Metal Mummy

We’ve just got back from the beautiful resort of Olu Deniz in Turkey and we had a fabulous time. Some of it was pretty testing, especially my daughter’s obvious “development” in the stroppy-little-shit department, but we coped. Just.

The locals were some of the friendliest people I have ever met. Freyja charmed the pants off all of them to the point where I think if I wasn’t watching, any one of them may have ran off with her. She bagged a free purse (which, as much as I appreciate the gesture, is the most sickliest of girly pink purses known to man with lace and bows and everything…I think I may burn it) and also woo’ed the receptionist so much that she got a trip to the office; the guest relations woman so much that she got an origami bird and the cleaner so much that we got a fresh flower collage on our bed. Luckily, the flowers didn’t have ants or bees in them. That would be less cool.

As well as being ridiculously lovely, they are also extremely hard working and Just. Don’t. Stop. They work all hours and always have a smile on their faces – even when we do go to fetch some apple juice from a machine that didn’t stop running and leaked all over the floor. Sorry Mr. Barman. They also seem to take extreme pleasure in some mundane tasks. Like arranging the cutlery into neat little patterns… and sharply intaking their breath if people so much as take a spoon. Followed quickly by replacing it. With extreme care and intricacy.

All Inclusive is amazing value. Why have we not done this before?! That blue wristband that was attached to us the first day was, albeit tacky and a bit minging by Day 7, a godsend that gave us access to good food and drink any hour of the day. Including saffron and dill potatoes, which, quite frankly, I could have eaten the whole dish of.

Turkish baths are thoroughly enjoyable. Mostly. For £30 each, we got a turkish bath (basically stripping down to your undies, being chucked on a boiling hot, hard marble table and being pummeled with an exfoliating glove until your skin falls off and then foamed up to redeem the torture), a full body oil massage (which included having your nipples massaged and tweaked – who knew?), some reflexology (which very nearly made me wee everywhere, seeing as I’m horrendously ticklish. I ended up grinding my teeth to try and stop myself from laughing) and a face mask which I was very close to eating. Oh, and some apple tea (which, despite not being from Yorkshire, was pretty darn lovely). Despite the qualms I had, it was a good experience, even if it did mean me stripping down to my only bra (I don’t have a bikini) and having to wear it for the next day or so a little bit soggy so my jubs were damp, but you know…)

Freyja is Houdini in disguise. Worryingly good at escapology. During her afternoon nap on the second day, we went next door to mum’s room. As we only had a one-room hotel room, there was nowhere else for us to go in order to not disturb her. We thought she’d be OK. Hmmm. How wrong were we. Mum went to get a drink form the bar and came back with her. “Hang on, how the hell did mum get into our room?”, I thought. She didn’t have to, apparently, because she found my dear Houdini playing football in the playground with a 5yo. She’d managed to shimmy up and out of the cot, open the front door, close it behind her, tackle the concrete steps up and down to the playground and play in there for god knows how long before we even realised she’d got out. Funny looking back, but awful at the time – so many horrible thoughts went through my head.  #Badparentingskills. She did love that park though!

Our Nightlife sucked big hairy balls. Because of Freyja’s escape attempt, we couldn’t really do anything after she had gone to bed. We had to tuck her in, put the chain on the door, leave through the balcony door, barricade it with chairs, sit there til she went to sleep, then shimmy over the fence and back over another to mum’s room until it was time for us to go to bed; then back again (quietly) to get to our bed and sleep silently until the morning.

The blue lagoon you pay £2 to get into is worth it. It’s gorgeous and really tranquil. Freyja loved the place, saying “big water” from the moment we left the hotel room to the moment we got there. It was a lot more difficult to get her to leave though. Her confidence in the water has increased 100 fold. She will kick her legs, float on her own and jump in off the side of the pool and venture out on her own. Clever girly. Some Turks are weird though and found great fun in providing my daughter with a dead fish to play with at the lagoon. He’d found it, picked it up (after much toil with it’s slipperyness) handed it to my daughter and laughed gleefully. Freyja found immense pleasure in playing with the dead fish. I thought it was just bloody weird, but hey ho. She had a bit of a fond admiration for this little dead fish, eyes glazed over and stiff as a board. A bit like she had an obsession with “cleaning” the balcony by baby wiping all the ants, shouting “Go Away” as she did it…

Trunkis are amazing except when you lose it at the other end because some twat took it off the conveyor belt and left it in the middle of the room like some sort of potential bomb. Luckily, coming back was no problem. We also found that everyone takes them on as hand luggage. Except us. We like to be different. Freyja loves it though and rode everywhere on it.

Changing a childs nappy, after said child’s nappy leaked all over the pavement, whilst standing up in a queue to get into an airport whilst moving further down the queue and getting things in and out of a trunki whilst moving whilst keeping said child happy and retaining her dignity at least a little bit is completely possible. I even remained calm throughout the ordeal.

Trying to get a toddler out of the pool, even when she has been in for so long that her toes have gone wrinkly, is nigh on impossible and guarantees a tantrum like no other. But, ice creams fix the tantrums. So does cake.

Even though you are staying All Inclusive, you are guaranteed to see one family who nicks a whole loaf of bread from the buffet table. This same family will have at least one kretin of a child who has the dinner table manners of an uneducated gnat. Actually, make that at least 3 kretins. The others piss in flower beds and pinch your child’s toys. Lovely things they were. I am nominating “kretin” as my word of the holiday. I think members of this family were also the noisy buggers having sex in the room above ours. I wouldn’t mind so much except it wasn’t a quickie and the bed was creaky and annoying.

Other facts about the holiday:

- James thinks he can dive but in actual fact, dive flops. He also thinks that a bite from a sea snake is poisonous and requires the antidote within 48 hours else he’ll die. He hasn’t died. Funny that.
- A clean ashtray is a good subsitute for a dish when your Mini Milk melts and you have nothing else to save it. #Badparentingskills again maybe?
- Being buried in the sand with your legs crossed gives you cramp
-  Freyja can handle the taste of sea water more than that of pool water. Probably because the pool water has kretin wee in it.
- “Genuine half price hubble bubble” is possible to get through customs in your hand luggage. Even if you do stuff all the flavoured tobacco in your case and when you get to the other side, your pants and socks whiff very strongly of apple and strawberry. Pretty shisha though!
- Oh, and my daughter is the cutest thing on Earth. When she’s not stropping, of course.

It’s amazing how much you miss the Internet. Especially when the closest you got to it was a bloke who called himself Mr. Tweety. Lovely bloke, but not exactly what I’m used to. It was weird not blogging or BDT’ing for a week. I didn’t have any contact at all. Which is why I was gobsmacked at the lovely surprise of being shortlisted for the MADs in two categories when I got home. Thanks everyone who voted for me. I’m up against some stiff competition (who have had a week longer to pimp themselves than I have!) but good luck to all finalists – you’re all amazing and whoever you want to vote for, you can do so here.

Thanks to James, Freyja and of course, my mum (who funded the holiday) for a lovely time. Nice to be back in the comfort of my own home, with no risk of escapology or concrete steps, or dead fish. I hope we will go back to Olu Deniz one day though. It really is a beautiful. And next time, I want to paraglide.