see them, they will be on military personnel, will be large and out in the open, and the military personnel carrying them will be guarding a military base or a place that is viewed as a potential terrorist target (e.g. embassy, Jewish synagogue, tourist site of high military or government significance, etc).  For example, Ataturk's tomb is heavily guarded.  Guns are treated in a ceremonial way, rather than being carried hidden inside a jacket.  I suspect potential terrorist sites in the US are guarded equally heavily but the guns are hidden.  To go into malls, one also has to pass through a metal detector and bags go through an x-ray.  This feels a little silly to us, but they seem to take security seriously here.

It's been interesting to watch the students start to feel this sense of community and relative security.  This group is not one to take risks, and they are generally fairly cautious, but they seem to feel relatively relaxed here and there is definitely a sense that in some way they are included in the community here, with no questions asked.

Last night Aydin also commented that he likes that we know people here.  On the streets, people don't usually make eye contact, and those odd Americans who smile at passersby are viewed as slightly unhinged.  Once you've met someone, though, even informally, they remember you.  If you go to a market several times, the shopkeeper will start to interact with you if at all possible.  If you know even a few words of Turkish or he has a few words of English you will be included in his large circle of people he knows and is kind to.  The students have expressed that even if they never can exchange more than a "thank you" with the locals in their neighborhood, they have a sense that people are happy to see them and know who they are and that they belong.  Since people are relatively stable, after being here for a longish time for several summers, our family has developed a large group of people who "know" us.  A waiter may be working in a different restaurant or the ice cream seller may have moved his stand, but when they see us again after a year they greet us by name.





The Ancient City of Ephesus

Today was one of the most exciting days of our entire trip! The day began with a very early rise. We left our apartments in Istanbul at 5:00 am to catch our 7:00 am flight to Izmir, Turkey. We were fortunate that the plane served breakfast because the fuel was definitely going to come in handy. After the plane ride, we loaded up in a bus with two other American travelers and our tour guide, who was a very sweet young lady. We arrived at the top of the ancient city of Ephesus. I had never been to an ancient city like Ephesus before, so this was really exciting for me. The city was filled with many tall pillars as well as statues of gods, important people of the city, and symbols. It was breathtaking to imagine what it must have been like to live in Ephesus when it was still a highly populated area. While in Ephesus, we had the opportunity to lay our eyes upon the Library of Celsus. It is a grand building that even as a remnant of its former glory brings awe and wonder to anyone that sees it. Ephesus was also where Paul preached, but was shouted out of the city because the people did not want to stop worshiping idols. (Possibly more importantly, those who sold the idols didn't want to stop making money.)

Our next stop was the Temple of Artemis. Not much of it is left, but it does provide a very unique scene. From the temple, three different religious buildings can be seen: the Temple of Artemis, the Isa Bey Mosque, and the Basilica of St. John.

We took a bit of a break from our tour to eat lunch. Lunch was held in the lawn area of a carpet store. However, these ar not your average carpets. These are all hand made, Turkish carpets. Even the smallest carpets made of cotton cost $100 easily. It was really fun to feel all the amazingly soft carpets and learn about the differences between the styles, methods, and materials.

After lunch, we went to the House of Virgin Mary. This is the place many believe she spent her last days. Thus, it is an important site for some Christians, as well as Muslims.

Our final stop on our tour was at the Basilica of St. John. This church was built in the shape of a cross. It has a beautiful view when looking towards the Temple of Artemis, which we had visited earlier, as well as the Isa Bey Mosque.

The tour of Ephesus was wonderful. I can surely say that it was thoroughly enjoyed! At the conclusion of our tour we retired to the beautiful Otel Ozcelik in Kusadasi, which overlooks the Mediterranean Sea. What a blessing it is to be in such a beautiful place!

Keep us in your prayers that we may have safe traveling!

With love, from Turkey!

Returned from Ephesus

Just a quick post to apologize for our gap in blogging.  We went to Ephesus, and the hotel there had their internet set up so it didn't allow access to the blog.  We hope no one was worried about why we weren't posting - it was purely an internet access problem.  I know some students were able to email or Skype to family, so that probably helped.  We had a great time, but it was very hot and we were out in the sun a lot, so I think everyone here is pretty wiped out.

We returned to Istanbul late tonight (around 11:45 pm) and are all exhausted, so I don't think anyone will post tonight (it's about 2:40 pm on Thursday afternoon California time now, but here it's almost 1 am on Friday).  So ... we'll say goodnight tonight, and once we're rested we'll catch you all up on what we've been up to.

Best wishes to all from all of us here.

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Every day is a Turkish Day


It was a day filled with Turkish.  Nerlin and I started the day excited to go get our American coffee—because Turkish was way too strong and bitter—at a coffee shop near Sultanamet Square called Denizen Coffee.  We were determined to learn Turkish.  With all the shopping we were planning to do as well as the fact that kept on being told I looked 100 percent Turkish, we needed to learn the basics.  We stopped by not really sure how to approach what were then complete strangers.

We had our basic introductions down—“hello,” “how are you?” “I’m doing well, thank you.”  We recited them all the way up to the coffee shop.  Confidence high and ready to go, we spotted our first target standing outside the shop drawing the menu sign.  We approached him cautiously and at the same time.  Our determination clouded us from realizing how close we actually stood in front of him without saying a word.  When he finally tilted his head up to see two women looking at him we just blurted out all the words we knew.  Waiting for his response, the man gave us a perplexed look and with a kind smile said “What?”

The American accent was very welcoming.  At first it took me a while to process what had just happened.  This guy definitely looked American, so what was he doing working here?  The man, Ken, offered us a seat and asked us where we were from.  We asked him what Turkish phrases he knew that he thought would be helpful and laughed when he told us that he only phrase he knew was “Sorry, but unfortunately I don’t speak Turkish.”  He did, however, refer us to his friend Salim, who seemed to be the owner of the place. 

What started as a casual conversation, turned into a full out grammar and Turkish language lesson.  Salim was very helpful and eager to teach us as much Turkish as he could.  He lent us books, wrote down different phrases, made us repeat several words over and over, and even borrowed someone’s laptop to give us some helpful sites.  His hospitality was comforting and his enthusiasm to teach was sincere.  We learned a lot that day, though we never actually got to have that coffee. 

Monday, August 20, 2012

It's a Zoo In Here!


Most of us students have gotten into the habit of sleeping in during the morning hours. While each student’s waking time varies, some students wake up later than others. Some wake up pretty early on a consistent basis, such as myself. I like to go running every other morning by the Sea of Marmara. It’s not too crowded, but there are pretty of runners so one does not feel as though they are alone in the universe. The peacefulness of the ocean along with the steady pitter-patter of footsteps on concrete creates a soft lullaby unlike any other. But this morning was different. We had to wake up early in order to go to the Aquarium. One may ask how the aquarium is remotely educational to those who are studying the exotic culture of Turkey. We have noted a strikingly disturbing trend in Turkey (other than the crazy driving); the behavior of most children in Turkey is, on average, marginally acceptable at best. In America one often hears the scolding of parents, telling little children why they can’t wipe sunscreen on walls, or why it isn’t ok to draw on the walls with crayons. In Turkey this scolding behavior is absent and it’s a zoo. What the kids want to do they do and the parent’s just shrug their shoulders. Perhaps this parenting style is just the remnants of past parenting and they don’t have any other parenting skills. There is (as we were informed) a lack of books of proper parenting (if there such a thing) in Turkey. So what we did at the zoo was study the interaction between Turkish children and their parents and if possible, try to come up with any hypothesis as to the reason for that interaction. Some thought that the kids seemed much more independent than kids in America and it was just an adaptation to that behavior. Others (as in I) seemed more like the kids friends than parents. Regardless, the fact there was a lot of really cool swimming stuff was just an innocent coincidence. Along with the really huge mall outside the aquarium with lots of cloth shops and IKEA. Alas, all things must come to an end and we left. We thought the adventure was over but in reality it had just begun. The tram and metro was packed and it was a struggle to go anywhere. We made it back to our temporary home and had class. We discussed Article 301, which dictates that it is a crime to insult Turkishness. There are other laws that we discussed as well but in general that law in used more than others to try people the state finds troublesome. After that we went to Doy-Doy where Aydin showed us some card tricks and we ate really great food and called it a night.

Sunday, August 19, 2012

Children

Eid Mubarak! or Iyi bayramlar! (Arabic and Turkish respectively).  Today was the end of Ramadan and the beginning of the three day Eid, or post-Ramadan holiday.  This morning Ramadan ended when the adult men went to the mosque to pray around 7 am.  After that, families have a three day holiday.  Many families head out to visit relatives and neighbors and they take sweets and other gifts.  Those who do not leave the city are likely to be on the road or on public transportation on their way to visit people.  This means that today the public transportation is mobbed.  Most stores and museums are closed, so for those of us who don't have family here, this is a good day to rest and stay local.

For whatever reason, the first day of Ramadan Bayram in our neighborhood seems to be when the kids decided to run wild.  There are always children around, and they aren't in school right now, but usually things seem calmer. This morning there was a lot of yelling and crying from upstairs (sounded like kids and a mom), and then a bit later a group of 8 and 9 year-old boys were running around in the street.  They had fireworks, cap guns, and matches, and found every possible way they could think of to start a large fire or blow something up.  There were several small fires and a lot of noise and explosions, but so far no permanent damage seems to have been done.  Throughout it all, no adults have shown up to tell them not to blow things up.  I find this sort of curious.  Turks really love kids, and from my perspective they don't seem to be running out to protect their little kids from fireworks.  Maybe the parents purchased them or maybe they see them as harmless entertainment.  It's also possible that this is part of a male stereotype that little boys are encouraged to emulate.  Certainly these don't appear to be very BIG firecrackers, but the kids do have a rather large quantity of them, and children can be ingenious.  I saw a number of little experiments with stringing them together for more firepower, adding fuel, containing them in smaller vessels to try to create shrapnel, etc.  It did look from my perspective like the little tykes were making some pretty creative attempts at blowing their fingers off.  If I had a little better Turkish I could have offered them some creative redirection and threats to follow up with their parents, but short of shaming the parents I'm not sure what good that would have done.

In general I've heard from several Turks and read articles in Turkish newspapers about how Turks are secretly a little baffled about why American children behave so well.  Of course, if the recent popular books in the US are to be believed, French children are much better behaved than American children, and I think most of us can attest that it's not some sort of genetic miracle or inborn trait to behave well.  In any case, I think because they love kids so much, Turks often tend to give them what they want when the kids are little.  Once they get a little older, of course the kids continue to expect this, and the parents don't seem to know how to curb it, and as a result the kids don't have some of the constraints on their behavior that might be ideal.  I have been asked this question of how we get our kids to behave well, and it's a little hard for me to know how to respond.  Is this is a serious request for information, and would it be seen as condescending for me to offer any help?  I tend to err on the side of trying not to be condescending, but I'm never sure exactly what the question means.  Most of the times I see parents having difficulty with their kids the problem would be helped a lot with a little information about behavior management.  Parents make idle threats and demands but then don't follow through, so of course the kids don't listen.  I've been told that there really aren't good popular child behavior and parenting books available for parents, so I think that's part of the problem.  I try not to jump in and get involved with the kids unless they are doing something really dangerous or something that's harming another kid or animal.  I did have to intervene when I saw some little kids closing a cat up in a box and hitting the box with sticks.  They seemed genuinely surprised when I explained to them that the cat would be afraid, that it was unkind to do something that would scare the cat so much, and that they would not want to be in the cat's situation.  Our kids tell us that Paul and I talk to them more than most parents do, and that may be true, but this type of thing seems pretty basic.  I debated a lot about whether to intervene with the kids outside today, but adult Turks didn't, and it would surprise me if the parents of all these kids were really completely oblivious.  The explosions were loud enough that they were echoing up and down the street.  I didn't want to usurp the parents' authority, and I'm aware that I'm sometimes overprotective, but I also didn't want any of these kids getting hurt.

Friday, August 17, 2012

Eyüp Sultan Mosque :)

 Fountain in front of Eyup Mosque














 Alisha thinking happily?

Cat resting near a graveyard near mosque

 Ablution

Boy, who will be circumcised, wearing a king-like cape.



 Rachel

Me

 Learning Turkish numbers,  "How much?", and ""I don't speak Turkish" from Dr. Mallery