Story: Late for Supper

Prerequisites for this Turkish Listening Comprehension Lesson

Late for Supper

The following is a real life story told by E.Y., shared here with his permission.

The Story in Turkish

Babam akşam yemek saatine kural koyardı, bizde. Sofra serildiği zaman, akşam yemeğine oturulduğu zaman bir kuralı vardı. Derdi… Şimdi biz sokaktaydık, çocukken oynarız yani sokakta arkadaşlarla oynarız. Akşam ezan okunduğu zaman eve koşardık. Hemen o sofraya oturup yemek yemek için.

Annem ezan okunduğu zaman sofrayı… ezan okuduktan sonra sofrayı hazırlardı. Ama ezan okundu, biz eve gitmediğimiz zaman, o sofra… yemek yendikten sonra o sofra kalktıysa biz yemek yiyemezdik. Babamız bize ceza verirdi. Yani yemek yedirmezdi. “Geç kaldığınız için. Ezan okunduğu zaman evde olacağınız (olacaksınız)” dedi. “Çünkü akşam ezan okunduğu zaman hava karardı artık. Sokak işi bitti”… “Bitti” derdi. Onun için bize ceza verildi.

English Translation

My father would set a rule for dinner time at our house. When the table was set, when it was time to sit down for dinner, he had a rule. He would say… Now we were always out on the street playing with our friends as children. We would run home at the evening call to prayer, to sit at that table and eat.

My mother would set the table at the call to prayer… She would set it after the call to prayer. But if the call to prayer already happened and we didn’t go home, if that table… if supper was finished and the table was cleared, we were not allowed to eat. Our father would discipline us. He would not let us eat.

“Because you were late… You should come home at the call to prayer,” he said, “Because it gets dark at the evening call to prayer. The time in the street is done”… “It’s over,” he would say. That’s why we got disciplined.